Chao Lay Thai Toronto — Restaurant in Toronto

I sincerely believe all the other reviews for this place are AI GENERATED. same spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, and one reviewer said the restaurant is “Pet Friendly” ?!?! Who lets pets in restaurant? Pretty sure that’s illegal. There’s no way that any sane human being could give this place 5 stars for anything.

This restaurant replaces the fantastic Chai Pochana. I had heard the chef took over the restaurant, so I was interested to see what was new. I used to come here 1-2 a month, on my own and with my family.

People in reviews are talking about the wonderful decor and ambiance. Crap. The restaurant never had much atmosphere, but the food made up for it. The first thing I did was ask them to raise the heat. It was set to 66f. So much for warm and welcoming. The decor consisted of wrinkly photographs of Thai food and a mysterious poster inviting you to the oyster bar - there were no oysters on the menu?!

We ordered shrimp rolls and calamari as an appetizer. The shrimp was raw. Totally uncooked. The calamari order was half the size of the Chai Pochana, and looked like they came out the freezer and tasted like rubber bands.

I used to love the Tom Kha coconut soup. They charged $25 for an order that was half the size of the old restaurant. The soup was bland and watery in comparison.

My mother ordered the street Pad Thai, which was her favourite. Also bland.

When I complained about the shrimp, she took it back and brought out another order. It stayed on the bill.

When I complained politely to the waiter, she patiently listened - but the new owner hid in the back. We paid full price for that food. What a shame, to simply slap a new sign, make a new menu, and make the food worse than it was. I give them 3-6 months tops.

My father, with Alzheimer’s, managed to articulate “This is the last time we’re coming to this restaurant”

I know it’s not easy to run a restaurant. But this place will need a major change. I won’t go there again. I used to be able order lunch for under $20. Now it’s double that for...

Ordered the Khao Spicy Eggplant Vegan.

The eggplant has literally 3 pieces of small cut eggplant. See photos. I don’t even know if they should call it an eggplant dish for the amount of eggplant found on this dish. In addition, tiny servings compared to the price they charge. It was steep. It tastes like soy sauce and that’s all you can taste. Soy sauce and nothing more. They can argue that it has other ingredients such as tofu, seasoning and spices, and aim for it to be nutritionally balanced, however, there are other considerations if you’re aiming for the right balance. These are the amount of servings, the taste or flavour, and the price are definitely not balanced to satisfy and make me come back as a customer. Not worth it. Chai Pochana is much better. Sadly, I do not recommend...

I had the calamari, seafood soup, tiger shrimp fried rice and 1 tea, 1 soda. I did not enjoy the seafood soup as the clams tasted not fresh and old with a wrinkled texture but the rest was ok. This place is just not as good as other popular Thai restaurants in the city such as Pai (downtown), EAT BKK Thai bar (Bathurst & Bloor), Sukhothai, Isaan Der (Junction). Somehow our bill came to $81 with a mandatory imposed tip of 20%, which none of the other places do. Food quality lower than comparable restos and mandatory tip (during fed tax holiday Dec15-Feb15 ’25) just left me not wanting to...