Salathai Thai Restaurant

The food is decent, but both times I’ve ordered takeout they’ve given me a time frame, and my food has taken much longer to come out. Just know your kitchen!

This is only the third time we’ve come here since Sala Thai moved from their Cambie St. location. But that’s a shame because it’s a lovely restaurant run by a terrific Thai family. The food is as good and authentic as ever. If you live Thai food you won’t be disappointed. Tip, try the Angel Wings or the Shrimp Cake or well, just about anything. We’re planning to be regulars again.

I normally stick to the same order, Yum Nai ($ 11) Thai-​style beef salad with lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, cilantro, parsley and onions. Tom Yum Soup ($ 11) and Larb ($ 11.25) Minced beef, pork or chicken with toasted chilies, ground roasted rice, onion and mint leaves. Tossed in lime juice & served over lettuce, that’s my go to for appetizers. For more info visit my blog!

Came here several times and has the thumbs up from my Thai friend.
Overall slightly pricey, but you can’t beat the authenticity and service. Highly recommend trying the Pad Thai (given), Pad Sew Ew Beef, and Larb
Lunch service might be quieter, but even during dinner it was manageable and wasn’t extremely noisy.

I almost didn’t come here because of the three star average rating. However, I live nearby and my girlfriend said she liked it so I went anyway.
Some people are being WAY too critical in their reviews. We were seated quickly, the décor is funny and authentic, prices are reasonable, and the food KICKS ASS.
We wanted a Pad Thai because that’s generally a good place to start when checking out a new Thai restaurant, but when we saw someone else eating one, we noticed it was kind of an orange/​red colour. Ketchup! HA! Nice try. I asked if they could do a traditional one with tamarind and it wasn’t a problem. Crisis averted.
We also got the curry dish with duck and bamboo shoots, which was also delicious. I read a review on here where someone complained about having too many bamboo shoots, and I must be part panda because I don’t think it’s possible to have too many. My only complaint with this dish is that there was a lot of loose pieces of skin in the curry, and not too much duck meat itself. But damnit the skin was good. So all is forgiven I guess.

I like this restaurant. Its spacious and I think they must have recently renovated. The décor is so fancy and very Thai looking. Staff are friendly and best of all they fill your glass frequently. The place can get pretty busy after 6:30. We were lucky to beat the rush by coming at 5:30.
We ordered the yellow curry chicken and the stir fried curry beef. Yes they do have thai names but I forgot what they are called. I loved their yellow curry. It has a really nice strong coconut taste to it. The stir fried curry beef is really good too. The food went well with rice.
I like the statues and decorations in the front entrance. So Thai feel…

Maggot in the food.
Went here to celebrate a co-​workers b-​day. One of co-​workers noticed a maggot in her food. When we called the waiter to complain they offered to replace the food but didn’t offer to comp her meal. After we complained to the lead waitress they comped her bill.
Needless to say the rest of us were disgusted and lost our appetite. Will never go back.

Dinner with family here. Conveniently located while walking to Robson from Burrard. Nice ambience and friendly servers. Packed in the evening — make reservations. Tasty food. We had the set dinner and all the items were great. Did reminds of authentic when we were in Thailand. Would visit again.

For those who think Asian food means Chinese, Japanese,– Sala Thai is a great introduction to a distinctive Thai cuisine characterized by spiciness and traditional Thai flavours. Carnivores will relish the savory beef and pork or chicken options for most dishes. The dinner menu sets to spicen up those evenings at work, as well as convenient and affordable family dinners. I recommend coming here with a group min 4 people so you have the opportunity to order a number of dishes. Definitely a family share style type meal. Golden baskets are a great starter, the green beans and red curry dish to delicious and don’t forget a side of coconut rice.
Also save room for the coconut ice cream and deep fried banana.

I’m not going to go into great detail as it isn’t required. This certainly wasn’t a poor experience but from what I’ve had in both Thailand and surrounding restaurants in downtown Vancouver, I felt this one to be slightly less authentic and catering towards the more «westernized» clientele. This is understandable given that it is across from the main theatre in downtown Vancouver. Most successful restaurants in that area seem to be generally pedestrian.
Again, no issues with this restaurant. It simply isn’t the best Thai food if authenticity is what you’re going for.

Ordered takeout from this restaurant on a busy weeknight.
Drunken noodles with beef — Flat rice noodle stir fried with green chilis and a soy based, slightly sweet sauce. To be honest, I don’t know what others are raving on about this dish, as you can find a similar version at most Cantonese restaurants, usually transliterated as «ho fun noodles», «gon chow ngau haw» or «sa die chow haw». The mark of a dish like this done perfectly would be that there is «wok-​fried» fragrance to all parts of the dish, without breaking apart the noodles too much. These noodles seemed a bit broken apart, overall pretty average.
The appetizer fish cakes were deep fried and heavily seasoned with lemon grass. Overall they were good, although the flavour was not subtle at all. I didn’t think they benefited from the sweet chili dipping sauce.
At this pricepoint, there are certainly cheaper Thai places out there at a similar quality, but I think the menu’s long enough that it’s worth another look.

Very nice ambience and friendly staff. Service was quick easy and on time. The tom yum soup and chicken pad thai was delicious. Nice to see they’re also serving Thai beer. Chang

Went here for lunch today with a friend and decided to order the pad thai. Normally I prefer some meat like chicken, but this one only had shrimp and tofu. It was delicious! For $ 11, it was a pretty decent sized serving — even had leftovers! The Pad Thai also came with a small green salad.
Probably one of the more authentic Thai restaurants around. $ 15 is what you’re looking at for lunch (incl tax and tip) so a bit pricier. However, the quality of the food was superb. Service was good.

