Capitol Hill has at least eighteen different Thai restaurants. I’ve tried most of them. Jai Thai was my first Hill Thai, but I like my food spicy and they tend forget a few stars every time I visit. Rom Mai Thai was ok, but the staff was a little too touchy with my companion. Samui Thai was tasty too, but they found a place on my banned list after some acutely poor service.
Then I found Jamjuree. I love Jamjuree. I’m not a food critic, so I can’t think of 10 polysyllabic adjectives to describe their food, but I always leave full and happy. The lunch special comes with a perfectly tiny soup and salad, followed by 3 pounds of pad thai and curry. I’m a vegetarian and even though I know that Thai food is plum full of fishy fish sauce, my rule is that I’ll eat it if the menu doesn’t explicitly list fish sauce as an ingredient and I can’t smell it. (I need to get my Omega-3s some way, right?) Jamjuree excels at hiding fish sauce, if it’s even there. The food is consistently spicy, not too sweet, and just plain yummy. I want some right now.
To top it off, if you order beer they bring you peanuts with little ringlets of green onions.
I just discovered the green onion/peanut mixture on Thursday! So cute, I love that place.
OK I am always raving about the lunch special but it increases in price like everytime I go there I swear it was around $6 at some time and now it’s almost $8. It was the best deal in town.
actually, they do use fish sauce in their curries, although it took us multiple visits to find a server who actually knew this. Alas, our brand of vegetarianism is not quite so flexible as yours, so no more Jamjuree for us.
It was always my favorite when I lived in the area. Now that I live in Bangkok, I can tell you that the food there is pleasantly authentic in a Bangkok/Central Thailand sort of way. We get little plates of peanuts with our beer here, too. Though without the little rings of onions, which I miss.