Blu Ginger professes to be authentic Thai cuisine but too much of their menu displayed playful, gimmicky descriptions making it difficult to take them seriously. Newbie-friendly fusion seems to be the aim at Blu Ginger…which perhaps explains the hit-or-miss execution of their dishes. Their Tom Kha Gai, for example, lacked the lemongrass and fish sauce punch expected of the chicken coconut soup, rendering it bland and unmemorable. Their chicken and ginger soup however proved stellar, intensely fragrant and tasty. The Reunion, an appetizer sampler of satay chicken, wrapped shrimp, dumplings–artfully rendered and all very tasty, but terribly routine for Thai food. The Nutty Professor, Blu Ginger’s version of a peanut sauce dish, was marred by too much bean sprout filler–a disappointment. The spicy salmon curry (which our server warned us would take a longer time to prepare) first came out overcooked–the tail end of the fish came out dry and inedible. After a 2nd pass through the kitchen, the dish came out much more presentable, with a spicy sauce and prettily decorated with flash-fried basil (?) leaves. For the dessert course, Blu Ginger pleased us again, serving up 3 samplers in shot glass size: tapioca pudding, coconut custard and rice pudding–all excellent. Sadly, the high price of dinner dampened our overall satisfaction with the experience. The only area that Blu Ginger seems to surpass expectation is in presentation. Here’s to hoping for more consistency from Blu Ginger in the future.

7 Salsas serves up more than 7 tasty, spicy salsas. Their menu is chock full of Tex-Mex dining options. Sitting in a nice neighborhood in North Irving (and another location in Coppell), 7 Salsas is a somewhat-upscale setting presenting tasty and reasonably-priced fare. For our visit, the endless chips and salsas came out; every one of the salsas proved mysteriously and addictively spicy. The restaurant also served up remarkably tasty chicken jalapeno poppers–moist and mildly zingy. 7 Salsas’ version of a Caesar salad turned out to be the only disappointment in the evening–I expected a Caesar constructed from scratch, but the only show came from our disinterested server tossing a few leaves, corn niblets, red peppers, with prepared dressing. The Parillada turned out to be a satisfying combo fajita meal for two; steak, chicken and shrimp on a sizzling plate with a saucer of flaming chorizo queso. The fajitas were pleasingly flavorful, though we felt the queso insufficient for our needs. Despite our server’s indifference, we found dinner a pleasant experience at 7 Salsas that we’ll be coming back to explore the rest of their menu.