Stepping Gingerly

Ginger
2861 Logan St
Nashville, TN
615-679-9555

As I publish this blog post, the menu on the Ginger website isn't the right menu, it is a menu from a CT restaurant. There is a photo copy of the real menu on the Urbanspoon website.

fresh spring rolls with spicy peanut dipping sauce

I have heard that this place was tasty and good from many people in town. But, then again, the people telling me to try this place don't have an Asian food tradition, they claim they don't know much about Asian food, but they say they liked Ginger. I am so weary of claims of good Asian food in this town because there is so many bad places that I stopped counting. This is why I was in absolutely no rush to try Ginger Thai Restaurant because I did not want to be burned again by bad Asian food. If I want some bad Asian, I could go to any one of the dozens of bad buffets in this town, I don't need yet one more bad Asian food place on my list.

But, I gave Ginger a shot anyway. The reason why I gave Ginger a shot was the word from a former cook at at a Chinese restaurant in the DC area. There are some decent to delicious Asian restaurant in the District as well as the 'burbs, and he was a cook in a restaurant there, so I trust him. He said the food tasted good at Ginger, it wasn't the best Thai food because his family lived in Thailand for many years and that is where the best Thai food is, but for Nashville standards, Ginger is a nice oasis from the bad Asian. So, I asked him quite frankly, "Is Ginger blog worthy, or what?" He said, "Yes, it is a tasty Thai style restaurant for Nashville."

chicken red curry with pineapple

So, after that conversation, I had Ginger on my mind. The man and I gathered a couple friends of ours to go with us, and give it a shot. There is one buddy who is a wonderful cook, and grew up within a multiple generation Asian household with lots of delicious food made by Grandma. This buddy knows food and good Asian food. There is another friend who is allergic to peanuts and milk. It is always good to bring a buddy who I enjoy hanging out with, and who has dietary needs that restaurants need to work around, and show they can be versatile while maintaining yummy food.

There we all met, and walked into this small restaurant. I would say there aren't more than 10 tables mixed of 2 or 4. We ordered a few dishes, fresh spring rolls, a special red curry with pineapple, pad pak and a fried rice. The fresh spring rolls were really, what do I say, Fresh! The name Fresh spring rolls really describes the dish accurately. The rolls have 1 shrimp in each, so the price of these are a little pricey for just rice noodles, lettuce and a few basil leaves. But, they are tasty though. We all agreed, the special curry with chicken and pineapple was our favorite. It is a coconut based red curry that we all couldn't get enough of. We all took that gravy and poured it all over everything on our plates. There was not one drop left. We were not wow-ed by the fried rice, but ladling some of that special red curry on it made it taste really good! The pad pak was tasty with beef and basil. The pad pak was made better by ladling on some of the special curry.

As we were leaving, we all commented that we were not expecting much, and we were pleasantly surprised that we had a decent meal, and we had one really good dish that perked us all up. We decided that Ginger can be on our list to go back to sometime.