Spicy Basil — Restaurant in Englewood

Had dinner there for the second time tonight. Thai peanut chicken was outstanding. It had pea pods, sweet potato, creamy peanut sauce and beautifully cooked, tender slices of chicken. The satay beef had a similar peanut sauce, but with more spice, and came on a bed of perfectly steamed (hot all the way through, but still with a reasonable amount of crunch) broccoli and a side of steamed rice. The beef was tender and matched well with the spicy peanut sauce. The Taste of Siam was a variety of seafood and vegetables covered in the same delectable peanut sauce that came on the chicken. The scallops and shrimp were perfect. Curiously, they highlighted eggplant as a main ingredient in the dish and treated it just like the seafood. The only downside to the evening was the Pad Thai (and it wasn't really a downside, just wasn't what I expected). It had the same tender sliced chicken as the Thai peanut chicken, but the sauce was sweet, rather than spicy, like most other Pad Thais I've had.

Also of note was the fact that on one of the hottest days we've had so far this year (mid 90's), they had the doors wide open and did not turn the AC on. It was at least as warm in the restaurant as it was outside and maybe even warmer. I stopped in to the same location for carryout a couple of weeks ago and was surprised at the fact that they had the doors open and no AC then, too. They claimed today that the AC was broken and they were waiting to get it fixed, but if that's the case, then it's been broken for weeks and is still in need of repair. The chef brought out a carry-out order and was covered in sweat. To see him looking that way while he cooked our food was less than appetizing. I spend this much time explaining this because the uncomfortably warm temperature in the dining room did affect our enjoyment of the wonderful meal that was presented to us.

Based solely on the food and service, I would have rated it five stars (or close to it), but the temperature in the dining room would cause me to drop somewhere between a half and a full star. Therefore, since I can't award half stars, I give the overall experience four stars out of five. If I'd gone when it was cooler outside, and, therefore, cooler in the dining room, it would be...

I stumbled into this place with the intent of trying the new seafood restaurant next-door. I'm a foodie, so, I bought from both restaurants. First, in comparison to two other seafood restaurants with that theme, (seafood in a bag), it failed to keep up, ONLY, due to lack of sauciness surrounding their crustaceans... this includes the shrimp, sno-crab AND crawfish. However, NEXTDOOR, the CHINESE food dish of choice, was not ONLY a welcome reprieve from the disappointment from the missing seafood sauce in my dish next-door... this Chinese food dish from, the The Spicy Basil, ended up being the BEST EVER BEEF PEPPER STEAK I'VE EVER TASTED!!!! Except, here, you have to call it by its menu name; "Peppered Beef". Now,..if you want to enhance your experience with this most delicious dish even further,.. ask for fried rice in lieu of the white rice that comes with the dish... it's so worth it. OMG!!! Pure Nirvana. The peppered steak has a slight, barely noticeable sweetness to it----- which makes it all the more TASTIER. I can't seem to get enough of this dish,.. I've visited 4xs for the same dish, and cannot, for the life of me, try something different here, bcz the peppered steak has me MESMERIZED. I'm eyeballing that Mongolian Beef dish though. I don't care about the mixed reviews on this, or any other dish, for that matter; As a former restaurant owner twice over, I'm smart enough to know that all tastes are different, and you can please SOME of the people SOME of the time, but you can't please ALL of the people ALL of the TIME. In conclusion,.. The Spicy Basil is Englewood's best kept secret, thus...

Extremely rude they hung up the phone on me because they tried to tell me that Uber eats would refund my order which was canceled within 1 minute of the order being placed, and because they supposedly made the whole meal already within a minute I was charged $2 less than the total of the order and was not informed that I would basically be charged for the order anyway upon cancelation. They then told me that I had to call Uber eats customer support to get a refund which I did 4 different times every single customer service representative informed me that spicy basil was keeping my money because they had already made the product and that it was a waste of their food however when I call spicy basil they tell me that they didn't keep the money they don't know where it went so uber's lying to me? They continued to lie and say that the food was already made and that it was wasted I wanted to know how you make chicken Katsu and 40 seconds because that's impossible unless it's pre-made. So rude the lady hung up on me when I called back she laughed did not seem to care at all didn't even consider giving me a credit for the same meal just decided they'd take my $17 and did not care two ways about it. Do not go here the food is overly fatty and sugary anyway there's so many better places to get Chinese food...