Reviews

• Araya's Vegetarian Place Gets Me Drunk on Mushrooms, But Not on Spice

  April 2, 2012

  Seattle Weekly

  Araya's Vegetarian Place Gets Me Drunk on Mushrooms, But Not on Spice

  
   
  By Jay Friedman Mon., Apr. 2 2012 at 8:00 AM
   
  Categories: The Mein Man
  
  

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  Dish: Drunken Mushrooms
  Place: Araya's Vegetarian Place, University District
  Price: $13.95
   
  On the plate: Per the menu: "Classic Thai spicy wide rice noodles stir-fried in garlic & chili with veggies beef, Portabello and other mushrooms." The other mushrooms are shiitake and white button mushrooms, and there's also red and green bell pepper, asparagus, and fried Thai basil.
  Supporting cast/What to do: You'll be asked how spicy you want the dish, but the dishes are less spicy than promised. This surprised me, since Araya's was features on Food Network's Heat Seekers as a "Thai restaurant with dishes that bring all comers to their knees." Be prepared, then, to request the special plate with spoons of spices so that you can raise the roof on the heat.
  
  Noodling around: Drunken mushrooms features one of my favorite noodles: wide rice noodles. They're fresh and essentially flash-cooked in the wok to warm them through, with their wideness keeping them a prominent part of the dish. Their size enables them to absorb flavors and carry the sauce--and they still have the chew that sometimes gets lost in thinner noodles.
  In this preparation, mushrooms are a key to the flavor. As Araya's is a vegetarian restaurant, recipes are non-dairy, non-egg, and non-fish sauce. Mushroom sauce substitutes for fish sauce, though this dish also uses sweet soy sauce to impart flavor. Fried Thai basil is nice touch, adding both flavor and texture. And it's nicely plated, with asparagus artfully arranged.
  I was told that "veggies beef" is, as you may have guessed, "fake veggie meat." I've never been a big fan of just throwing this in a dish, but understand if it's a protein source and an alternative texture.
  My only disappointment, as mentioned above, was the spice level. "Mortar-and-pestled" chili peppers (and garlic) should have provided powerful heat, as shown in the Heat Seekers segment. I much prefer to have the chilis cooked into the dish than having to add it in myself--especially if I've requested a high spice level.
  If you want more: There are many appetizers, but especially if you have company, I recommend the avocado curry ($13.95). I cook a lot of Thai curry, but this is the first time I've had it with avocado--and I was pleasantly surprised how well it worked in the dish. This is a green curry, in which you'll find both soft and fried tofu, more of that veggie beef, bell peppers, Thai basil, and something called "bean composition," which is apparently made from variations of soy bean.
  Be aware/beware: I ended up here after trying to get into OK Noodles, which was surprisingly closed on a Friday night. (Many others encountered a closed restaurant recently, but it's reopened with new owners, and I featured it in last week's Mein Man.) So, for those wondering, this is how I found myself in a vegetarian restaurant. I was skeptical at first, but ultimately pleased with the quality and creativity. Araya's has a way with cooking vegetables. Now, if they'd just boost those spice levels...
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• Araya’s Vegetarian Place Now Open in Bellevue

