Zabb Elee in Manhattan is actually the new outpost for this Queens Thai restaurant. This isn’t your ordinary Thai restaurant where you’ll find Drunken Noodles aka Pad Kee Mao. Zabb Elee actually specializes in food from Thailand’s northeast region, Isan. The cuisine is less about stir fries and curries (I think some other diners in the restaurant were a little disappointed not to see any pad thai), and there is no shortage of fiery flavor.

To try a couple of things, I got their lunch special which is a good deal at $9. Even with this deal, most dishes on the regular menu are less than $10 making Zabb Elee a pretty good value.

For the lunch special you pick a “salad”, i.e. a cold dish as well as a main. I’d heard that the larb was very good here, so I went with their chicken version.

Larb Kai is a salad of minced chicken with mint, lime and fish sauce. It’s also available in beef and pork versions at Zabb Elee. Larb is actually Laotian and considered its national dish (portions of the northeastern part of Thailand used to be a part of Laos).

I loved this dish. It’s light, clean and refreshing for a summer day and balanced between savory, spicy and tart. Zabb Elee has levels of spice from 1 to 5. If you are like me and can take spice, I’d say you’ll be fine with level 3 (it makes your lips tingle with spicy goodness. Fun!)

While this was a simple brothy soup, I really did enjoy it even if it wasn’t the best day for soup (we’ve hit prime summer here in NYC). The broth is just comforting, and I could see how anyone wouldn’t mind a little extra sweating for these soothing yet pungent flavors.

Everything about this meal at Zabb Elee made me feel like I could hit the city streets afterwards and not feel weighed down. I appreciate that.