I cooked about half the Pad Thai noodles called for, drained them in cool water several times unti they were cool, and tossed with a small amount of toasted sesame oil while I finished with the veggies and herbs.
All the sauce ingredients (except oil and soy sauce) lined up and ready to go. I had the toasted sesame tahini available, and so used that.
The sauce was delicious, and as it said in the recipe, pretty salty but once it was tossed with the noodles it was fine in the level of saltiness.
I had some carrots I wanted to use, so I julienned those as well as slicing the carrots. I was excited to use my new julienne peeler from Williams-Sonoma that I had gotten with a gift card.
I had some cilantro, mint, and Thai basil to chop, along with the peanuts.
And I will say that it makes a pretty dish.
However, there was just something missing. As intense as the sauce was before mixed with the noodles, it seemed to lose a lot of flavor when mixed with everything else--not just the saltiness. It wasn't bad, it just didn't make me want to lick the bowl and have seconds.
Maybe some of it was the cilantro. I seemed to have a bunch that didn't have as much flavor as normal. Maybe a little fish sauce would have helped.
I'm not entirely sure I will make this again. I like the idea of it, but it needs some fiddling. I would definitely include the carrots again, and I would probably go ahead and julienne the cucumber as well. It was awkward to eat in these slices with the noodles, so I ended up cutting it up anyway.