05/24/09

"Ok" authentic Thai

by nolascene

Decent food in an unremarkable atmosphere. Better suited as a lunch joint to get a quick Thai meal & not for dinner. Service was slow and bad.

• Pros: Good range of choices
• Cons: Bad Service

01/28/09

Small place, sub-par food

by houston_aggie

I went here with a group of girlfriends to celebrate a birthday. First of all, it is tiny and hard to find because it used to be just an alley. (It is next to Texadelphia) At 7pm we were the only patrons in this little restaurant. The service was attentive (obviously). We tried the Tiger Cry Salad, Pad Thai, Ke Mao, and a red curry dish with chicken. The salad was just awful. The beef was tough and dry and was on a meager bed of iceburg lettuce, tomatoes, and cucumbers.The dressing was overly spicy, without any taste...just a jalapeno puree really. The pad thai and ke mao were just okay. We have had better. The curry dish was simple and tasty served with white rice. Overall, the food was just okay, but for that price, we won't be coming back. The place lacked ambiance. Fake windows and harsh overhead lighting attempt to make up for the lack of real windows in this restaurant flanked by brick walls.

• Pros: curry
• Cons: high prices, no ambiance

05/03/08

Once a favourite, seems to have gone downhill, probably won't go back

by onereview

Ok. I loved Patu. I've been eating their food since the summer of 2006, when I worked in the Village (a co-worker and I used to order the vegetarian massaman curry for lunch a few times a month, one of us would pick it up to go). I moved away from Houston, but every time I am back in town I make sure to get an order of the massaman curry. I take my family there and have recommended the place to friends.

The service has never been good - the waitstaff does not engage with customers, they are sometimes slow or get things mixed up. Regardless the massaman curry dish was so great I didn't care. When I went last night with my family, however, I was quite disappointed. Sure, it was a busy Friday night...but they were way too disorganized. A woman who i've picked up orders from many times took our order, and read it back to us, specifying each of our "spicy" choices and ensuring my sister that "mild" was just a little spicy. Two of our dishes were delivered to the girls at a table next to ours, and finally brought to us. My sister's curry was more spicy than my father's (he had ordered his a step up). My massaman curry had changed to "g ang mussaman" in the menu and I hadn't realized this included the elimination of vegetables, star anise, and peanuts in the curry (it usually had all of this). When I asked our waitress if the recipe/menu had changed, she kept saying no, the mussaman never had vegetables in it. The change is fine, but they weren't pleasant about my question. The potatoes in my dish were undercooked. We weren't checked on again after getting our food, and when we asked for our cheque it was brought to the girls next to us (AGAIN! by the look on their faces, they weren't pleased or impressed with the service either).

I was disappointed with the change in my dish, but their reaction to my attempt to find out when it changed tipped things (last time I ate there was January). The disorganization and general unenthusiasm of the staff is no plus.

• Pros: Food, price
• Cons: Parking, service, changes to massaman curry