I told Aaron and Kara that I love Thai food, and they recommended checking out Thai City (or Little Thailand, I can’t remember what they called it).  Basically, it’s an open strip mall that has 7 or 8 Thai restaurants in it, and mandatory valet parking (even though parking is ample).  It definitely had fewer brothels than I expected for being a US-version of Thailand, but it was definitely interesting.  One trend I’ve noticed when it comes to Thai food is that Thai people really like confirming that the food is from Thailand and not anywhere else in southeast Asia (hence the many restaurant names with “Thai” in it: My Thai, Mai Thai, Planet Thai, Pad Thai, Taste of Thai, Thai City, just being a few…).  Aaron and Kara’s favorite place was called Ruen Pair, which from my experience is a good sign if the Thai restaurant doesn’t have to tell you its Thai (although I concede that Ruen Pair might mean “Thai Restaurant” in Thai for all I know)*.

We decided to order three dishes and eat them “family style”, though I convinced them into getting an appetizer first.  We ordered the vegetarian spring rolls, which were pretty standard fare.  I don’t really know why I would expect anything special, vegetarian spring rolls all taste the same.

The first of the three dishes we ordered was the pad thai with tofu (this was my idea).  I know pad thai has oyster sauce and sometimes fish stock, and is not truly vegetarian, but I like it so much.  I was told by the waitress that all of the dishes are truly vegetarian, and don’t have any fish in them.  The pad thai was really tasty, though like spring rolls, it’s pretty hard to screw up pad thai, except for making the noodles mushy, which they were not.

Next up, panang curry with soft tofu, which was a brown curry (with, I am told, no fish stock), which was nicely spicy, and one of my favorite dishes of the night.  Aaron and Kara insisted that we have it with soft tofu instead of fried tofu because we ordered fried tofu with the pad thai.  I just went along with their bizarre notion that you can’t have two dishes with fried tofu (I would have all dishes with fried tofu if I were in charge).  Regardless, the curry was very tasty, even with the soft tofu.

Finally, a dish that I have never tried before in my life.  Sauteed morning glory with garlic.  I had never had morning glory before, and I thought myself to be familiar with most types of vegetables.  This dish is very similar to broccoli rabe, and if broccoli rabe and spinach had a love child, this would be it.  Slightly bitter, with lots of garlic for flavor, I really enjoyed this dish, and paired with the panang curry, was very tasty.

I am a big Thai food fan (even places that put “Thai” in their names), and Ruen Pair might be one of my favorite places to get Thai food.  All the food is reasonably price (cheap by LA standards), though you do have to deal with the valet parking.  The restaurant itself is very strip-mally (as you would expect for a strip-mall), and that detracts somewhat from the atmosphere, but you definitely feel that this is the place that Thai people would eat at if they ate out Thai food. So, I’ll give it four and a half cheese sandwiches, only because its not made blatantly clear what does and does not have fish or other meat dishes in it (as you would expect for an Asian restaurant).

*It means “twin house” based upon my Google translate.

Ruen Pair
5257 Hollywood Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90027 
(323) 466-0153