Wokworks Fishtown — Restaurant in Philadelphia

I normally don't leave negative reviews unless I've been somewhere a few times or it was a very bad experience, but my food issues seemed to be similar to a few other people. It's a shame, I really wanted to like the food here and this was my first time.

I ordered drunken noodles and Brussel sprouts. What caught my eye initially was the advertisement of "healthy" food on their website. While I wasn't under the impression it would be super great for me, I was hoping the food would be more thoughtfully crafted. I was also looking forward to spicy food, which I didn't find this spicy at all.

Both of my dishes were swimming in oil. I was given a stack of napkins, over half was needed for eating just the noodles. I couldn't even finish my Brussel sprouts because of how caked they were in oil, it was extremely unappetizing. The responses here state it's the chili oil, and cutting with another sauce is recommended, but I didn't see that on the website for this order and I'm not sure I want to try again.

The photos from others looked good, so maybe I just grabbed it on a...

This place is fine in theory, but I’m not sure what qualifies it as “farm to fork”. I know the shrimp are wild caught, but it’s not clear what else makes the ingredients more fresh or sustainable. I was disappointed to find out after the fact (only because of my physical reaction) that every sauce in the house has MSG. I'm not sure how sauces with MSG and thickening agents count as “from the farm."

If things were to improve, would be nice to have glass noodles or brown rice or some other actually healthy base option on the menu, and a nice, homemade peanut sauce or even peanut or sesame oil sauce that’s all natural (i.e. no MSG, no thickeners) would be nice!

Finally, the cashier was pretty darn unfriendly, even though someone else working on the other end of the window tried to make up for it. I tipped him anyway — he didn’t flinch nor acknowledge it. Kind of off-putting to have such an unfriendly interaction on my first time there.

For now, I’ll be sticking with most any local Thai resto, for the same price, no MSG, and more...

The food is good, the portions are good, but for a vegan meal the price just doesn't align with the value. I got a bowl of rice, with broccoli and tofu for $15, that's after a 15% discount.

I like to see local brands succeed but jeeze, up charging for "broccoli only" burns a bit (I can't get the mixed veggies bc it's loaded with onions and doesn't agree with my system, ha). Another local fast casual stir-fry brand allows you to customize all the ingredients and my order is $3 bucks cheaper for more variety and customization.

Also service is sortaaa meh. The singular window taking orders and handing out orders seems like an unnecessary bottleneck for pick up. You could have a pick up window and an order window.

As a young, growing brand it has been evolving a lot. I've visited four times since their opening in Fishtown. Rooting for it to continue to work out the kinks and...