Neighborhood Gems: Yummy Thai and Laotian at Padaek Arlington Ridge!

Welcome to our NEIGHBORHOOD GEMS series featuring emblematic meals from around the world. This series shines a light on local restaurants and is designed to bring together inquisitive foodies and dishes that are unique and oh so worth a trip on roads less traveled!

Join us for a memorable evening at two time James Beard nominee chef Seng Luangrath’s Padaek Arlington Ridge!

Arlington Magazine:

I’m in heaven slurping chef Seng Luangrath’s longevity noodles in garlic-butter sauce, twirled up on my fork with bits of Chinese celery, shiitake mushrooms, cured egg yolk and lump crabmeat. Sweet, rich, peppery and slightly funky from padaek—the heady Lao fish sauce after which her restaurant is named—the dish is both balanced and an escapade of luxuriance.

“I based it on this buttery crab noodle dish I had at Crustacean [restaurant] in Beverly Hills and Chinese mee sua noodles, which a Chinese immigrant brought to Bangkok, according to my research,” the chef explains. “I made it Lao with padaek. That’s the foundation of Lao cooking and where most of its umami comes from.”

Over the years, Luangrath, 55, has become the leader of a veritable Lao food movement in the greater D.C. area. Born in Vientiane, Laos, she fled that country’s political turmoil in 1981 with her mother, two brothers and uncle, winding up in a Thai refugee camp for two years before an American family sponsored their immigration to Berkeley, California.

Luangrath’s marriage to Boun Khammanivanh brought her to Springfield, Virginia, in 1989. Having learned cooking from her grandmother and from people of multiple backgrounds at the refugee camp, she started catering for Northern Virginia’s Lao community. In 2010, she took over Bangkok Golden Thai restaurant in Falls Church, adding Lao dishes to the menu and later changing its name to Padaek.

After debuting her acclaimed Thip Khao in D.C.’s Columbia Heights neighborhood in 2014, she introduced a small plates and cocktail joint, Hanumanh, that reopened as a Southeast Asian eatery called Baan Mae (which translates as “Mom’s house” in Lao). Thip Kao is the first Lao restaurant to garner a Michelin Bib Gourmand designation. Luangrath has twice been nominated for a James Beard award.

At Padaek’s Arlington Ridge outpost, which opened in March 2023, the chef has expanded the concept to include other Southeast Asian cuisines, including Vietnamese and Burmese.

Designed by D.C.-based Natalie Park Design Studio, the interiors are accented with rattan pendants, patterned tile work, woven cane partitions and colorful paintings by Richmond artist Gianna Marie Boccuzzi Salvi.

“I love supporting local artists,” says Luangrath. “The art reflects my vision. Palm trees, elephants, banana leaves, tropical plants and birds represent where I grew up and memories from the refugee camp.”

Working alongside Burmese chef de cuisine Nyi Nyi Myint, Luangrath turns out some of the finest Southeast Asian food in the DMV. The presentations are visually stunning and the cooking fires on all cylinders: spicy, herbal, funky and sour. The kanoom jeeb—plump chicken and shrimp dumplings sprinkled with fried garlic and served with a peppery soy dipping sauce—are so flavorful that others I’ve had elsewhere seem drab by comparison.

Luangrath is known for the superiority of her laab, and the duck version at Padaek, adorned with watermelon radish and cucumber, is a knockout. For this dish, the chef dresses roasted duck meat and skin with fish sauce, toasted rice powder, chilies, lime juice, lemongrass, galangal and tons of chopped mint and cilantro to create a sensory explosion. (She used to add duck livers, but Americans disliked it, so she stopped.)

Also magnificent is siin savanh—strips of beef marinated in ginger, garlic, lemongrass, sesame seeds and fish sauce, which are deep-fried into tender, caramelized jerky and served with hot sauce. Resisting the temptation to polish off an entire order is futile.

For the dressing base of her invigorating green papaya salad, Luangrath brews unfiltered fermented fish sauce overnight with shrimp paste, fermented crab paste and palm sugar and lets it sit out for a day before filtering it.

“My team hates it because it’s so stinky,” she says, chuckling. “We have to leave the fan on overnight. It’s a real process.” Diners benefit from its umami dividends.

Stews are also a good bet at Padaek. Aom, an herbal stew whose base ingredients include chilies, lemongrass, galangal, lime leaves and glutinous rice, is loaded with green eggplant, wood ear mushrooms and dill. The flavors are reminiscent of Thai red curry, but without coconut milk. Customers can add the protein of their choosing—chicken, pork, tofu or beef brisket.

Chef Myint’s hearty, gingery gaeng hang lay, a Northern Thai and Burmese pork belly stew, also gets a thumbs-up.

Offerings unique to the Arlington Ridge location are found on the menu under Chef’s Recommendations and Daily Specials. There you’ll find delicate strips of batter-fried Chesapeake catfish atop sweet-and-sour tamarind sauce, and a whole poussin (spring chicken) marinated in lemongrass, ginger, fish sauce and oyster sauce and grilled to moist succulence. The latter comes with coconut sticky rice, but that didn’t stop me from also ordering the divine fried rice packed with lump crabmeat.

Padaek serves only one dessert and it’s a stunner: warm black sesame and coconut sticky rice topped with a gelato that Dolcezza created exclusively for Luangrath in a flavor reminiscent of her favorite Thai chewy milk candy. Surrounded by fresh mango and topped with crunchy fried mung beans, this sumptuous coda is a fitting send-off after a superlative meal.

Check out the menu here

Separate checks will be arranged in advance. All diners will settle their own tabs.

We ask that ALL folks honor their RSVP. If you are unable to attend after sending in a YES, please update your status so that others may join and help us support local businesses. In the event our group incurs a fee for no-shows / late cancellations, your ability to RSVP for future events will be restricted. Thank you in advance for your understanding.

To enhance the opportunity for great conversation, we will continue to limit the group size. Please feel free to sign-up to meet us along with up to 3 friends.

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In the future, we will vary the days of the week and the types of restaurants to keep events interesting.

PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU ARE COMMITTED TO GO WHEN YOU RSVP FOR THIS EVENT. Feel free to make suggestions for future meet locations.

** The small non-refundable registration fee helps us share the cost associated with the Meet-Up platform ($360/yr) and reduces the likelihood of no-shows, allowing us to better plan our events and accommodate all participants. Meetup charges $0.51 and Paypal charges $0.53 on the $2 registration fee. Thanks in advance for your understanding!**

If you are unable to join us in December, we hope you'll stay interested and join us for a meal in the future. Looking forward to catching up with you for Yummy Thai and Laotian dinner at Padaek Arlington Ridge!