i am loathing wordpress right now. i had a nice witty in-progress post and when i went to save it- wordpress ate my post. all the blood drained from my face and then my heart skipped a beat. it was bad. it didn’t just chew it up and spit out bits and pieces; it just gobbled it up in one bite this time. twice in one week. luck is definitely not this lady.
i went downstairs to get some air and some second hand smoke. i have a new cup of tea. i am ready to re-post. you’ve missed the ramblings from the original, but i don’t have all day to re-type that stuff.
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SO. The fam and I haven’t been out in a while. Last semester [errr, it’s weird how I break down my non-school time as if I were still in school.. but it’s justifiable.. the entire fam was still in school at the time… yes, except me], we had a weekly family fooding event. I’ve decided since my life has re-settled down into its norm now, I should revive the tradition. Also, Caled, an old JHS buddy was back for the weekend, so we had to go out and play.
I decided I wanted Thai because it’s been a while since I’ve had any Thai food. I wanted to go try Holy Basil, but it turns out that they don’t take reservations for, nor do they serve parties of 6 or more on Fridays and Saturdays. Can you believe this?! THEY ARE TURNING AWAY BUSINESS, because what? There are too many mouths to feed? What? Bah. Holy Basil- you suck for this. You better have some damn good food to make up for this too. I will not boycott you… yet.
Well, Holy Basil’s a lost cause. It was back to the drawing board for Twin & I. She did some quick research and found Peep in Soho. I used to pass this restaurant all the time after work from Tribeca to the soho shops. I decided it was worth a try due to various menupages reviews and that it was situated in my favorite part of town.
Due to the lights and chandeliers of the interior, it was really hard for me to get some good pictures. Peep is all about the atmosphere though; it would serve really well as a party venue. Think about it. You are greeted by a bar when you walk in, the lighting is pink and dim, mirrors are everywhere, a buddha [think: buddhakan] on display, and an open kitchen to top it off. You can’t really get sexier than pink lighting. Okay, it may be a bit much, but it doesn’t bother me too much. I like how the place wasn’t too dim; I could still read my menu without the help of a candle. It always bothers me when restaurants dim their lights down so much, your whole party has to literally hover over one candle to read the menu. Is it a romantic thing? Cuz me, I like my personal space. There are times I go to dinner with people I don’t need to be that physically close to.
best pic of the batch. the view from my seat
I noticed that the drinks there were all reasonably sized [maybe it was the tall glasses, but they seemed bigger than regular drinks at restaurants] but the prices reflected the atmosphere. The food prices weren’t that bad. I didn’t get a drink b/c I wanted my whole dinner budget to go towards as much food as possible. I ordered the crispy gingered calamari with avocado-green onion emulsion and tomato chutney. The calamari tasted like any other calamari- there was nothing special about it and it wasn’t bad- it was crispy on the outside, and not too chewy/soft/hard on it inside. The sauce sounds delicious, and I have to say it was good, but it wasn’t as memorable as I first anticipated. Twin ordered the four season noodle wrap with vermicelli, mint, crispy tofu and tamarind reduction. It’s like a summer roll that I’m not allergic to! Curse the shrimps and my allergies, I tell ya. The flavors were good, and I enjoyed it, but possibly more than any other person b/c.. like I said.. I’m not allergic to this one. I also had a taste of Stanley’s taro spring roll With bean vermicelli, ginger, carrot dip and taro chips and Rich’s scallop ‘ceviche’, peep style with salad of spring onion and banana blossoms, grilled banana, and mint cream. For the record, I can eat scallops, but only in very minimal quantities; it’s in a different shellfish class than shrimps and lobsters. The taro was okay; it was just taro deep fried in a spring roll. If you like fried stuff and taro- this is for you. What made the ceviche peep style is that it was not in a soup base. I only had a tiny bite b/c I was curious how Peep would present the banana flavor. The banana flavor was really light and I’m not sure if the banana was even combined with the scallop.
For entrees, I wanted to try all the noodles. Thus, Daniel got the ragu of beef and lemongrass with papparadelle with sun-dried chili paste, tomato, fresh squeezed lime juice, and garlic oil, Twin got the pad thai with chicken and shrimp, peanut and egg, Rich got the black noodle with chicken, egg, and squid ink, and I got the face towel noodle squid, and chicken, with egg, tomato paste, chili, and basil. During dinner, we just switched our plates back and forth. And that, my friend, is how you sample an entire noodle section. Peep’s noodles aren’t as good as their appetizers. When I saw that ragu of beef dish, I thought they were going to use Ragu spaghetti sauce [which is quite possible still]. Daniel thought this dish would be better spicy b/c of the chili paste, but the spiciness factor was very mild. They used wide, flat egg noodles which was different. I didn’t like the flavor of the sauce and thought it was too runny. A thicker and spicier sauce may be the answer.
I’m one of those people [yes, there are more of us] who judges a Thai restaurant on the restaurant’s pad thai. Well, at Peep, the pad thai- not so good. It was a bit boring and …. citrusy [before the lime]. The chicken was also over-done, as was the chicken in my dish. The face towel reminded me of a cross between a pad see ew and the drunk man’s noodles. I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would… I don’t know what it was. Maybe it was the basil? There was too much of it? It overpowered the dish. We all agreed that the black noodle was the best. I am usually not a fan of squid ink, but it didn’t overpower the dish this time so I liked it.
black noodle // face towel noodle
pad thai // ragu unpictured
There was also a fried rice dish in the noods section- I don’t know what that was all about but Stan ordered it. Grilled Banana Pouch with Crab Meat Fried Rice With scallop, shrimp pasta, green onion in banana leaves. I have absolutely no imput to this because I didn’t and couldn’t eat it. He also didn’t give me any feedback. But here’s a picture!
looks like regular fried rice to me
Several of us couldn’t finish our dishes so what did we do? Pile it all into one dish and gave it to our army boy, Caled. In the picture that follows, there’s rice, pad thai, and face towel noodles…. I think that’s it? We did try to make it all pretty though with the flower. I’m guessing the combined flavors weren’t that bad, cuz he ate it. Or maybe he’s just really good at not wasting food.
Ultimately, I love the atmosphere here but other than the presentation of the food, the actual food doesn’t really keep me from wanting to come back. Holy Basil, anyone?
hello miss bean curd –
i’m enjoying ‘this here’ webbersite …
i’ve also been to peep in soho, because i work close by. they have a good/cheap lunch special. but you’re correct – their pad thai is a little too syrupy – not terrible though. and at least they don’t try and pass it off with a lemon wedge (when only lime will do).
pad thai is rarely a good thing to judge a place by, most people who order it don’t know any better – and the place may be trying to please everyone with it (not that that’s an excuse, i love great pad thai!).
speaking of thai food – i haven’t had anything as great as sripraphai in woodside, queens. everyone knows queens has the best food!!
as for barbecue in the city, daisy may’s and RUB are the only real games (i think), and they are good, but not the best. i think RUB beats Daisy’s in their smoking technique. RUB’s ribs are wonderfully pink, Daisy’s are over smothered. Both could stand to use better cuts – Daisy’s more than RUB. i note your picture with the vein of fat in the rib from RUB – that’s not ideal.