#northern-thai-cuisine

#northern-thai-cuisine

Despite the constant churn of new development on SE Division, the labyrinthine amalgam of interlocking structures that once housed the original Pok Pok has remained vacant for more than half a decade. The Northern Thai comfort food chain began as a food cart and ended as an empire, with outposts in LA, Las Vegas, and Brooklyn, along with a small constellation of Portland locations.

Narkara's boldly flavored and unfamiliar dishes would kill in a utilitarian setting along some semi-decrepit stretch of eastern Chinatown - think Mam or Ha's - but will the city's more adventurous eaters be lured inside such a generically opulent room, on such a normie block? In the early going, the answer seems to be yes. Here is the scene at 6:30 p.m. on a Friday night, when nearly every table was taken.