At their food cart outside Montpelier’s county courthouse, Wilaiwan Phonjan and her husband, Tim Azarian, serve colorful, spicy fare that fuses traditional Thai street food with the cuisine of Phonjan’s native region near the Laos border. They roll out two dishes at lunchtime every weekday — such as coconut curry or crispy pork salad — and almost always sell out within two hours.

SEVEN DAYS: What is the most difficult ingredient to find here in Vermont?
TIM AZARIAN, CO-PROPRIETOR: I would say the hardest to get is galangal, a Thai ginger. It’s similar to the Asian ginger we get in the store but it has a much different taste. The thing with [authentic] Thai food is that you can’t really get it here. In Thailand, everything is fresh, to be eaten right away. The lemongrass there tastes different, the limes are different. It’s just a soil thing. It’s really hard to recreate Thai food here, but we try to get as close as we can.

— Corin Hirsch