Thai Basil

Like most reviews here say, there’s two Thai Basil: Anna’s Thai Basil and A Thai Basil. This review is purely for A Thai Basil.
I keep coming back here for their Thai Teas — cheap and quick! I haven’t tried any other of their drinks, but they were honest. The other drinks are not natural or homemade, they’re powder which is mixed and then served.
I also came back here for chicken pad thai and chicken kee mao which both were equally as delicious. Any time I’m back in Portland, I will definitely come back here!

This is a great place to get a spicy Thai food. Believe me I don’t give 5 stars to any business easily. I’ve been here a lot to get Thai food. They are very friendly especially the cashier girl. She always smiles which is good for their business. They always give you yummy food, the prices are reasonable and they are very fast .
Btw, that change the name to A Thai food. Check here out if you like an amazing Thai food. Get the Chicken Basal or Cashew

There are two Thai Basil food carts directly next to one another at this food pod, and I am not sure what the difference is between the two. I chose one and ordered the shrimp pad Thai; I was pleasantly surprised at the quality and amount of food I received. The pad Thai was piping hot (just the way I like it), and it was served to me in a large plastic to-​go box. The portion was large enough for two, and it only cost $ 6 – what a steal!

The food was abundant for the price and tasty too! I recommend it. Also it was fast!
What more can I say? I didn’t pay much, I had a great time, the food was good, it was fast and it just doesn’t get much better than…
… But that! but then it does!
Anna, the progenitor of «Anna Thai Basil» as well as a Thai basil directly next door called me out and started a great conversation. I learned a significant amount about her life and the food cart culture in downtown Portland!
If you want a great meal an interesting peak into food cart culture check her out.
She is the one on the left!

Got food to go and they sent me off with the completely wrong order. I was the only customer at the time.

I really wanted to check out the food cart scene, but a lot of places closed early! This was one of the few that was still open late (like 7:00pm on a Saturday). I ordered the pad thai with chicken and it was huge portion for like $ 7 and it came out piping hot. Probably not my top pad thai of all time, but it was definitely satisfying. And, you really can’t beat the price.

Visiting Portland and we had to try the food carts! Thai Basil was very friendly and their menu stuck out with its varied menu. It took a little while to get our food, but it was worth the wait. It was fresh with a lot of flavor and HUGE portions. Neither my husband or I could finish all of it. We both got the chicken pad thai and loved it!

Had the Thai basil with tofu and it was quite delicious. Generous portions.
Stand was quite busy when we were there.

I do like my Thai food, but to be honest, today I wanted Chinese. The problem with that was that both of the Chinese places in the group of food carts were cash only. Bummer for them, good fortune for Anna’s Thai Basil.
Now I guess on a Sunday like most any day, once they run out of items, that’s pretty much it. They ran out of the wide rice noodles that I like so much. So no Pad See Ew, or Pad Kee Mao unless I wanted either with thin noodles. So I opted for another choice that is normally done with the thin ones. Chicken Yakisoba.
I asked for spicy and it had some heat, not enough for my liking but with fresh cabbage, carrots, green onion, broccoli, red pepper and white onions plus a decent amount of chicken, I was not leaving hungry. As many of the reviews state, for $ 6, you get a healthy amount of food in a large plastic clamshell with chopsticks. It made me happy.
The food was good, made on the spot and I really can’t find anything bad about it. I was as full as I could be and thankfully had a nice walk back to Buckman to work it all off. So I’m not too sure why other people had such poor reviews. Granted some were about bubble tea, which is something I’ve never had and maybe they could have had an off day cooking. Anything is possible, but mine was fine.
Enjoy.

I walked by this food cart and saw that we shared a name. So I had to stop and grab something to try. Pineapple fried rice with chicken it is! Can’t go wrong with Thai food, right? And I had been craving rice the entire weekend, too. Two birds with one stone!
SO. SAD. This wasn’t very good! While incredibly filling and I received a RIDICULOUSLY huge portion for $ 6, I was still sorely disappointed by what I got. The rice seemed stale, which surprised me since I was pretty much the first person to order as soon as they opened shop for the day that Sunday. And there just wasn’t much flavor to the meal at all. I mean, granted, it’s fried rice and there probably isn’t really much going for it in general — but come on! It could be better than just rice and chicken with some scattered pineapple, nuts and cilantro thrown around!
Maybe if I were still in college and I was more worried about stretching my dollars in order to get hefty meals that would be more filling than satisfying, this would be a fantastic place. But now that I’m a working gal, I want more flavor and quality than I want quantity necessarily!

I was really excited for my Pad Ke Mao … until I found the hair in it. I take that back TWO hairs in my noodles!

I tried this cart for the first time today at lunch… I will never go back!!! While eating my chicken Pad Thai I foundation long black hair, after 3 bites when trying to pull noodles out of the to go container back in my office! So I couldn’t exactly take it back then!

In town visiting Portland. Thought I would definitely need to try their food carts. Anna’s Thai Basil stuck out with their sandwich board «$ 5 plates…» Definitely had to try.
Got the Pad See Ew… At first glance there’s a lot of veggies. Noodle and beef were really tasty, well seasoned. The Green Curry Chicken taste like something my grandmother would make. The only thing I would have changed is putting the curry in a separate container from the rice. This way you can really enjoy the flavors from the curry. For being only $ 5, the portions are huge. Definitely a bang for your buck or for those who are on a budget.

