Tida Thai cuisine — Restaurant in Norfolk

I had dinner at Tida Thai as part of a business conference trip. I had high expectations, as Thai cuisine is supposed to incorporate sweet, sour, salty, and spicy flavors. There should also be attention to detail in presentation. Unfortunately, Tida Thai failed on all of these criteria.

We started with a Sampler appetizer. That sampler had 2 shrimp bikini, 2 crab Rangoon, 3 dumpling, 4 calamari, 2 spring roll, and 4 fried tofu. The tofu was dry and bland, like eating a stir fried piece of cardboard. The spring rolls were burned and lacked any depth, instead seeming more like frozen fare. The rest was subpar as well.

I started with some Tom Ka with Chicken. The soup was sour and salty, but had an off taste. The chicken was bland and had a boiled texture and no flavor. Not a good start. For my entrée, I had the cashew chicken. In typical Thai versus Chinese-American cashew, it is a drier stir fry with a more intense sauce flavor. I did not get that at all. I got a watery, bland sauce that was minimally seasoned and the same boiled chicken strips. It tasted OK, but had no wow factor.

The other guests in my party had the papaya salad, hottest heat level. They stated it was pretty good.

Overall, I felt disappointed and regretted my decision to dine at this establishment. It should have been a warning sign that we were the only people in there. Service was good yet there was no offer of any drinks other than tap water with ice. I will not be returning to...

We are a family of 4, and we eat Thai food multiple times a week since our family is part Thai. This restaurant is authentic and quite good. We didn't expect to find such a good Thai place in the middle of Dowtown and so close to our hotel. The waitress was super friendly and greeted us in Thai. The overall ambiance is nice. The place is spacious and has good spacing between the tables. We went on a rainy night so not alot of people, so it was covid friendly. The overall restaurant and bathroom are clean, and the place is well decorated with fresh flowers and pictures of all the Thai kings on the wall.

We were offered a complementary salad with ginger sauce. We ordered seafood tom kha soup, beef glass noodles, crab fried rice, spicy beef salad, and chicken massan curry. The kid friendly dishes were the crab fried rice, glass noodles, soup, and massaman chicken. I was pleasantly surprised by the fresh, tangy ginger sauce from the complementary salad. The winning dish was savory seafood tom kha and the beef salad. The soup had the delectable scallop and generous portion of straw mushrooms. The soup was perfect for a wet rainy day. My husband ordered his beef salad extra Thai spicy, and the chef delivered (and that's how we know they...

Tom ka soup is nasty. Either it’s not fresh or it’s something else. It has unusual SOURNESS with a reddish color. When I returned the store the server told me some place in Thai make it sour and the red is the soup mixed with chili oil. Well, I know it can have tanginess from lime or lemongrass but this was not that kind of sour. And I know chili oil floats on top, it doesn’t turn the whole soup red. That explanation made no sense.

If you want utensils you have to ASK the server during night time takeout. What kind of unnecessary rule is that you made up to give customers inconvenience? Or blame the inconvenience to customer that I didn’t know their rule? No service whatsoever.

On top of that the restaurant is outdated and seems short staffed with only one server running around during a busy dinner hour. Out of courtesy, I ordered takeout but the overall experience left me disappointed. As a flight attendant, I’ve traveled widely and tried Thai food in many places, and sadly, this was one of the least satisfying experiences.

I’m leaving 2 stars because I know running a family restaurant is difficult, but that shouldn’t be an excuse for poor food quality, confusing policies and lack of...