Tea – The Saboscrivner

Isan Zaap Thai Cafe

For years, I had been hearing my friends rave about Isan Zaap Thai Cafe (https://isanzaaporlando.com/), unfortunately a little far from home for me, but moments away from another Thai restaurant my wife and I love very much, Naradeva Thai. You could seriously eat a big meal at one, then still comfortably walk to the other for another meal, they are that close. But I don’t recommend doing that.

I do, however, recommend Isan Zaap, and I’m not the only one. Michelin, that tire company that doubles as a restaurant critic organization, awarded Isan Zaap Thai Cafe one of its coveted Bib Gourmand awards, for “good quality, good value cooking,” joining some of Orlando’s finest establishments. So if you don’t trust your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner’s recommendations by now, you can rely on the Michelin Guide, known for its completely unbiased judging.

While Naradeva’s dining room has a serene wilderness vibe, Isan Zaap is more of a modern dining space. Their menus are very different as well. I do not pretend to be an expert on Thai food, but I know they represent different regions of Thailand, with Isan Zaap covering Isan, the Northeastern region of Thailand (similar to another local Thai restaurant, Mee Thai). According to Isan Zaap’s website, Isan cuisine includes fresh herbs and spices, multiple proteins, and fermented ingredients, which makes sense, because I enjoyed a lot of funky, pungent flavors in the dishes I tried.

On my first visit in late January, I brought a friend with me who I always run into whenever I do anything cool and fun around town. Whether it’s a concert, a stand-up comedy show, or a comic book convention, this dude is always there with his finger on the pulse of all things cool and good. We were both riding high after attending a comic art show where I met my all-time favorite artist, so I chose Isan Zaap as a way to prolong the good feelings and rare chance to hang out.

I started my meal with a refreshing, sweet, slightly smoky Thai iced tea. It was so good, I wanted to gulp it all down, but I knew I would want to save it to cut the heat of whatever food I ordered.

I decided to order larb for the first time ever, after remembering young Peter Parker and his smokin’ hot Aunt May (played by Marisa Tomei) riffing about larb in Spider-Man: Homecoming. I don’t think they ever explained what larb was in that scene, but it sounded right up my alley, with minced pork, pork skin, pork liver, and “seasoning” with lime juice, herbs, and roasted rice powder. I asked for it with medium heat, but boy, was it spicy. I have gotten used to ordering Indian dishes hot, but I eat Thai food so infrequently, medium felt just hot enough. Man, was this some luscious larb! Listed under the “Salads” on the menu, it was so bright and tangy, sour and spicy, crunchy and funky, and surprisingly cool and refreshing, while spicy enough to make my lips tingle. It was served chilled, with thin slices of onion, finely shredded carrot, cucumbers, and lots of mint, and it exceeded all my expectations with its blend of flavors and textures. I was a little surprised the larb did not come with rice, but what do I know? Anyway, it made me a larb lover for life.

Because I’m me and I just can’t help myself, I ordered a second dish, figuring I would try it there and finish the rest at home: my go-to favorite that I like to try at every Thai restaurant, stir-fried drunken noodles, also known as pad kee mao (or sometimes pad kee mow). These are wide, flat, chewy rice noodles sautéed with onions, red and green bell peppers, basil leaves, and a protein (I chose squid, which was a little rubbery, but still tasty), in a sweet and spicy sauce. I asked for this dish medium as well, and it also brought a pleasant amount of heat.

My friend chose excellent-looking pad Thai with tofu, another dish you can never go wrong with. He let me try a bite, which had the nice sweet-and-sour tanginess I always enjoy in pad Thai. I made a mental note of it, because my wife loves this dish, and I definitely wanted to return with her.

It was a great lunch and a great hang. I went home and talked about this meal for damn near three weeks before my wife and I finally made it back to Isan Zaap together, again for lunch on a weekend. We both ordered Thai iced coffees this time, which I liked even more than the Thai iced tea. (I almost never drink tea or coffee, but this just goes to show you that if you put sweetened condensed milk in anything, I will consume it.)

My wife ordered pad Thai, as I figured she would. She got it mild and chose mixed seafood for her protein. It came with shrimp, squid, and mussels in the half shell, which she was kind enough to share with me, because I notoriously love mussels and she is ambivalent about those bivalves. She liked it, and as usual with her, she got two meals out of the dish.

