Thai Aroma Restaurant — Restaurant in Maryland

We really wanted to love this place again. It used to be one of our favorite Thai restaurants. The food quality went downhill years ago, but we noticed that the menu had changed, and the reviews were improving, so we decided to give it another try.

We won't be back again.

I ordered Krapow with crispy duck. It is my very favorite dish, and I have eaten it at dozens of restaurants all over the country. This was the worst I've had. Positively inedible. The duck was sliced very thin, and it was coated with a layer of gummy goo. Even pieces that were not in the sauce were slimy and not the least bit crispy. The sauce tasted good, but the flavor of the mushy duck was just just awful. I told a gentleman, who I believe was the manager or owner, about this issue, and I tried to show him the gooey mess coating the duck, but he would've even look at it. He insisted, "That's how we do it." I asked him, "shouldn't crispy duck be crispy?" He did not respond, but instead said, "Do you want something different?" I said no. Never once did he apologize or offer to remake the dish. He only tried to convince me that the slimy, gloopy duck was "crispy duck." Disgraceful and so disappointing.

The rest of my family order curries, larb, and steamed dumplings. The dumplings were below average, and the curries (green and panang) were okay but not great.

The larb was good.

Our waitress was very nice, but the dismissive man was demeaning and cold. I guarantee this business will not survive with him...

My wife and I had seen Thai Aroma a few times when we came to shop at Lotte. While she was decidedly against checking out this place - I convinced her that it couldn't be so bad. It isn't - if you are hungry or easily satisfied. We ordered the calamari, the egg/vegetarian fried rice, and the catfish. The calamari was fine - it's fried. If a restaurant messes up the calamari - it's best if you cancel the rest of the order, pay, and promptly leave. The fried rice was actually good. My wife liked it. However I started wondering if I was a rabbit because it had a lot of carrots. Then came the fish - and I had to ask my wife if I had turned into a rabbit. It had fish, green beans, and carrots, more carrots, and still more carrots. I don't think Thai cuisine, or for that matter any cuisine in the world, has that much carrot. What made it intolerable was that the carrot tasted funky - some undefined metallic taste that made one feel sick. My wife nibbled on it and quit. I bravely sifted through the jungle of carrots and ate the fish pieces - I guess I was hungry. The service was not bad - the female wait staff were polite and attentive although the dude at the front desk who also chips in as wait staff - he's better off doing something else although it's very possible that he actually owns the place and therefore can afford to work as sloppily as he did. Definitely do not recommend - unless you are a rabbit or...

Do NOT spend your money here!!!! After reading the mixed reviews we decided that the good ones out weighed the poor ones and to give this restaurant a try today. All I can say that we have absolutely no idea how they got so many good reviews and we would have been better off staying home and eating Ramen Noodles! The service was awful. We were ignored for 10 minutes after being seated. After finally being acknowledged we were brought water with almost no ice that tasted like a rusty faucet. I've had better water out of a garden hose as a child. The waiter seemed disgusted when I asked for a soda instead. The Drunken Noodles came out lukewarm and looking like a pile of brown dog food. The noodles appeared to be over cooked broken up lasagna noodles. The consistency was mush and the only flavor came from the generous amount of sriracha I had to put on it to get it down. The Thai Fried Rice was also a huge disappointment. It was far from fried and for that matter, barely even sautéed, lacked any flavor except the half a bottle of soy sauce that we dumped on it. We were ignored by our waiter after our food was dumped in front of us and quickly and rudely dismissed when we attempted to discuss the poor quality of the food. Over all a fun afternoon out, turned into a huge disappointment and even worse, a waste of money. We will never go back and very strongly urge you not to go...