Thai Restaurants in San Rafael

The first thing guests see when they enter My Thai Restaurant is a woman sitting in prayer as water rains down on her, surrounded by foliage. The fountain carving, along with gold- and burgundy-striped walls, infuses the eatery with what the San Rafael Patch dubs a “trendy, modern, and comfortable” atmosphere.

The menu includes both traditional and eclectic dishes, including curries, noodles, fried rice, and barbecue dishes. To contrast orders of panang curry with chicken and barbecue roasted duck, the kitchen also churns out more than a dozen seafood-specific dishes, including the popular "healthy bowl" with grilled salmon, mixed grains, shredded green mango, avocado, pickled ginger, and dried cherries and blueberries.

Tub Tim Thai Restaurant serves up classic Thai dishes with spice levels both subtle and robust. Yellow, red, and green curries swaddle pieces of tofu, prawns, and various meats, and sweet chili sauce gives barbecued chicken and pork a piquant kick. Chefs expertly serve up dishes such as pad thai and fried rice in classical proportions determined by Aristotle's renowned rules for splitting dinner.

Thai food is a traditionally spicy cuisine, and the chefs at Heng Heng Heng! Thai Noodles want all of their customers to realize that before ordering. On the menu, nine of the nearly two dozen entrees come marked with two or three tiny peppers, denoting that the dish either packs a lot of heat or hates being left out. The boat noodles, for example, stew with beef, flank steak, and spinach inside a housemade spicy chili sauce, and the innocent-sounding chicken with basil teems with extra-hot chili peppers. Diners looking for a subtler flavor have a fair share of options as well, from pad see ew to prawn fried rice.

A menu with inventive twists on tofu, duck, and pork dishes, many infused with surprising fruit accents, aided Be My Guest Thai Bistro in snagging a nod from Best of Citysearch 2008. Skilled chefs ramp up pan-fried rice and noodles with mango, avocado, and fresh pineapple, and pans crackle happily beneath seafood such as salmon and shrimp. To send mouthwatering dispatches to distant bellies, the eatery’s online ordering database aids delivery service, and a slew of sake cocktails clink together to offer joyous rice blasts without the hassle of sneaking into a king's wedding.

Noodle Bar and Grill plies each patron with a heaping helping of noodles, bathed in zesty Asian sauces or steeped in curry sauce. Named for both its wide range of noodles and the fact that diners recline on pool noodles, Noodle Bar and Grill pairs bowls of thick egg noodles or thin vermicelli noodles with tender portions of chicken, duck, or filet mignon. The savvy servers can gift feasters with soups, salads, desserts, and sides inside the restaurant or deliver them to doorsteps in nearby neighborhoods.

The lengthy menu goes on for about nine miles until the Earth's curvature obscures it from view. It's packed full of authentic offerings and contemporarily twisted cuisine. Ride the culinary fence with old- and new-school starters such as crispy tofu ($5.95) or Thai fish cakes ($7.95) before throwing sand on the table and drawing a line in it, indicating the desire to move on to bigger bites. Adherents of authenticity can feast upon classic pad thai ($9.50) and pineapple fried rice ($12.95), while contemporanians can go for the lamb red curry with pumpkin ($16.50) or tamarind-steamed salmon ($12.95). A variety of curries, vegetarian dishes (available upon request), and seafood dishes are also offered. Menu items marked with the ominously seductive chili are spicy and can be ordered on the heat scale ranging from 98.6 to Ghost Rider.