Thai Station — Restaurant in Washington

Sale Thai in the Rhode Island Row complex is a quaint clean Asian chic decor, DC hidden gem. This location has a Sushi Bar off to the left side of the main entrance. The Sushi bar is beautifully decorated with precision cut seafood in bright beautiful color and textures the Chef we amazing to watch him prep and prepare your food to order. There is a medium size bar with premium and some top shelf liquors. It's neatly stocked with a 60" flat screen posted directly above the bar. Also its the first thing you see when walking in the restaurant with the kitchen entrance opening viewed directly behind it. Great gathering spot especially for happy hour. Also family friendly with the dining room side. The staff is friendly welcoming and well spoken. The food is Thai cuisine fantastically cooked to order. Beautiful presentation of plated dishes and unique appetizers. The menu is plentiful but not overwhelming with a million different choices. The choices are great and there's even organic dishes, vegetarian, a few desserts, appetizers, lunch specials, and more. The fried rice with a choice of meat(lump crab or shrimp) with or without Is AMAZING!!!!! I had the fried rice with both crab and shrimp added. First the meal was placed to order and it was a Togo order. It came in a timely manner I went on a Saturday around 2pm. The bar we full a few diners in the restaurant. I sat at the bar and waited on my order. The waitress brought my food I peeked in the bag and was amazed at what I saw. The rice is coated in a light colored brown sweet and savory sauce which is not over powering to the other flavors it was mixed with square cut carrots, shallots, onions and peas there was also tucked in there two cherry tomatoes split in half with crumbled fried egg on top. With about 6 plump perfectly cooked jumbo shrimps and a large scoop of fresh jumbo lump crab meat placed onto of the rice mixture with a parsley garnish to finish off the look of the dish. So it looked fantastic but the TASTE WAS AMAZING!! It is hands down the best fried rice I have ever had. I loved it and it's enough in the dish for two people. I saved half the next day it was still good the next day reheated. I had a few other dishes here from Sale Thai all were good in their own right but my personal favorite is the fried rice. Gov this place a try you won't be disappointed. Parking in front is limited and metered parking by coin or credit card. There is a parking garage across the complex next to Dunkin Donuts. It's $5 for 4:00 hours but one minute past 4:01 it will cost you $25.00 to get out the garage. The CVS does validate garage parking tickets...

Note: This review is based on a delivery / takeout order, so focused exclusively on the food and not the service / ambiance.

Although I was a little hesitant about the less-than-stellar reviews, I was recently desperately craving some Thai food and UberEats had a 30% off deal for this place that was just too good to pass up. And, wow, am I glad I took the risk! I was SUPER happy with everything that I ordered, and it absolutely satisfied my need for a bit of spicy, holy basil-infused comfort in a bowl.

I ordered their pad see ew with vegetables and shrimp, papaya salad, and mango sticky rice -- each dish was fantastic, and they had generous portions; this was plenty of food for 2-2.5 meals. I put everything at their "regular" spice level, which didn't seem to be super consistent across their dishes. The pad see ew was hardly spicy, while the papaya salad made me run for a glass of water.

The pad see ew was nearly perfect -- it had a great balance of spicy, sweet, and savory flavor profiles, and the noodles were soft but still slightly chewy. The veggies were fresh and crisp, and the shrimp was juicy and plump with a great touch of char from the wok. The noodles were a bit more oily than I generally prefer, but it was still a great dish overall!

And the noodles paired perfectly with the light, refreshing papaya salad (requested without peanuts because I'm allergic). The papaya, carrot, and green beans were all super fresh and had a great crunch. They went wonderfully with the salty, sweet, sour, and spicy dressing, and the tomatoes offered a great extra little pop of freshness! This dish takes its spice a bit more seriously than the other items on the menu, so either have a glass of water ready or order it slightly milder level.

After a delicious (and slightly spicier than expected) meal, the mango sticky rice was the perfect way to wrap up this comforting dinner. The rice was perfectly sticky but not mushy, and it was sweet, but not overly so, from the coconut milk / sugar. This was all topped with a lovely sliced mango, which was at the perfect level of ripeness to offer a refreshing, natural sweetness as well as a slight sour kick to balance out the rest of the dessert. I also loved the way they arranged the two mango halves to look like a heart -- so cute!

All in all, I was thoroughly impressed by Sala Thai! Every dish was delicious and super well-executed -- I can't wait to try out the rest of their...

Update 2021: over the last 5 years I've been going to this place when I work in DC for months at a time or when I come to visit. Last time I went for some middle-aged woman sitting right in front of the desk they're absolutely refused to acknowledge that I was standing right there despite me after probably about 10 minutes of waiting right in front of her face while she was doing a crossword puzzle cleaning using the phone. Eventually she sat me down after I requested it in a menu. And then she told me there was absolutely nothing on the menu that would be gluten-free so I can't eat it. All these years I've been eating there I was told that I was getting gluten free stuff and having some minor GI discomfort afterward after the Massaman curry... This woman's rude that's really dampened my experience of a place that I really enjoyed going to for years. I'm going to be honest I was really feeling some kind of way about how I was treated. Absolutely no apology about making me wait or for not being able to accommodate my dietary request.

Original review: I've been to this place precovid and postcovid...I personally think their food is a bit too salty but I'm from New York and I seem to think everything out here is but too salty That's not catering to ethnic folk... But I will say the service is phenomenal but if you like Masaman Curry or a lot of Thai variety this is not the place. I believe the lunch specials come with a soup or salad. they lost one star for not having massaman and for the saltiness. But overall the food was pretty good and personally I think I got enough duck in my meal. A lot of places don't have duck and this place did and it was...