Lanta Thai Fusion — Restaurant in Orange

I was looking for a great Thai place next to my work, and with the great Yelp review I thought I couldn't go wrong. That was HORRIBLE idea. The prices are a reasonable mid range, which I'm sure is the reason for the amount of business they were doing at lunch time. I was seated by a very rushed and indifferent waitress at a tiny table. I ordered the Lanta signature stew, and figured it must be good if it's what they are known for. The fist thing that arrived was a cup of soup. The should was a clear broth with 1 carrot slice and some mushy cabbage. Honestly the only thing I could taste was the cabbage. Next they brought out the salad and egg roll. I was very surprised to see what look like ranch dressing all over a Thai houses salad. I tasted it against my better judgement and instantly gagged because the flavor was 90% watery mayonnaise. At this point I was very frustrated and hungry so I threw caution to the wind and ate the egg roll. The egg roll was cold and flavorless but was not as gross as the salad and soup. At this point a waitress returned and I asked her to take my salad. She asked me if I didn't like it and I said no the only thing I can taste is mayonnaise. I asked if that was the only dressing they had, and she told me they also had a house peanut dressing. I asked politely if she could replace it with the peanut dressing, she was annoyed but she did so. At this point my entree had arrived which was the Lanta stew and rice. This was not a stew but rather a soup with large over cooked stringy pieces of beef inside. The broth had a greasy sweet flavor, and somehow they manage to service scoop of rice that was crusty on the outside. The waitress returned with the salad with the peanut dressing and it was thick globs of a sticky sweet goo that I could not get through. I could not get through a quarter of my meal before I finally flag down a waitress and paid the bill. Biggest waste of money ever. I'm now nauseous, and so sorry I went here. IF YOU LIKE THAI FOOD, SAVE YOURSELF THE DISAPPOINTMENT AND GO...

Delicious Thai food and an unbeatable lunch special!

Craving Thai food, my girlfriend decided to try this place out. We got here a little after they opened (~11:30AM) and there was already plenty of people dining in. We got seated and were handed their nice, double sided menu. They have a lunch special available every day from 11AM-3PM, where each item under that menu comes with soup, salad, an egg roll, and white rice. It didn’t take long for us to choose what we wanted, even with so many different options to choose from. I ordered the Pad Thai w/ Beef, a Papaya Salad, and a Thai Iced Coffee for my girlfriend. She had ordered the Pad Kee Mao (not pictured).

The food, how was it?

Pad Thai w/ Beef: Absolutely delicious. I almost opted for no bean sprouts but I’m glad I didn’t. Everything went well together. I didn’t touch the side of white rice at all, I was getting too full!

Papaya Salad: I highly recommend this. It has a decent amount of spice and very good flavor. We finished this completely, no leftovers!

Thai Iced Coffee: It was good, that’s all.

The included soup and salad deserve honorable mentions, they were pretty dang good. The dressing on the salad is tasty.

Service was good, our server was friendly and always had a smile going on. It was a pleasant experience dining in.

I parked on the street in front of the restaurant, which seems to be 1-hour parking. I believe there is more parking elsewhere, but I didn’t look.

This place is worth being a...

Summary: good food but quite over-seasoned, fast service, plenty of parking; may or may not come back

I placed my lunch order over the phone after reading overwhelmingly positive reviews about this place, as I happened to be in the area. My order consisted of spicy fried rice and orange chicken. I appreciate the staff who took my order as she was so accommodated my request for modification to the fried rice: no bell pepper and extra basil. I was quoted 15-20 minutes, but my order was ready under 10 minutes!

The spicy fried rice is the best among the three restaurants I have tried so far. The rice is very moist and soft. They used fresh chili for the dish, which separates them from other restaurants who used dried chili. The extra basil was totally worth it as it gave the dish an extra boost to flavor (I am obsessed with basil, FYI).

The orange chicken came with a side of rice, which I did not expect. The chicken was crunchy, and the sauce was sweet but tangy. Unfortunately, both dishes felt short as they are quite over-seasoned.

There are plenty of parking as they share the parking lot with other establishments in the plaza. The restaurant can be accessed using both the front and back door. They do have a minimum for card...