SAAP Avenue: Authentic Laotian Eatery
A right turn on 51st dissolves the semiurban cram of Oakland into a silent Rockridge sprawl. Climb the hill at night and at the peak you will be liberated: a Safeway, set far back like a regal estate, stands watchful over wide and empty streets. These streets have never been full. The landscape feels preserved, frozen in time the day the concrete set, while occasional cars and pedestrians add muted signs of life. There is room to take a breath without being seen. The sidewalks are clean. The cutthroat economics of The City are entirely absent. If you've made a home here, you can stay forever.
This dreamscape is the backdoor entrance to the final block of Piedmont Avenue. Most of Piedmont is a bustling array of boutiques and restaurants, uncannily balancing kitsch and freshness. But this final block, adjacent to the cemetery and the chapel of the chimes, sits on the threshold of the beyond. On the more mysterious side lie the mortuary, the flower shop, and the tiki bar. On the other side, the very last building still clearly in the world of the living, is SAAP Avenue, a Laotian restaurant and cocktail bar.
SAAP Avenue is slightly hip. Modern decor and colorful graffiti murals oppose Thai elephant tapestries. A Buddha and potted poinsettias hold vigil over the entrance. Michael Jackson, The Joker, Steph Curry, Salt Bae, and other motley celebrities pronounce inspiring quotes from headshots in the rafters. The center of the restaurant is dominated by a full bar with a single TV. There are signs of wealth too: 4" wooden slab tables, a full wine refrigerator in the wall. Most of the tables are empty. The air is relaxed, but is constantly moving. Three huge fans in the ceiling turn quietly and efficiently. Even in the sole fanless corner you can feel the silent, freshening breeze. No bar has ever felt this clean.
The air is constantly moving. Three huge fans in the ceiling turn quietly and efficiently. Even in the sole fanless corner you can feel the silent, freshening breeze. No bar has ever felt this clean.
Duck curry comes quickly. It's well plated, colorful and organized, and the woven basket of sticky rice has a little extra ornamentation. A pint of Drake's pilsner whets the appetite, a little hoppy but light and floral too; a good complement for a strong-hearted curry. You tuck in.
The curry is warm and wide. Deep in the broth is the hint of galangal, ginger's mysterious cousin, clearing room for a creamy swath of coconut milk. Spices float to the top, a balanced heat without any hint of sharpness. Thickly cut carrots sit softly between perfectly cooked green beans and bell peppers. All three vegetables are fresh and cooked to order, bursting with flavor as they yield to the tooth. The carrot is gentle, the beans and peppers crisp and firm, their youthful bodies refreshed by the quick blanch that cooked them. Breaded fried duck has settled amid the vegetables, half submerged. Atop it all is a generous sprig of holy basil, its leaves tender and full. It is so fresh it still feels alive in your mouth.
Lovely as the vegetables are, the duck is merely okay. Its breading, while perfect for soaking up sauce, smothers the duck's natural richness. Instead of duck and curry intertwined, you mostly taste saucy oil and breading. If the meal were only duck in curry, it would fail. But in combination with greenery and rice, it feels whole.
The sticky rice more than lives up to its basket's promise. It is creamy and sweet, almost like mochi. The mouthfeel and flavor are that of short milled rice, like sushi, but the grains are medium-length. Some trick of washing and steaming has elicited a softness these grains could not normally attain. It is soft and pillowy, a cushion to rest on whenever the mounting heat of the curry comes on a little too strong.
That mounting heat changes the profile. Duck, vegetable, and rice, formerly distinct, are now a continuum, unified by the curry's escalating sensations. It takes several bites to fully break it in, achieve a peak. You can coast for awhile at that peak, and while you do, you are part of the south Rockridge suburb: the possessor of unromantic and unobtrusive wealth. SAAP's patrons have it better than anyone realizes, including themselves, and you are one of them. The curry peak is a mirror to be experienced with your eyes closed.
But eventually the curry cools. Your body slows. Soon this moment, the endlessly repeating moment of schoolkid summer where all problems are trivial and all deep needs are accounted for, will recede. Unlike your childhood, you can see the end coming this time. All the more reason to savor the warmth while you can.
And even as it cools, the curry puts up a fight. Its peppers are tenacious, clinging to life. There is no anger or desperation in the peppers' struggle. It is just a longing to stretch the moment, no matter the cost.
The stories of our lives always change before we're ready. Children grow, friends depart, we no longer look the way we remember. Innocence is a guaranteed casualty every time. You've been here before, and you know the bargain. See the cracks in your stories and walk through them to the other side, where something—a laugh, a walk, a bite, a pain—is alive to receive you. Not new, maybe. Almost certainly not exactly what you hoped for. But different.
Outside the window, night has set in. The cemetary rests in silent regard. The curry is now too cold to eat. Any further bites would displace the still-fresh memory of when it was still warm and lively, and you don't want to spoil the faintly lingering glow. You hold the heat in your belly, fresh air in your lungs and on your skin, and glance at the other patrons. They seem happy. These moments, unspectacular as they are, are the ones to recall when, on a deathbed, you stare past the wall and ask, was I happy?
Your life was a warm bowl of curry on a nameless Rockridge corner, a telescope of histories on loan in a Wayfair-and-knickknack present. Someone loved your life. In a way, you loved your life by eating this curry, feeling it cool, and missing it before it was gone. You put your spoon down and watch the server dump ice on the sidewalk, closing early. You are not yet on the cemetery’s side of the street. An SUV rolls across the threshold under thin illumination. These pinprick street lamps will, here or elsewhere, outshine all our headlights as they guide us home to rest.
