Thai Pots knows its coconuts, but service is odd
By CRYSTAL PETROCELLI
Get Out

Wait: Oh, I waited roughly a month. In August, I called Thai Pots at 7:30 p.m. on a Sunday and was told they closed at 9 p.m. I took the half-hour trek to Chandler only to find a locked door. On my second attempt, I play it safe and visit at 7 p.m. on a Thursday. The place is dead, and we seated ourselves.

Service: We don’t die of thirst or find crusty food on a fork, but the experience is a weird one.

There’s a lot of big smiles when there shouldn’t be. Example: I ask for the crispy mee-grob starter and, with a grin, our waitress says she thinks they’re out of those noodles. Is that somehow a good thing? She stands there smiling for a few seconds and then asks if we’d like her to double-check. Uh, yeah. And how does a Thai place run out of noodles, anyhow?

By the way, the woman is fluent enough in English to not use a language barrier as an excuse for her odd reactions.

Later, when our waitress asks if we want dessert, I say yes and ask what they have. Her response? Laughter, followed by “Coconut ice cream.” We have no clue what’s so funny (our appetites, perhaps?), and I recall the menu having a couple of other dessert options — very odd.

Meal: It’s your basic Thai food — pretty good, but nothing to tell the neighbors about.

The heat scale is 1 to 10, plus “Thai Hot” for the brave. We try 4, 6 and 8, and the difference between them is very slight. None are very spicy.
Our nam-sod appetizer has a foul odor, and the pork is more clumped than ground. There are lots of red onion slices and peanuts, but they can’t save the unsavory pork, which is served lukewarm.

The curry dishes are nice, and there’s a generous amount of the gravylike sauce in both the panang and yellow styles.

I’ve had better drunken noodles — I order those flat, wide babies every chance I get — but this version crushes the competition when it comes to veggies. We’re talking carrots, baby corn, snap peas, jalapeños, zucchini and bell pepper — way more than what’s listed on the menu.
The robust pad prig pow — chicken stir-fried with a mild chili sauce, onions and bell peppers — was the clear favorite of the night.

Well, that is until we had the homemade coconut ice cream with crumbled peanuts. Spoons were flying’; luckily she hooked us up with two scoops!

Scene: It’s a small room with four big mirrors on one wall, a couple of Thai posters and white and red layered tablecloths.

Bathroom break: A worn, bare-bones boy/girl unit.

Tab for four: $66 with tip and tax for a large tom yum gai ($7.95), nam-sod ($5.95), pork drunken noodles ($7.95), chicken panang curry ($7.50), beef yellow curry ($6.95), chicken pad prig pow ($7.50), three Thai iced teas ($2 each), one soda ($1.39) and one coconut ice cream ($1.39).

If work weren’t buying: Thai Pots didn’t blow me away, but I could cure a curry craving here if I had to.

Scorecard
Food C+
Service B-
Scene C
Bathrooms C+
Overall C+