A few fellow foodie friends and I (say that five times fast) recently started up a dinner club and last Saturday was our first outing. The idea is for the group of us to go out to eat once a month at an interesting restaurant. We want to experiment and try new types of cuisine. With that in mind, I suggested YoMa, a Burmese restaurant in the Allston area of Boston, for our inaugural meal. I found YoMa via one of my favorite websites, Yelp, and was sold by the endless list of fabulous reviews.
What I experienced at YoMa was no less than one of the best meals I've had in a long time. The restaurant is tucked away in a neighborhood off the T lines, and you would never guess the quality of food inside this little place. Burmese food is sort of a mix of the cuisines that surround it - Chinese, Indian, and Thai/Southeast Asian. There is lemongrass, chili, curry, and coconut. The menu at YoMa is huge and it was pretty difficult to choose a dish because everything sounded so darn good! It was a mix of curry and stir fry style dishes, noodles, and salads.
I decided fairly quickly on the Pumpkin Shrimp (here's a photo via the restaurant's website) and was quite impressed by it. The pumpkin was utilized in a savory was like a true squash - stewed in big chunks. It had a potato-like texture but more of a squash taste. The shrimp were large and very well cooked. The pumpkin and shrimp were cooked in a light sauce of crushed tomato, ginger, lemongrass, and cilantro. The dish came with a large plate of coconut rice (jasmine rice is standard but upon recommendation, I ordered the coconut rice for $2 extra and it was well worth it). The rice was sweet but not too sweet, and light coconut flavor melded well with the tomato and pumpkin. One of the particularly Burmese parts of the meal is that every dish comes with a small bowl of toasted spices - garlic, chili flakes, dried shrimp, and probably a whole bunch of other things that I can't identify. The topping adds a an extra crunchy layer of flavor and heat.
Our meal was just wonderful and everyone loved their dishes. I tried a bite of Ken's beef and potato curry and was amazed by the size of the chunks of beef. The service was also good - our waters were constantly refilled and when we arrived, we noticed that one of the staff had drawn a little name card for our reserved table. Talk about a personal touch! I definitely plan to return to YoMa for the pure fact that there were so many menu items that looked delicious and I need to try more things! The food was simple, fresh, and well-prepared, and importantly - cheap!
YoMa
5 N Beacon St
(between Brighton Ave & Cambridge St)
Allston, MA 02134
(617) 783-1372
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