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We've been on two separate occasions and tried a few of the curries and basil beefs. Everything is very tasty and filling. Service is friendly and you don't have to wait forever for the food. While this is not an authentic Thai place because it's run by Chinese, it's a really good tasty Thai alternative before or after a movie at Silvercity.
I definitely like it here more than the Thai House down the street. Plus they are in the entertainment book, so bonus! =)
We had never been to this establishment before however we had heard it was good, and had read some good reviews about it, BUT after going I WOULD NOT recommend it!
The ONLY plus is that yes you do get a nice size portion for the value, if the food doesn’t actually take 45 minutes to hit your table. When you are there for lunch and you wait to be seated, then you wait for your order to be taken, then you wait for your food, then it comes and you have to have it packed up because you are now late because you have been there over an hour this is unacceptable for lunch, it might be acceptable to some if you don't have places to be and schedules to keep, or even if it’s the evening.
The staff didn’t seem to care that it was taking so long or that we had somewhere to be, or that we kept asking when it was going to be ready. When it actually got there I had a few bites before we actually got someone to come back and pack it up and a dish I like and have had it at all Thai restaurants we’ve gone to is the Pad Thai Noodles and I have never had any that tasted like this one, it tasted like they used ketchup, there was no peanuts, there was no egg, and there was canned shrimp, it was like they ran out of ingredients and just tried to make it up to put something on someone’s place, it was AWFUL. I can’t say my husband’s dish was any better, if you ordered Pineapple Rice, do you think it would have pineapple in it? Yes it should this one, had raisin’s no pineapple.
My last comments is about the establishment, when it’s cold outside, you should heat your place enough so people don't have to keep their coats on to eat. The tea should also be served HOT not luke warm, and when it’s served you should advise the customers they have to pay for it, or at least we did.
My advice this place isn’t worth recommending to people.
The lunch specials at $6.95 are a deal. They all come with a salad, spring roll and dip and soup. The downside to this is that they were are quite forgetable. Tiny and tasteless. I'd prefer to pay a few dollars more and get a tastier larger portion.
The main is another matter. The chicken with cashew nuts in hot chili peppers with rice was excellent. Great flavour and spice, fresh and lots of it. Service was very good. They take your order and serve quickly and gave you water and a refil without asking. It's hard to beat for a lunch stop.
I have been to Green Basil a couple of times. The food is nothing special, just decent. The lunch specials are a pretty good deal. Service is efficient and friendly enough. The restaurant is quite modern and nicely decorated, but the tables are very close together and it gets quite noisy when it's near full house.
Food: had a variety of the curries, pad thai, calamari and satays and everything was generally delicious and definitely better than the majority of thai food I've had in the Lower Mainland.
Service: on and off - they were quick to seat us and take our orders but then disappeared when we needed more water or to add to our orders.
Ambiance: nice but somehow is missing that cozy feel. Clean nonetheless.
Overall, I think I would return for the food and would recommend others to try it as well as it is more authentic than other Thai places.
In Vancouver, it's not hard to find good lunch deals. You can definitely count on Green Basil. I used to frequent Thai House for their $6.95 (slightly higher now) lunch deals until their quality started slipping and their food became slightly on the greasy side. Still good, but not what it used to be. Across the street, Green Basil recently opened up.
They offer $6.95 lunch deals including soup, salad and spring roll, but their choices aren't as many as Thai House. Only about 10 choices. Portions are big and service is friendly and fast. Ideal for the quick and cheap lunch. They also offer other lunch specials at a slightly higher price and their soup offering changes occasionally.
In my opinion, this is a better choice for Thai food than Thai House.
Me and my boyfriend USED to frequent this place often.
Basil fried rice was my favorite with lots of vegetables and spices. The green curry was a staple too. The food takes long to come and it is difficult to communicate to servers to make any changes to the dish due to a language barrier.
But the food has always been a hit and miss. Sometimes its too spicy and at times we've had to send it back because its too bland.
I hate to have my fingers crossed each time when we order food. Just not worth the risk. Never coming here again, gave them too many chances already.
Its a pity because the food when its good its really good. But i cant afford keep getting dirty looks from servers when i send the food back because the cook forgot the put salt in my food for the 100 th time!
Such a shame
Our group of 3 decided to try something more ethnic one evening and decided on the competition across from Metrotown.
Upon entering there was an immediate feeling of westernized influence from the decor. We hoped for the best and picked the usual dishes. The spinach dish with chicken and peanut sauce was gelatinous and excessively oily as was the over-abundance of crushed peanuts found inside the sauce. The green curry had amazing aromatics and taste but was highly salty, even if served over rice. Best made dishes where the pad thai and fried rice which for all purposes are typical of what you'd find elsewhere. We finished off with a somewhat disappointing fried banana with ice cream - note the ice cream was the best part. Prices border on the steep.
Service was fairly informal though timely water top-ups were welcomed.
Overall the food did ok by us but was hardly memorable. Definitely not a place I would feel confident in bringing other dining companions.
