Ling & Louie's Asian bar and grill

Tag : Thai Chili Sauce

At Ling & Louie's Asian Bar and Grill, you won't have to pluckkaffir lime leaves out of the Tom kha gai before you eat it.

The food at this Scottsdale lunch and dinner spot is anunitimidating take on several Asian cuisines, including Thai andJapanese. In many ways, it might remind you of a full-serviceversion of Pei Wei, the fast-casual offshoot of P.F. Chang's.

Ling & Louie's is meant to feel like a Asian pub, with brick walls throughout the restaurant and bar, exposed ceilings and neon beersigns. Paper menus are also placemats, and food comes out in whitebowls and square plates.

The concept comes from the same owners as the former Thaifoon, aslightly more upscale restaurant that operated in Scottsdale.

To its credit, Ling & Louie's knows where it falls on the scale ofauthenticity. So, rather than take itself too seriously, it had funAmericanizing its cuisine, even putting meatloaf with an Asianmakeover on the broad menu.

We're not sure which culinary region of Asia claims the JeweledBeef ($12.99), but it should be proud. A spicy sauce coated a bigbowl of skinny, squiggly egg noodles, chunks of filet mignon, sugarsnap peas and mushrooms. A little flame icon next to the dish'sname promised a kick. It was addictively and awesomely spicy, thekind of hot that makes you suck in air to try to cool off yourmouth.

The majority of our table put out the fire with fresh limeade($2.49). Our waitress brought carafes of this tart drink to ourtable, which was a much-appreciated gesture since specialty drinksaren't typically refilled for free at restaurants.

The filet mignon was again a superstar in the Sizzling Surf andTurf ($14.50). Tender and perfectly pink in the center, the chunksof lean meat gave an upscale feel to the dish, which also hadshrimp, asparagus, mushrooms, onions and Thai basil in a thick,salty brown sauce.

The New Wave Pad Thai ($11.99) and the Red Palace Potstickers($7.99) made everyone happy, even if neither dish wasgroundbreaking.

Everyone went back for seconds of pad thai, the iconic rice noodledish with shrimp, chicken, veggies and chopped peanuts. And the sixpan-fried dumplings filled with a pork mix went fast, too.