Night + Market Song — Restaurant in Los Angeles

I was so excited to eat here. All the great reviews. People love the food.

As someone that lived in Thailand for almost 10 years, I was just underwhelmed by everything here. A quick summary - the food is rather bland, the service is slow, and the restaurant is simply too loud to be enjoyable.

At 8:30 PM on a Tuesday, the wait was about 20 - 30 minutes for a party of two. Fair enough, because the hype that surrounds it seems like it would be worth it.

After I was sat, a server didn't come by for about 10 - 15 minutes. One didn't even walk by for that long. The server was cool enough, but didn't look particularly excited to be there (Can't blame them, service work sucks).

I ordered 4 dishes. Larb Moo Tod, Som Tam, Tom Kha Gai soup, and Uni and Garlic Fried Rice.

The larb moo tod was so, so, soooooooo disappointing. It tasted like McDonald's breakfast sausage which is not what it should really taste like. It was also burned beyond belief. Larb moo tod is supposed to be crispy and fried like fried chicken on the outside and nicely cooked on the inside, but this was thoroughly beyond well done the whole way through. Tough, chewy, breakfast sausage. Not fun. This is one of my favorite Thai foods and it set up a bad mood for the rest of the meal.

Som tam - Papaya salad. Hard to mess up. Rather flavorless here. It's typically strong in sweet, spicy and sour all at the same time. It seemed undertuned and blanded out for the generic, white, hipster crowd that made up 80% of the diners here. Everything seemed pretty fresh which is the only good thing I can really say about it. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't as good as Thai food in LA can be.

Tom Kha Gai - a coconut milk based chicken soup that typically has a good sour/spicy flavor to it. Again, pretty bland. It's really lacking the strong flavors thai food is known for. The chicken and mushrooms in it were good, but the soup base, yeah... just underwhelming.

Uni and Garlic Fried Rice - For $17, it's expensive fried rice. It came with 3 slices of uni on top and a bunch of salmon eggs. It was probably the most flavorful thing on the menu, but due to the price and the small slices of uni, I'd just recommend getting normal fried rice at an actual Thai restaurant. The reason the flavor was okay was due to the sauce that came with it, and the squeezes of lime I added to it.

Me and my date were both excited to try this place. Neither of us finished any of our food, neither of us wanted to take the leftovers home, and both of us left underwhelmed and knowing we'd never be back.

Listen, it's not a bad restaurant. It's Silverlake, so it's a gentrified area that maybe can't handle the stronger flavors of Thaitown Thai food, but everything I experienced do not make this place live up to it's amazing hype.

If you want actual Thai food, just go to Thaitown where you'll get good Thai food with actual flavor. Darabar, Sanamluang, Luv2Eat, Siam Sunset, Pa Oord Noodles, Jitlada.... I can recommend all these full-heartedly.

Sorry Night + Market... you're just bland Thai food for bland...

I rarely am ever this furious, but before you go to this place and support this establishment let me tell you about our experience tonight.

My friends from out of town came for my wedding yesterday, and wanted as a meal before they went to try good authentic Thai food. My brother in law is Thai and told us about this awesome place, so of course, we went there. They don't take reservations, and so told us to come and waitlist. We were alright with the reasonable wait of 35-45 mins given what we'd heard about the food. Since we were told not to leave the premises for fears of losing the table, we stayed behind to make sure we wouldn't lose it. I sent some of the party out so they wouldn't block the entrance, but we were definitely there the whole time.

One of the hostesses then took off our names off the list, unbeknownst to us. That isn't even the worst part, they gave away our table to the owner's good friends whom the hostess just got notice to go and seat and wouldn't be able to accommodate us any longer. No sorry it was our fault, just an oh sorry that happened. What was the worst was the lack of communication, organization, basic customer service, and willingness to make it right.

Their main hostess is plain rude. She scoffed when I said that we waited 35-45 mins and to wait another 35-45 mins is a long wait. She said that's pretty good wait time in this area. On a Monday night?! When we were already there? Math is not your forte because 35+35 is equal to 65, not 35 only.

When asked about take out options, we were told it would take just as long, which is ridiculous. Throughout this entire debacle, they kept seating other tables, and basically we were in the way the whole time like we'd screwed up. It was terribly embarrasing. We ended up leaving because my party was hungry and by that time, 8:30pm, loads of places are booked or might be closed.

It was one of the worst possible dining experiences I've ever had in Los Angeles where the restaurant apparently has good reviews and great vibes. So disappointed, furious, and still waiting for the general manager to call me. She was supposed to arrive at 8pm, it is now 8:52pm. I was told at 8:26 she was 6 mins away, and still no call. What a...

Like the spot. Didn’t like the food. Food is definitely overrated. When you go into a Thai restaurant and there’s no Thai eating there. it’s a sign. I guess if you’re Farang, you’ll think it’s great, because you just don’t know. Even my Thai wife, who doesn’t ever say anything negative about anyone or any place, commented how it felt like a Farang must own it. Lmfao. I told her it wasn’t a white dude that owned it, it was a Thai guy. Oh, she says, must be a Thai that never been to Thailand. Ouch.

On to the food. Som tum Thai was kind of boring and needed tamarind. I know they use lime, but tamarind gives it a better sour note.

Chicken sandwich doesn’t compare to any fried chicken I’ve ever had in Thailand. Wasn’t all that juicy and didn’t have any herbs I’m accustomed to. They say it’s northern Thai fried chicken, which I didn’t know fried chicken from the north was a thing. I know grilled chicken is a thing in the north and that fried chicken from the south in Hat Yai is a thing, but northern fried chicken? Sorry, but I spend a lot of time in the north and must of missed it. Idk. Was ok, but not something I would label “world famous”.

Crispy rice was ok. If you want killer crispy rice, look up crispy rice in North Hollywood and you’ll be in for a treat.

Lastly, we had the pad kra pao, which they spell it grapow. Kra pao is my all time favorite Thai dish. I’ve eaten it at literally hundreds of different restaurants and street vendors throughout Thailand. When we are home there, I eat it sometimes for breakfast, lunch and dinner for days on end. Sorry, but the dish here pretty much was my least favorite I’ve had. To put it simply, it sucked. This dish is literally named after a type of basil, which didn’t taste like they used, so not using the correct basil defeats the dish.

Anyway, if you want great Thai, go to the multiple other great Thai restaurants in LA. But I guess if you want to be a trendy Farang, come here. For me and my wife, when we aren’t home in Thailand, but visiting family and friends in SoCsl, we will not be eating...