Thai eatery planned for northwest Longmont

LONGMONT — The tastes of Thailand that will grace a former taco eatery in northwest Longmont this week have taken a circuitous route — through Oklahoma, Louisiana, Missouri and the Front Range foothills. But owner Somying Fox seems to feel the trip was worth it.

Fox and her family members will bring Thai 303 to a 1,500-square-foot corner space at 1751 Hover St., with opening planned for Tuesday.

“I looked around Colorado and fell in love with Longmont,” Fox said. “It’s a small town — well, not really small — and the weather is very nice. I live in the mountains and there’s always snow. There’s not that much snow here.”

The space, she said, “is perfect for a family-owned business. I think we can manage this one, and the landlord is very nice. He’s helped out with the renovation” complete with a new ceiling, floor and paint, “and given us four months’ free rent until we get ready. And we’re in a corner with a lot of windows.”

Fox came to the United States from Thailand in 2001 to work toward a master’s degree in finance and accounting at the University of Tulsa. “I was intending to go back and teach in Thailand, but instead I got married and had children.”

That was the first of several changes of plans for Fox.

Working at a Thai restaurant while in college sparked her love of cooking, so she planned to open a Thai restaurant in New Orleans, where her husband had gotten a job as a university professor. She found a location, signed a lease and prepared to open. But less than a month after they arrived in 2005, Hurricane Katrina flooded and devastated the Crescent City.

When her husband’s contract was up, they opted to move to a city that was less prone to hurricanes and found it up the Mississippi River in St. Louis.

There, Fox opened a succession of three restaurants, all in trendy areas of the city. The first was Basil Spice in 2008, which she unveiled along a stretch of South Grand Avenue near Saint Louis University that had been blossoming with international cuisine; it has evolved to add Indian dishes as well. After her children were grown, she opened My Thai, now Thai Bowl, on Euclid Avenue in the Central West End just east of the sprawling Barnes-Jewish Hospital complex. And, finally, there was Turmeric, on Forest Park Avenue near Washington University and the Delmar Loop entertainment district.

But like many Midwestern transplants, she came to Colorado for family connections and the mountains, turning over her St. Louis eateries to partners.

“When we lived in St. Louis, we’d come to Colorado every year to visit my oldest son,” an engineering student at the University of Colorado’s Colorado Springs campus, she said, “and we wanted to be close to him so we moved here ” 

“Here” meant Conifer, and Fox spotted a space in nearby Evergreen to open Thai 101, named because “when you first go to college you take things like English 101.” She sold that restaurant after a year and opened Thai 202 closer to home in Conifer, named not only for the next-level college class but also “because that is my house address,” she said.

So it only seems natural that her new venture would be Thai 303, which also reflects a local telephone area code.

“We’ll have good food,” Fox said. “A lot of people in Conifer really love it. We use fresh ingredients, and all the dishes are very authentic. Our basil pork is my favorite, then the kao soy, noodles with curry and crispy wontons on top.”

Her restaurants earned rave reviews in the Riverfront Times, St. Louis’ version of Denver’s Westword, but Fox said that’s not what’s most important to her.

“The food is very good because my kids say it’s good,” she said. “They say we have the best pad thai.”

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