  May 10, 2012

  Downtown Bellevue Network

  Araya’s Vegetarian Place Now Open in Bellevue

  
  It has only been a few weeks since the Greek restaurant Orexi has gone out of business (http://www.downtownbellevue.com/2012/04/11/orexi-greek-restaurant-bellevue-way-out-of-business/) and the landlord has wasted no time replacing the tenant.  Taking its place is Araya’s Place, a Thai Vegan restaurant. It is their second location in the area; their original location is on in the University District on 45th Ave, which has been open for 26 years.
  Araya’s has been looking to expand in Bellevue for over a year. The reason they wanted to expand to Bellevue was due to many of their customers living on the Eastside. This is the first strictly vegan restaurant in Downtown Bellevue. To celebrate their grand opening for the entire month of May they are offering a 10% off to customers.
  The menu features many dishes with noodles, rice, and curry.  Many of these dishes often include some of their popular ingredients such as tofu, banana, pineapple, mushrooms, and more. One of their most popular items on the menu is “Drunken Mushroom” that features wide rice noodles that are stir-fried in garlic, chili, and of course mushrooms.
  During a trip to the restaurant this week the staff was very attentive and friendly.
  You can view their menu online at their website (http://arayasplace.com/).
  Araya’s Vegetarian Place
  http://arayasplace.com/
  31 Bellevue Way NE
  Bellevue WA 98004
  425-453-1366
  It has only been a few weeks since the Greek restaurant Orexi went out of business, but the landlord has wasted no time replacing the tenant.  Taking Orexi’s place is Araya’s Vegetarian Place, a Thai Vegan restaurant. It is their 2nd location in the area; their original location is in the University District on 45th Ave and has been open for 26 years.
  Araya’s has been looking to expand in Bellevue for over a year. The reason they wanted to expand to Bellevue was due to many of their Seattle customers living on the Eastside. This is the 1st strictly vegan restaurant in Downtown Bellevue. To celebrate their grand opening, for the entire month of May they are offering a 10% off to customers.
  The menu features many dishes with noodles, rice, and curry.  Many of these dishes often include some of their popular ingredients such as tofu, banana, pineapple, mushrooms, and more. One of their most popular items on the menu is the ‘Drunken Mushroom’ that features wide rice noodles stir-fried in garlic and chili, mixed in with a variety of flavorful mushrooms. The dish is famous because it was featured on Food Network!
  During a trip to the restaurant this week, the staff was very attentive and friendly.
  You can view their menu online at their website.
  Araya’s Vegetarian Place
  http://arayasplace.com/
  31 Bellevue Way NE
  Bellevue WA 98004
  425-453-1366

• The hottest eats to set your mouth on fire

  July 27, 2011

  King 5, New Day Show

• Araya's Tom Yum spices the town, Heat Seekers come to prove it!

  August 11, 2011

  Heat Seekers : Food Network / Seattle

• A Bloodless Coup: Two of Seattle's FUBU Vegetarian All-Stars

  June 2, 2009

  The Stranger

  For that fabled special meal, vegetarians could hardly do better
  than Araya's Vegetarian Place (1121 NE 45th St, 524-4332), a
  University District mainstay I'd heretofore stupidly ignored. Plunked
  down on 45th Street within spitting distance of the Ave, Araya's was, I
  assumed, a collegiate vegetarian restaurant, and visions of
  kaffiyeh-clad undergrads and PETA-inspired poetry readings kept me
  away. My punishment for this idiotic assumption: a life devoid of
  Araya's for years—regrettable, regrettable years.
  Araya's hypes itself as "vegan Thai cuisine," which seems
  restrictive until you realize that the difference between vegetarian
  and vegan Thai cuisine is egg on your pad thai. Araya's comes off as
  another good-to-great Seattle Thai restaurant, with special attention
  paid to vegetables and tofu/meat substitutes. In other words, it's Thai
  veggie heaven, with the heavenliness extending to the dining room:
  surprisingly large, well appointed, and both vast and cozy (a nice
  trick). Service is attentive but never overbearing, encouraging the
  sort of languorous multicourse meal Araya's extensive menu makes
  glamorously possible.

  We started with a pair of appetizers that would've sufficed as a
  meal. The spring rolls ($6.50 for six—six!) were exemplars of the
  form (thin deep-fried crispiness surrounding a fresh veggie jumble),
  but all thunder was stolen by the vegetable tempura ($9.50), a platter
  of oh-so-lightly battered-and-fried fresh veggies (red peppers,
  zucchini, broccoli, onion) that thrilled my vacationing-carnivore
  dining mate and me equally. There's simply no arguing with a good fresh
  red pepper, and adding tempura to the equation takes things to an
  almost pornographically delicious level.
  After such pleasing openers, our entrées were perhaps doomed
  to disappoint. Only one did. My pad phirk khing ($8.50) boasted an
  attractive aroma and a sprinkling of finely cut lime leaves, but
  problems arose with another primary component—the fake meat, here
  billed as "bean composition" (yum!) and formed into knotted chunks that
  required aggressive chewing. Not helping: the sauce-soaked green beans,
  which were distressingly bland. But happiness came rushing back with my
  dining mate's pad thai ($7.95), a straight-up meat-free spin on the
  classic tamarind-kissed noodles, delightfully spiced, with nice-size
  chunks of stir-fried tofu. When I order this pad thai again (and I
  will), I'll request the addition of broccoli and zucchini. But such a
  request may be a ways off, as working my way through Araya's voluminous
  menu could take years—glorious, glorious years.

