Thum SD – A Soft Opening Visit

A few months back, I noticed a Cambodian – Lao Restaurant was opening on ECB just East of the 15 right past Vallarta Taco Shop. I wasn’t quite sure of the name since the sign made it kinda hard to read. Then in my Donburi Rice Bowls post; “FOY” Elle who is nice enough to keep me informed of new openings in the City Heights area mentioned that Thum SD had opened! So, I made sure to check the opening hours and made time to visit at around 1115 on a Thursday…to find that the place was closed….sigh….. I did wait around until 1130, but there was no activity within the place, so I left. Still, I did want to try the place out so I returned on a Saturday, to find that they were indeed open.

Upon entering, I quickly noticed that this was one of those order at the counter places…..the menu board only had around 8 items on it. The really nice young lady working also informed me that they were out of several items as well.

And as far as I could tell, there was only one menu item that was Cambodian; a soup made with Kroeung, the foundational Cambodian seasoning paste that we had run into when visiting Cambodia all those years ago. In the end, I decided to just order two of my favorite Lao dishes to go. Nem Khao (of course) and Sai Oua….Lao sausage. With regards to the sausage, you have two choices, regular or spicy. This was when the really nice woman working on her laptop chimed in saying “I prefer the spicy version”. Turns out she was one of the owners. Her husband, who is Thai-Lao and co-owner is also the chef. We had a nice little chat while I was waiting. Turns out that she is Cambodian. She was so very friendly and sweet. She apologized for not having a full menu at this time, saying that many of the ingredients they needed were still in transit. She did say however, that the week of May 3rd will be grand opening, so they should have a full menu by then.

Here’s the Nem Khao.

Nice sour tones and there was actually some coconut flavor in this; something missing in most versions we’ve had here in SD. There’s also some thin slices of pork skin as well.

On the other hand, the rice was too soft and fluffy’ lacking the crisp crunchy bits and also was devoid of sausage.

Rice was not evenly coated as well.

The Spicy Lao Sausage on the other hand was a winnah! The filling was so porky, moist, and tender. It also had some good spice to it. The casing had a bit of “snap” to it.

While the Missus thought it could have used even more herbs and Makrut Lime leaves, I thought it was fine. The Missus also loved the dipping sauce which along with typical fish sauce flavor had a ton of garlic in it.

It also came with a large portion of rice.

We’ll definitely have that sausage again, though I’m going to wait to revisit until they’ve been opened for a bit.

As I mentioned above; I was told their grand opening will be this week.

Thum SD
4151 El Cajon Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92105
Current Hours:
Tues – Fri 11am – 7pm
Saturday 11am – 5pm
Sunday 11am – 4pm

Thanks again for the heads-up Elle!