Mamu Thai Opening on 36th Avenue

This piece has been updated (5/27/14)

While walking along 36th Avenue this past weekend, I noticed that a new restaurant is opening up in the space that used to be home to Savory Café (no, not this Savory Cafe, but this one) at 36-02 36th Avenue. Mamu Thai is a food truck that bills itself as “The Original NYC Thai Noodle Truck.” The food served in the truck includes dishes as ubiquitous as Pad Thai and Drunken Noodles, to less familiar ones such as Kua Gai (broad rice noodles cooked with chicken, egg, garlic, and scallions in a light soy sauce) and Ba Mee Hang (thin egg noodles with homemade roast pork and chinese broccoli).

At the new space, they’ll broaden the menu, adding to the noodle dishes that made them so successful, which has included boat noodles! (Competition for Pye Boat Noodle perhaps?). Here is what the owners told us:

As the truck is exclusively noodles dishes, we are particularly excited about our curries and rice dishes as well as our Thai BBQ dishes (Pork or Chicken) which come with our delicious sticky rice! Also, since it is Mango season, the Mango with Sticky Rice and coconut milk is not to be missed!

They won’t serve alcohol just yet, but are considering a beer/wine license for the future.

I asked them what they thought distinguishes them from other Thai places in the neighborhood (as we all know, there is a lot of Thai food in Astoria), and they told me this:

We are a family owned and operated Thai takeout shop. Unlike most Thai restaurants in New York City, we are not a full service, seated restaurant that also has takeout and delivery. Our concept is: quality food, quickly.

It is a very relaxed environment in the shop, customers can choose to seat themselves and eat in house, or take their food to go.  We feature very authentic recipes that have been staples in our family over many generations as well as recipes that are used in my uncle’s restaurant in Bangkok.  We will continue to operate the Mamu Thai Noodle Truck in various parts of NYC daily, and we also provide catering.

As far as the space goes (which is quite small), there will be limited seating. Currently, they have six barstools and a small table for two, and a picnic table and bench outside in front of the shop. They will be adding more table space in the near future..

They do plan to provide delivery, though not at the start. That will happen between the soft opening and their official grand opening. Their hours are 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday; and noon to 10 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday (subject to change).

They plan to have their soft opening this Wednesday, May 28. The official grand opening will happen in a couple of weeks after than.

Mamu Thai, 36-02 36th Avenue, Astoria, NY 11106

One Comment

Carla M. June 18th, 2014

My husband and I stopped by last weekend (as we’ve been anxiously anticipating the opening of Mamu), had some amazing food, and would encourage all Astorians to take advantage of having Mamu in the neighborhood! Delish!

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