Poor Calvin's — Restaurant in Atlanta

Poor Calvin’s 12/24/24 The food and flavors are outstanding. Gorgeous elegant atmosphere and perfect ambiance for the 2 of us on Christmas Eve! My husband and I have no idea how to truly rate the rest as it’s almost comical for a restaurant with so many “house rules”.

Once we walked in we were greeted in hast while the host was occupied with another person. After a few minutes, another gentleman acknowledged us took our reservation, and asked us which of 2 locations we would like to sit. One was to our right in the front dining area and the other was on the left down the hall at the end in a room that couldn’t be seen. I asked what the other location was like. He stated “another dining room”. I was like ok. I laughed and we chose the one we could see. Seriously, why ask if you don’t want to be bothered to explain or it’s not a good area. Next is quite funny. Drinks arrived and appetizers were to die for (Deviled Eggs W/ Crab and Steamed Chicken and pork dumplings). Merry Christmas Eve, the night is starting beautifully!

We started placing our entree order, my husband ordered Scallops & Lobster Sacchettoni, and Spicy Crab Fried Rice. The server takes our menus and says thank you. I had not ordered or was asked. My husband says quietly, “No, no, no, wait.” I say I would like to order and the server says “Oh” with a shocked look on his face. I order the Sea Bass with a side of Tiger shrimp and Chinese broccoli. The server explains the Sea Bass and that it comes with bok choy. I then canceled the broccoli as I didn’t realize the entree had a vegetable. The server then says “I would, that’s a lot of food already”., and walks away. Wow, ok. Never quite felt ashamed about ordering food at a restaurant.

It gets better! Our 3 main dishes are delivered by another server who says, “That’s a lot of food!” My husband and I could not have been more shocked, but also could not stop laughing to ourselves. I was like, is this a lot of food, seriously? Anyway, as we took a bite my husband was missing the seafood and it had mushrooms. Well to our dismay it was the wrong dish, it was the Saffron Saccehtoni Purses. The server corrected it got the seafood, and also comped the very appropriate entree dish. I then realized the side of tiger shrimp never came, so we canceled those as it was just too late. In my comedic personality, I whispered to my husband “I guess we did order too much so the kitchen decided to help us out and remove /change some dishes”. We could not stop laughing!!! 😂

There’s more…. As we were waiting for our card to be run, the server turned the table behind us and said very loudly “Your card only took a partial balance of $35 I need another payment.” I felt so embarrassed for the other couple. There are so many ways that could have been handled. Once we received our check, the server explained that a 19% gratuity was added to the bill and thanked us. I look at my husband puzzled and say “Gratuity included, and you tell me we are ordering too much food?!?! 🤔 Shouldn’t larger orders be encouraged?

Needless to say, even with the comical Christmas Eve experience, we are still laughing the food...

I googled “Thai restaurant near me” here in downtown Atlanta after work tonight figuring I’d grab some standard Thai fare. Along came Stephanie my Lyft driver to carry me there, & as we talked about my dinner plans, she mentioned that there was another, better choice that was closer. She went on to say that it gets rave reviews from everyone who goes there. I asked her the name & she said “Poor Calvins”. Laughing, I blurted, “What kind of Thai restaurant is called Poor Calvin's?! To which she responded, “The best one!” She was right- well, kind of. It turns out that Calvin’s is an Asian/Thai/Southern cooking fusion restaurant. I did a little bit of research to find that Chef & owner Calvin was formally trained in Germany & had experience running Thai restaurants. He opened Poor Calvin’s about a dozen years ago and never looked back. The first thing that popped out at me was the decorative ambiance. Lots of dark carved latticework done Thai style lined the walls. Several beautiful Buddhas standing tall projected a welcoming vibe to me as I looked around the place. I was promptly greeted by Griffin, the Host. He was friendly and polite, seating me at the corner of the well stocked bar, right next to his station. Malik the bartender took my drink order, & explained the Chef’s specials. I had a ginger beer with lime & ordered the grouper with basil. It was fantastic! The fish was light & crispy with a nice clean taste. The stir fried vegetables were perfectly balanced & flavorful. The dill & radish garnish was kind of a curve ball that didn’t compliment the dish, so I just pushed it out of the way & dug in. I finished my dinner with the pistachio crème brûlée. It was amazing. I decided to return to Calvin’s the next, last night in town to research the menu further. My 2nd visit was wonderful as well. This time I met James, the General Manager. Malik, Griffin, James & I laughed and joked as I enjoy my meal. This was how I learned about the history behind Poor Calvin’s. My meal this night started off with the Tom yam soup. The calamari in it was perfectly tender and the shrimp were very tasty. By this time a nice lady named Jen was seated beside me. She had ordered the mussels, which she generously offered to share. I couldn’t resist, & was treated to a couple of the yummy mollusks. In turn, I insisted that she try a taste of my entree, which was the drunken noodles with shrimp and lobster. We both agreed that it was an amazing dish. For dessert, I went for the pound cake. It was delicious, rich, & filling. I now have a go to restaurant in Atlanta that I will visit every time I travel to Atlanta. Try Poor Calvin’s out for a special occasion or celebration. It’s not cheap, but it’s most definitely worth the price. Take note- It is the house policy to add a 19% gratuity to your bill. I usually tip 20-25% so this was no problem for me. I actually added a little extra for the server Malik. I’m a fan of this place & I think you’ll enjoy...

This is the third DragonCon in a row that my wife and I have been here. This time we brought a larger group with us for the experience and everyone loved the experience. Plus, this time we actually had Calvin himself come out for our omakase! Everything was absolutely fantastic!!! The food here has so many great flavors combined. This time around my wife and I ordered specials for the majority of our dishes.

We had appetizers of duck bao buns (with a side watermelon salad) as well as the shaky garlic tofu. The bao buns were so tasty! The bao bun was very crispy, not very oily, and had a lovely sauce as well as a bit of fresh veg including some cilantro that that really brought the whole dish together. There was a watermelon salad that accompanied the bao, which contained a bit of mango and some acidity to really bring the whole appetizer together. The shaky tofu was phenomenal! With the balance of salty, garlicky, and umami the flavor was second to nothing. Maybe it could have used a tiny bit more of a crisp? However, there was plenty of crisp to it considering it was soft/silky tofu.

For the omakase, there were three dishes: App, soup, main noodle dish. The first dish/appetizer was a roti shell filled with crispy Peking duck. The duck had been cooked for several hours then flash fried to get an extra crisp skin. The duck was carved in front of us by Calvin himself! There were pieces of duck, veg mix including some daikon radish, and two wonderful sauces wrapped in the roti. The sauces were a passionfruit sauce, which was reminiscent of a sweet chili sauce, and a peanut sauce which went unbelievably well with the passionfruit sauce.

There was a second course of a coconut soup. The size was around and about a standard sized "crock" for French onion soup. The soup had great flavor combinations. There was the perfect amount Thai basil within the soup. Gave a bit of licorice flavor to cut the powerful flavors of the soup itself. It all blended so well.

Third course was a duck noodle dish that used the remainder of the duck that had not been used for the roti app. Wide noodles with a load of crispy skin and delightful duck meat. Sauce was fantastic and went very well with the bits of Thai basil and green onions.

Throughout the meal I ended up drinking two different drinks, both were fantastic. A Midnight Overture and a Strawberry Fields(?) were the two drinks during the meal. The Midnight Overture had a wonderful foam floating on top. The Strawberry Fields(?) had great floral flavor to it with a sprig of mint. Solid flavors all around. With the whole meal being spectacular. No members of our party had anything bad to say about the meal or the service. We'll have to come back if I...