Siam Orchid Thai Bistro — Restaurant in Concord

As far as a restaurant goes, there are a lot of opportunities for a better restaurant experience. For me, first thing is that the service is a little slow. With tight cramped quarters and a disorganized staff, there is some work that needs to be done. Now, onto the food. We started with vegetable tempura. Now, I know that tempura is typically a dish you'd find in a Japanese restaurant, but being vegetarian, there was not a lot to choose from. The dish was mediocre due to the tempura batter being overcooked, while the vegetables were tough and undercooked. That is fryer cooking 101. A small adjustment to cooking temp, and you'd have a great tempura.

For our entrees, I had the red curry with tofu and my partner had the Massaman curry with tofu. While our order was being taken, we were asked if we wanted white rice or brown rice with our curry. Now, when you are asked what kind of rice you'd like, I'd think it safe to say that it is included with the dish - which is pretty standard in many restaurants serving Asian cuisine. But, I digress. . .

The curry for the most part was delicious. It was a bit watery, but flavor was there. I didn't care for the basil stem, but that's fine. All in all, it was a standard curry.

As we finish our dish, we are given our check. To my surprise, the bill is tipping to about $40! What?! That is FAR too expensive for A) the amount of food served, B) the level of service and attention to guests (not just us, but others in the restaurant) and C) the quality of the dish. So where did the extra costs come from? $3.00 for white rice...PER ORDER! And I mean, we are talking 1-1.25 cups of cooked rice. You want to charge me (without telling me) $3.00 for a small portion of rice?! You're out of your mind!!

So, I'm obviously a little taken back, and I tip a small amount not only for the service and food but, for the fact that the amount charge was pushing my budget. All of which is my right as a customer.

We get up to leave and then the waitress has the audacity to chase us down and say "did I not take good care of you?" pointing to the amount tipped. So, reluctantly I increase the amount. But, really?! You chase down your consumer and harass them for more money? That is RIDICULOUS!!

Good thing we didn't order any tea.

Needless to say, this was a one and done for us.

If you don't have a budget and don't care about standards, service, quality or comfort...then eat your heart out. Otherwise, stick to other Asian retaurants for fresh food, great price, and awesome...

When we arrived in Concord, NH, we were craving Thai food. My friend James recommended me to check out Siam Orchid Thai Bistro. Shortly after we arrived at the restaurant, we were asked whether we wanted to sit indoors or outdoors. We chose indoors and were able to pick which table to sit at. Our server Nake was friendly and attentive. He checked on us periodically and asked whether we enjoyed our food and whether we needed anything else. For drinks, I tried their Thai Iced Tea but didn't enjoy it as much as I hoped. When I checked in on the Swarm app, there was a tip that said the Chicken Coconut Soup was delicious so I decided to start with a bowl of Chicken Coconut Soup. It was a coconut milk based soup with chicken, mushrooms, lemongrass, bayleaf, galangal, and lime juice. It was fragrant and it had calming and soothing properties. Since Pad Thai can be found at every Thai restaurant, I decided to get their Crispy Duck Mango Sauce. The duck was stir fried with mangoes, bell peppers, broccoli, and snowpeas in a tangy, not your type red colored, sweet and sour sauce. The duck wasn't as crispy as I liked but it was tender and juicy. I didn't like how the mango had a slimy texture. Brendan had Sweet and Sour Chicken cooked slightly spicier to his liking. The chicken was stir fried with seasonal vegetables (including carrots, onions, mushroom, cauliflower, broccoli, snowpeas, green beans, grape tomatoes, and pineapple) in a tangy sweet and sour sauce with chili flakes. We were too stuffed to try their Mango with Sticky Rice but heard great...

Full disclosure: My mom is from Thailand so I grew up on thai food. Also, we were given a $75 gift certificate a couple months ago so we decided to check this place out.

We got the appetizer sampler, basil beef, crispy zesty chicken and 2 bubble teas. Sampler was ok, nothing special. The satay was bland and peanut sauce was just ok. Bubble teas were ok too, I prefer the blended type but it was fine.

Then we waited for entrees. And waited. 50 minutes on a Thursday night and the place was not busy. We finally asked about the food and it arrived shortly after. Staff was a little all over the place. We also had to order rice separately, which is kind of ridiculous, and it did not come out with the food so we had to wait for that to arrive before we could eat. It should come with every meal. The food was good, but I felt like it was a little light on the seasoning.

Our bill came to $59. We decided to just give them the entire $75 gift card to pay for the meal and tip. The waitress chased us down and said we could not use the gift card as a tip because they don't give cash back. My husband said someone paid cash for it in the first place and we didn't want any cash back. And then it was kind of weird and awkward...so at that point we just left. sigh

We wanted to like it but with the wait, the bland food, rice up charge (???) , and weird tip situation we were...