  Full Article »

• Araya's Vegetarian Place: Vegan for Everybody

  June 2, 2009

  The Stranger

  Araya's, a vegan Thai restaurant, is just the kind of peaceable kingdom
  you'd expect it to be (queendom actually, since like many Thai chefs,
  Araya Pudpard is a woman). It's got golden walls, potted plants, a
  blue-sky-painted ceiling, quilted wall hangings, and dancing
  sculptures. The air is heated to near steaminess, and there's a high
  dreadlock count among the diners. But there are also a couple of Middle
  American parents eating happily with--one can only imagine--their newly
  radicalized college-aged kids. And that's the good thing about Thai
  food: You can easily go vegetarian, or vegan for that matter, in mixed
  company.

  Normally, when I cook a vegan meal, I end up going the Mediterranean
  way, using olive, walnut, or pumpkinseed oil here and there to add
  flavor that might otherwise come from meat, butter, or cheese. The
  beauty of a Thai meal is that the shift to vegan is almost
  unnoticeable. Thai cooking oils are vegetable-based, and the food gets
  its complex flavors from non-animal sources: coconut, coriander,
  galangal, chilies, and kaffir lime. Besides, most of the meat in Thai
  food, at least as it's cooked in American restaurants, is vestigial
  anyway. I often order my curries and noodles with eggplant or tofu
  rather than chewy, overcooked shreds of pork or chicken. The only
  really characteristic Thai flavor that isn't vegan is fishy--most
  notably, the funky back note of fish sauce or nam pla. At Araya, they
  use thin soy sauce to simulate nam pla's fermented depth.

  Vegetarian diners get accustomed to having only a choice or two on
  menus, but Araya's menu stretches on and on, entirely skipping the
  standard portobello mushroom "steak." In among the canonical Thai
  options--spicy coconut-milk soup, panang curry, Bathing Rama--are
  offbeat curries that skew toward the sweet: avocado, pineapple, and a
  vast, red pumpkin curry ($12.95) that's filled with smooth hunks of
  squash, crisp slices of broccoli and bamboo, and several forms of soy,
  including a kind of soy bologna and a chewier "bean composition."
  Vegetable cakes (like Asian knishes made of rice paste and stuffed with
  tasty Chinese leeks) are both pleasant and ponderous ($6.95). Rad na,
  made with the fat noodles I often prefer to rice sticks in pad thai, is
  bathed in a thin soy gravy, pleasant and messy to slurp up, with plenty
  of vegetables to crunch into--broccoli, carrots, and cabbage, for the
  most part ($6.95). The broccoli is a regular supporting player in
  Araya's food, popping up in so many curries and noodle dishes that I
  think it's acting as a signifier of vegetarianness. The pastel cover
  illustration of the first Moosewood cookbook, The Enchanted Broccoli Forest, kept popping into my head.

  Much to its credit, and like many other U-District restaurants, Araya's
  also has a cheap lunch buffet ($5.99). As a kid, my parents would only
  take my siblings and me to restaurants with endless salad bars and
  endless steam tables. The abundance on display at the local Coco's was
  thrilling to a little girl with wide eyes and a big belly, and I still
  get a little all-you-can-eat thrill each time I grab an empty plate and
  start spooning away. Araya's buffet starts with a salad bar--a sesame'd
  spinach salad and sweet marinated cucumbers--and then offers soup and
  egg rolls with peanut sauce. It's the hot table, though, where you can
  really store up for the day on dishes like a low-key pad thai,
  vegetable fried rice, and a gentle green vegetable curry. Of course,
  there's more broccoli in everything.

  Sweet and broccoli-heavy as it can be, the food at Araya's, much like
  early Moosewood, has a kind of homespun wholesomeness that seems like
  good medicine this time of year. Unlike Moosewood, however, there's no
  cheese.

  Full Article »