Mon Thong

Thai cooking balances four tastes at once, hot and sour and salty and sweet, and the point of balance shifts from one kitchen to another and from one dish to the next. That is why two curries with the same name on two menus can taste almost nothing alike, and why it pays to ask questions rather than assume.

Heat is the first thing to settle, because a scale of one to five means something different in every kitchen and it is easier to add than to take away. Ask what mild actually looks like before you commit the whole table. Peanuts appear in more Thai dishes than people expect, so flag any allergy clearly at the point of ordering, and ask about fish sauce and shrimp paste if someone is eating vegetarian, since a vegetable curry is not automatically free of either. For a group, ordering rice separately and sharing several dishes usually works better than one plate each, and it lets everyone find their own level of heat.