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Jasmine Thai is but one of the many Thai restaurants to have sprouted in the Medical Center area. Unlike some of its compatriots, however, Jasmine offers a cuisine that's both sweeter and mellower than the norm; the characteristic yin-yang of spicy and citrus doesn't play as big a role. Summer rolls are pretty standard, with generous chunks of shrimp sharing space inside the translucent wrapper with shredded vegetables and rice noodles; fish cakes, spiked with ginger, are flavorful and only marginally chewy; and the Jasmine noodle soup is the Platonic poster child for putting everything in the kitchen into a single pot---with amazingly good results. Doctors in scrubs join civilians in savoring the exceptional green mango salad---and the adventurous among them go for the added, dried shrimp. Gang keowan, a spicy green curry with chicken, is almost like a New England chowder---just a little more exotically flavored with coconut milk. Coconut milk is the obvious base of the house-made coconut ice cream; you have to have it. And in season, fresh mango with sticky rice manages to seem both virtuous and excessive all at once. |
