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Haha I spent a lot of time in Thailand and Cambodia! Haven't heard of any Cambodian restaurants in the area but for Thai the closest to what I found in Thailand is Tom Yum Thai. I went to the Sawasdee on Glenwood and had literally the worst Tom kha soup there. It was like they had dumped a bag of sugar into the pot. I was so pissed about that I haven't been back to try anything else lol
I've been dying to try that, and am actually going to be at Tir Na Nog (next door) tonight for some beer swilling and kilt-rocking. Thinking about an early dinner there.
Seems like your knowledge of the regional cuisine makes you an ideal person to ask. Two questions:
1. Is it authentic, and
2. (much more important to me) is it good.
BTW, couldn't rep you on your original reply in this thread, but that is great info!
We went to Bida Manda once and I thought it was very good but a bit overpriced for what it was. I don't know if I would go back at dinner but I do want to try their lunch. One nice thing is they don't skimp on the heat, which may or may not be authentic haha. Thailand obviously loves the spicy but in Cambodia the food was very mild. In Vietnam it was all about the fresh herbs! I would say based on Bida Manda Laotian food seems to be a cross between Vietnamese and Thai food.
If you want a fairly reliable barometer for how authentic a Japanese restaurant, look at how long and gimmicky the list of rolls on their sushi list is. The shorter the list, the more authentic. Roll sushi in Japan is, pretty much except for Ikura and other types of roe, much less common and generall reserved for fillings like cucumber or natto.
Sushi Tsune is one of the most authentic from an atmostphere standpoint. The prices are reasonable and the sushi menu is not loaded up with dozens of gimmicky unauthentic rolls. I've never had the bad experience with the sushi that evanc mentions. Tsune san is hard working, affable, and always willing to let me practice my rusty Japanese. This place gets my vote.
Kurama Express in Chapel Hill is a revolving sushi restaurant. Is it gourmet? Absoultely not. But it is authentic. There are thousands of cheap, fast food Kaiten Sushi restaurants all over Japan and this one gets the feel just about perfect.
The atmosphere and decor at both is conservative, even stodgy. Sushi is not viewed as a hip or cool food in Japan so the way sushi restaurants here in the US try to play the cool or modern card always strikes me as out of place.
At Waraji, the food is great (a bit better than Tsune I'd agree, but also more expensive.) The menu is pretty authentic, but the decor is a little more on the "trendy" side though so in that sense it doesn't quite do it for me from an authenticity standpoint.
The one time I went to Kurama it was awful. To be honest I was surprised to see it still open last time I was in Chapel Hill. I question how long they let the sushi sit on the belt because we got a few plates that were so rank we ended up having to talk to a manager about it. At least with kaitenzushi in Japan they have high turnover on the food and they have RFID chips in the plates that a scanner reads every time it passes back to the beginning of the line. If it passes too many times a mechanical arm pops out and pushes it into the trash. I'm not sure Kurama gets enough turnover to be sure you're not getting something that has been sitting up there for too long.
We are regulars at Waraji and really like it but have friends in Durham who are loyalists to the Kurama on Durham-Chapel Hill Rd in Durham (same name, not related!). Went there when we first moved here to see if it was any good and frankly, was not impressed, but went back last month and was much more impressed. Granted, our friends arranged an omakase from the chef but it was excellent and WAY more food than we expected for the price!
Omakase is definitely the way to go if you have a group and aren't picky. When some of our friends came to visit from Japan two years ago I arranged an omakase at Waraji and they loved it. It was a TON of food and I have no idea how the eight of us finished it all lol.
...
I swear if I win the lotto I'm going to open a proper izakaya and ramen shop in town.
Oh, man. Quick! Anybody know how to rig the lotto in evaofnc's favor? Just please put it somewhere in or around Downtown Raleigh, rather than out in Cary. And make sure it's nice and inexpensive. And open late. This is gonna be so awesome!
Omakase is definitely the way to go if you have a group and aren't picky. When some of our friends came to visit from Japan two years ago I arranged an omakase at Waraji and they loved it. It was a TON of food and I have no idea how the eight of us finished it all lol.
I was going to ask about this, eva. I hate trying to pick out rolls from a menu and I suffer from menu paralysis. When I'm craving sushi, I just want to go in and do the chef's choice. Is Waraji the best place in the triangle to do this?
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