Hot or Not Thai\u2019s name implies what you\u2019ll get there: Food with unique blends of herbs and spices seasoned exactly to your taste.\u00a0
\nAsked what sets his eight-month-old Thai restaurant at 4965 Cass St. apart, Jim Brewster, the eatery\u2019s owner, replied: “Better recipes. Very authentic taste. Traditional Thai.”
\nAnd that\u2019s exactly what you\u2019ll find on Hot or Not\u2019s lunch and dinner menus, which feature an array of curries, noodle dishes, rice and rice sides, salads and entrees served with steamed rice like kra prao, ginger and cashew chicken, mixed vegetables ad shrimp with asparagus.
\nBrewster proudly notes that his restaurant often draws comments like, “Best Thai food I\u2019ve ever had,” in online reviews. He added another secret to his success is freshening up his tasty Thai recipes by adding new and unusual menu options. He gave an example.
\n“One of my partners wanted to add seafood,”said Brewster to which he suggested, \u2018How about salmon?\u2019 But they don\u2019t have salmon, a freshwater fish, in Thailand,” replied his business partner.
\n“So I said,\u2019How about kra prao salmon?\u2019 And his eyes lit up and he said, \u2018Yeah, that would work.\u2019”
\nAnd that set a new standard for Hot or Not in “maybe putting some [menu items] in there, that would ordinarily not be in there,” said Brewster.
\nThat willingness to experiment blending traditional and non-traditional ingredients is reflected in such dishes as choo chee prawns, Thai baby back ribs and crying tiger steak.
\nBrewster previously owned a Thai restaurant for a decade in the Long Beach area, adding he came to San Diego because he liked the area and “wanted to do something more coastal. We really wanted something closer to the coast.”
\nThe retail space inhabited by Hot or Not was formerly a juice bar serving the gym next door, which is now PB Fitness.
\nThere is only one dessert on the Hot or Not menu, and it\u2019s a crowd-pleaser: mango with homemade sweet sticky rice. Brewster said much of the food he serves is gluten-free. Beverages served, which include Thai iced tea and coffee, hibiscus and hot jasmine, ginger or green tea, also have a tropical flair.
\nBrewster said his cook, JJ Derngjabok, a Thai native, come from a part of that country known for its flavorful food.
\nHot or Not prides itself on customizing its dishes. “It\u2019s not coming out of warmer already made, we make it from scratch,” said Brewster.
\nThe eatery has seating inside and out. Customers may also order online at Hot or Not, and take out and deliveries are done through Grubhub.\u00a0
\n“We do a surprisingly high volume of take out,” noted Brewster. “Sometimes we\u2019ll fill up the dining room, but even when we do, there are take out deliveries on top of that.”
\nAsked if he liked being a restaurateur, Brewster replied, “It\u2019s great, never a dull moment. I like very much interacting with the diners.” Hot or Not Thai
\n4965 Cass St.
\n619-369-1688
\nhotornotthai.com<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hot or Not Thai\u2019s name implies what you\u2019ll get there: Food with unique blends of herbs and spices seasoned exactly to your taste.\u00a0 Asked what sets his eight-month-old Thai restaurant at 4965 Cass St. apart, Jim Brewster, the eatery\u2019s owner, replied: “Better recipes. Very authentic taste. Traditional Thai.” And that\u2019s exactly what you\u2019ll find on […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":270084,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11559","_seopress_titles_title":"Hot or Not Thai offers authentic flavors in Pacific Beach","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11559,11551],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-270083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beach-bay-press","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}