LaLa Rice Thai Eatery and More — Restaurant in Los Angeles

I really wish I could give you the 5 stars. I was excited to have found this place & try it out. It's a shame a place with such good food & ambiance would end up leaving a bad taste on you all on their own personnel's fault. As a business, you might as well add automatic gratuity to your tables of 4 or more (or as many as you want) instead of harassing a customer at the end of their dinner. It was a birthday dinner on 2/12/24, came in around 7:30 I want to say. 2 adults, 15yr old & 9yr old. The service was decent, not much of a greeting or small talk, they sat us then brought us waters & plate settings. When we were ready they took our order, brought out the drinks & food as usual any restaurant does. That's it. We ordered 1 Chicken Satay 1 Egg Rolls 1 Steamed Rice 1 Pineapple Fried Rice 1 Brocoli Lover with Beef 1 Fisherman Soup 2 Thai Iced Tea 1 Thai Iced Coffee 1 Apple Juice All came out to a total of $120 & some change.

There was no check ins after if we needed anything so you had to flag girls down, they only came by to refill already warm water. We finish dinner, the bill is paid & we're now just hanging out at the table. The servers are quick to clean off the table but also to let me know "by the way, that total is withOUT tip." I say Ok, thanks for letting me know. That didn't bother me because we're still hanging out at the table. But not even 5 minutes go by.. my little sister & boyfriend start to feel very uncomfortable because they notice EVERY single server staring us down, just watching our table. Now that bothered me. I start to pay attention & it's true. Any server that walked by, stared at me as they passed, a server standing behind me was staring at my sister, watching us. A server got a table sat next to us & she was too busy looking at US instead of paying attention to her own table. I decided we were going to just leave because it became so obvious & that blows your tip from me personally. Already being the service wasn't anything that stood out, still my boyfriend was overly satisfied with his birthday dinner so I was more than happy to tip up until this moment.

No sooner than we pushed our chairs in, the server staring down my sister ran up to ask "um what was wrong with our service?" Excuse me? She says "what's wrong with our service because you didn't tip us" I tell her nothing is wrong, I already paid you the $120 on the bill. She gives me a look & proceeds to circle the SUGGESTED gratuity at the bottom. I tell her, yea I'm not tipping you. She turns to look at another server with a nasty smirk & says "ohhhh she doesn't want to tip" & giggles away. I say yea I'm not & with that attitude much less am I going to leave a tip. We walk out & turn to see all the servers are standing at the window, watching us walk out to our car. Talk about uncomfortable.

I wish I would have asked or looked for names. Sumet looks very familiar to the one who confronted me about the tip but I couldn't be sure without the name & she did have glasses on as well.

Let me state that when I tip a restaurant, I tip when I am finally getting up to leave. I don't tip at the moment I go to pay. That's my own habit. Not that it should matter how or when someone decides to tip anyway but it does explain to them why they didn't get theirs from me. Regardless, Tips are always optional & there's no reason to want to intimidate or pressure a customer into tipping. I work in the restaurant industry & If tipping is obligated for whatever reason then it's made known to customers in various ways. In your case for example there should be a gratuity percentage ALREADY added on the bill & the customer should know that because it would say so at the sign in seating sheet you have at the very front. Many places do it & you should too to save yourself trying to harass someone else into tipping an already flourishing business, especially during these difficult times for everyone. You'd think you would appreciate you're getting any business at all. From what I see on other reviews as well, you've tried to steal tips...

LaLa Rice is a reliable Thai restaurant on the west side. Since moving to Santa Monica, I've been on a quest to find the best Thai food, having previously lived near Thai Town in Hollywood, which set a high standard. LaLa Rice caught my attention with its extensive menu, convenient location, and positive early reviews since its recent opening. While I usually opt for food delivery, I occasionally choose to pick up my order to save a few dollars.

The food at LaLa Rice is generally excellent. The portion sizes could be slightly larger, but I've noticed a decrease in portion sizes across the board post-Covid. One standout feature of LaLa Rice is the quality of their meat. Unlike some Thai places where the chicken can be chewy and dry, the chicken in my Pad See Ew was moist, plump, and bursting with flavor. It's a step above other Thai restaurants in that regard.

I particularly enjoyed the Pad See Ew, which came pretty close to perfection. I appreciate that they use Chinese broccoli instead of the more common American broccoli. The Tom Yum Fries were an interesting and delicious surprise. While I wouldn't typically order them, they were complimentary when ordering through Postmates. The fries arrived crispy and the Tom Yum seasoning added a nice touch. However, I wasn't a fan of the mayo dip that accompanied them.

Although the Crispy Crab Rolls were flavorful, they were disappointingly tiny and didn't justify the price. On the other hand, the Coconut Shrimp Cakes were both delicious and provided better value for the money.

As a lover of Thai dumplings, particularly those from Pa Ord in Hollywood, I had high hopes for LaLa Rice's dumplings. Unfortunately, they were just okay. While they tasted good, they were rather small. Pa Ord's dumplings are large, juicy, and the epitome of dumpling perfection. I'm still searching for a rival that matches their quality, and unfortunately, LaLa Rice falls short in this regard.

Overall, LaLa Rice is a solid Thai restaurant that offers friendly service, authentic flavors, quick service, and consistency. However, it hasn't become my preferred Thai spot on...

It was our first time going to this restaurant . Had been wanting to try. The time before last the line was too long even with a reservation. Both of my friends plates were good I on the other hand did not have a good experience. For appetizer I got the stuffed fried wontons with chicken and shrimp. It came to the table in a cute little basket but they definitely weren't stuffed. Just a pea size flat piece of grounded chicken and shrimp. They were flat and no seasoning on the meat. The outer wontons were in perfect color and taste, but please don't say stuffed when they obviously aren't. Then for my main course I had the pad woon sen with chicken and a cup of steamed white rice. The food took forever to come out and funny because there were only 2 other parties in the restaurant. The food on our table ddnt come at the same time so we had to wait for everyone to get their food to eat together. My plate had an extra amount of cilantro. The plate doesn't say anything about cilantro but some one was definitely confused back there..the chicken actually tasted well and my plate was good minus the excess amount of cilantro. Now I ordered a side of white rice. I asked the server to bring soy sauce. She did, but so when I received it. I just put it on my rice. It tasted horrible then I took off the lid and it smelled expired also looked funny. So we tried for 10 mins trying to get or inattentive server. After 20 mins we got her to come to the table we told her the issue and before I got to explain to her how to avoid it from happening again, she left. She never came back with another soy sauce or at least never notified me that they had none at this time or at least could have offered me something else. She seemed like she was there for the paycheck not for us. She left on break or left home and we had a different server the rest of the time. The coconut ice cream was great but the fried donuts weren't the best. Mostly...