Rosa's Thai Guildford — Restaurant in Guildford

A late evening dinner with friends at Guildford's latest restaurant on the strip-mall that is Friary Street.

Let's focus first on the food. I went for a Thai lemon tea drink. This was advertised as 60kcal per glass, but mine seemed to be far sweeter than this would suggest. How my blood sugar shot through the roof! I'll not be having this again.

Starter was the "pumpkin crackers". These were, I guess, supposed to be a vegan replacement for prawn crackers, and indeed their look and feel just like prawn crackers. They were crunchy and felt fresh. The flavour though: best described as "meh". There's very little of any flavour at all. I wonder if that's because it's not pumpkin season, or perhaps pumpkins have gone up in price recently. Whatever, they weren't very tasty. Thankfully there was accompanying sweet chilli sauce.

Main dish was the "signature" red curry with vegetables and tofu. The small bowl contained four small pieces of tofu and a number of slices of vegetables. The tofu wasn't particularly well cooked, but that's probably how the chef likes it which is fine (I prefer it more fried than this). The curry sauce tasted like it contained a lot of sugar, much like the ice tea. If only there was more spice and less of the sugar, although no doubt this would increase cost prohibitively. Many curry places also like to use a lot of sugar in their sauces as it is relatively cheap. I hope that's the not the case here, but it was the impression gained. The mix of spices in the sauce wasn't helped by the sweetness which totally dominated. There wasn't much spice, although my friend had the green curry which was much more potent in that regard (perhaps what I should have next time).

The roti I had with this didn't resemble any roti I have had before, it was more like a small, folded, rather oily paratha. This is fine, I like paratha, but the size again seemed to be skimpy.

We were not asked if we wanted dessert or another drink after this, just whether we wanted the bill. I guess the staff wanted to go home even though it wasn't very late.

The service was good willed even if this wasn't really reflected in the service itself. My pumpkin crackers were forgotten when the other starters were served. I had a chopstick flung into my leg when staff behind me dropped it (and not a word was said by them). We were offered discounts on the mains but then this offer was rescinded. All a bit chaotic.

The restaurant could far better label which of its dishes contain copious sugar. This would help those of us sensitive to this. Perhaps an offering of ice tea not rammed full of sugar would be possible too? It might taste better as well. I appreciate that this might just be that I don't like things super-sweet, while Thai culture is such that sweet is everything. I don't know, so let's give them some benefit of the doubt.

Finally, our server Chloe asked us to say hello on here so she wins the competition for the most mentions. That's nice. I would recommend that, when asking if we'd like a receipt, she doesn't point out that we should indeed take a receipt and use it to declare the meal against tax even though it's not a business dinner. Perhaps her claim that she'd saved hundreds of pounds doing this was a joke? I hope so for her sake!

Service charge was included without a vocal mention. Yes, it says it's included in the small print on the menu, but it should be mentioned politely by staff as it is optional. Many, including me, find this practice wholly offensive.

The wifi makes one sign in. Why am I forced to give the restaurant personal details like this? Just use next door's "Yo Sushi" wifi for free. All the staff do, according to Chloe.

Will I go back? Not voluntarily. For the served amount, and the average quality, and not great service, it wasn't good.

I will return to other Thai offerings in Guildford, e.g. the excellent Thai Terrace and Rumwong, where the food is far better and the service impeccable. Yes, they're more expensive, but I live only once and I'd rather have one Thai Terrace meal than...

I had high hopes for my visit to Rosa's Thai restaurant in Guildford, especially given its generally positive reviews. We chose it last-minute for Father's Day lunch.

As expected, the restaurant was incredibly busy, which unfortunately set the stage for a few issues. Our initial table near the front was problematic; speakers were blasting music at a rather loud volume, and combined with the general din of a busy restaurant and lively conversations, it created an overwhelming atmosphere. My daughter has some sensory sensitivities, so we had to request a move to a table at the back, which helped a little.

Next, we ordered from the menu, which offered a traditional selection of Thai dishes, typical of UK-based restaurants. We opted for the classic Pad Thai, Basil and Chilli Chicken with fried rice, two kids' meals with stir-fried flat noodles, satay chicken, and prawn doughnuts. We also selected a sharing platter for our starter.