I chose two things again on this trip, figuring we would share them both. This is a picture of half our order of grilled pork neck, which looked and smelled so good that I uncharacteristically devoured half of it before remembering to take a picture. It was a very pretty plate of thin slices of perfectly grilled, marinated, tender pork, accompanied by pretty shredded carrots and cabbage on the side and a very spicy Isan dipping sauce that I loved and she wanted nothing to do with. The grilled pork neck did not come with rice or anything else, so it might not be the most filling dish for a single hungry person. I would definitely recommend it to share with a group, though — or if someone is avoiding carbs and just wants delicious lean protein.

I also thought we would both enjoy the chef’s special dish of crab fried rice, after noticing so many crab dishes on the menu. Again, I ate the vast majority of this, even though it was not spicy or intimidating in any way. It was solid fried rice, but there wasn’t a lot in it aside from eggs, garlic, a little basil, and the lump crabmeat on top. I certainly enjoyed it, but next time I will order something more unique and unfamiliar, that’s for sure!

Unlike our first visit, this time our server brought us a container of four tins of seasonings to spoon onto our food: chilli, sugar, vinegar, and fish sauce. I used a little bit of the chilli (just a red powder) and a splash of vinegar to jazz up the fried rice, but I did not want to overwhelm any of the flavors. I know the sugar is meant to cut the heat, but the spiciest thing I had at this second meal was the Isan dipping sauce with the sliced pork neck.

Last, but certainly not least, I ordered another dish to bring home and enjoy later: the pork liver larb, served chilled and tossed in the same spicy, sour dressing with toasted rice powder, shredded carrot and cabbage, sliced cucumbers, and more herbs on top. This time I made jasmine rice in my Aroma rice cooker to go with the larb, which may be completely inauthentic, but it worked for me. I love liver in all its forms, and the pork liver was rich and intense in that offal (but not awful) way, and tender enough to almost melt in my mouth. It might have been my favorite component of that original larb dish I tried, but I found myself missing the additional textures and flavors of the ground pork and pork skin in the “O.G.” larb. Again, you live and you learn, or at least I do! As always, I appreciated that Isan Zaap packed my takeout larb in one of those great plastic containers with a clear, locking lid. These are microwave-safe AND dishwasher-safe, and if you think I keep a collection of them, you’d be right as rain.

So Isan Zaap Thai Cafe was really wonderful after both of my visits, and it ignited my newfound interest in Thai food. I’ve been to a few other Thai restaurants in Orlando, and a longtime favorite closed in 2023, but I am excited that there is so much more to learn about and experiment with. I’m no tire company, but I can tell you that Isan Zaap is definitely worth all the hype and praise, whether you eat Thai food all the time or just dabble occasionally, as I do. I don’t know how often I will make it back to this restaurant, but Isan Zaap serves some of the best Thai food I’ve ever had, and not just in Orlando either. If you know, you know, and if you don’t, then what are you waiting for?

CLOSED: Thai Singha

UPDATE: Apparently Thai Singha closed in April 2023, and I am very sad about it.

***

Thai Singha (https://thaisingha.net/) is the first Thai restaurant I ever visited in Orlando, shortly after meeting my wife and starting to date her, back in 2006. It is out in the sprawling Waterford Lakes shopping center in East Orlando, south of the University of Central Florida. The area is full of restaurants, but not many stand out and draw attention. Thai Singha definitely does, or at least it should.

We realized it had been years since we had gone together, especially after discovering newer favorites like Mee Thai and Naradeva Thai, both wonderful places. But you never forget your first, especially since Thai Singha is where I discovered my favorite Thai dish that is now my benchmark order at any new Thai restaurant, to compare and contrast them all.

My wife started with hot ginger tea ($2.95), which smelled really good and came in a neat-looking receptacle:

Then she ordered one of her favorite dishes, that she also introduced me to at Thai Singha over 15 years ago: mee grob ($6.95). Some restaurants call it mee krob or meekrob, but many around Orlando don’t serve it at all. It is a veritable mountain of crispy rice noodles, shrimp, pork, and tofu, tossed in a tangy sweet sauce and garnished with scallions and bean sprouts. It is awesome, folks. It is very sticky, crunchy, sweet, salty, and sour — a feast for all the senses. The shrimp is fried so nicely that you can even crunch and swallow the crispy tails. It is one of the only places where I like tofu, but I fully admit I haven’t had enough tofu to discount it completely. Maybe everyone is already wise to the joys of mee grob, but if ya don’t know, now you know.

My wife ordered her favorite entree as well: late night noodles with a combination of shrimp, scallops, and squid ($16.95). You can choose any of the options from the “Favorite Dishes” section of the menu to come with mixed vegetables, tofu, chicken, beef, or pork for $11.50, shrimp for $14.50, or a meat combo or this seafood combo for $16.95.The late night noodles are soft, chewy rice noodles stir-fried to perfection, then tossed in a light soy sauce with eggs, the shrimp, the buttery little bay scallops, and the tender squid, and served over a bit of lettuce. She loves it.

