TLK- Tigerlily Kitchen (TAKEOUT & CATERING) — Restaurant in New York

The food was wonderful, service was great EXCEPT for one very unprofessional and aggressive female employee. Her treatment is ultimately what led me rate this place 2 stars. Read on to hear more about my trials and tribulations, ye gentle reader.

There I am, belly full and heart content when “CRXJXKS”! My arm knocks into a glass light fixture as I am putting my coat on to leave and brave the storm (there were snow flurries that day).

Glass falls to the floor. Me: horror stricken. Am I secretly Frankenstein ?? For surely I am a monster ?! Also, I don’t lift weights and can barely do a push up - how can this be??

Nonetheless: The server and who I assume to be owner were very gracious about the accident. Picture the scene: me fumbling over my words, trying to figure out how to make it right.

The plot thickens:

A Spanish speaking woman, short, dark hair in a ponytail was heinously rude during and after the incident. After the last shard fell to the ground. It first sounded like she had cursed at me in Spanish. I thought it sounded like she said “morte”, which means death. So make of that what you will…

She then proceeded to glower at me as I profusely apologized and navigated the awkward waters of a freak accident. (Not the Jon Snow glower either. Think more The Mountain or Cersei Lannister vibes). It felt like she was trying to manifest my downfall.

I was at a loss of words. I felt really bad for what happened - but it was an accident - and this wOmaN was doing everything in her power to shame me, make me feel like a piece of garbage. When I asked the server if something like this had happened before, the woman (who I was not speaking to and was also standing far behind me) blurted “NO iT hAS NoT” in a tone that could make Lucifer bristle in fear.

Accidents happen. I think most of the staff handled the situation very well. I am not impressed with the unprofessional, aggressive, and condescending tone and demeanor of the short woman (bartender? Coat lady?). I think maybe she spent the weekend watching one too many judge Judy episodes and felt self-righteous? Perhaps she was extremely partial to circular glass light fixtures?

I wouldn’t recommend going to this restaurant if she is going to be there because she cast a pretty heavy damper on the place and my spirits. Learn how to talk to people and navigate accidents, lady. The Thomas the Tank engine show has a song called “accidents happen”, it’s a bop. YouTube it.

The fritters were super good though. 10/10. Keep in mind my check came to over $100. The food is solid and the server Oscar is the right blend of attentive and calm. Maybe he can host conflict resolution workshops and the other lady can learn...

Lived in NYC since birth, and I have NEVER had an unpleasant dining experience remotely close to this one.

Food-wise, I liked the tofu app, and Malaysian entree, but that’s it, soo for that, I’ll give it one star (also because I didn’t have a choice)

I do not recommend anyone to consider dining here unless you want to be kicked out.

We made reservations for a party of 5 and decided to opt for their Restaurant Week menu when we were there. They would only take one order for the entire table and refused to get started otherwise.

Half the apps came, which was fine but then all the entrees came soon after but half the apps were still missing - blame bad timing, but it happens- we can understand. While we were eating, they came over and asked if we were still eating. Then came back shortly after and asked us what we wanted to pack… (our dessert wasn’t even served yet despite partaking in restaurant week menu) and we told them we were still eating… so then they came back while we were eating, and barely managed to toss on the dessert while we weren’t done with our appetizers that were served late.

They continuously came to ask us if they could clear the table and if we were done. Completely rude and disrespectful. All they needed to say was “hey, we have some reservations and need the table back, can I help wrap anything up for you?”, would’ve been completely understandable. But instead, we were approached with “Are you done? What do you want packed? Are you done now? Can we clean the table?”

Mind you, there were multiple open tables all around.

At least the main server kept a smile on and a friendly face while harassing us on whether we were done, the hostesses just glared at us while handing us our jackets.

Also don’t recommend the coat check because we were given other peoples jackets despite being on a ticket system.

Needless to say, none of my friends and I would not...

Honestly was a fantastic place! Food was great (wings, peanut noodles with tofu, and glazed donut), not only because it was gluten free, but just because it was amazing to begin with. There are very few food options when traveling for me since I’m celiac, and unfortunately a lot of the time you can tell the food is gluten free. This place just tasted like regular (non gluten free) Asian food, which is great when you have people with you that are not celiac.

The donut had the ingredients listed and it did not contain grains or oats, which is great as 1 in 5 celiacs are affected by oats (even gluten free oats). They do have a strong coconut flavor from the coconut oil/coconut milk so if you don’t like coconut I would say these may not be for you.

Also to note, as of today they are currently working on building out the inside of the restaurant so it’s only pickup/delivery currently.

When picking up the person that working there was extremely nice, and offered us plates/plasticware since they knew we were outside.

Next visit to NY I will...