Krua Thai Restaurant — Restaurant in Monterey

Shocked the food here is described as “authentic” and how busy it is. I visited twice and each time was very different. The first time was several years ago. I remember ordering the Tom Kha Gai soup and noting it was good. I came in with my mom recently and we ordered many different dishes - green curry being one of the “standards” we order to determine how authentic the thai food is. Although all of the vegetables were extremely fresh and the portions generous, the green curry was extremely , exceedingly bland- it basically tasted like coconut milk. The owner, who is extremely gregarious and brash, was chatting with us the whole time we were waiting, and we did inform him that the curry was bland. He said “Green Curry is about the vegetables and ordered by vegetarians because it doesn’t have much flavor, so you should not expect much flavor in that dish”.

As a person who cooks thai food at home and for my partner, who spent much of his life in Thailand, I can assure you, I have eaten my fill of green curry and not once has it been so bland. There was no galangal, no lemongrass, no green curry paste even, nada. Also we discovered by chance that the tempura shrimp and egg-rolls are not made in house (and they certainly do not taste homemade) because a woman walked into the kitchen with boxes of frozen egg-rolls and shrimp tempura. 5 minutes later the appetizers were served to us and a few other customers. Even though I do believe the owner and can attest that the stir fry and noodle dishes are prepared with very fresh vegetables, the rest of the experience was a real disappointment. A immense lack of flavor across the board. We definitely will not return. Zab Zab and Lemongrass are now the only two I know we can rely on for good Thai on the...

Echoing other reviews complaining about the bad and unwelcoming service: my wife and I had a terrible experience as customers.

We have been frequenting this place, mostly dining in, and today my wife and her friend went for a take-out. The owner said they had to wait outside due to Covid restrictions. My wife asked again if they could wait inside because they both had masks on, the restaurant was more than half empty. The owner then raised his voice and said "get out" and yelled at the waiter to cancel the orders. My wife said I'm here often why can't I have a seat while waiting and the owner shouted "I don't care, get out" before she could finish.

My wife and her friend left the restaurant in shock. Against her advice, I went there to have a conversation with the owner, which turned out to be eye-opening. I said (1) you could have explained it more patiently why they couldn't stay inside, instead of jumping to "get our or you're not getting your food", and (2) what's wrong with inviting a frequent customer inside with a seat, on a cold day, while waiting for a take-out? That's not against any Covid rule.

To which he replied: (1) I have a loud and strong voice and am often mistaken as rude/angry, and (2) the tables can quickly fill up at any time so I can't afford a seat for take-out customers. He also offered the I'm-sorry-that-you're-upset-but-I-can't-do-any-better apology.

This is when I realized that the restaurant is so popular that he is constantly concerned that seating 2 customers waiting for take-outs will block the 30% full restaurant from profiting off of a sudden influx of imaginary dine-in customers, and it is totally worth it to yell them out of the premise to preserve the precious tables.

Needless to say we won't come...

We ordered lunch takeout since we were staying across the street at Casa Munras hotel for our short road trip. I ordered via phone, one pad kee mao with chicken medium spicy, and husband got pad thai with tofu, mild. Total came out to ~$30+ and about 20min wait. The portions and prices were standard, very comparable to what most Thai places are charging nowadays. The ease of ordering and wait time is a solid 4 stars, but we were left underwhelmed with the foods. I have high standards being Thai and I cook Thai/Laos foods at home, we had a feeling the foods would be catered to the American demographics in the area.

The pad kee mao did not have a wok hei taste to it - it tasted and looked like it was just sautee in the pan. It was soggy, with wet liquid remaining, a bit soupy at the end. Very odd, when I make pad kee mao the sauces usually get glazed with the sugar, leaving no liquid behind. The noodles also tasted REALLY sweet, with lack of flavoring from any sauces (tasted a small hint of fish sauce) but it was just overly sweet for my taste. The spicy level was OK, had a bit of a kick. We got a side of hot sauce - it was good but I think they mixed the chili garlic sauce with sweet chili sauce. Or at least that's what it tasted like. I was hoping it'd be fish sauce with thai peppers (authentic way most Thai/Laos folks eat hot sauce). My husband's pad thai was much worse than my dish - it tasted nothing like pad thai. I couldn't taste any tamarind... it tasted more like Chinese stir fry noodles thats overly sweet? We were confused what it was supposed to be. I was left embarrassed with the meal since it was my idea to grab Thai food to go. If you want Americanized version of Thai foods that's more on the sweeter side,...