What I Ate: February 20, 2010 (Annie's Cafe & Bar, CK Thai Cuisine)

Lunch: We ate at Annie's Cafe & Bar (319 Congress Avenue, Austin, TX‎ - (512) 472-1884‎). We ordered their Antipasti Salad which was passable.

The Chili Prawns in Peppery Butter Sauce were decent. The heads had more of an iodine/bromine taste (which we don't like) but the ends of the tails didn't have the off putting taste. The sauce was slightly spicy and very flavorful.

The Fried Calamari with Spicy Sriracha Dressing wasn't as good as it should have been. Even though the batter was blonde, the calamari was overcooked - chewy and rubbery. They did include fried pepperoncini rings with the calamari which was a nice touch.

Dinner: We ate at CK Thai Cuisine (5207 Brodie Lane, Sunset Valley, TX‎ - (512) 892-2744‎). I ordered a few dishes that we were familiar with so we could assess how well it was made.

Pad Eggplant Delight with Pork Stir-fried with eggplant, fresh basil, bell peppers, onions, mushrooms and Thai chili in brown sauce. Eggplant and pork cooked with basil and chili is one of my favorite Thai dishes, so this was a pretty big disappointment to me. The pieces of eggplant were small (and not that many) and were undercooked. They were a little hard still and definitely had not been cooked in enough oil. The pork was tough and could have been fresher.

Pad Puck with Chicken Combination of vegetables, including broccoli, carrots, cabbages, zucchini, snow peas, celery, mushroom, beans [sic] sprouts and baby corn stir-fried in light brown sauce.. This dish was fairly bland.

Pad Thai with Tofu Thin rice noodles stir-fried in eggs, bean sprout and green onion. Service with bean sprouts, shredded carrots and topped with roasted peanuts. Not the worst pad thai we've had in Austin. The rice noodles were a bit too gummy (sticking together quite a bit) but not too bad (we've had it elsewhere as one giant clump of rice noodles).