- We're going to meet up with an old old friend of mine
who is now a successful restauranteur here in Los Angeles.
Kris has alerted us to some of the hottest pad thai spots
in the city.
- Pad thai tour.
- Yeah, we're on the pad thai tour.
(upbeat music)
Your food is very different
than like standard American thai food.
So what is it about it that's different?
What have you done differently?
- The only goalI really have with the food
is to make it as delicious as possible.
90% of the time that amounts to making it
in the most traditional way.
It's been boiled down to just like the essence.
There are certain things
about the process that I'll do different
because I think it makes a better end product.
- Is there a specific order in which you put spices together
that can alter the intensity
as opposed to just having, like too much of something?
- I don't usually try to get too technical with our food
and what we do, but I would break down pad thai
into like four or five things.
Technique, meaning how you work the ingredients in the wok.
The seasoning.
The quality of the noodles, is it too soft, is it chewy.
The fourth thing is just like, how amped it is.
It's supposed to have this trifecta of
kind of tart, kind of salty, kind of sweet,
but where it's all in balance.
- I'm hungry now.
I'm straight-up hungry.
Can we follow you into the kitchen?
- Yeah.
- Let's do it.
- We're going to make the most basic,
kind of elemental, no frills pad thai.
- Guess who gets the basic one ready?
- Steven.
- This guy.
Oh yeah.
- We're going to throw in the noodles
and then we put in, this is basically tofu,
and sweet radish.
This is essentially a basic pad thai.
Now we're going to do one that's sort of not as basic.
It's a little more decadent.
- [Colin] What should we call this one?
- [Freddie] So I've come up with the Mandy Moore
for the basic one.
And I think for this one we can step it up to Britney.
- You guys wanna go try these?
- Yeah!
Let's try some Mandy.
- [Colin] If I'm just ordering pad thai to get a feel
for the restaurant, this is how I want it.
- Pad thai has always been like,
a Chinese restaurant serves it
because people demand it so much.
But then I order that,
and it's super mushy and wet.
- You can't have wet pad thai, that is not a good look.
If it's sort of smoky and the noodles are cooked
but kind of chewy still,
then I've done my job.
- Colin, when you eat food,
it both makes it look appetizing and very unappetizing.
(laughs)
I don't know how you do it.
- It's like that thing, dance like no one's watching
or whatever, it's like eat like no one's watching.
So with the Britney, you want to get some of the eggy part,
get some shrimp.
- That Britney though.
- That's amped up.
- [Freddie] I like both, but I think I like the Mandy.
- I'm feeling Steven today.
- It's kind of Steven today.
A little basic.
- This is our pork toro kho my yang.
So that basically means I've grilled pig neck.
- Wow, that's tender.
- I brought out this beer because the other component
of this dish is essentially the drink that goes with it.
- Cheers!
- So we're gonna go check out some other thai restaurants
that Kris enjoys.
I think what we should do at each restaurant
is get their pad thai and then also get
like a specialty item off their menu
that is their like thing that you think is really awesome
at that spot.
- Let's go to Lacha Somtom, the papaya salad place.
- So we're headed to Thai Town,
one of my favorite places in LA.
Kris had just informed me
that he gets carsick really easily.
- So this is gonna be fun.
- We had the Mandy and the Britney at your spot,
so we're on the search for the Lady Gaga at the next spot.
- I'm pretty confident we can find the Lady Gaga today.
- Let's dig in, alright.
- That's pretty good, oh my god.
- It's so different from your pad thai.
- Yeah I like Kris' noodle better.
- [Steven] I can see that.
The meat is super crispy.
I kind of like that better.
- Now Chris does this make you want to call the paparazzi?
Or are you crazy in love?
- I think we should taste the other one first.
- And then judge?
- We've only been here for like five minutes by the way.
Look at this.
We need to emphasize that over and over again.
Colin is a monster on a sailboat.
- [Colin] This is the crab pad thai.
Oh man that crab omelette.
- Wow, it's like so many different flavors.
Coming together.
- I'm in love with the crab.
- Papaya salad coming up.
- What?
That is not what I was expecting.
I'm going all fingers.
They're basically french fries.
- An onion rings vibe, but it's less heavy.
- This is a version with marinaded raw blue crab.
You basically just suck the meat and the juice out of it.
- [Freddie] I eat crabs all the time,
I've never had raw crab.
It's a totally different experience.
- Usually if you have cooked crab you've gotta
like pick it out and eat it.
This is just like coming out at me.
I feel like an animal eating this,
and it feels so good.
- [Freddie] The crab omelette one was Beyonce.
She is like super iconic
and it gives me more like that comfort feeling
as opposed to like super crazy out there.
- I think we found our Gaga and our Beyonce.
- I'm not asleep yet, I'm just getting sleepy.
Oh man, I get caught sleeping in every video.
- We're here at the last stop, this is Pailin.
We're gonna have pad thai
and we're gonna have khao soi,
which is curried noodles.
- Oh yeah, this looks promising.
Who is it, Freddie?
- I wanna say, Ciara.
It's got the moves.
- It's a Mariah to me, it's full of flair
but like also knows the basics really well.
- I didn't know that pad thai
could have so many different styles.
- Should we try those noodles?
I've been eyeing this guy from the beginning.
- [Freddie] This is my favorite thing.
- [Colin] Yeah this is so good.
Doesn't this seem like something you'd eat
on a cold wintry night?
- Are you eating off your lap?
- Maybe.
- I'm gonna explode right now.
- Yeah he was saying that we gotta try the Northern sausage
and I already ordered it.
So hopefully it'll come out in a quick second.
- Whoa!
I think my stomach just made room.
- That's some crazy sausage.
- That's a great way to end the day, right here.
- Thank you Chris, for having us.
Thai food is more than pad thai.
I already knew that, but now that's been reinforced.
- My mind has been expanded,
and I know like the go-tos and what to get.
- I think I'm realizing now that I was very ignorant
with thai food, and like anything thai related.
I just got taken to school by Kris today.
Peace.