I went here with my husband today for the lunch buffet. It was great!
The lunch buffet is $11.99 plus taxes per person and served from 11:30am - 2:00pm, Monday to Friday only. The buffet is small with only 8 items, plus 1 soup and 2 choices of ice cream. I sampled everything except for the soup and one of the ice cream flavours. Everything I sampled was absolutely delicious.
So the items were: basil beef, ginger chicken, stir-fried vegetables, chicken curry, shrimp curry, pad thai, white steamed rice, vegetable spring rolls, tom yum soup, orange ice cream and mint chocolate chip ice cream. I'm not sure if the selection changes every day, as this was my first time there.
The basil beef was full of basil flavour and was tender. The beef is stir-fried with red and green peppers, onions and mushrooms (and of course lots of basil leaves).
The ginger chicken was full of gingery goodness. It was also stir-fried with red and green papers, onions and mushrooms. You could see slivers of ginger throughout the dish. Both the basil beef and the ginger chicken are a dry sort of stir-fry, not covered in sauce. This is how I like my stir-fries. I hate stir-fries that are drenched in sauce or gravy. This is not to say that the meat tastes dry or hard, the meat is tender and delicious!
The stir-fried vegetables were broccoli, baby corn, green beans, and red and green peppers. Again, a dry sort of stir-fry, but the veggies were tender and flavourful.
The chicken curry was a yellow curry with potatoes. Very mild flavour, not spicy at all. Tasted great on the steamed rice.
The shrimp curry was a red curry with pineapple and tomatoes (and maybe red peppers?). Also very mild flavour, not too spicy. The shrimp were not that large, but a fair size.
The Pad Thai was a chicken Pad Thai with egg. No tofu and minimal bean sprouts. I hate bean sprouts, so the Pad Thai here was perfect for me. It was both sweet and tangy and didn't tasty too much of fish sauce, nor too ketchupy. It wasn't too greasy either. I really liked it.
The steamed rice was nicely steamed. Not too mushy, but not too dry.
The vegetable spring rolls were probably my least favourite. They were crispy and hot, but the filling was too mushy. I couldn't even tell what was in it. It looked and tasted like white mush (potatoes? cauliflower? I'm not sure).
I did not have the soup. It looked like mostly broth and you could add mushrooms and green onions to your bowl. There is a small freezer that has 2 ice cream flavours. The orange one was all gone. It might have been mango or orange, I'm not sure. All that was left was the mint chocolate chip, of which I had a scoop. Nice and creamy. Not freezer-burnt.
Service was excellent. There was one woman who greeted customers, cleared the tables, poured water and worked the cash. There was one man who refilled the buffet. I didn't see any other staff, but they were so efficient. Our waters were refilled as soon as they were empty. Our dirty plates were removed promptly. The buffet trays were refilled as soon as items were getting low. And they were very nice and courteous.
The decor is typical of most Thai restaurants. The location is weird. It is inside the Chateau Royale Office Building. You must go into the main building entrance to get to the restaurant entrance. The parking is a pain in the butt. Not a lot of parking spots and all the snow banks made maneuvering difficult. If you are traveling southbound on Prince of Wales, turn right before the signage, if you turn after you will be in a different strip mall complex and the parking lots are separated by a fence.
Other than the awkward location and less than stellar spring rolls, everything else was excellent. Awesome pad thai and the basil beef was amazing! I will definitely be back :) read more