East Meets Northeast

Friday night I went to check out the new "Thai-Fusion" place in Northeast called Ginger Snap. It is located where the former "Times" restaurant stood, across the street from Nye's Polonaise Bar.

We started off with some of their signature cocktails. I ordered the "Dirty Kimono", which was essentially a dirty martini with a shot of sake. One of my friends ordered the Ginger Snap version of a bloody mary...except it came with a quail egg. My drink was decent, but not necessarily worth the $7.

(That large white thing is the quail egg. Eeew)

We shared several appetizers including: chicken lettuce wraps, duck pot stickers, shrimp spring rolls, and cream cheese and carmelized onion fried won tons. I don't think any of them blew me away, but they were all tasty and satisfying.

Now for the main entrees--I ordered the green curry with chicken. The green curry was pretty thin, and had pieces of eggplant, peas and onion. The chicken was not pure white meat, but a mix of white and dark in assorted sized pieces. Because of the mix of white and dark meat, I was not a fan of the dish. I think Tom Rup Thai has a much better Green Curry dish, with far superior flavor and heat.

(Fried Tofu with Green Curry)

I actually enjoyed the fried tofu pieces in my friend's vegetarian green curry more than I enjoyed my chicken.

Another friend ordered the beef pho soup, and it came with lots of accompanying garnish and greens to mix into the soup.

And adventurous friend ordered the grilled rueben with kimchi. "Kimchi Kulakofsky".  He said he really enjoyed it, so i'll have to take his word for it since the thought of corned beef and kimchi did not sound too appetizing to this native Korean. I did have one of his sweet potato fries, and it was very good.

My final verdict is that this place is just okay....certainly not a place I'd purposely seek out again, but if I lived in the neighborhood, it wouldn't be a bad place to grab a drink and some appetizers on occasion.  If you are looking for true Thai food, you will not be happy with this place....head to Tom Rup or Amazing Thai in Uptown instead.