Thai Peacock

Three straight Thai restaurants to start off our Portland trip?  Woah, Thai food is excellent here, but isn't this a bit of an overkill?  Of course not!  There is never too much of a good thing!  Well maybe except too many fried chicken sammies.  That gave me bad cholesterol!  Anyways, Thai Peacock is related to some other great PDX Thai restaurants in Khao Moo Dang and Ruk-Diew.  Since we enjoyed those 2 spots already, we were pretty confident that Thai Peacock would too!

So all of the food pretty much showed up at the same time.  Hence, I'll just put them in order of how I would've eaten them starting with the House Combo with a variety of small appies.  My favorite item on the plate was the chicken teriyaki meatball.  Sure, not really a Thai item, but delicious nonetheless.  It was moist, meaty and had all the great caramelized sweetness from teriyaki.  The coconut prawns were pretty awesome too.  They were crispy and aromatic with a buttery snap texture.  Also not Thai, the gyozas were solid having a thin crispy dumpling skin with tender chicken and cabbage filling.  Veggie spring rolls were crunchy with non-mushy veggies inside.  Salad roll was veggie too and it was okay, I would've preferred some meat but I get there needs to be non-meat options.

As always, we got the Papaya Salad since we can say we got our veggies!  Well, also because we enjoy it due to the crunch and briny tangy dressing.  This one here was no exception as it was fresh and had plenty of brightness with a touch of spice.  On that note, we could customize our spice level with their box of Sauces.  I was using the hot chili with lots of the other dishes including the following one.

Yes, I added it to the Pad See Ew since I love my noodles spicy!  Even though this was prepared medium spiced, I wanted more heat.  Loved this version as the rice noodles were intact and not clumpy.  This was the case despite the dish not being overly greasy.  Lots of wok hei ensuring caramelization and smokiness.  Also a touch of brininess from fish sauce provided that umaminess.  We opted for tofu in this one and that goes the best in this dish in our opinion.

For our choice of soup, we had the Tom Kha this time around and it was fragrant due to the lemongrass.  It was pretty prominent and of course had the bite of the galangal and brightness of the kaffir lime leaves.  Due to the addition of coconut milk, the sharp tanginess was muted while the spiciness (we asked for medium) was balanced.  We had this with prawns and they were buttery and cooked just right. For me, I wished there was even more coconut milk.

From the soup, we moved onto 2 pork dishes in the Braised Pineapple Pork and Pad Ka-Phrao with Pork Belly.  Due to the use of pineapple, the natural enzymes broke down the pork muscle fibers.  The result was super tender meat with a natural sweetness.  The stir-fried pork belly was really good with proper wok hei that produced intense sweetness.  The Thai basil really came through with added sweetness and herbaceousness.

We were all ready to order a standard Pad Thai with shrimp but it was suggested we have the Pad Thai with Crispy Trout instead.  Good call as the trout was fantastic.  Crispy on the outside but flaky and moist on the inside, it was unexpected match for the noodles.  The noodles were chewy and not clumpy with a tangy and sweet tamarind sauce.  It had balanced spice and the extra squeeze of the lime made it even more impactful.

One of my favorite dishes was the Garlic Fried Rice with Garlic Shrimp.  As expected, the wok hei was evident here with the nuttiness of the rice and the caramelization of the shrimp.  Since it was an open kitchen, we had a clear view of the flaming wok.  Lots of aromatics within the rice including plenty of garlic.  It wasn't greasy though and the rice was chewy.  Shrimp were bouncy and naturally sweet with spot on seasoning.

We also decided to try the Seafood Khao Soi where it came with a pretty impressive amount of ingredients.  The large scallops were so buttery and soft while the prawns were as good as the other dishes.  Calamari was tender while still retaining a bite.  As for the broth, it was a bit less rich than other versions I've had but still aromatic.  Noodles were al dente and did soak up some of the flavors of the broth.

For our curry selection, we had the Kaeng Matsaman with Beef.  Although this is generally a milder curry, it still had plenty of impact from its nuttiness and creaminess.  It was medium spiced with a small lip tingling at the end.  The ample amount of beef was fairly tender while the nuggets of potato were delicate and soaked up all of the sweet and peanutty goodness.  Of course this went well with some white rice.

For our drinks, we had the Thai Iced Tea and Thai Iced Coffee.  Predictably sweet, the ice tea had all of the strong tea flavors.  It was actually not overly sweet, so we enjoyed it.  As for the coffee, it was pretty strong and that was enough to balance off the sweetness.  It had Vietnamese French coffee vibes and that suited us just fine.  We also had one mocktail in the Lychee Daiquiri.  It was fruity and semi-sweet.  Great with the spicy food!  Overall, the food at Thai Peacock is solid with some memorable dishes.  Pricing is affordable and portions are fair.  Definitely an option if you are craving Thai food in Downtown PDX!

*All food and beverages were complementary for this blog post*

The Good:
- Excellent wok hei and caramelization
- Well-priced
- Open dining space with high ceiling and plenty of light

The Bad:
- Tom Kha and Khao Soi could've used more coconut milk