Prawn crackers were brought out while our food was being prepared, which was a nice touch. However, the starters arrived strangely at the same time as the kids' meals. The sharing platter included spring rolls, squid, chicken wings, prawn crackers, and pork skewers, all with accompanying dipping sauces.

The squid was genuinely amazing – truly the highlight of the meal. The chicken wings were also quite tasty and crispy! There were no complaints about the spring rolls. Sadly, the pork skewers were disappointing; they lacked flavour and were generally very dry.

The kids' starters were less successful. The satay chicken was dry and overcooked, with a heavy, almost raw, spice flavour. While the satay sauce was okay, it couldn't redeem the chicken. The prawn doughnuts were unique; I didn't mind them, but my son wasn't a fan and much preferred the squid from the platter. The adult mains were a mixed bag. The Chilli and Basil Chicken (minced style) was flavourful, but halfway through, I really noticed the salt level, even with an ample portion of rice. The Pad Thai was decent and came with a good helping of chopped nuts on the side, though it was a little unvaried in taste.

The kids' meals, made with large flat noodles similar to Pad Thai but not as good, were particularly disappointing. My son, who usually eats anything and everything, only had a quarter of his meal, which is highly unusual for him. My daughter tasted hers and was not happy with it, ultimately leaving it uneaten. What compounded our experience was the lack of attentive service. There were no usual checks to see if our meal was okay or if we needed more drinks; we felt largely ignored throughout our visit. They did offer to remove the kids' meals from the bill, and I agreed to one, as that seemed fair since my son had eaten some and was full.

While some dishes certainly had a "sparkle," the overall experience and the lack of consistent quality were ultimately a...

Dined here last night as part of their soft opening (50% off all food until 4th Feb) and think it’s a brilliant addition to the Guildford restaurant scene.

The restaurant was packed due to their current offer so there was a small wait to get our table but only a few minutes and we received a very warm welcome from staff despite them being rushed off their feet.

We were seated and served by the wonderful Pang who was friendly, efficient, polite and effortlessly cool - thank you Pang for your great service 🙏

Once seated we ordered drinks and prawn crackers to nibble on whilst our food was prepared. My husband was pleased to see that Singha beer was available on draft. Bit of a shame that the passion fruit bubble tea I wanted was not available but I’ll just have to try it next time!

The classic mixed platter (pork skewers, chicken satay, prawn crackers, spring rolls and deep fried squid) was good - however, the satay and spring rolls were cold which was a slight shame but we still enjoyed them. The trio of dips - sweet chilli, tamarind and peanut satay were particularly tasty! The sweet chilli is next level and really authentic and the tamarind is a taste explosion that we loved.

We then went for Pad Thai, crab fried rice, chicken with cashew nuts and the duck with tamarind sauce (way too much food but we were provided with tubs to take some home which was appreciated). All dishes were tasty but the stand out dish for me was the duck as the tamarind sauce is simply amazing! It’s a must try in my opinion. We did find a few bits of shell in our crab fried rice but again, not a deal breaker when you’re used to ordering shellfish.

We loved hearing from the lovely Jevin about how a lot of ingredients come directly from Thailand particularly the sauces and pastes which was great to hear and you could definitely taste the authenticity in the food. It was also really interesting that a lot of Thai families connected to the restaurant are staff working here - really interesting and again, you can tell that this chain takes authenticity very seriously which is great. Thank you Jevin for taking the time to talk to us - you were fab and we really appreciated your kindness 🙏

Dessert wasn’t available by the time we enquired as the kitchen had already shut (around 10pm) but we were so full from the rest of the food that it wasn’t a problem- I will however, be back soon to try the mango and sticky rice as it’s my favourite!! Now just to hope that they add a banana / condensed milk pancake to the dessert menu to take me back to my backpacking days and wandering around the Koh San Road!! 😂🤞

All in all, we had a wonderful night of great food and friendly service. A couple of small issues for the team to work through but that’s exactly what the soft opening is for and we wish you every success.

Good luck Rosa’s Thai Guildford Team and...