Thai Famous Cuisine — Restaurant in Garden Grove

I don't usually post reviews, but my experience here was bad enough to merit one. Now, I'm not sure if it was just an off day for them, but boy, what an OFF day! I took a friend here recently because I had eaten here about a year ago and had enjoyed the food then. Perhaps, it's under new ownership or they're struggling right now. Whatever it is, I usually like to give the benefit of the doubt, but this night in particular was just bad.

I had arrived at 7pm, asked for dine-in. Weirdly enough, despite dine-in, they serve all their sauces, drinks, rice sides in to-go cups/boxes. This just makes freshness questionable as I'm sure they were all pre-packaged and definitely not made to order. They try to impress you with a free drink but tbh doesn't make up for the quality of the food which was a tad overpriced as well. Maybe they rely on the to-go boxes because their plates are also chipped.

I ordered Crying Tiger beef, Tom kha, and fried wontons. I figure these entrees were simple enough. It took 45 minutes since seating to get our appetizer; stale fried wontons that tasted as though they had been microwaved. An additional 30 minutes later we received our mains; crying tiger (emphasis on "crying") and tom kha chicken soup. Firstly, as someone who has grown up with south east Asian cuisine, I understand there may be some regional differences in some dishes, however, this was not it; the look of each dish was just off. The crying tiger was drenched in a sauce that was split (e.g. fat and liquid separated) and it wasn't emulsified at all. For some reason, the beef looked black and rubbery, and since they have xmas lights decorating the interior of the restaurant, I swear it made the beef look a disgusting blackish blue. I still tried it, and what a mistake that was. The beef was rubbery, bland, and overcooked. I was appalled. I looked over at my friend's dish, tom kha soup. It looked like a watered down tomato bisque! When we fished for the pieces of chicken it claimed it had, the cuts looked like butchered leftovers of breast meat! Also bland and overcooked.

I could not believe what I was seeing and tasting. For my friend's safety, after I took a bite of both the beef and chicken, I told her not to eat anything else and that we were leaving. The wait staff, who all look like college kids just trying to make a buck, asked us how the meal was, and in the only polite way I could manage said, "I'm trying to find something nice to say, but tbh it's really not good." Poor waiter offered us some fried ice cream or to swap out our dishes but considering, they had done so poorly with what I considered the most basic Thai cuisine, I simply asked for the check. No doggy bags required, wouldn't feed it to a dog tbh.

They didn't even try to comp part of our meal or provide a discount. I was so upset and hungry, I didn't want to make a scene. I paid the bill and left in a hurry. On the receipt, I left my last "tip" stating "I know it's not the waiter's fault, but the food was NOT GOOD." I took my friend literately 8 minutes away to Brodard Chataeu, which was 1000x a better experience than here.

Given the atmosphere, the food, and the price, I cannot in good faith recommend this place anymore. The beef and chicken looked butchered, drenched in oily residue, and simple side sauce/dishes were all stale in to-go boxes.

Perhaps, these other reviewers had their dinner on a good day but I shouldn't have to gamble on a decent eating experience.

Please, proceed with caution. Check your dishes and make sure you're not eating old, butchered meat hidden in sickly...

Wow!! The reviews do not lie. Your meal comes with a free papaya salad, pop chips, beverage (excluding fresh coconut juice), and fried ice cream with each dine-in entrée!

My boyfriend and I got out of a really late movie and were craving some Thai food. Sadly, there's never anything open late in Irvine so we had to venture out to Garden Grove to grab a bite to eat.

SERVICE Slow but incredibly friendly. In fact, for it being 11:30pm on a Thursday night, I was absolutely shocked at the fact that the restaurant was completely full. The servers would drop by our table to ask how we were doing and since it was our first time they kindly explained to us that the aforementioned items would be free... sweet! The food itself came out very fast so I was very happy about that.

BEVERAGES Thai Iced Coffee -- not too sweet and rightly portioned!

Thai Iced Tea -- definitely not on the sweet side but had a decent enough portion of milk to even out the vanilla notes.

FOOD Papaya Salad -- Interesting choice and the papaya tasted very strange but the sauce was delicious and I liked it overall.

Pop chips -- there's seasoning on it that adds a bit of kick to it. This is perfect for munching on and chatting while waiting for your food.

Pad See Ew -- very, very thick noodles and LOTS of beef! Not as oily as other pad see ew dishes I've had in the past which is actually something I prefer but I also felt like they were a bit lacking in flavor... I just couldn't quite put my finger on it.

Crying Tiger -- so-so. I did like this dish as the beef was very tender and delicious. The sauce that it came with would have properly been better for chicken or shrimp and not with beef but I did like it as well.

Deep Fried Ice Cream -- you could tell that the ice cream had been sitting in the freezer for a while based on the chewy texture of the breading itself. The overall flavor was delicious. I loved the blend of peanuts and coconut sauce.

-- Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience here. Though I would've realistically given them a 3 or 4 star review, the fact that so many of the items mentioned above were complimentary made them deserving of a 5 star mention. I definitely plan on coming back here for another visit to try out several of their...

My sister and I came on Sunday for lunch. There were only two other tables inside and they already had their food. We were seated promptly but that was about it for the quick service. After 10 minutes the server(an older man) came and took our order. My sister had the drunken noodles while I ordered the khua khai. Another 10 minutes passed, he brought us the complimentary papaya salad and Thai tea. The salad was drenched in sauce and exceptionally sweet and the papaya was soggy. It was made a while back and soaked up too much of the vinegar sauce. After another 15 minutes, we finally got our food and only one other table came in after us. Since we already been in the restaurant for 30 minutes, we expected our food would come out hot but it was just warm. Both noodles tasted very similar with the drunken noodles being better than mine. My noodle dish was very bland. It was bland even after adding tons of hot sauce. I tried adding all four chili choices to deepen the flavor but no luck. From the picture you can see I only had five pieces of small chicken on it. The egg was burnt, yes burnt. It was dry and charred. I'm not sure why they seasoned the egg but it made it very salty almost like chewing on a piece of paper. There was no table service as we tried to flag down a server since I was exceptionally thirsty. I have been here a year ago but the food was better but still very slow service. After spending an hour in the restaurant we were finally able to get our bill and it took another 15 minutes for them to charge my card and hand it back. We wanted a quick lunch and ended spending an hour and fifteen minutes there with bad food. Next time I'll just head to Cutie across the street. They have much better...