Night + Market Original Redux

Americas - USA West Los Angeles
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I haven’t been back to the original location in a while, but was lured by the prospect of boudin noir on the DineLA menu. I was very sad to learn they no longer make their amazing ice cream sandwiches, but oh well.

Their DineLA deal is ridiculous. It’s $39, but I don’t see how one person could eat all of the food given the portions.

Started off with what is most people’s favorite dish apparently, Nam Khao Tod. This version was way spicier, crunchier, and more sour than the version at Song I had. Really intense and pleasant. A great display of Thai cooking. I think I understand why it is so popular now.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BBHDu4yk0BF/?taken-by=compulsiveaesthete

Raw Scallop and Ikura Fried Rice was a huge portion, and a seemingly obscene deal for the massive amount of scallops and roe. For me, Night + Market fries rice exactly right. It has a wonderful sticky texture that is pungent with garlic. It was deeply accented by the salinity of roe, and fresh, delicate scallop meat, as well as a very spicy sour birds eye chili sauce. One of the best fried rices I’ve ever had, similar to the Uni and Ikura one I had a bit over a month ago at Song. The side sauce seemed much spicer than at Song.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BBHD8tmE0BX/?taken-by=compulsiveaesthete

Boudin Noir was kind of this amusingly classic French plating. Lovely silken potatoes, a kind of jocular basic green iceberg salad (actually quite pleasant, and nicely dressed), and a simple boudin. The sausage itself was explosive with cinnamon and anise, while retaining a lovely earthy must from the blood. My only gripe is that it seemed like such a small sausage…I wish the portion was as generous as the scallops on the fried rice, but I digress. It was a wonderful, classically French dish in the middle of the Thai storm. I hope this ends up on the regular menu in some form.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BBHEIPDE0Bh/?taken-by=compulsiveaesthete

Overall, this visit revealed to me that the cooking may be stronger at the original location. Food seems spicier, more pungent, and generously more carefully prepared. It also taught me, and should show everyone, that Night + Market is not a pure Thai restaurant in terms of its food. How Thai is boudin noir? I assume not at all…except that hotels serve it in Thailand apparently. How about the ludicrous scallop and ikura over garlic fried rice? I could be wrong, but it seems like more of an invention of a creative Thai chef living in California. Yet at times the cooking IS, or at least feels straight up as intensely Thai as Thai can get, as showcased by the nam khao tod.

For those who have dismissed the place based on Song, I say it’s worth giving the original location a trip.

Especially while DineLA is happening, since this was more than enough food for 2 of us, meaning it was like $25/person after tax and tip. We split a great bottle of cab so it came out to $49/person, but that’s not bad at all really. I also admire the strange, yet delicious wines that Night + Market always seems to cultivate. I started off trying a Mexican wine, but the bottle had a defect and was the last one, so we went with the cab, which I thought was going to be boring, but was actually remarkable, and interesting. Super reasonably priced bottles all in the $30-$45 range, nearly unheard of in places with such a high caliber of cooking.

Now if they would just bring back those ice cream sandwiches…

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what do “amusingly classic” and “jocular basic” mean?

thanks.

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Nice review, I remember having a surprisingly good Mexican Wine at Vinoteque a while back makes me curious about the one you were going to have. Too bad it was corked.

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Went on Tuesday night, it was really a great meal.
Especially the Nam Khao Tod and Lamb Curry that came with dine LA menu.
Whole fish terrific too.
To your point @Aesthete about it not being a “pure” Thai joint, the couple next to us came just for the Fried Chicken Sandwich (a dish I don’t think one woulfd find outside of a KFC in Bangkok), which apparently they don’t usually serve in WeHo, just at Song: looked great, but we did not get one.

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Yes, it was a bit disappointing. The only other place I see Mexican wines on the menu is at Taco Maria. Worth the schlep for the food alone, but doubly so if you want to also explore Mexican wine a bit =)

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Indeed, lol The fried chicken sandwich is their most popular item isn’t it? In a way it’s “authentic Thai” I suppose, just not in the way that many food enthusiasts probably think about authenticity. So in some ways I think that’s kind of cool.

I’ve had the sandwich before btw, it’s a pretty good sandwich. I don’t see any reason to have gotten it on the DineLA menu, but it’s fun to throw into a meal there sometimes haha

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Ok so we eat a lot of Thai food since we live right in town and for many years. Why is it then that we don’t go to Night Market more often (WeHo)? I think it’s the pricing and the non-thai staff. The food is obviously amazing. Well, this weekend we stumbled in and learned of their happy hour. And it has plenty of food options on it! Going a lot more now.

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No clue what happened to the green duck curry… it’s as if they added salt, then later someone walked by and knocked another container of salt into it. Not enough rice in the world to fix it. Other flavor was nice though.

Sausage was crazy!!! So herbal

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I have also had some overly salty dishes at Night+Market on some visits.

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Was just 1 dish. I should have sent it back i suppose.

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What is the happy hour deal?

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until 7 mon - fri… there is a variety of foods and some nice drinks

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I’m not finding anything specific online. Do they mark down the bar snacks? Or do they do a specific menu only for happy hour?

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There’s a happy hour drink and food menu. There are snacks for $5 like that sausage and satay etc and there are a whole bunch of salads like that crispy rice and the grilled pork salad for $8

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Excellent. Thank you.

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I think we are done with the place. I don’t know why they’re over salting things but I’m not about to argue with them. 2 of the dishes were gross with salt last night, mouth is still sticky

Also I don’t really wish to be put through the “do you have a reservation” interrogation at 5:30 on a Friday when they have literally 1 customer seated out of 30 tables. Kris keeps talking in interviews about how casual he wants the place to be, for people to come, hang out, drink wine. Yet they want to do this BS fine dining thing where I have to feel like they’re doing something special by letting customers of an empty restaurant have a table? If I have a reservation I’m going to tell you I have one. And stop sitting a group of 3 on bench seats for 6 by the bathroom. Hostess from stuffy places. Maybe I’m ranting but I’m a bit miffed. I want to go there regularly

And you can’t be “sold out” of larb if we are your second dinner table

Thai town offers the comforts we seek with consistent seasoning

A lot of things are very good and I’ll miss the roti with curry but…

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Not everyone does. Don’t take it personally that they ask, they’re just making sure they’re not holding a table for someone who’s already there.

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