One food event I look forward to each year is a special dinner hosted by Malai Kitchen owners Braden and Yasmin Wages. The talented couple run what Yasmin calls an upscale mom and pop restaurant located in the West Village.

Now that summer has subsided (on the calendar, anyway), more Dallas restaurants are getting back into the events game. This is a good thing, especially when places like the Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek are involved.

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This week Malai Kitchen, the Thai-Vietnamese restaurant in Uptown, held the first of their public "Thai Me Up" dinners: Five-course meals with beverages for an affordable $55. I attended as a guest on behalf of SideDish.

Now retired, chef Paul Singhapong has had a fantastic career working in fine kitchens in both Dallas and San Francisco.

Braden and Yasmin Wages have been married three years. That means that during their newlywed phase they were busy planning and putting together a restaurant -- one of the most challenging business ventures to tackle. And yet they're still smiling.

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