Tai Fai — Restaurant in Oak Park

Tai Fai has amazing customer service. You always are greeted respectfully, with a smile. I have been to this restaurant twice now before writing a review. This review is strictly on the food alone.

I ordered Fried Rice with beef, chicken, and shrimp along with a roll of sushi and Pad Thai on my very first visit.

The fried rice was actually good, similar to Benihana’s just a tad bit more oily. 👍🏾

The Pad Thai was gummy and stuck together in the box. You could literally stick a fork in it (if you don’t eat with chop sticks) and the whole meal would come out of the box. Speaking of chop sticks, the Pad Thai was impossible to eat with them. This was very disappointing because Pad Thai is my favorite dish.👎🏾

The sushi rice was severely over cooked and extremely dry. You could literally choke on it if you aren’t careful. The presentation of the sushi is deceiving because it looks absolutely beautiful. It even taste okay but the rice ruined it for me. 👎🏾

On my 2nd visit, I ordered the fried rice once again and this time, since it was earlier in the day, I tried the sushi again.

The fried rice was consistent in taste, presentation, and flavor. 👍🏾

However, the sushi was not so good. Once again, the sushi missed mark. The taste was nice but the rice was terrible, and you guessed it, “DRY”. 👎🏾

Once you have had authentic Asian/Thai cuisine, your standards change. This restaurant doesn’t quite meet my new standards or the standards that I had prior to eating Thai food out of the United States.

Tai Fai is however a really cool little restaurant with unique appeal, and amazing employees that offset the mediocrity of the cuisine I have tasted so far.

Maybe I’m just ordering the wrong things from them and should ask what their...

I can't in good conscience go here anymore. This place USED to be amazing. It's charm was the food was pretty good and it was all at a reasonable price. Then the pandemic came and they turned into the cheapest, stingiest restaurant around. I understand costs went up when the pandemic flared up, so nobody complained when they raised the cost of their food. But then they started adding a 15% surcharge to every order as well. So we had increased food costs AND the 15% surcharge. I supposed it was fine for the peak of the pandemic OVER A YEAR AGO but they never got rid of. As food costs settled done and EVERY OTHER RESTAURANT lowered their priced down again, Tai Fai kept theirs high, they raked in the money. On TOP of that, their portions became smaller and they started doing RIDICULOUS stuff like only giving one sauce for 4 eggrolls or one set of chopsticks for a meal for 4. Their $1 sides of sauce became smaller and smaller. The deal breaker was when I got charged nearly $10 for an eel roll this last time I was in there. When I asked why it was so much they pointed to a NEW sign explaining yet ANOTHER raise in food prices. You think people don't notice or care about this stuff but we do. This is a horrible way to take advantage of your loyal customers. I'm done with you and so are a few people I know. Way to screw your clients. Food costs are high again, I get it. But you raked in the dough with your raised prices, smaller portions and surcharge for the last 2 years when the prices came back down. If you hadn't have done that perhaps we'd be more understanding, but this doesn't come off as "survival" it comes off as price gouging. You're not the only asian...

Very okay. The food was all right, but my regular place is way better. Tuna tasted off, and I scraped it off of my Red Dragon roll. The crunch roll was okay, and honestly, they both tasted like cream cheese. Like half the rolls had cream cheese in them. The rolls were cut into massive pieces. There's no way I would've been able to eat a piece in one bite, so everything fell apart. Soy sauce smelled weird, so I used my own. Egg roll was cabbage and some very dry chicken, didn't taste like anything, really. Honestly, though, I'd never come back here mostly because of the experience. Don't tell me the wait will be 30 mins when it'll be over an hour. I got there after 30 mins, and was told they were working on it. There were like 10-15 people crammed into that small lobby where I waited an extra 45 mins on top of the original 30, and it was freezing the whole time. Every time I asked how much longer, I was told they're "working on it." I ordered 2 rolls and an egg roll, not sure why I couldn't get an accurate estimate. Don't lie to me, just tell me HOW LONG. Not sure why this place has such amazing reviews. Crazy Sushi is better, cheaper, and way more...