Hawker chicken pad thai with an omelette blanket ($7)!
A hawker chicken pad thai wrapped in a thin omelette: tamarind-dressed rice noodles with chicken, tofu, bean sprouts, chives, crushed peanuts and lime. $7.
Lunch at a hawker Thai stall: chicken pad thai for $7, the omelette-wrapped kind. ๐
What was on the plate ($7):
- Pad thai: flat rice noodles in tamarind sauce with sliced chicken, fried tofu cubes, bean sprouts and chives
- Wrapped in a thin omelette blanket, with crushed peanuts and a lime wedge on the side
This was the fancier presentation of pad thai, where the noodles are wrapped inside a thin omelette that you cut open at the table to reveal everything tucked inside. It is a nice touch, and it keeps the noodles from going soggy. The egg layer had lovely browned, slightly crisp edges.
Underneath, the noodles were dressed in that classic tamarind sauce with the proper sweet-sour-savoury balance, mixed through with sliced chicken, soft fried tofu cubes, bean sprouts for crunch and Chinese chives for a grassy, oniony note. The pile of crushed peanuts on the side is the finisher: scatter it over for nutty crunch, then squeeze the lime to wake everything up with a bright hit of acid.
Mix it all together once the omelette is opened up and it eats really well, tangy, nutty and fresh. At $7 it is good hawker value, since the mall Thai chains charge $10 to $14 for the same thing.
Overall: 4.2 / 5. ๐๐๐ผ Tangy tamarind noodles in a crisp-edged omelette blanket, with peanuts and lime doing the bright-fresh finish. Hawker Thai win.
