Thai One On

It’s no secret to people who know me that Thai food is my favorite. I cook Thai at home, but I enjoy eating in Thai restaurants even more. When we moved to the country last spring, we left my favorite restaurants behind. The nearest Thai restaurant is nearly an hour away, so at least we’re saving money.

When we need to venture out to a metropolitan center like downtown Harrisonburg, VA for say, office supplies, we always work it around a Thai lunch. On Tuesday, we took the car to a dealership there for service. While my husband fumed over the $350 charge to put in a sensor the size of a cashew (just after the warranty ran out), I took solace in knowing that a great Thai lunch was waiting for us at the Taste of Thai restaurant. And what a lunch it was.

I never met a peanut sauce I didn’t like, but the Praram Curry with Fried Tofu was transporting. Beyond wonderful. Since the rich, multi-dimensional flavor is still tattooed on my brain, my new obsession is to duplicate it. In my lifelong search for the perfect peanut sauce, I’ve developed no fewer than a dozen variations over the years, and examples can be found in Vegan Planet, Vegan Fire and Spice, and many of my other books. However, my quest ended when I tasted this sauce. It was creamy, silky, and peanutty, sure, but it also wafted subtle echos of curry and all the flavor dimensions that word represents. Has anyone else found their perfect peanut sauce? If you have, I’d love to hear from you.