I took a friend here a few weeks ago and found the food very good, the service prompt and (with a coupon from a local paper) excellent value.
Yesterday, I decided to order in and reached for the take out menu from this restaurant. This time, I found the staff member answering the phone very terse to the point of rudeness. I asked for a simple substitution Iinstead of beef in my stir fry, I wanted Ostrich (which was an option in other menu selections but not for the stir fry for some unknown reason). When asking for the substitution, I advised that I was willing to pay extra for it (as the Ostrich selection in the other dishes came with a small surcharge). I was surprised that, for this substitution, the charge would be almost twice what the charge was on the other dishes. I thought perhaps more product was used (thus justifying the bigger charge).
I received my food and was quite disappointed. I had ordered some of the same items that I enjoyed so much when dining in person. This time, the stir fry was looked thrown together. It was much smaller and there was actually very little meat (the Ostrich which I paid so handsomely for). The dish was about 2/3 the quantity that we received when dining in person.
The Phat Thai was okay - but it didn't have as much seafood as when I dined in person. There was very little peanuts and, again, the quantity was smaller.
Keep in mind - I am paying the same menu prices (without a coupon) and giving teh driver a tip. I would think that I should receive the same quantity and quality as someone dining in.
In any event - like another reviewer said earlier and I have stated in my other reviews - there is a limited amount of disposable income ESPECIALLY WHEN LAYOFFS ARE ON THE HORIZON AND, AT BEST, WAGES ARE FROZEN. My budget allocation for dining will be spent on restaurants that are consistently good - Green Basil is not one of them.
I like the fact that they add scallops to their pad thai, too. The yellow curry is wonderful - lots of chunks of potatoes, which you often won't get at other Thai places. Lunch specials are great if you are looking for good value.
The restaurant seems a little austere, atmosphere-wise, but the quality of the food more than makes up for it.
Been here at least 3 times with different groups of friends. Always had a good dining experience.
I'm not a big curry fan but I love the pad thai they make here. Maybe a little higher quality of beef would push the dish over the top. You definitely get a bang for your buck. The portion sizes here are huge and even their lunch menu is decently priced for the amount of food you receive.
I will be back for sure.
A couple of friends and I were trying to catch a 10pm movie at Metrotown, and we stumbled upon Green Basil Thai. We normally go to the Thai House Restaurant at Station Square, but we saw the Green Basil sign and had never tried it before, so we decided to give it a try.
We all agreed that this was by far the best Thai in the neighbourhood after our first time dining here. We were surprised to see that many of the items we normally get at the Thai House were also available here. Though items were similar in both restaurants, Green Basil's dishes were much better, both in taste AND value. I don't know what it was, but everything just seemed more fresh, and the colours and tastes were much more vibrant, and to top it all off, we noticed most items were slightly lower in price on the menu. We tried the green curry chicken here, and it was one of the best I've had, almost brings me back to Thailand. The curry was savory, the chicken (chicken breast I might add) was tender and moist, and most of all, the vegetables and garnish were fresh, not soggy, like the veggies I've had in curries at other thai places. We also had the steamed mullet fish here, absolutely delicious, the spiciness was just right and the tanginess in the sauce helped to balance out the flavours. If you absolutely love seafood, you have to try the chef's special live crab here. We had those two dishes and asked the server for a suggestion for a third dish, and he told us to try the live crab with chilli paste. He also mentioned that there were many other sauces to try like yellow curry, curry powder, and many more. We are definitely going to come back and give those other sauces a try.
Aside from the awesome food, we also had an awesome dining experience because of the service and atmosphere of the restaurant. The servers were very attentive, though service was maybe a bit TOO frequent (ie. with the water fills, but I guess I can't complain about that). The ambiance here is great and would be a great place to take friends or even a date, it's much more modern and has an updated look as opposed to the other (drab-looking) restaurants in the area. Value was great, as all the dishes were HUMONGOUS, we couldn't even finish all the food, given we had three adults sharing three dishes, and like I said, most of the prices were cheaper than other Thai places we had tried before.
Overall, we had a pleasant experience here, and would definitely choose this place to come back to for Thai food in the burnaby area. I guess the one thing I would like to see here, are more parking spots, there are only a mere 6 or 8 parking spots in the back and when we arrived, all of them were taken already, so we had to pay for the meters in the front. However, given our dining experience AND the food, I guess it's worth the parking inconvenience.
Hope they keep up the goodo work and stay consistent!
Came here after on a Saturday night during the Olympics. The food was okay, liked the look of the place, normally priced food (around 10-17 dollars per entree), decent portion size, and bad service.
Everyone who works here are Chinese and constantly speak Cantonese. Plus everytime someone comes in that looks of Asian descent they seem to try and speak Cantonese to them too. They left the TV on and we stayed a bit longer (10:30 ish) chatting, all the while the waitress was giving my boyfriend dirty looks (no, not the sexual kind).
The restaurant looks clean, liked the decor, the colours. No chipped plates or cups in sight. Did not like the fact that we were so close to another table though.. we were sitting next to some extremely Chinese people.
