Sun and Moon (San Francisco, CA) – When my team at work was looking for a lunch spot for us to celebrate new hires as a special hire, we came across Sun and Moon, a Thai restaurant that also features ramen. They had great classic Thai offerings along with fresh interpretations of dishes and had a a great selection of vegetarian dishes. So as we would pre-pandemic, we hopped on over to the restaurant to enjoy a nice lunch away from our office’s cafeteria and desks.
We arrived a little before noon, so the restaurant was pretty empty. This was great for me because I got a great photo of their mural on the wall! I liked how bright it was inside during lunch time and all of their pretty light fixtures. We were seated right away at one of those side tables against the window. Because we had a variety of different diets at our table (one of my co-workers is a vegetarian, I have several dietary restrictions, and we needed to factor in food allergies), so we made sure to order a variety dishes that would leave everyone satisfied and full.
The restaurant is named Sun and Moon to represent the different cushiness highlighted in their menu. The sun represents Japanese, known as the Land of the Rising Sun, and the Moon represents Thailand as it plays a significant role in Thai culture. Chef Tee takes inspiration from his favorite dishes in his hometown in central Thailand and also has a passion for Japanese ramen and puts his own spin on it They also source high quality seasonal produce and local Bay Area ingredients.
If there’s a fun non-alcoholic drink on the menu, I usually try to order it. When I’m a Thai restaurant, I occasionally order a Thai iced coffee or Thai iced tea. I was in the coffee mood so I ordered up one of their coffees. It was nice and refreshing – perfect for a pleasant day in SF. Thai iced coffee does tend to be a lot for me because it is strong – and this was no different. 😂 I still enjoyed it though!
As an appetizer, we ordered the fresh spring rolls with tofu and local vegetables wrapped in rice paper, topped with sesame seeds and served with their homemade peanut sauce.
I loved the presentation of this dish in this boat shaped dish! The bright, fresh vegetables made for a vibrant dish that you just had to do dig into. This was a great way to start our meal because it was light and fresh. I love the softness of spring roll wrappers paired with crunchy veggies.
We also ordered spicy snow peas to complement our meal. Though such a simple dish, the Thai spicy sauce the beans were mixed with really made them such a good treat! You could totally eat these with plain rice or a side of noodles and have a quick meal. It was very similar to spicy string beans that you can order at many Thai restaurants – which I often do!
We ate our meal family style and sampled all of our dishes like small plates, so we got to try a variety of dishes during our experience at Sun and Moon.
Pictured above is the Som Tum Going Salad, which is a shredded green papaya salad with tiger prawns, carrots, cherry tomatoes, crushed peanuts and served with spicy lime dressing. I think lime dressing is such a fun burst of freshness on salads, so I was immediately into this dish. There were a bunch of great elements here that paired well in each bite. There were fresh, crunchy elements from the vegetables, the kick from the dressing, and perfectly cooked prawns.
Onto some of our entrees! You always need a noodle dish when you get Thai food! We ordered the Pad See You (I think this is similar to Pad See Ew haha), with flat rice noodles that were stir-fried with egg with Asian broccoli and a choice of meat. We made our order vegetarian by adding tofu as our choice of protein. I personally love tofu and noodles so it’s a win for me! I’ve gone through phases with my noodle preferences, and right now I’ve landed on thinner noodles but I wouldn’t turn down flat noodles either. 😉 And pictured below is their Pad Thai with stir-fried noodles with egg, bean sprouts, chives, tofu, ground peanuts and your choice of meat, of which we chose tofu.
I also think a Thai curry is an essential dish to order when you order from a restaurant. I could eat rice and curry from a Thai place and be totally happy. I’ve had pumpkin curry before and this was my first time having it with a different kind of squash. This is their Kabocha Curry, which has kabocha squash, bell peppers, basil leaves, snow peas, and crispy yam in red curry sauce with your choice of meat and served with their special sun rice. Like a pumpkin curry, it has the sweetness of the squash which helps temper the spices in the dish. Thai curries just have so much flavor, I can’t get enough of them! The sun rice reminded me of a turmeric based rice where it had a light flavor but it didn’t overpower it.
This was the one meat dish we ordered, the Spicy basil chicken. It has stir-fried Thai basil, fresh Mexican chili, bell peppers, onion, garlic, and your choice of meat (it can be served with beef). This dish is served with rice, bone broth, and a fried egg on top. I avoided the egg in case it had a runny yolk, but the dish was great! Because it had ground meat, it felt like the middle ground of a larb dish and a basil chicken dish with chicken pieces.
With all of the food we ordered, my team was not planning to order dessert! In fact, there was no dessert item on their menu. The restaurant, which had fantastic service, ended up surprising us with this fantastic spread! It featured mango sticky rice in the coconut, green tea ice cream in the bread roll, and sliced fruits. Mango sticky rice is such a treat and I love mango anything. I also like matcha and green tea desserts, so the ice cream was a great way to balance the more sweet rice dish.
I will admit at first our team wasn’t familiar with the concept of putting your ice cream in a bread roll. We’re familiar with ice cream sandwiches of any kind, but this was a new dish for all of us. I’m not sure if this dish is prominent in broader Asia, but the Philippines serves ice cream in bun rolls! I’ll admit we didn’t eat it with the bread, but I likely would have if it was a sweet roll.
Overall, we had such a pleasant experience! Service was great and the food was absolutely delicious. I wish I’d been able to go more before the pandemic started to try their ramen. They had ramen lunch specials, but because we decided to go family style and Thai food is one of my favorites, I opted not to try it at that time.
With COVID regulations, they’re offering delivery and take out. As of this blog post, they’ve now resumed outdoor dining, so please be sure to support a local restaurant if you can!
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