Krua Thai Cuisine - Sab E Lee's legacy spreads to the South Bay

A couple weeks back, "Rik" sent me an email telling me that a new Thai Restaurant had opened in Chula Vista and was serving up Issan style dishes. Which sounded great to me. I finally found time in my schedule to head down to Broadway and check out Krua Thai.

The place is a tiny hole-in-the-wall that you'll miss if you blink while driving past Halsey Street.

The tiny place,  a couple of tables and a counter, with no A/C reminded me of Sab E Lee, circa 2008. And to my extreme surprise, when the cook came out front....we both stared at each other and laughed; it was one of the cooks from the later version of the Original Sab E Lee!

Sadly, looking over the menu, I noticed few Issan dishes; I was told that there's no customer base in the South Bay for Duck Larb, Koi Soi, Nam Tok and such. Still I ordered items that I thought would give a good indication of flavor, spice, and technique.

Starting with the Yum Nuea, the beef salad.

I ordered this at a heat level "7" and it did bring it on. The base flavors were there; mild sweetness, pungent fish sauce and garlic. Protein was pretty scarce and I didn't take to the iceberg lettuce, no cabbage and really tough beef makes this lean more on the "no bueno" side.

Issan Sausage (of course).

This was very dark and the casing a bit over-fried. Flavor the same as TOSEL, after all, it's the same sausage. No cabbage, ginger, chilies, and cucumber makes this kind of fall short. The wilted cilantro made the dish look sad....but the sausage was fine in spite of how dark the casing looked.

My usual test of the cooks wok skills, Pad See Ew (with shrimp).

This lacked the color and "wok hey" that I look for in Pad See Ew. I did appreciate that the noodles weren't over-cooked. The shrimp were also done right. The flavor was good, if a bit too sweet. This one just missed the mark.

The service was very friendly and mellow. I was told they'd make me anything from Sab E Lee's menu if I ordered ahead, so you might try and do that if you visit. This place has potential, the dishes are so close, just barely missing the mark. I'm sure I'll have a better meal next time. Nice folks here, I hope they do well.

Krua Thai Cuisine
686 Broadway
Chula Vista, CA 91910

So this meal got me thinking. I hadn't been to TOSEL in a while.....as much as I've written about the place, it seems that they've kind of "jumped the shark" over the last year or so. Many of the dishes I've gotten have been uneven and some of the young folks there seem to be somewhat blase' these days. Perhaps that's what success brings.....but I really do miss Koby and the tight ship he ran.

So I decided to drop by and order the Issan Sausage and the Yum Nuea.

You can see the difference, though the Beef Salad flavors were pretty close, the meat was more tender and there was just more of it. I will say, this is not the same as the version I enjoyed back in 2008. It seems like the flavors of some of the dishes here have been somewhat diluted, probably just as the talent pool of cooks is. Sad to say, TOSEL is just not on my rotation anymore......

The Original Sab E Lee
2405 Ulric St
San Diego, CA 92111

Though I haven't been to Sab E Lee Santee in ages.......

Comments

[nhbilly]

If only the palates here(SATX) were more adventurous.

[liver]

TOSEL has gone down the tubes, headed toward mass mediocrity. I used to be able to get raw beef salad (koi soi) at any heat level I wanted. The past two times, they refused to honor my request to have it at 20 out of 10, or even 11 out of 10. I had to get it 10 out of 10, which ended up being similar to the previous 4 out of 10 in the good old days of Koby, et al. They said someone got a tummy ache and cried about it, thus ruining the authenticity for the rest of us. Haven't been back since.

[kat]

too bad you used to post a lot of sab e lee before :(

[caninecologne]

This new Thai place used to be another 'new' Thai place, Thai Orange, which only lasted a few months last year. Parking is pretty tight in that little lot. We got lucky that one time we went. Too bad the Issan sausage isn't served with the accoutrements. The restaurant is in the shadow of La Querencia, a Mexican restaurant I've been wanting to try but haven't yet.

[Kirk]

You need to train them Billy! One palate at a time.... ;o)

Someone cried about it? Get 'em a tissue, "don't do the crime if you can't do the time...." Sheesh. It's so sad to see the place starting to dumb down dishes Liver.

It makes me very sad Kat.

[TFD]

Do you remember the time when we ate the spicy raw shrimps and a few of us cried? We also cried at home too. We still came back, though!

[Soo]

I'm bummed you didn't try the fried chicken wings!

[DT]

Kirk,
Is Koby still at one of the other Sab E Lee's or somewhere in SD? I've also noticed a decline in TOSEL's food.

[Kirk]

Hi TFD - You mean the time Samuelo almost died.....sure, I remmeber the burns around my lips.

Hi Soo - I've tried them TOSEL, they're ok.

Hi DT - Koby has been gone for years. He sold the Linda Vista location to the cooks and Jay and moved on to open the Santee location. Eventually, he decided to sell his share and leave. I do miss him.

[Stephen]

I recently ate at TOSEL after not eating there for nearly a year. I was surprised that the quality of the food had gone down. I used to think it was the best Thai food in San Diego, (maybe I haven't tried enough of the other Thai restaurants around.) I ordered the beef larb which used to be spicy, and have that wonderful roasted rice powder on it. It wasn't too spicy, the sauce was kind of watery, and there was no roasted rice powder. Guess I'll have to look elsewhere to satisfy my thai cravings now.

[Kirk]

Hi Stephen - I totally understand....things have been going downhill. BTW, I think it was the Nam Tok that had the rice powder.

[buddha]

I went to Tuktan Thai today for lunch. http://www.tuktanthaifood.com/home.html

Very nice sweet and friendly lady.

Unfortunately the food was just average. The pad thai noodles were overcooked and too soft. Basically it was just noodles and whatever meat you ordered. I didn't detect any eggs or sprouts in there.
Also ordered panang curry and it was passable I ordered the tofu and vegetables and it was kind of nondescript.

I am going to try krua thai next and order the pad see ew and see if they have improved it. Anything else I should try there? No duck I guess?

[Kirk]

Hi Jeff - No duck; but maybe they'll make it if you call in advance.

[buddha]

I went to Krua Thai today and I have to say it may have been the worst experience in a thai restaurant I have ever had.

I ordered the crab noodles, garlic wings and yellow curry.

The crab noodles had the worst crab I have ever eaten. I would have been happy with imitation crab. This crab was dry and completely tasteless. The eggs in the noodle dish were way overcooked , no wok hay in the noodles just a disaster.

The yellow curry was served with the smallest serving of rice I have ever seen! Maybe a half scoop of rice at best. The tofu was of the cubed fried variety but didn't seem fresh at all. The flavor of the curry was decent.

The garlic wings were 5.95 and there were only 4 wings! That is almost 1.25 a wing!

The cook asked me how everything was and I told here everything I wrote here. I hope they don't serve that crab dish anymore as they will go out of business with unsatisfied customers.

Not sure what is my favorite thai place. I like Sang Dao for the value but it still doesn't have that 'wow' factor. So far the last year I have not found any super star restaurants. I am going to cook a lot more at home than ever from now on!

[caninecologne]

@ Buddha - I was wondering about that Tuktan Thai place. It's in a tiny strip mall and very easy to miss. Too bad about Krua Thai. :(