Elephants and Crying Tigers

You don’t need chopsticks--or to eat the rice first--to enjoy Thai cuisine.

“Remember that Thai restaurant that lost the elephant?” Jan says. “They have cooking classes Monday nights. I should go.”

I am not thinking of the cooking classes just yet. I’m thinking of the lost elephant. “There was a restaurant that lost an elephant?”

“Not a real elephant. A wooden one. Teak. It was stolen. From in front of the restaurant.”

“Who stole it?”

“I don’t know,” she says. “A couple of guys, I think. What do you think about the cooking classes?”

“Did they get it back?”

Jan takes a deep breath. “I think they found it buried on the beach or something. But it’s there. Or, at least, an elephant is there. I think of it every time we drive past that restaurant.”

After more discussion, it is decided that since we have never been to this Thai restaurant, which, as it turns out, is named Royal Thai, perhaps we should eat there before Jan takes cooking lessons. What’s the point, after all, of being taught how to cook Thai food if the food isn’t any good to begin with?

We pull up in front of the restaurant and the first thing I see getting out of the car is a wooden pachyderm about five 5 feet tall. “Is that the same one that was stolen?” I ask the young valet. He looks puzzled by my question.

“What was stolen?”

“The elephant.”

“When was it stolen?”

“I don’t know. A few years ago.”

“Huh,” he says, driving off with my car.

It is cool and serene inside. Restful. Green walls and green carpeting and single stems of purple orchids on each table. A woman in a royal-purple uniform seats us next to two sunburned men wearing wet shorts and Hawaiian shirts. One of the men wears a baseball cap over his bald head. The other looks a bit like Elton John with a bad toupee.

Elton is leaning back in his chair and holding the menu with one hand. He tells his companion, who seems a bit perplexed by the dishes, that he’ll “interpret” for him, though the entire menu is in English and the dishes are clearly explained.

“What the heck is kang quah?” asks the bald man.

“It’s a sweet red curry,” says Elton, reading from the menu. “They serve it in a pineapple boat.”

“I don’t like curry.”

“Then let’s not get curry. How about soup? You like soup?” Elton asks.

“I’m not into soup,” says the man, taking off his cap, running his hand over his sunburned head, then replacing the hat. “But I like rice.” He digs into his pocket, finds his cell phone and starts punching numbers.

“I’ll order for us,” Elton says. “I can get us out of here for 12 bucks.”

When the young woman in the purple uniform comes over, Elton orders paht thai and chicken satay. “And rice.” He is told that rice comes with the dinners. “Yeah, but can you bring the rice out first? With two waters.”

“You want the rice before your dinner?”

“Right,” Elton says. When the server leaves, Elton tells his companion, who is finished with his phone call, that that’s the way they do it in Thailand. “You always eat your rice first,” he says, scratching at his bare leg, which is as red as a chile.

Jan has been so fascinated by this conversation that she hasn’t really had time to look at the menu, though I’m ready to order. “Know what you want yet?” I ask her.

“No. But let’s order some rice while we figure it out.”

“Very funny,” I say. “What sort of dishes do they teach you to cook in the cooking classes?”

She digs around in her purse for a folded piece of blue paper. “Let’s see. Naked shrimp, Crying Tiger. Stuff like that.”

“I love that,” I tell her.

“What?”

“The names. Why doesn’t McDonald’s do that? Don’t you think ‘Crying Cow’ sounds better than Big Mac?”

“Nobody would order a ‘Crying Cow’ and fries,” she says. “Nobody.”

We order several of the dishes taught in the cooking classes, including the naked shrimp and mee krob, rice noodles with chicken and bean sprouts in a tamarind-flavored sauce. When the server brings out a bowl of rice for Elton and the bald-headed man, they ask for chopsticks.

“You want chopsticks for the rice?”

“Absolutely,” Elton says.

Jan rolls her eyes and whispers across the table to me. “They don’t use chopsticks in Thailand.”

“Oh, and I suppose they don’t eat their rice first either?”

She rolls her eyes again.

A large group of seniors, looking casual but elegant in stiff khaki pants or floral dresses, is standing around the hostess table waiting to be seated. A small, baby-faced man strides out of the kitchen and welcomes them, shaking all of their hands.

“That’s Sammy,” Jan says.

“Who’s Sammy?”

“The owner. He teaches the cooking classes.”

“How do you know Sammy?”

Jan shrugs. “I’m just guessing,” she says, dipping her naked shrimp into a pale pink sauce. “I wonder if they teach us how to make this sauce. It’s yummy.”

“Why don’t you go ask Sammy?”

The mee krob is delicious, even without chopsticks, and the chicken curry hot and spicy, but not too hot and spicy.

“I could eat this stuff every night,” Jan says.

“Maybe we will if you take the cooking classes.”

“We should go to Thailand this fall,” she says.

“Why don’t you take the cooking classes first?”

Jan shrugs. “I don’t cook,” she says.

“I know. But maybe if you took cooking classes, you would.”

I give her a big smile.

Meanwhile, Elton and the bald man have finished their dinners. Their paper tablecloth is soiled with blots of brown sauce, bean sprouts and clumps of white rice. Elton is looking at the bill. “You got some quarters?” he asks the bald man.

“How many you need?”

“Two, three if you want to leave a tip.”

The bald man empties a pocket and counts out the change. “Here,” he says, handing Elton a fistful of coins. “Leave her a buck.”

“Good,” says Elton, who drops the change on top of some watery bills. “She was a nice waitress.”

As they walk out the door, Jan says, “I’ll bet they took it.”

“Took what?”

“The elephant.” Then she gets up, goes over to their table, takes a five from her wallet and adds it to the mound of coins.

When she comes back to our table she says, “You don’t eat the rice first.” I nod.

Then she smiles at me. “I’m definitely taking the cooking classes.” She gets up to find Sammy. I sit at the table alone, eating coconut ice cream, imagining dinners of naked shrimp and Crying Tiger every night.

Lunch daily, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.; dinner Sunday-Thursday, 5-10 p.m.; Friday-Saturday, 5-11 p.m.

David Lansing’s column is published on Fridays in Orange County Calendar. His e-mail address is occalendar@latimes.com.