Uncle Boons-- 7 Spring Street between Elizabeth and Bowery

Uncle Boons is gourmet, real, hardcore thai food.  I'm not talking about some dumplings and drunken noodles-- I'm talking about seasoned grilled octopus, shitake pepper covered cod, hot spicy lamb curries, and a whole lot of other authentic stuff. Uncle Boons looks like a little hole in the wall, but when you go in it's very kitschy and feels sort of ancient.  We sat down in a corner, with a smooth wood table holding brown paper plates and a bread basket.  Brown paper plates; interesting.  We started with a ground lamb curry that we ate of an order of a green mango salad.  Usually at Thai restaurants, they serve green papaya salads, so this was a nice change. The whole dish lit my mouth on fire!!! There were also some crunchy bits of bacon hidden in the curry, and that added a nice crunch. I thought the green mango salad was way too bitter.  Even though it's supposed to be crunchy and citrusy, I was hoping it was sweet, so it would compliment the spicy lamb perfectly.  After that, we ordered the boneless beef ribs, which was extremely tender.  They were falling off the bone already, even though there wasn't a bone in the first place!!! There was a nice teriyaki-like flavor in the ribs which really enhanced the flavors of the meat.  Finally, my mom and dad ordered the Whole Charcoal Dorade with charred leeks and a variety of dipping sauces.  The dorade was humongous, but I thought it had too many bones for my liking.  Also, I thought the fish was a bit too chewy.  But the charred leeks were very crunchy and salty, and I felt like I was eating something like leek chips.  The dipping sauces were also great-- there was this one green sauce that tasted like a mix of jalapeño and a sweet fruit, but I couldn't place my tastebuds on which fruit that was.  But it doesn't matter.  Still delicious anyway. Overall, I rate Uncle Boons 3 1/2 pineapples.  Impressive, but not impressive.
Till next time!

-tdg