The Lemongrass on Queen St., Richmond — Restaurant in Tasman

Last weekend I had a real craving for a Thai meal. We went to Lemongrass. We were seated and viewing the menu. As I was scrolling over the menu, there didn't appear to be the usual Thai meals there. I thought 'this isn't a Thai Restaurant.' No usual stir frys, no usual entres, no usual curries,!

Went back to the Counter and spoke to the man who seated us and said 'this isn't a genuine Thai Restuarant, there are no usual Thai meals, entres etc' Yes yes yes, it is Thai owned and Thai chef. Thought I had better just accept that!!

So hubby and I ordered mini spring rolls (very common on Thai menus). When they arrived at our table, we were gobsmacked. These were no Thai mini spring rolls. We love Thai food and also cook it. These spring rolls would have been skinnier than a cigarette!! No filling of mince, onion, sprouts and vegetables inside a thin crispy cover of pastry. Not joking, there was none of that filling, we were lucky to see 1 piece of grated carrot and a tiny sliver of something, green, presumed cabbage. This revolting pastry was rolled very tight and looked like super thin white cigarettes on the plate with nothing else, a wee bit of dipping sauce , that didn't add flavour either. Certainly not appealing, to even eat. Thai restaurants, always put a wee garnish on entre plate, or a wee bit of salad, or so - they present food amazingly appetizing.

Then came the main course - I ordered a stir fry chicken. I couldn't believe what I was presented with. A stir fry with boiled cabbage chunks with a few bits of onion and what looked like boiled chicken in a brownish runny sauce. The taste well ...chicken was dry and revolting. The cabbage was half cooked and half raw with the look 'who would eat this'? The sauce was nothing more than chicken broth with a bit of soy sauce for coloring, certainly not flavor. The taste was a revolting chicken broth.

This is not authentic Thai food. I may have managed to eat quarter of it with some of the rice. Thai stir fries are very tasty, with carrot, celery, shredded cabbage, peas, broccoli, cauliflower etc combined a tasty sauce with soy sauce, oyster sauce, garlic and yummy flavors. Hubby had stir fry with crispy pork - that had no flavour either and basically clumps of uninviting cabbage which looked boiled, half raw and some soft in a flavorless sauce.

There was certainly no Thai music or ambiance, just radio music and no Thai music, no Thai pictures on the walls, no Thai ornaments on the counter. No Thai staff. Instead there were some of those red paper balls things that the Chinese have, hanging in the windows. Nothing at all to promote restuarant as a Thai Restaurant.

When we went to pay, the man at the Counter assured us that it was A proper Thai Restaurant. We relayed the above comments and he said we have a Thai owner and Chef.

We said the menu doesn't have the usual Thai meals or entres... we were disgusted in our entre and meal. It is very obvious this is not a Thai Restaurant - maybe a mixture of Asian countries, but food certainly has no Asian flavor, no flavor at all.

With looking so forward to a lovely tasty Thai meal out, this was a...

We had a really lovely dinner here. All of the food was just outstanding and the service and atmosphere were great too. We were looking forward to giving them a lovely 5-star review. However it looks a lot like they intentionally tried to overcharge us...

When we went to pay they said it would be $123, and I asked to see the itemised bill (which I typically do at restaurants to check it is correct - as often it isn't). Without hesitation he instantly screwed up the piece of paper that had already been printed, and a second later printed another one which he gave to us. It was all correct but the total was $115. We paid that, but asked why he had originally said $123. He said that he had noticed that the cost of the corkage was wrong and he corrected it, so he was going to charge us $16 (for two people and one bottle) but changed it to $8 which is of course what it should have been. This explanation didn't make sense given the speed which he noticed, screwed up one bill, made a change and reprinted it - all within a second or two. It looks like they have a standard practice of overcharging on corkage and only fix it if you ask for an itemised bill.

I recommend to the restaurant that they print the itemised bill for all customers to check, and then charge them once all is confirmed to be OK. This standard practice will show they are no longer trying to rip customers off. Such a pity as other than that, this place was...

Very poor experience. Started off OK, seemed polite enough to begin with, the starters was ok if nothing exceptional but proceeded to go downhill rapidly from that point. My mains was duck smothered with what I can only described as a cheap 'off the shelf' bottled sauce (totally overpowering) spread over a layer of cabbage - yuk! During this time they tried to serve us some other customers dessert (of which on leaving they tried to charge us for!!). When we decided to try dessert for ourselves (to help get over the disappointment of the main dish) no-one would come to take our order, and then on top of that one of the staff started to do some hoovering, unbelievable!!! So it became clear they had no interest in providing us with dessert and just wanted to finish for the evening, so behind charged for someone else's dessert when they wouldn't provide us with one was a real slap in the face! Oh yeah, they also booked us in at the wrong time...