My favourite Thai place, Longtail Kitchen in New West, is finally serving a great local beer on tap, courtesy of New West neighbors Steel & Oak. I wrote about Steel & Oak’s opening a couple weeks ago here and was looking forward to having more of their delicious Red Pilsner with Longtail’s food.

Longtail offers one Steel & Oak beer on tap. Which one? Ask the staff or read the ghetto sticker on the counter!

It works.

Man, is that a sight for sore eyes! They’re using this Danby Keg Cooler (pictured below) and my beer came out cool and delicious.

 

Longtail also has these new beer towers. It would be damn fun to dispense your own beer. But because of my measly stature and inability to process a ton of alcohol at once, I’m more of a quality-over-quantity type guy.

If you decide to go for this, please tweet me a pic of you using it!

Menu seems tweaked a bit since last time I was here. Great!

They recommended getting the Green Curry to pair with the Steel & Oak Red Pilsner. We ended up getting the Chicken Khao Soi and Geng Gati of Prawns & Clams in addition to Green Curry Fishcakes.

Ahhhh, they have a nice big roll-up window here so you can enjoy the fresh air while eating and drinking your way to personal bliss. These little birds even flew in and hopped around on the floor. Pretty cute and it reminded me of Snow White’s relationship with birds.

Steel & Oak Red Pilsner (in a wicked branded glass!) with Geng Gati of Prawns & Clams (Tumeric Curry) and Chicken Khao Soi (Burmese Style Noodles).

Longtail Kitchen has started using plastic trays instead of their deluxe dishware when it’s busy. Unfortunately the food doesn’t look nearly as good in these bleak institutional trays as it does in real bowls. But flavour is foremost here. The Geng Gati had a ton of flavour. Both rich and mild at the same time, with flavours of coconut milk, tumeric, sweetness, savouriness and other spices that you can’t identify but just contribute to a deep and delicious whole. The prawns and clams were cooked perfectly. The sauce is SO GOOD on the rice. Or just drink it straight. I won’t judge. The kicker is the strips of young coconut meat. Tender with a delicate crunch. Coconut meat isn’t just for desserts!

The Chicken Khao Soi is a Burmese-style noodle dish with a rich, flavourful gravy-like sauce and fried noodles on top. We loved the crunchy pickled mustard greens. It came with a chicken drumstick and thigh. A prototypical Asian street food dish. Make sure you mix it up and get all the gravy distributed.

We also got some Green Curry with fishcakes. This is where the Red Pilsner really came alive. Somehow, the interaction of the sweet, rich green curry and the malt-forward pilsner resulted in a somewhat rare magical pairing. Each bite of food did a square dance with each sip of beer, and vice versa, making me go back and forth between the curry and the beer again and again. I couldn’t stop until it was all gone!

Those green things that look like peas are actually tiny bitter eggplants. I’m growing to appreciate the extra dimension they give to Thai food.

I’m not sure how long Longtail will be carrying Steel & Oak Red Pilsner, so get your butt there soon to try it out with your choice of food!