Thai Tanic, Washington, D.C.

My friend Graham is one of the original volunteers for Food & Friends here in D.C. ever since the charity was founded in 1988. Naturally, he is a big supporter of last night's Dining Out for Life event, and nearly two weeks ago, he called and booked me to go to dinner with him—"just us," he said, as usually when we're out to eat, it's with a crowd.

So, he drove over and picked me up at 8:30, thinking that if we went a little later in the evening, it would be easier to get a table at his restaurant of choice, and off we went. And went, and went, and went.....there was absolutely no place to park! After spending considerable time (and gasoline) in quest of a parking spot, we happened to have a momentary stop in front of the restaurant due to traffic, and he got a good look at the packed tables and the line crammed in the bar and doorway. We decided to move to a different part of town, since we'd seen lines at several other restaurants in that area, too.

Then we drove to the 14th and P area. It still required a search, but at last we found a legal, on-street parking spot. Then, the first four restaurants we went to had 30-45 minute waits for a table.....and it was already approaching 9:30! We ended up at Thai Tanic, a place both of us frequent and like a lot, but, for some reason, a place that wasn't participating in Dining Out this year as they have in years past. Oh, well, we didn't spend that much on food, so the charity wouldn't have made that much from us...and we can always just mail them a small check. I'm really really happy, though, that all the participating restaurants had such excellent business!

Thai Tanic's food was excellent as always. The dining room was about the emptiest I'd ever seen it and we were able to have immediate seating, getting the booth that's right in the window where we could watch passers-by on the street.

We started with Singha beers and appetitzers. Graham got the por pea shrimp spring rolls with sweet chile sauce (you can't tell in the over-exposed photo, but the spring rolls are each cut in half lengthwise on the diagnonal).



I had the tom ka gai soup, a delicious, delicate chicken soup with mushrooms, tomatoes, and basil and a surprisingly large amount of sliced chicken breast in a slightly hot-sour coconut milk broth.



For our main courses, I got the pork and ginger, a mix of pork slices, mushrooms, vegetables, and fresh ginger in a light brown sauce served with steamed white rice.



Graham got one of the daily specials, and it was quite the pièce de résistance! He ordered goong lava—"goong" being the Thai word for shrimp—and got a wonderfully creative food volcano. Large shrimp were battered, dipped in coconut, and deep fried. They took what looked like thick phyllo dough and baked it into an edible bowl. The bowl was filled with an interesting mixture of ground pork, ground peanuts, finely minced vegetables and mushrooms, and a bit of spicy brown sauce, just like a volcano filled with lava. The fried shrimp then were arranged around the edge of the crater and presented.



The only problem with the goong lava was that we weren't quite sure how to eat it! Graham tried dipping the shrimp, spooning "lava" onto the shrimp, eating the lava with a spoon, and then just eating the shrimp separately and the lava with the accompanying white rice. However he was supposed to eat it, he said it was good, though.

We passed on dessert, as it was getting late, and he drove me home. It was quite a lovely evening, even if it didn't turn out to be quite as charitable as we had planned.