Thai By Tara

*** Thai by Tara is now Sab-E-Lee. You can find a post here.

There are some locations that seem cursed, locations come and go, changing every year or so. This location right off the corner of Ulric and Linda Vista Road is one of them. A few years back, it was a Banh Mi, and Vietnamese shop called, Linda Vista Food to Go, less than 2 years later, under new Ownership, it became a "Mi" shop called Mi Ngoc So 1. Than, last month ago, "Noodlefan" mentioned a new restaurant in this spot in His comment under the Filiberto's Linda Vista post. That'll be 3 restaurant in 3 years! And a Thai Restaurant to boot....... Of course, we made sure to check it out ASAP. Funny thing was, as I was getting ready to post I realized that I could never figure out what the name of this place was....

Ummmm, can you? Finally, on our last visit we asked.....and the Owner, a very funny, energetic Lady, told me "Thai By Tara". So Thai by Tara it is....even though it has a weird ring to it, I mean it sounds almost like a nail or hair place....Nails by Tara, or Hair by Tara....

The tiny restaurant has had a bit of freshening up, but otherwise has not changed much.

  What has changed...other than the menu, is the personality of this shop....Tara(I'm guessing the restaurant is her namesake) has a personality like your outgoing, bossy, generous Aunt. Twice while eating, "Tara" brought out some nice dishes, and made sure to show them to us, with an, "Hmmm, looks good, huh? Next time you order this...." To be honest, the first time I looked at the menu, I was a bit disappointed....it looked like the typical "choose your meat, choose your sauce" style of Thai Restaurant.  But the prices were quite good, with regular prices starting at $5.95. And when I turned the menu over, I noticed some "house specials" that looked promising...and nothing over $7.95.

There wasn't much else to do, but to start ordering. And soon enough, a nice tray of condiments made its way to our table. Things were looking up.

We started with the Pad See Ew with Chicken($5.95):

This was borderline terrible...the dish was on the greasy side, the noodles mushy, and overall very under flavored...it needed a bit more soy and garlic.

Luckily, the meal was rescued by the Namtok, which was priced at $7.95 on the menu, but we were charged $5.95....in fact everything we had was $5.95.

This grilled beef salad was quite good. The beef was to our surprise very tender, in fact the Missus kept eating piece after piece....later She told me; "that first piece was so tender, that I thought it was a fluke, so I had another, and it was tender, so I had another....." I enjoyed the crisp "bite" of the onion, combined with the nutty roasted rice powder. Granted, I added some pickled chilies for a bit more heat, as well as a good squeeze of lime.

The Som Tum.

We enjoyed the crisp shredded papaya, the sweetness was spot on, as was the heat. There were 3 large plump, and perfectly cooked shrimp, though I did miss the savory rehydrated and shredded dried shrimp. Overall, not bad, not enough tomato and too much shredded carrot(?), and we'd have enjoyed some long bean.

The Shrimp Fried Rice.

If there's any reason to return, it would be this...nicely "wokked", great flavors, including lots of garlic...and 6 shrimp! For $5.95!

The Green Curry with Chicken:

Too watery and sweet, weak in the curry department.

Kai Kra Pow:

This minced chicken stir fry was on the sweet side for me, though the Missus enjoyed it. I think it was the nicely fried egg that reeled Her in.

Beef Larb:

This was a nice dish, finally a Larb with enough herbs....the roasted rice powder was a nice touch. The flavor was quite good, though the Larb was a bit on the dry side. The acid test? The Missus said this was much better than the version I make. Hmmm......

Hot Basil with Beef:

Another one of those, choose the meat, choose the sauce dishes. Beef was fairly tender, not enough basil flavor. Mediocre.....

And finally, the Pad Thai with Tofu:

The noodles were perfect in texture, just the right amount of elasticity. We would have preferred fried tofu, it has a better texture, and more flavor. This Pad Thai was very bland......

As you can see, its a mixed bag...but the prices allow you the luxury of really trying out the various dishes. And we found a few that we'd have again.

The restaurant is small, 5 tables crowded into a small space. The Owner is very nice and funny....one day She shared some really nice "Ginger Tea" with us. On one occasion, The Missus and I watched in amusement as a young Hispanic Man ate his noodle soup with wooden chopsticks....that he never broke apart! We were amazed at his ability to feed himself......he used the one piece chopstick as a glorified fork, and twirled the noodles around the chopstick like pasta.

Oh......and Buddha eats really well here!

Which made me think that there's a lot more than what's on the menu....next time I want some of that!

Thai By Tara
2405 Ulric St
San Diego, CA 92111
(858)650-6868

Hours - Mon-Fri 9am-8pm
Sat-Sun 10am-9pm

Thanks again for the recommendation Noodlefan!

Comments

[nhbilly]

Yummy - sounds like a decent shop for some decent Thai food.

I love Thai food especially when it's mildly hot. The ground chicken with Thai basil and rice is my favorite dish. Did I mention my in-laws live in N. Hollywood close to that famous Thai Temple?

[Ted]

LOLOL!!!

Man that Budda comment was hilarious. I seriously called my brother into the room to show him the pic. Thanks Kirk!

[howie]

That beef salad and larb look very promising! That's amazing that someone was able to eat a whole meal with one large chopstick!

[clayfu]

Its good for the price, it doesn't taste amazing but for 5.95 you can't really complain much =).

They also gave free thai ice tea when we were there. hehe.

[elmomonster]

It redeemed itself after the pad see ew! That's a relief. For me, usually when the pad see ew is bad, everything else is too.

[Hao]

At first, I was scared that the Tara Thai chain from the Washington DC are had expanded out here, but from the looks of it, the two just happen to have similar names. While your post made me dubious about the quality, at the very least, paying $6 for mediocre thai food is better than paying $12 at some upscale abomination.

[RONW]

that chopsticks story is hilarious, albeit the diner must have been quite skilled. It's almost as bad as people who mistakenly ate a tamale without peeling off the corn husk wrapper.

[Liz]

I find it so difficult to find some decent all around Thai restaurant in SD. I've all but given up on finding something. I did really like that weekend food court at the Wat Thai Temple which you talked about in the past. If only we had something like that in SD!

[Pat]

I tried this spot for lunch a couple of days ago and just got a quick pad thai with shrimp for takeout...if I had known how bland it would be, I would've jolted it with condiments before leaving. There seriously was ZERO heat and very little flavor at all....they were generous with the shrimp, however.

Kirk - have you tried Bangkok Spices Thai in North Park on El Cajon blvd??? It is superb!

[Kirk]

Hi Billy - This place is a bit inconsistant, but some of the dishes are pretty good.

Hi Ted - I'm glad you enjoyed seeing what Buddha ate at Thai by Tara!

Hi Howie - The Missus and I gave the Dude major props for sticking with the one choptick technique.

Hi Clayfu - Tara is very nice....She always gives me Thai Iced Tea when I'm waiting for take-out.

Hi Elmo - It won't set the culinary world on fire....but several dishes are pretty good, and for under 6 bucks....

Hi Hao - Someone I know ate at I think the Arlington location of Tara Thai....he called it Tara-ble Thai.... ;o)

Hi RONW - The Missus is still recovering from reading about eating that tamale.....

Hi Liz - Unfortunately, the neighborhood got tired of the traffic and parknig, and they had the Wat Thai weekend food court shut down. What a bummer....

Hi Pat - I agree, the Pad Thai was very bland....it seems that they havea problem with noodles dishes here. Bangkok Spices is in the queue, and coming up...though I wouldn't call my experiences as superb.