Mantra Thai Restaurant & Bar — Restaurant in Seattle

Simple, elegant Thai restaurant located by a busy street with a modest menu and descent food. Clean, presentable and above average decor compared to a typical Thai restaurant in town. Friday lunch time we were able to get a table quickly. Service was prompt.

May be there was mix up in the order taking or my colleague's expectation. He ordered spicy and he felt it came as shoe spicy. I won't judge the food by this experience. Other colleague really liked his cashew chicken. He judges this restaurant by that dish. For me, rice noodles with beef and veggies lacked the Thai flavor and intensity of spices. I supplemented with ordering their chilly rack. Now that's a compromise.

I was really amazed that soup was served as part of lunch menu. It probably cost more do serve, and to wash cup, saucer and spoon used for the soup than the quality or quantity of soup. Literally 1/2 a bowl of tasteless soup. See the image...

This place looks really nice inside, spacious and modern, if you are close to the Space Needle and don’t want to go far to get something to eat, this place is a great option. The service is ok, they are really sweet but they leave you alone for the majority of the time, so you have to speak up to get their attention. “They don’t let you know that the gratitude is include in the ticket” this is just not good, I am ok with that, but they should let the customers know, I almost leave and other $25 until we noticed the gratitud was include without let me know - $31 - I think the Custumer should be the one to decide the gratitude base in the service and food.” Especially if they don’t let you know that they will do that. The cucumber Martini is very good, the appetizers are so good, the only bad thing was the white rice was dry. And of course that they don’t let you know they will...

Update: second visit. Ate in and the staff was very attentive. Tom Kha Gai was thick and creamy. Wish the chicken could absorb more of the coconut milk flivir, but that's standard in all the versions I've had. Noticed this time they have All Gender bathrooms.

Original: Usually Golden Singha down the street is my go to for Thai in the area. Mantra though may be usurping that title. Stopped here one rainy night because it was closer to the bus stop. Grabbed some green papaya salad and splurged to added shrimp for $3. Got it as take-out since it was late. Food was really good. I want to try again to have a larger sample size before I give it a full 5 star rating. The one item I had was great though. Only down side was the to-go container leaked in the plastic bag. Ended up with shrimp juice oozing out in to my reusable...