Locally owned restaurant serves authentic Thai cuisine

[caption id=”attachment_2891" align=”alignleft” width=”300" caption=”Siri’s chicken ginger, topped with mushrooms and ginger sauce. Photo by Mary Tablante”]

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From the outside, Siri’s Chef’s Secret does not look like a place for romantic dinners or birthday celebrations. But luckily, it is the inside that matters.

The interior of the restaurant, which specializes in Thai and American cuisine, creates a calming ambience. It is adorned with decorations from Thailand and is coupled with soft classical music in a dimly lit atmosphere.

The Thai menu includes entrees such as crispy duckling, a cherry roasted duck with pineapples, cherry tomatoes and cucumbers in pineapple sauce and Siri’s chicken ginger, grilled chicken breast topped with sautéed mushrooms and ginger sauce.

The American menu offers entrees like baby back ribs, salmon fillet and fish and chips, as well as a selection of vegetarian dishes.

Located in Greenbelt, Md., on Greenbelt Road, the locally owned Siri’s Chef’s Secret, which has been opened for more than 30 years, stands out among the several chain restaurants surrounding it, including Boston Market, Checkers and KFC.

Siri and Sutti Chai are a husband-and-wife team who manage the restaurant. Siri’s mother and aunt, who handed down the recipes, inspired the food and Sutti worked on the design and restaurant decoration and presentation of the restaurant’s dishes.

Waiter Benz Makung said the restaurant benefits from being family-oriented. He said the restaurant has a good amount of regular customers, and the servers have many of their customers’ orders memorized. Makung also acknowledged the authenticity of the Thai dishes.

“Since I’m Thai, it’s my food, and -it’s easy for me to eat. I enjoy it a lot,” Makung said.

Makung, who has worked at the restaurant for five years, said his favorite foods at the restaurant are pad thai and the drunken noodles. Pad thai, the most famous Thai dish outside of Thailand, consists of stir fried rice noodles with bean sprouts, eggs, crushed peanuts, scallions and tofu with a choice of shrimp, chicken or beef.

The drunken noodles can be paired with either chicken or beef, and are fresh noodles coated in Thai chili, tomatoes and basil leaves.

Makung added that what makes the restaurant unique is their friendly attention to customers, their decorations and being one of the few Thai restaurants in the surrounding area.

University alumnae Jeanine Reyes finds the atmosphere of the restaurant unique.

“I went there for my birthday, and instead of singing to you, they play you ‘Happy Birthday’ on a wooden flute, which I thought was cool,” she said. She added that although she does not know much about authentic Thai food, her favorite Thai food at Siri’s Chef’s Secret is the red curry and the mango sweet sticky rice.

“My only complaint is that I wish it was cheaper, because then I would go more often,” Reyes added.

Prices of entrees range from $9 to around $20. The restaurant also offers a small selection of desserts, which all cost $5.

Sameer Malla, a junior geography and meteorology major, said he had never heard of Siri’s Chef’s Secret but would be interested in going if he were with a group of friends. He also liked the fact that it is independently owned and added that chain restaurants are more about quantity than quality.

“The chain restaurants all have the same ingredients and products and cook or fry them the same way in the quickest way possible,” Malla said. “Independently owned restaurants put their own kick in their foods and prepare them in their own unique, time-consuming way.”

Siri’s Chef’s Secret is open for lunch Monday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., and for dinner Sunday through Thursday from 5 to 9 p.m. Dinner is offered from 5 to 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.

For more info, visit sirichef.com.