Saran Thai Restaurant & Wildrose Cafe — Restaurant in New South Wales

I've visited this place a few times, and while the staff is always polite, my recent experience was disappointing. The drinks took too long to arrive—one by one, spaced about 5-10 minutes apart. Three of our drinks didn’t arrive until we finished our meal. The Coke, for instance, could’ve been served immediately—just take it from the fridge and open the can—but we had to ask three times before it was brought out.

There was only one staff member working the floor. He was doing everything—taking orders, making drinks, bringing food—and while he was polite, he made a mistake with one of the orders, which caused further delays. As a result, three of our meals didn’t arrive until everyone else had already finished. The excuse given was that they took all the orders at once, which caused delays, and that one staff member had called in sick.

The drink delays are consistently an issue. I visited this place 3 times, and I always end up waiting for my drink until after the meal is finished. I’ve noticed that the staff has to rewrite all orders on paper each time, which causes an unnecessary 2-3 minutes of delay. This time could’ve been better spent serving drinks.

If staffing is the issue, they should consider hiring additional help or a dedicated drink staff. It wasn’t particularly busy—there were only four tables occupied when we were there—and I overheard another table also complaining about delayed service.

If making drinks takes too long, maybe the drink menu should be streamlined or they should hire a dedicated drink server to speed up...

Consider this more a placeholder than a review as I just popped in for a fast lunch, but there’s something special about Saran Thai in Wyoming. The Central Coast hasn’t, thus far, particularly impressed me with its handling of Asian cuisines so Saran Thai felt like a bit of an exception. Set in an ugly little strip mall, the restaurant shows a great commitment to creating a transportive experience through decor, with flowers adorning nearly every available surface.

On the plates, you’ll find the same attention to making things as beautiful as possible. I stressed head chef Cholathee Jiemthong (Charlie) out a bit by ordering bussaba chom-sourn ($29) or chicken flower rolls for lunch. Turns out these hard-to-assemble rolls are usually only offered in the evening. They team chopped fresh chicken and colourful crisp salad inside thin egg crepes, then wrap the lot in rice paper. They’re dipped into a tamarind, sweet soy and roasted peanut based sauce that had a good kick of chilli. Along with a generously proportioned plate of yum nua ($23.90) or Thai beef salad, that I didn’t even photograph because I wasn’t going to review, it made for more food than the two of us could...

Husband and I went around 4pm this Sunday. We had seen this place before but we judged it from the outside and didn’t think it would be good...we were wrong! We caught them at a slow time thankfully so it was just the owner Rosie and her husband Charlie running the kitchen. The service was beyond excellent! Rosie was so sweet and made great recommendations. Charlie came out of the kitchen to check on us and ask how the food was. 10/10 would go back just for those two sweethearts! The restaurant was beautifully decorated. You could tell Rosie wanted to make the restaurant feel like home. We sat at one of the couches in the back and we were very comfortable. The food was the best Thai we have had in a while! We got the Yellow Curry, Massaman Beef, and Spicy Fried Rice. We ordered way too much food but the flavour was outstanding! Rosie also recommend the fried noodle wrapped prawns as an entree which I’m so glad she did! We will definitely be going back and will definitely bring...