My life in noodles: Mexican Street Thai in Tulum

While Mexicans do enjoy pasta dishes like Fideos and Mexican Noodle Soup, my personal Mexican noodle adventure was born when, cycling through dusty downtown Tulum, my noodle radar alerted me to a heaping plate of delicious looking Pad Thai at an outdoor cafe. It had a wonderful, rich, color and wasn't at all what I was expecting to see on the streets of a small Yucutan city. While there are some very fancy Thai restaurants in Tulum near the seaside, the sleepy town itself has only a couple of Asian restaurants, most of which look like seedy NYC take out joints. After doing a double take, I circled back and decided it was time to try something exotic.


The aptly named "Thai Restaurant" in Tulum

Obviously I had to try the noodles, and I also decided to have some Tom Kha Coconut Curry soup and well as melon juice. The melon juice was amazing and fresh, and I got a whole liter of it for 40 pesos- or about three bucks. Unfortunately, it was the highlight of the meal..

Tom Kha Gai and wonderful melon Juice

The Tom Kha soup had some extremely fresh vegetables in it but the broth itself lacked depth of flavor and had very little heat. I didn't notice any lemongrass or galanga- which are possibly hard to come by in Tulum. It was fine though- I really wasn't expecting much. I was here for the noodles, and soon they arrived.

Beautiful looking Pad Thai

The color of the Pad Thai was a deep, rich, amber and the serving was abundant. I had been drawn to this dish, nearly yanked off my bike seat really, as a moth to the flame. Unfortunately, I was badly singed. Upon closer inspection, the noodles were kind of gloppy, slightly underdone and way too chew. These undercooked noodles seemed to be missing key ingredients, like egg, and they were swimming in a starchy, bland sauce. Sadly I only ate about a quarter of these pretty noodles.

Street noodles Mexican Style

The meal wasn't that cheap either- both the noodles and the soup were around $7 each-- I could have had 14 fresh Quesedillas for that amount-- or I probably could have had this meal in NYC, but I'm glad it was in Mexico... and I wasn't even sick! It's been a long "workcation" in Mexico and tomorrow I head back to NYC after 10 days here in Tulum. If you happen to make it to Tulum there is plenty of great food to be found, including the amazing and world renowned Hartwood . I've included a couple of bonus shots of a meal I had with some friends at Hartwood below.