Came for lunch today and ordered the Pad Gra Prao and the Mussamun Curry to share between the two of us. The former was warm when served and quickly became cold. It did not have much flavour at all and the serving was quite small, even for a lunch dish. Mussamun curry was excellent.
The service left a lot to be desired. We waited for less than the ten minutes quoted for a table. Once seated, it took awhile for someone to take our order and bring over drinks. Both dishes took a long time to come out, though they were served together. Plates were not cleared for awhile after we were finished, and we had to ask someone to do so and bring our bill. Some of this can be explained by the restaurant having a full house when we entered, but by the time we were ready to leave it was closer to half full.
My last few visits in fact have been less than stellar — in terms of spices being too strong or nonexistant, and service.

Went here for a late lunch ($ 10 lunch special) with colleagues mid week. We missed the noon rush, but it was still pretty busy. The server was straight to the point, no formalities — thankfully we all knew what to order.
I had the Thai Green Curry; the curry was ok. I went for the all tofu no chicken option and this resulted in a cup of extra bamboo shoots being added into my order. It was overwhelming. There was also only 2 pathetic slices of bell pepper and no basil to speak off.
My rice, as well as 2 people with me, was bone dry and starting to get hard. Not enjoyable.
We let the server know, but nothing was done about it.
I guess that’s what you get with a $ 10 lunch special. I will not be back.

We went on a Friday night, had to wait 20 min before sitting (not a big deal at all, I expected to wait anywhere downtown). Once we were sat down, we were greeted by our server who wanted to take our order but we weren’t ready. We had to flag her over when we were ready as she was MIA for a while. I was sharing with my 2 year old daughter so I made sure the curry dish I ordered was not spicy at all. The server reassured me that it was not spicy.
My husband ordered the pad thai and got it before me so he waited to eat it like a gentleman… I didn’t end up getting my curry until about 5 min after he got his. I ordered rice with it and it didn’t come at the same time so I had to wait for the rice… our server disappeared and never came back so we had to flag someone else down to get us a bowl of rice. Once I tried the curry, I realized it was even too spicy for me… and I LOVE spice! I tried to give it to my daughter and of course she couldn’t eat it. I wanted to get our server but I had no idea where she went… I didn’t end up changing my dish as nobody came back and I was too hungry by this point. My husband ended up giving half of his pad thai to our daughter instead and the rest of my rice.
It was not a good experience at all and the portions are small and the prices are way too high. Will try not to come back.

Had an excellent dinner here the night before the Lululemon Seawheeze half marathon.
Why yes I will carb-​load with pad see-​ew…
Started off with 2 appetizers– spring rolls and another crispty wonton-​type dish with shrimp/​chicken. Both were piping hot and fresh.
Entrees– this is where we tend to get disappointed when visiting a new to us thai restaurant, but Salathai didn’t let us down.
My tofu pad see-​ew rivaled that of my favorite restaurant at home and my husband’s dish had that perfect balance of spice that builds as you keep eating which is hard to perfect.
Service was friendly although a little forceful about ordering alcoholic beverages; with the race looming I declined.
Would definitely come back if in the area again.

I’m not a big fan of Thai food, but once in a while I’ll feel like I need to re-​energize my taste buds with something I haven’t had in a while. Today was one of those days. I usually come here about once every one or two months.
I had the «gaengtay-​po» special which consisted of morning glory (not the urban dictionary term) cooked in coconut milk, sliced pork belly, kaffir leaves, tamarind sauce, salad (not pictured), spring roll, and rice. In layman’s terms, red coconut curry with pork.
The pork was a nice touch, it contained both fatty and lean meat and was very delicious. You can taste the coconut and it also had a kick of spiciness. Even though I don’t really do spicy, so I able to survive and ate each last bit of rice. The spring roll and salad are decent as always. However, I’m not sure when it changed, but it’s kind of sad they no longer include soup with their specials :(I was totally looking forward to the soup!
Would I come here regularly? Not really. But would I be back eventually? Absolutely!

I’ve come here multiple times, but surprisingly I’ve never written a review for it on Unilocal.Anyways, I went to Sala Thai again on Mother’s Day with my 10% coupon that I got from a booklet I picked up at Daiso in Richmond :) Heads up though, the coupon doesn’t work during happy hour (3−6pm) and on drinks.
Anyways…
I’m tempted to give it a 3 star, but I think in general… having been here multiple times. It’s usually a 3 – 4 star food/​dining experience. So 4 stars it is. And our server, «My», on Mother’s Day was fantastic. She was friendly and quite pretty too, her smile is extremely contagious.
But yeah… The ambiance of the place is really light and casual :) but some of the chairs are oddly shaped and extremely uncomfortable … I wonder when they’ll throw them out for better chairs.
The Lychee martini I had was overly sweet.
The Tom Ka was delicious! I like how it’s a little spicy, but not over the top. The blend of lemon grass and yellow ginger is nice. And it was nice and hearty with mushrooms and chicken breast.
The Pad Thai is definitely not as good as their Pad Thai Chao Wang!
The coconut icecream was light and refreshing.
Anyways, I like the Sala Thai in Downtown. It’s one of the better Thai restaurants we have in Vancouver.

One of my favourite Thai place. This is always our go to place for a group lunch as they can accommodate large groups. Their lunch specials are fabulous all under $ 12. Today was no exception to celebrate a birthday lunch and we ordered all our usually, drunken noodle, pad Thai, eggplant delight, egg rolls, red curry, yellow curry… We tried everything on the menu and everything is delicious!
Service is spotty at times, the food arrives at different times for groups which can be annoying if not doing sharesies…
Value ⁵⁄₅
Atmosphere ⁵⁄₅
Service ³⁄₅
Quality ⁵⁄₅
¹⁸⁄₂₀