And this is my favorite Thai dish, made with the same flat, wide, perfectly chewy rice noodles: drunken noodles, also known as pad kee mao or pad kee mow. I got mine with tender pork for $11.50, and I always wish the portion was bigger here, because it is so incredibly delicious. Drunken noodles are stir-fried with onions, green bell peppers, fresh Thai basil leaves, and a sweet chili paste sauce. It is always sweet and spicy at once, which I just love in any cuisine, and the Thai basil brings such a unique herby flavor — very different than the typical basil in Italian recipes. Despite the name, there is no alcohol in this dish, but it is a common, beloved Thai street food for drunken revelers. I’m sure the late night noodles have a similar origin story from nocturnal hawkers and their grateful post-partying clientele.

So that’s our first Thai restaurant we were able to share with each other, Thai Singha. I am pleased to report we enjoyed it as much as ever after being away for far too long. I was just sad to see it dimly lit and not busy, despite it always bustling during our past visits, too long ago. We got there in the late afternoon on a recent Friday, too early for the dinner hour, but we were the only diners in the place, while others popped in and out to pick up sporadic takeout orders. It is difficult to get to Waterford Lakes, and we rarely end up on that east side of Orlando anyway, but it remains a treasure well worth braving UCF-area traffic to return to from time to time. Over the years we’ve been together, we have ordered other dishes on the menu that are always solid, but we are always a little disappointed when we don’t go with our favorites here. Now you’ve seen our go-to dishes, so pay it a visit, decide on your own favorites, and let me know what they are!

Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria

Way back in December 2005, chef-owner Pom Moongauklang founded Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria (http://pompomsteahouse.com/), located in Orlando’s Milk District neighborhood, not too far from downtown Orlando. Pom studied as a pastry chef, and she cooked in several trendy and high-end New York City restaurants (including the famous Nobu and also an infamous BDSM-themed French restaurant that no longer exists, but sounds fascinating) before striking out on her own here in Orlando, serving up some of the city’s most creative sandwiches and eclectic tea drinks for over 15 years. That was about a year after I first moved to Orlando, and right when I was changing careers and going back to school. Things seemed really hopeful at the time, and all food tasted better to me. I remember Pom Pom’s being one of our first really hip and cool locally owned restaurants. For me, it was love at first sight… and first bite.

The restaurant is a hip, funky space, full of artwork by local artists that is rotated regularly. All the art is displayed on consignment, so if you fall in love with a piece of artwork, you can buy it. Pom Pom’s is open until 4 AM on Fridays and Saturdays, making it an oasis for hungry and restless partiers, back when it was safe to be out partying. In addition to the sandwiches, salads, and tea drinks, there is also a breakfast menu, only available Friday night through noon on Saturday, and then Saturday night through 4 PM on Sunday.

On a visit a while back, the special tea (heh, “specialty”) of the day was strawberry-kiwi, so I impulsively ordered an iced version for $3. I’m not a big tea drinker, although I sometimes appreciate a good, strong, sweet Southern-style iced tea. I am not into hot beverages at all, but you can order any of Pom Pom’s teas hot or iced. The strawberry-kiwi was sweet, but not overly sweet, and very refreshing. I was glad that it tasted like real fruit juice, not artificial or chemically. I’m not a big tea drinker in general, but I’ve had the chocolate cream tea there before, and that’s always really good.

One one particular visit, I ordered two sandwiches, just so I could write a more comprehensive review here. I’ve been going to Pom Pom’s since shortly after Pom opened the place, and I have my favorites, so I decided to choose an old favorite and try something new too. This was my old favorite, the Woody ($9.95), with hot pastrami, Swiss cheese, honey mustard, Thousand Island dressing, Southern slaw, and red onion on pressed pumpernickel bread. I always love pastrami, and the pumpernickel goes so well with it. (You can choose sourdough, whole wheat, or rye with caraway seeds as the other bread options.) All the sandwiches at Pom Pom’s are pressed, so they’re served hot. Especially with the Woody, you get the crispiness of the pressed bread and the melty, crunchy, meaty, creaminess of all the other ingredients, warm and sliding around.

