EE-Sane Offers Authentic Thai Cuisine

Inside EE-Sane. Photo by Cari Taylor-Carlson.

If you travel south on Farwell Avenue, you will see the flower-decked entrance to EE-Sane in the 1800 block on the east side of the street. This little gem, a restaurant that features Thai and Laotian cuisine, has been at that location since 1998, no small feat for a neighborhood restaurant in today’s world of frequent openings and closings.

Once inside, you are far from the bustle of the Lower East Side. The restaurant has a quiet ambiance, perhaps from its subdued colors, mainly brown and beige with gold accents. You will see one large painting and another decoration that resembles salvaged pieces of ancient Buddhist temples often seen on the walls in restaurants in Thailand.

To accompany your meal, you will see a basic wine list, some N.A. choices, and a selection of bottled beer including Chang, Beer Lau, and Singhi. My companion’s choice, the slightly sweet Plum Wine, was the ideal match to her medium spicy Curry Squash.

This entree, a bowl filled with cubes of roasted butternut squash, sliced onions, carrots, and pea pods, was a masterpiece. The squash added subtle autumn flavor to the rich coconut milk and with its mild heat, it was more like a slow-burning ember than a bonfire. We thought it tasted similar to the Mussaman Curry, another scrumptious, not-to-be-missed dish at EE-Sane.

At the recommendation of our server, I ordered Singapore Noodles. What she said was, “You will like any of the noodle dishes.” She suggested medium heat; said it was a safe choice for a first visit. She was right about both the noodle dish and the heat. Because it was a Lunch Special, available Tuesday-Friday 11:00-2:30, the noodle dish came with an egg roll or hot and sour soup. It might have been a Lunch Special, but that did not affect the quantity of noodles on the plate, enough for at least two hearty eaters. The curried noodles were fried and mixed with BBQ pork, and cabbage, and topped with chopped scallions.

A casual remark by my companion led to our server’s suggestion, an off-the-menu cucumber salad. It perfectly complemented the rest of our meals with its crunchy cucumber, marinated red onions, and crushed peanuts in a light, slightly sweet rice wine vinegar dressing.

On a second visit, my companion and I started with Chicken Satay because we noticed a cute little hibachi at an adjacent table. Six large chicken cutlets were dipped in an egg batter and sauteed before we finished them on the hibachi at our table. They were served with peanut sauce and a sauce that tasted like the dressing we liked on the cucumber salad. The chicken was fork-tender and the sauces added delicious pizzazz to this hearty appetizer that could have served as a complete meal.

The Pad Thai, another Lunch Special, is a popular and well-known Thai entrée. As a self-proclaimed Pad Thai aficionada, my companion wanted to compare it with past experiences with the dish. It did not disappoint. From the protein choices — beef, chicken, pork, and shrimp — she ordered shrimp and found more than enough tucked in the noodles along with onions and bean sprouts. It was a classic Pad Thai that left a slight lingering taste of fish sauce, a common ingredient in Thai cuisine.

Another Lunch Special, Curried Fried Rice, featured pineapple and cashews. There was enough curry to make it interesting but not so much that it overwhelmed the rest of the flavors.

The Thai BBQ Chicken was a delicious surprise. It was chicken fried in a tempura batter and served on top of steamed vegetables. A sweet BBQ sauce added to the dish that combined fork-tender chicken tempura with gently steamed broccoli and other vegetables. It was a tour de force with its rich BBQ sauce, healthy vegetables and abundant chicken, which made for two meals, one at EE-Sane and one via take-home container at home.

You could almost call the Thai Iced Tea a dessert with its rich mix of tea and sweetened condensed milk, but we wanted something we could share and ordered Kha Nom Mor Kaeng, Thai baked custard. They served it hot in four tiny ceramic dishes adorned with an edible flower. This was a gorgeous presentation of a light dessert and a fine finale after we had overindulged in the Chicken Satay, the BBQ Chicken, and the Curry Fried Rice.

The next time you drive south on Farwell, watch for the restaurant with the flowers over the entrance. This charming neighborhood place may become a favorite stop when you crave some authentic and delicious Thai-Laotian food.

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• Location: 1806 N. Farwell Ave.
• Phone: 414-224-8284
• Hours: 11:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Tue-Sat, 12:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Sun
• Neighborhood: Lower East Side
• Website: https://www.eesanemke.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EE-Sane-200300303329320/
• UM Rating: 3.95 stars (average of Yelp, Trip Advisor and Zomato)