We were eating with another couple, they ordered a fresh fruit fried rice or something, and what looked like peppered beef or chicken. They said it was decent, nothing to brag about. The boyfriend had a yellow curry with a side of rice, said it was just okay. I had the phak vegetable tom yum soup.. which was okay. It just had lots of random vegetable pieces floating around in it (a snowpea, a tomato, cabbage, etc). I also had the phak vegetable lettuce wrap. I'm used to the Chinese version of this.. so it's different for me. First time I ordered a "Thai" lettuce wrap, I liked it. Tasted good, ingredients looked fresh. I would order it again since the lettuce wrap normally doesn't have a vegetarian option to it, nice change.
Anyways, I might come back for a lunch, seeing their lunch special. I wouldn't especially recommend it, but it's not horrid either.
I live in burnaby and am not crazy about the Thai house, I find it too westernized for me, not authentic, so I decided to try Green Basil. I decided to order take-out, I ordered their seasonal veg, and a green curry chicken. It was pretty average at best, nothing special at all, pretty generic I thought. Don't think I'll be back.
Sometimes too much service is annoying and just an bit away from being a nuisance. Just let the diners dine and be a little less obtrusive. Water was warm, maybe the ice machine was broken. Some items are quite spicey so ice water would be a must. Food was great and portions were more than ample. Calamari appetizer was a little different but still delicious. Bamei Rommitr #43 was excellent as was the Goong Ob Woon San #G3. Prices were reasonable but what the heck jasmine tea should be a comp item not $3.50 for 2 people. Lots of other places to try before returning here.
We ordered the Neuua Gae Gaaeng Pha Naeng (lamb with coconut curry). And two lunch specials of Gai Gaaeng Ka-Ri (Chicken with yellow curry) and Gai Gaaeng Kiew Waan (chicken with green curry). The specials came with a vegetable spring roll and soup. They were of good size portions and excellent in flavours. The lamb curry hot pot was an over kill and was taken home for dinner. Cook a little rice and “Vola”… is a bachelor’s instant T. V. dinner for tonight’s Canuck play-off game. Definitely return to Green Basil for dinner. Lots of items on the menu to sample.
Food: Been there on an average of 2 or 3 times a year. We tried quite a few things on the menu. Including the Combo for 6 (which feed 8 of us), all of their curry (green, yellow, and red with a choice of chicken, beef, pork, or veggies), roasted duck curry dish, phat thai noodles, pineapple fried rice and the list goes on. The food was all quite good and solid. You can choose your level of spiciness that you like. I like coming here because it's very standard every time. Nothing extravagantly surprising though.
Service: It's enough. They seat you, give you menus, take your order, serve you food. That's all. Nothing more or less. Food comes really quickly so that's good. They are nice and friendly. I don't understand about the other reviews issues with communication problems. I didn't have any. They were able to communicate in English... and if anything, point to what you want on the menu, they can read it.
Value: I would say a little pricey for the amount of food you get. It's usually about $12 to $16 per dish but the portion size is kinda small. I only go with a 2 for 1 coupon. You can always get on one in the Georgia Straight newspaper almost every single week.
Ambiance: It's clean and cozy looking. Decorated with figurines and pictures on the wall. Not bad. Washrooms are clean and odor free, which is great for an Asian place.
I often take associates from other offices here when they are out of town. It is a good middle of hte road fake kinda Thai place. However, the lunch specials are reasonalbly priced and we can each get out for well under ten bucks. No one has ever raved, but no one complains either. It is very reliable, fast and convenient.
Order a stir-fry with chicken and green curry. Green curry was very mild and average quality. I have had much better curry. The stir-fry was also very average. The decor was nice but food was not good. It bit expensive for what they give you. I would not go back. Both my gf and I were not happy with the food. Try some other place
Food: Tom Yum Gai was fairly standard. we were surprised to see larb neua on the menu as it's usually omitted or seasonal. it was done right with the spices and lettuce on the side for wraps. we were very happy w/ this dish. we tried the ostrich skewers as we rarely see that on the menu. they were done nicely. gaaeng-ki-ri (yellow curry) was a decent size. but the veggies they posted on the menu and what we actually got were diff't. flavour was still good, we didnt say anything but it was a bit strange. phat bpriaao waan- sweet & sour veggies was ok. overall we were very happy w/ the quality of food. we thought it was better than thai house.
Service: servers greeted and seated us promptly. took our order, filled our glasses, asked if we needed more rice, all in all very well rounded.
Value: use your entertainment book coupon!! i think they sometimes have coupons in the georgia straight too. for the quality and quantity, the value is definitely there. the curry was the most expensive dish we had but for the amount of vegetables and chicken it was definitely more than some other restaurants which seem to serve only sauce.
Ambiance: very clean and tidy. i like the bold colors on the walls. it goes nicely w/ the dark wood. it's tastefully decorated. i would feel comfortable on a date here or even for a casual dinner.
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