This was the new sandwich I hadn’t tried before, the Billy Chang (also $9.95). It sounded a little weird, but just weird enough to work: sliced smoked beef brisket, blue cheese, red onion, and strawberry jelly, and I got it on pressed sourdough bread. This sandwich had everything: salty, smoky, pungent, sweet, funky, crispy.
I love savory and sweet flavors together, but I think the smoky brisket and sweet jelly would have worked together with something spicy uniting them, like a pepper jelly instead. I would have also preferred goat cheese or cream cheese to the crumbly and funky blue cheese, and it also would have made for a more cohesive sandwich that held together better. But those are my own personal hang-ups, not meant to take away from the sandwich at all. There was a lot going on, flavor-wise, and it was also the messiest sandwich I’ve ever eaten, on one of the very rare days I ate lunch in my office at work. It had already soaked through the paper wrapping by the time I got it back to my desk, and eating the half I tackled at work was a multiple-paper towel job. Would I get it again? I don’t think so, not that it was bad! There are just so many other sandwiches at Pom Pom’s I either like more, or that I still have yet to try.

On a more recent visit, I got my old favorite sandwich, the smoked salmon ($11.25), with thin-sliced nova salmon, bacon, cream cheese, cheddar cheese, arugula, tomato, and and lemon caper aioli. This is an intense rush of strong, smoky flavors, and I just love it. I ordered it on pumpernickel and it came on sourdough, but I couldn’t complain because it was still awesome.

On my previous visit, I tried the daily special sandwich, a spicy mac tuna melt. I grew up eating tuna salad sandwiches, but never buy canned tuna anymore, and rarely order it out anywhere. Pom’s regular melt includes capers, celery, red onions, lemon zest, and your choice of a domestic cheese, which sounds good on its own. But I loooooove the macaroni and cheese here (more on that shortly), and I figured adding it to any sandwich would take it to another level — like hipster tuna noodle casserole, only a thousand times better. I didn’t think the combination would disappoint, and it definitely did not.

Putting their delicious macaroni and cheese in a sandwich is a recurring theme at Pom Pom’s, because here is a special from this very weekend, the Chez G, with spicy crumbled chorizo sausage and mac and cheese on sourdough. I took this one home, so the bread wasn’t crispy anymore, but it was still really good.

Pom Pom’s offers a few sides, including my absolute #1 favorite macaroni and cheese in Orlando, the spicy turkey mac and cheese (on the right; $2.25), with cheddar cheese, diced tomatoes, scallions, and that most overrated of hot sauces that nevertheless works so perfectly here, sriracha. There are always nice cubes of tender turkey in it too. When I make mac and cheese at home, this is the consistency I aim for — not a liquidy, cheesy soup, and not barely-melted cheese shreds that look like they came straight out of a bag. It’s the ideal “middle way.” Melty, not soupy, not greasy, not dry. I love it, and I would happily eat a much larger portion of it. On the left, you can see Pom Pom’s German potato salad ($2.25), which is different from most American-style potato salads, which are usually mixed up with mayo and served cold. This potato salad is served warm with crumbled bacon, scallions, and vinegar, and it’s so, so good if you’ve never had it before. I love potato salad. In fact, it’s probably my second-favorite thing to do with potatoes, after chips, and just edging out fries. That’s my spicy hot take on potato salad, that underrated side order. And as much as I love the mayo-based varieties (especially Southern-style potato salad with chopped hard-boiled eggs, pickles, and yellow mustard added), German potato salad is a nice change of pace, especially as a rich side dish in the fall and winter.

Pom Pom’s also has soups of the day that I rarely order, but I’m usually happy with the ones I try. Waaaaay back in December 2020, Pom had cooked up a pot of dark chocolate duck chili, and there was no way I was going to miss that. They were selling it by the cup for $5 or by the bowl for $7. I ordered a bowl for myself and a cup to bring home to my wife, who doesn’t like my chili at all, but sometimes surprises me by liking professional chefs’ better versions of chili. Both were served in coffee cups as part of my takeout order, and mine was topped with scallions and smoked gouda cheese. It was a rich, hearty chili with at least two different kinds of beans and plenty of shredded, stewed duck.

You can get a better view of everything here, after I caused a stir. It was quacktacular!

When I returned today, I tried Pom’s beef lasagna soup, which sounded perfect on a cooler day leading into a very cold night. It was a savory tomato broth with crumbled, seasoned ground beef, lasagna noodle sheets cut into squares, floating pools of melted mozzarella cheese, lots of garlic, and a surprising amount of chunks of zucchini and yellow squash.

So this is a review after at least three separate visits to Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria, even though I’ve lost count of the many times I’ve been here over the past 16 years. Follow Pom Pom’s Instagram page for daily specials, and time your visit so you can try something new that may never be seen again. But the old classics stick around for a reason — because they are loved and treasured throughout Orlando.

