Basil Canteen
Neighborhood: SOMA
1489 Folsom St(between 11th St & Juniper St)
San Francisco, CA 94103
Basil restaurant just opened it's second restaurant, also on Folsom. Basil Canteen is located where the Public restaurant used to be and is it's a terrific loft space. There are big shared tables and also small intimate tables, whatever is your choice. Both are good experiences. The staff are super friendly and very knowlegable of the food - and, it's a good thing because I am not so familiar with traditional Thai dishes. We started with the Mian Kum, $7, which is fresh cut mustard leaves topped with diced shrimp, roasted coconut, pomelo, peanuts, ginger and shallots. This was so fresh and unique! We took a chance on the Aor Suan, $10, because it sounded so unusual. It was an omelette, loosely, of fresh oysters, beansprouts, and scallions served with a sweet and spicy Sriracha sauce. It was fabulous, spicy and no where near anything I have ever tasted before. We then had something a little more familiar: Pla Pao, $7, which is charcoal grilled wild caught fish on bamboo skewers served with a Thai chili-lime sauce. It was perfectly cooked and again, nice and spicy! We ordered Pla Sahm Rot, $13, which is a traditional dish that comes with rice. It is a pan-roasted rock cod fillet with a Thai three-flavored sauce. The sauce was very tasty and I would eat it on anything.
