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Very Best Restaurants: Duangrat's

Very Best Listing | Very Best by Cuisine | Very Best by Location

Duangrat's ***
Baileys Crossroads , $

Well-spaced tables, peach walls, and abstract paintings make for an appealing backdrop at this popular Thai restaurant. The many-paged menu includes rarely seen regional dishes like chili-stoked satoh shrimp as well as worthy renditions of Thai standards. Other offerings cooked in Thai style with native seasonings might fall under the heading of modern Thai cuisine. Salmon-and-ginger salad is a tasty example of this, but skip some of the pricier specials involving lobster, which are not worth their cost.

Start with open-faced shrimp dumplings, plump and loaded with seafood, or a spicy appetizer salad like the salmon or green papaya. Among the better main courses are bhramchicken with an explosion of napa cabbage, crispy shallots, and peanut sauceand the simpler grilled basil-stuffed trout in banana leaves. But even the familiar panang beef, heavier on the meat than at other places, satisfies. Desserts are terrific in their own right. The two best? Black sticky-rice pudding with coconut cream and, in season, mango with sticky rice.

Duangrat's , 5878 Leesburg Pike, Baileys Crossroads ; 703-820-5775. Open daily for lunch and dinner. MapIt!

QUALITY: ****Excellent; *** Superior; **Very Good; * Good
PRICE RANGE: $$$= Very Expensive; $$ Expensive; $=Moderate; ¢=Inexpensive

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