Noodlebox — Restaurant in Saanich

Note to reader: this was a Doordash delivery order. Not factoring in the slightly under warm temperatures due to delivery taking an order elsewhere first.

Every two or three years my memory fades. And around the same time, my wife gets a hankering for Noodlebox. She really enjoyed it in Edmonton over a decade ago. Today, the stars aligned it was time for our quarter decade Noodlebox punishment.

I ordered the Teryaki and added beef with a lime. My wife ordered the Spicy Peanut "something" and added a lime and Thai basil (which we paid extra for, but wasn't in the food).

We also had two vegetarian deep fried spring rolls. They were "ok". Soggy, actually, but that's because the delivery delays. If crispy they're not bad. Sauce was fine.

When I opened my teriyaki box, immediately I inhaled a lung full of vinegar smells and it made me reflexively cough. Through and through, this sauce had way too much vinegar. There was a decent portion of meat (extra charge of nearly $5), not really worth the upcharge TBH. I was hoping for more vegetables, but it appeared the majority of the mass was the sauce that was sopping in the box. It was way too much sauce to noodles. The spicy level was pretty great. Huge hit and that was level 3 of 6. Overall, everything felt unbalanced culinary speaking. Passable, but at $16-17 dollars, not sure it was worth it. Gimme a bottle of hoisin or oyster sauce, and I could beat this recipe easy.

Now there was the matter of my wife's Peanut whatever order. I don't know what the heck was going on but hers was totally saturated with sauce. It was basically soup. The flavor was quite bland, so it was like the box of noodles was doing the quantity verses quality thing. Seriously disappointing to watch her put half the noodles in the colander and rinse the noodles off, and mix it back in later. Cut down that ratio by half basically. Then it was edible. Bland. But edible. Also. The upcharged Thai basil was MIA.

Overall, I think this is my 4th time at a Noodlebox. All different locations. It must be that "this" is how it is supposed to be. I am baffled because this is such an inconsistent and underpar brand. I really don't get the appeal.

The memory of the Noodle box burns bright today. Hopefully Future Self will be wise enough to think OUTSIDE the BOX when picking a meal...

Ive been getting food here for years but never again! First off, we went and picked up some cups and filled it with the water at the water tap, and there was a thick film of oil on the water in each cup. We politely asked for clean cups and they kindly gave us the throwaway plastic ones to use instead. I also asked for a cloth so I could clean the table (which was dirty). They insisted on doing it themselves and then came over with cleaner and just started spraying it over the table (and us)-no warning, no asking us to move. They just let it rip.

I ordered four meals for myself and my family. My daughter pulled two thick black hairs out of her food. I brought it to the front and showed them and they remade the food for her. However, the food was disgusting because rice was overcooked and mushy. They also put pork in it instead of chicken, the egg was partially uncooked and the prawns smelled strongly fishy.

My order also contained two spicy peanut boxes, one with extra chicken. There was barely any chicken to be found and the noodles they used were not the usual noodles. It was disgusting and disappointing.

I ordered a drunken thai box with beef. There may have been 4 skimpy pieces of beef in total-two I had to spit out because they were hard as rock. I also ended up having to spit out several of the noodles because they were not cooked and very crunchy and hurt my teeth. The rest of the noodles were undercooked. I spent almost $100 here today ( Father’s Day) at my dad’s request and it was such a disappointing disgusting experience.

My daughter has a splitting headache and stomach ache...

Vegetarian Dish with some Chicken

Visited this location with friends. Not only was the service super slow, there was chicken in my tofu buddha bowl. Concerning thing about the whole interaction was that the store clerk did not seem phased. The District Manager Bruce, who replies to these reviews, was just as nonchalant. He asked how big the piece of chicken was in the bowl! That is like asking someone how allergic they are to peanuts, because the size of the peanut would determine the allergic reaction:) Apparently him doing a vegan challenge with his wife made him fully understanding of the magnitude of this error. Apparently this has never happened at Noodle Box in his experience.

Needless to say, the organization is only as good as its leaders. However, in this case denial and ignorance seems to be the theme of this location and perhaps this chain. Having said that, perhaps instead of giving generic replies to google reviews, Bruce can spend some time re-looking at process control and better employee engagement.

Thank you for your free coupon to come back, however the fact that you literally could not even write a note or even reply to the email, shows me that this is likely to happen again and probably happens regularly.

Be it dietary restrictions, health choices or religious views, I have lost confidence...