I’ve tried better, but the service was very very nice by the gentleman thus i’ll give 4 stars instead of 3 stars (food quality). I think they should use fresh brocolli!

It simply comes down to opportunity cost. To eat here means you’re not eating at the next trailer. That said, I enjoyed my food but felt I was missing out on something better.
Pros:
*Spicy Basil is actually spicy. I asked for the precise term «Pretty spicy» and overheard «medium.» I thought about upping my ante but it came out pretty dang spicy.
*Good flavor.
Cons/​Needs to improve:
*I could tell right away the veggies (esp. the green beans) came from frozen bag. Do I make Asian on the fly w frozen veggies? Yes, of course, don’t be a fool. Do I want to pay someone else to do the same? Why are we having this conversation? But for $ 6 what are you gonna do? Prob go to an adjacent food cart…
Improve the veggies and you got a winner.

WORST BUBBLE TEA EVER!!!
I went to Thai Basil yesterday during our little heatwave to get a nice cold bubble tea.
Good
1. Affordable $ 3.50
2. Nice choice of flavors
Bad.
1. Customer service was poor. A young man wearing a backpack who wasn’t very friendly took my order.
2. Upon making my drink, he sloshed the flavorings into blender without even measuring them or attempting to be careful about the amount he put in.
3. At no point did I see anything ‘tea-​like’ go in o the blender; syrup, water, half & half, tiny bit of ice.
4. He poured the watery mixture (which he made too much of which showed me he didn’t know wtf he was doing regarding measurements) into my cup, and slapped it down coldly.
I walked away and as I took a sip, it was so sweet I had to spit it out. While he was making my drink, I had a feeling he didn’t know what he was doing. I dumped the drink in the trash and chalked the experience up to LESSON LEARNED.
I will just stick to the more expensive but expertly made bubble teas a few carts down. I guess you really get what you pay for.
Unless you want diabetes and bad service, go elsewhere for your bubble tea needs.

Despite the fact that this cart sits next to 2 other Thai food carts I decided to give it a go based on the fact that they served Thai iced coffee while the others did not. First of all the coffee is an excellent deal. $ 2 and it comes in a big bubble tea sized cup, not to mention it’s delicious. Now on to the rest.
The food has been consistently good, the portion size always generous, and since everything on the menu is $ 6 it’s a great deal. I’ve tried several items from noodles to rice to stir fry to soup. I have yet to be disappointed in any way.
I typically get the food to take home with me and thanks to the low price I can easily get several dishes and have plenty of leftovers without feeling like I overspent.
The lady who runs it is always nice and very upbeat, she usually remembers me when I come by. The food is super fresh and served piping hot. The wait time is generally pretty short, so it’s suitable for a quick lunch break. While it may be the least flashy Thai cart in that section (seriously, out of 5 carts next to each other 3 of them are Thai food) it’s possibly the best one. You can tell they care about cooking well, plus the low price adds a nice boost to the delicious/​value side of it. Highly recommended for a quick Thai meal.

I wanted to go to I Like Thai for an early dinner the other day, but they were closed. Thai Basil is right next to it and was open, so I figured I’d give it a try. After all, it was $ 1 cheaper anyway.
I ordered Pad See Ew with medium spiciness, even though I was a bit worried about the spiciness because I’m a wimp. Spoiler alert: It had almost zero flavor. Anyway, I waited approximately 15 minutes for my food, which I consider to be WAY too long for a food cart. Like I said before, there was very little flavor even though it was supposed to be the medium level of spice. My Pad See Ew was extremely watery and was really hard to eat. It also was a much smaller portion than you would get at I Like Thai.
Never again.

The other review is spot on. This place gives you a decent amount of acceptable food, but something just isn’t quite right.
It’s a good third or fourth choice when the other carts on the block that you like aren’t open. (I’ll give them that… they do seem to be open all the time).
Also, in my experience, the service has been mixed. Sometimes really great and sometimes really lackluster.
I eat here because of the hours (often times when other carts are not) they are open and I know the food is consistent, bu, it is not going to be my first stop.

Decent Thai food — and everything on the menu is just $ 5. We appreciated the quick delivery of our lunch, the quantity of food for the price was impressive, and the service was quite nice, but the food itself was a bit lacking; while the sauces and curries were quite tasty, and the proteins and rice were cooked perfectly, many other ingredients seemed to be lacking.
For instance, I am 100% certain the vegetables on my chicken pumpkin curry (with the exception of the squash) were from a frozen bag of mixed veggies. They also were not cooked with the curry, they were just dumped unceremoniously and quite plainly on top. So this cart must make base sauces /​curries, then just add stuff to the top as ordered. The «pumpkin» (squash) however, was divine; it came in large, perfectly steamed and delightfully tasty chunks and, once I mixed everything up, went brilliantly with the sweet, flavorful curry.
I think that’s what made me a bit disappointed in the thrown-​together, cheap, hurried aspect of the rest of the meal; I think this cart would be perfectly capable of creating much better dishes. But if they put more thought and love into their cooking, then I guess they couldn’t serve all of their dishes for just $ 5.
It’s not that the meal wasn’t adequate, I just do not feel it was up to typical Portland Food Cart standards, and especially not up to typical Thai food standards. So you might not want to try this one if you’re expecting to sample the best Thai food Portland has to offer, but if you’re in a hurry, you like basic Thai food, and you only have $ 5 in your pocket, this cart would probably do just fine.