Thai in the Heartland

Last month I visited Fayetteville, AR for a short business trip and enjoyed the atmosphere of a place new to me. The first night we arrived, we were given an enthusiastic recommendation of "A Taste of Thai" from the hotel staff. They weren't the only ones who knew about this place as we found that we had a short wait to secure seats.

We started with a cup of the House Vegetable soup which contained chopped small zucchini, cabbage. cauliflower, and celery with clear vegetable broth. I always have a small fear that these type of vegetarian soups will be thin and watery, and was pleased to find this one was light and flavorful.

We then had some Poh Pia Tod, which is Thai Spring Rolls. The rolls were filled with clear noodles and mixed vegetables, deep fried and served with sweet and sour sauce with ground peanuts. These came to the table piping hot and were quite a tasty treat.

I tried the Pad Woon Sen Tofu as my main dish which is stir fried crystal bean noodles with fried tofu, black mushrooms, bamboo shoots, cabbage, carrots, celery and green onion. I really enjoyed this light, yet filling dish.

An eggplant fan, Michael tried the Ma Kur Yao. This dish featured sliced eggplant sauteed with tofu, garlic and basil. Although he didn't feel it deserved superlatives, it was a solidly good dish.

We enjoyed our time and the friendly service, and no doubt we'll visit this place again and try out more of their extensive vegetarian choices on a future trip to Fayetteville.

Lights of the Ozarks

Zoomie asked me to say more about Arkansas. I arrived one evening, conducted some business, and left in the afternoon the next day so my exposure was brief. The evening we arrived, we had dinner at a restaurant near "The Square" in Fayetteville. The Square enthralled us with its Christmas finery -- the entire area was decked out with lights and Christmas displays, and there were Christmas carols playing from speakers in the night air.

Fayetteville is home of the University of Arkansas, and there are Razorback mascot images everywhere! I didn't take a snap though.

Fayetteville is also known as the "Track Capital of the World" because of the numerous awards won by the University of Arkansas track team.

Everyone I ran into was charming and helpful. That certainly put a shine on the already positive experiences there.

My business took me to the RFID Research Center of the University of Arkansas. It was quite an amazing place, and this gadget-girl really enjoyed the tour after the business aspects were done. There were amazing applications of this technology demonstrated in several areas of a very large laboratory. Imagine taking a dress into the dressing room where there was an interactive screen where it 'knew' what you brought in and could suggest accessories, or you could press a button for someone to bring you a different size of the item(s) you had? Or a smart jewelry case that keeps a constant, automated inventory and locks things up tight at the end of the day?

The countryside on the way to and from Northwest Arkansas Airport, when out of the city, did look like yesterday's photo with gentle rolling hills, lots of grass and winter-scene bare trees.

I was charmed by it and thought it would be a interesting place to explore if you like peaceful prairie environments. My intuition tells me that the quality of life here is pretty high. I look forward to returning there.

Arkansas

Yes, I've been out of town again, and quite busy leading up to the trip. This visit was to Fayetteville, Arkansas and the above photo is typical of the surrounding area that I visited. I saw some unique things like a drive through liquor store, with pick ups lined up (in 21F weather!) for a cold beer through the drive in window! Wish I got a photo of that, and I'll remember the mental picture for a long time. There were lots of BBQ places, and the typical national chains along with a selection of ethnic and deliciously unique places. I'll be blogging a little more about the food and sights in future posts.