According to Thai superstition, you should call a newborn “ugly baby” in order to misdirect thieving ghosts enamored of comely young things. At a new Thai restaurant tucked away on a quiet stretch of Carroll Gardens, the method of misdirection has the opposite effect, reeling in a certain breed of New Yorker for whom the interplay of an underexplored cuisine, a well-regarded chef, and a memorably insouciant name is irresistible. Securing a table at such an establishment is a prize almost as precious as a sweet-smelling babe.

The items chosen for the menu feel thoughtful, like a poetic distillation of the culinary regions of Thailand from which chef Sirichai Sreparplarn, a Bangkok native, took his inspiration. Start in the northeast, which borders on the Mekong River and produces a dish called kao tod nam klook, a crispy, sweet-sour-spicy curried rice amplified by delectable bits of pork skin, ginger, and peanuts. Pair it with the laab ped udon, a duck salad of Laotian origins tossed with Vietnamese coriander, mint, and dried chilies that land on the tongue with explosive heat.

As you note the brilliant red and orange brushstrokes on the wall and wonder if they are meant to mirror the color of your swollen, chili-smeared lips, take a detour to central Thailand. Think of it as a pit stop at Grandma’s when you order tom som pla kra pong, a hearty tamarind-soured broth with red-snapper fillets peering up from under piles of ginger. Then take a deep breath (and a preëmptive gulp of water) before heading south, where, despite your better judgment, you will try the kua kling, a dry beef curry that is advertised as “brutally spicy”; its potency is akin to subjecting your taste buds to a firing squad of capsaicin-loaded machine guns. Recover with another southern specialty: a fleshy sea bream, generously bathed in turmeric, rubbed with garlic, and fried whole, that is mercifully spared of chilies.

Service wobbles a little under the burden of over-appreciation. On a recent evening, a table of six, half of whom were dripping with sweat from a self-destructive contest to see who could eat the most kua kling, waited fifteen minutes for their drinks, only to discover that the harried waiter had forgotten. A few days later, the Thai iced tea had run out by 8. Just as one iced-tea obsessive was feeling sorry for herself—wondering if the absence of tea merited a change of venue—she spotted a TV star, who was told there would be a two-hour wait. The star settled in and began tapping on his phone, and those seated, even without their teas, stayed. (Dishes $9-$25.) ♦