Ms Tea’s Bento

This week I ordered takeout for myself and two co-workers from a relatively new Taiwanese restaurant for the first time, after seeing some photos of the food on The Orlando Foodie Forum presented by Tasty Chomps, the main reason I haven’t deleted my Facebook account. Ms Tea’s Bento (https://msteasbento.business.site/) opened last year, then closed for six months due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and only recently reopened at the beginning of September. The restaurant and teahouse is located in a shopping plaza on East Colonial Drive between Dean and Rouse Roads, easily accessible via the 417 or 408 and not far from busy Alafaya Trail.

It’s a cute little cafe, very warm and welcoming with simple decor (lots of tea, lots of cats), and I was welcomed by the sweetest woman who had my order all ready when I showed up. They have a menu on the website, but I thought it would be convenient for my readers to scan and share the menu here:

I mentioned it was my first time in, and I was so excited to try everything. The lady offered to make me a tea drink for free, because it was my first visit, which was so sweet and generous. I was almost ready to get a black milk tea, but I saw they had a sign in the window offering Yakult beverages, made with a popular Japanese probiotic drink, similar to sweet, thin yogurt with a subtle citrus taste. I asked about the Yakult, and she ended up making me a beautiful pink iced hibiscus tea drink with Yakult added to it, the way you would normally add milk. It was really light, sweet, and refreshing.

I also picked up an iced coffee for my co-worker ($3.75), which was shaken up with some sweetened condensed milk, like Vietnamese cà phê sữa đá. It looked and smelled delicious, and she seemed to love it. My longtime readers know I’m not a big coffee drinker, but I do make an exception for Vietnamese iced coffee.

So this is the chicken teriyaki bento box my one co-worker ordered, with steamed rice and vegetables ($9.50). I appreciated that all the meals came in recyclable, dishwasher-safe, microwave-safe plastic containers with lids that snap into place. That’s always nice to see, especially because I clean and reuse all those kinds of containers. Those are so much better than styrofoam or those flimsy, fragile folded paper takeout boxes.

My other co-worker loves takoyaki, crispy fried fritters made with octopus, a popular Japanese street food. She wanted to try Ms. Tea’s takoyaki ($5.99), and seemed to really like them. I believe they came garnished with thin bonito (fish) flakes and Japanese mayo.

I couldn’t decide between two dishes, and she was also interested in one of the two I wanted, so I suggested we split one of them, knowing her takoyaki wouldn’t be a large order. We split the spicy pork dry noodles ($8.95), which were nice, thick udon-like noodles with ground pork and julienned cucumber, very similar to dan dan noodles I’ve enjoyed before at Chuan Lu Garden. It also came topped with an egg fried to a perfect over-medium with a runny yolk that added richness, and fresh cilantro.

The other dish I wanted to try was the pork stew rice bowl ($7.50), which included braised pork belly in a rich brown sauce over steamed white rice, with still-crispy celery sticks, some tangy diced preserved vegetables (near the top), and half of a “tea boiled egg,” which was one of the things that drew me to try this dish. I think those lighter diced cubes at the bottom were fried tofu, which I definitely wasn’t expecting, but I could be wrong., since I almost never eat tofu. Saboscrivnerinos, please weigh in and set me right!

Finally, I couldn’t resist trying the sweet butter/condensed milk toast ($4.25), which sounded like a rich, delightful dessert. I love buttered toast, from Waffle House breakfasts to every kind of garlic bread with barbecue or Italian food. And I love sweetened condensed milk with anything, from coffee to fruit to Cuban tres leches. To me, plain ol’ sweetened condensed milk is a more satisfying dessert than many kinds of cookies, cakes, and ice cream!

I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but it ended up being ONE large, thick slice of bread, very lightly toasted, and soaked with butter and condensed milk. I didn’t share this one, even though I realized about halfway through that it was scored into several smaller squares to be easily divided and shared. I ordered it for myself, so I had no compunction about enjoying it all myself.

I enjoyed everything I tasted on my first trip to Ms. Tea’s Bento, and I definitely plan to return and try more dishes and drinks. It’s one of Orlando’s hidden gems in that sun-baked industrial stretch of East Colonial Drive between the 417 and Alafaya, and it’s easy to miss. But when the sun is beating down and you want pull over for a cold, tasty beverage, or you’re hungry for something unfussy and possibly unfamiliar, it’s one more delicious destination in East Orlando and a casual, affordable alternative to the chain restaurants that proliferate out around UCF and Waterford Lakes.