Ban Mai Thai Restaurant — Restaurant in Harker Heights

This is the best personal, authentic, and generous Thai restaurant in Bell County with Texas-sized portions. This small restaurant seats 12 tables at best, but the to go orders are endless. I almost want to keep this place secret due to its flavor, prices, and portions.

To start, the pad thai is glistening with flavor. The lemongrass flavor pops a concoction of sweet, tart, umami, and spicy. Truly, this is a taste explosion with huge portion sizes that is freshly made to order. The massaman and penang curries are full of deliciousness as you can taste a distinct nutty lemongrass essence in each bite. I highly recommend the curry crab rangoons that are uniquely filled with curry, adding a layer of Thai spice and flavor that elevates it to another level, 5/5.

For those with allergies, all curries are made with coconut milk and peanuts can be placed to the side.

Even the drinks with the thai ice tea is 5/5 with a sweet milkiness rarely found in most commercial tea shops.

Service is 5/5. The server recognizes familiar faces and recognizes aunties and uncles personally.

The value. Oh the value. These are all double portions at cheaper than normal prices. Normally, as a value pick, I would tell you to order one entree for 2 people. However, the food is so good and I want to support this place so order your separate entrees and take the rest home. You will not regret it. Just a fyi, they are not yet open on the weekends. They are just that good.

Flavor 5/5 Value 5/5 Service 5/5 X-factor, double down...

I'm here for a good combination fried rice. The guy warns you that mild spice has a kick like a "fresh jalapeño". I'm okay with spice and I'm not usually going much spicier than mild or medium anyway. I hate it when my nose or the sweat under my eyes runs into my food. I went with the mild and I was fully prepared for the kick that I was warned about. I was not, however, prepared for the scalding hot fire on a fork that I stuck in my mouth. That food was hot and fresh. It was so hot though that my over medium egg continued to cook over the rice so I'd have to order it over easy next time or maybe get it on the side until I was ready it. Maybe just get a raw egg and crack it over the top at the table. The meat was really fresh. I'm an adult, but there was probably still too many peas and carrots for me. Thai tea is one of my favorite sweet drinks and it's really not the same everywhere. This was wonderful. I still got a glass of water. I also got the chicken egg rolls and they were good. I was expecting something with a little a little lighter and fluffier with at least some vegetables. The meat tasted good, but it was like a a chicken stick wrapped in a spring roll wrapper. Tax, tip, and everything, I think I spent around $30. I almost never finish anything onsite so I probably took more than half of it home with me. It didn't reheat well for me so there's that. I'm going back. I'll just need to remember that my egg will...

We went about 7 PM for a quiet dinner since we had no children for the night. We were properly seated and were one of two tables being served that were socially distanced. Noticed a child at the first table under the TV set who must’ve been related to the owner or an employee. At first, we didn’t have any issues with what she was doing. But eventually realized that she was watching some sort of absurd Anime cartoon That was depicting the repetitive bloody murder of several characters. The child ,seven or eight years old, Kept repeating video segments over and over for 20 minutes or so as we sat there waiting to place and receive our order. At one point we decided to get our food to go since we did not want to have to hear and watch that over and over again. We mentioned it to the male waiter, Who apologized and said nothing to the child. He would mention something to the older woman. She hollered something at the child and the volume was lowered. Five minutes later the child raised the volume up again. We finally received our food and left. It was OK considering it was cold by the time we got home. Would’ve really enjoyed eating it fresh at the restaurant. I understand sometimes parents have to bring their kids to work, but there should be some oversight especially in a public dining room of a restaurant in which atmosphere...