la.foodblogging

When I was a kid, I ate in Alhambra fairly frequently. There was one restaurant in particular that I went to. I can’t recall the name of it or how the food was. I really only remember it because it was an art deco building, which stood out for that area. I drove by there about a year ago or so and I had to do a double take. The building still stood out, but not just because of its shape. It was very yellow. Of course, I had to find out who occupied the space and discovered it was a Thai restaurant, Spice Basil.

Over the weekend, I was meeting up with a few friends for dinner, and I suggested we go there. First of all, parking in front of the restaurant is very limited (about 6 spaces) and tight. I was running incredibly late and was ever so grateful that I was able to just pull right up to the front of the restaurant and park literally 7 feet from the door. Although it’s impossible to not notice the yellowness of the building, but if you missed it, let me reassure you that it’s just as yellow inside. We were immediately seated and figured out rather quickly what we wanted to order.

I find that I am very picky when it comes to pad thai. I like pad thai, but I rarely order it because most Thai restaurants can’t make it the way I like it. (I do go along with ordering it when I’m with friends if we are all sharing. It is, afterall, a favorite.) So here’s what Spice Basil did right. The flavor in general was right on. There was enough crushed peanuts and the lime juice really brought out a nice tang to each bite. There was also a good amount of chicken throughout the noodles. So what was wrong? Definitely not enough shrimp. I think there were only 3 pieces at most. While every Thai restaurant I have ever gone tend to be stingy when it comes to shrimp in the pad thai, usually there is still about 6-piece minimum. The worst offense, however, was the texture of the noodles. I understand that Pad Thai noodles are supposed to be soft, but theirs was a little too much so. For me personally, this is a huge no-no. Nevertheless, if I had to choose between the right noodle texture or the right flavor, I will choose flavor every time.

We also ordered a couple of Spice Basil’s specialty dishes, the garlic clams and the spicy fish. Some time between the cooking and plating process, some of the clams escaped from their shells. I scooped up three clams to my plate and as I eagerly picked up my fork to taste them, I found out that only one of the three on my plate had clam meat in them. This didn’t happen to any of my friends. I did eventually get to taste more of this dish. Even though I enjoyed the garlic clams, I tasted more garlic than clams. I couldn’t really tell the quality of the clams because the garlic and sauce were very strong, but I thought it was delicious. Also, it wasn’t really spicy, but there was a slight kick to it. The fish was also a very good dish. It was deep fried first, so the outside was nice and crispy while the inside was soft and moist. The pineapples went very well with the sweet and sour sauce. I did not find this dish to be spicy at all, but it was still enjoyable. As this is a whole fish, be forewarned that there are fishbones. People who are not used to eating fish that has not been deboned should proceed slowly.

While you can order steamed rice with your dinner, I recommend skipping that and going for one of their garlic rice in clay pot dishes. There are only three choices: pork ribs, beef, or shrimp. We chose beef. (We had ruled out shrimp because there was shrimp included in the pad thai, but had we known that we would only get 3 shrimps in our pad thai, maybe we would have ordered that one instead.) I was not too impressed with this one at first. Overall it was good, but I didn’t feel like there was much garlic flavor with the rice, despite the fact that I could see some minced garlic on top of the rice. As we ate more of the rice, I found the garlic flavor to be quite potent. I suspect that since I had the garlic clams right before my first bowl of the rice, the garlic taste in the rice was just more subtle in comparison. After a while, I came to really appreciate the flavor of the garlic rice with beef and was reaching for a second bowl.

I usually give exact prices for what I order, but unfortunately, I left the receipt back at the restaurant, so I don’t recall exactly how much each dish is. Roughly, the pad thai and rice were $7 each, and the fish and clams were $14 each. Thai iced tea is $1.75, and a smoothie is $2.50. Spice Basil is not the best Thai restaurant in L.A., and definitely not my favorite Thai restaurant in town. It is, however, good food at a reasonable price. You can’t miss it. It’s the yellow building.

Spice Basil
25 W. Valley Blvd.
Alhambra, CA 91801
(626) 282-3200
Hours: Sun.-Thu. 11 a.m.-midnight, Fri.-Sat. 11 a.m.-1 a.m.

By Pauline (see more of her posts).