Cabbages & Condoms Bicester — Restaurant in Cherwell District

📍 Trinity: Cabbages & Condoms, Bicester

Lest the cringey name, the food itself was good! Having read up that this was the ‘it’ Thai restaurant in the area, we decided to try it out.

The service was excellent - always attentive to our needs etc. The food was good, but I’ve had better more locally (maybe we’re just lucky in South West Wales to have such choice!).

One thing I did love was the menu on their website. Every dish has a photo of it, for you to see what you’re getting which I think is a great idea to offer visual aid to their customers (it certainly helped us with what we ordered).

We ordered:

Starters: 🐟 Thai Fish Cakes (sharing) £8 The taste wasn’t too bad but the texture was not such a great one - quite rubbery and chewy - not the texture I was expecting from a fish cake! 🍘 Vegetable Crackers (Taro, Pandan, Purple Potato, Pumpkin and Carrot) £2.50 Very tasty and an alternative from the usual prawn cracker!

Mains: 🍛 Chicken Panang Curry (sharing) £11.50 Reduced thick curry cooked in coconut milk garnished with chilli & shedded lime leaves. Curry was very tasty! 🍚 Sticky Rice (sharing) £4.50 🍜 Chicken Pad Thai (sharing) £11 Again, this was very tasty, but not that much on your plate considering we were sharing.

All in all we very much enjoyed this experience here, but I don’t think we’d rush back too soon what with it being a little on the expensive side too.

As cringey as it was (and made me laugh) - on the way out, they have a bowl with a note that says ‘We don’t offer mints, but take a free...

So firstly, I’m sorry for having to write this but I feel it’s 100% necessary.

We opted for the sharing starter, it was oily, no flavour, not cooked properly, presented like a child had put it together - genuinely (and I mean this) worse than 3rd world standards.

We also had coloured prawn crackers - tasted stale, oily and unpleasant.

For mains : My friends chicken pad Thai was passable - just.

For mains I ordered the lamb Massaman (I ordered this when I ordered starters, otherwise I would have left right away but I wanted to give the place a chance)

Surprise surprise this was also a shambles, a few new potato’s cut in half -no flavour or care , the lamb was all the off cuts and the sauce was like a soup. Genuinely revolting. Had 2 bites and called it a day.

We complained and only paid for drinks, had a bad stomach all evening. (Not surprised)

: To the owner - I’d strongly suggest firing your chefs and evaluating how the company is run, how this place has any ratings over 1 star is beyond me but I guess everyone has different standards.

Until this place has had some serious alterations done, I wouldn’t Recommend to anyone.

On the plus side, the outside of the building is pretty.

Again, I’m sorry but this was the worst food I’ve ever had (I eat out 3-4 times a week)

Should you wish to contact me, please feel free to...

This is definitely the best oriental restaurant in or near Bicester. We have been several times and each an every time the staff and the food have been brilliant. It is clean, well spaced and diligently run. The setting is in what I believe is an old chapel with a pay carpark right across the road. It is a well hidden little gem with little foot or road traffic. Inside is nicely decorated and all seating is spaced comfortably. The staff are very friendly and have you seated quickly with a little light-hearted conversation as they take your drinks order. You are then given time to view the menu and make your choice from a fantastically varied menu. Once you have ordered, a little bowl of prawn crackers or two are put on the table as an appetizer. The meals are really fresh produce cooked to perfection. In all the times I have been there, there were only positive comments from our entire party.

During the covid-19 the staff are suitably gloved and masked and there are no limitations on the menu such as I have witnessed in other eateries. You will have to endure entering with a mask and a contactless temperature reading being taken. Such a small price to pay for...