Critic's Review
This place has been on the brink of opening for months; they first said they were opening in November; now they STILL have a Coming Soon banner on their web page with a Jan 11 date. I couldn't confirm they were open until today.
The Now Open sign is the 1990 way of marketing your grand opening, and it's not generating big crowds yet. One a cloudy but warm day there was no interest in eating outside.
Inside I was greeted by a male who seemed pretty excited to see a customer. He offered me a booth, which is the benefit of dining at 2:30.
If you'd been to Pei Wei, the previous occupants of this space, you'll notice that they replaced the order counter with a full bar. This restaurant is full service.
They've also taken out the small booths and tables and replaced them with larger booths and bench seating. I'm not a fan of the bench seating, as when it's crowded you have no privacy and when it's dead you feel like you're sitting in the middle of the room.
Servers are Asian, and I only mention that because I simply could not understand my server. You can order by number; I ordered the Pad Thai; but trying to order the soup or salad option was tediously painful. She repeated it 5 times, but I never actually heard her say "Ginger" as a dressing option. The choices were peanut or ginger, and I only surmised that Ginger was a choice because ginger is always a choice. I've never had a peanut or ginger dressing that I liked, but I also think Miso soup, the only soup option, is dishwater. So I ordered the salad with the dressing on the side so i could taste the dressing.
The salad came out right away.
I tasted the dressing and it was surprisingly good. I put it on the salad and opened up the fancy rollup. Only Soy Sauce on the table, but no dish for it.
Just a fork and chopsticks. How was I supposed to cut the salad? Put a knife in the rollup please.
Music is cool jazz all the time: "Whispers", Sade, Richard Elliot. Not offensive but nothing I'd listen to in my car either.
They have wireless but it's locked, and I figured I had zero chance of understanding the password if conveyed by my server, so I stuck with LTE.
The open kitchen from Pei Wei remains. Can't really see much from the dining room however.
The food came out before I could take 3 bites of my salad. Timing isn't a thing here yet.
The pad thai was a very American version, no spice, no YUM here, no lime provided either. It was very edible, but it simply didn't taste like Thai food. The chicken was very dry, and I'd guess there was no Sriracha at all. The balance that makes Thai interesting was completely missing.
Another criticism is the inclusion of plain white rice with this dish. Plain white rice (like the stuff you throw out that you get with Chinese take out) simply doesn't pair with pad Thai. A bit of seaweed or a roll would be better. The rice just takes up space.
My server offered me a refill on the tea as I was asking for my check; a trick I'm wise to at this point. I really didn't want more tea.
I asked the server when they opened and she said "Saturday". "Nobody Knows" I said. She said something about advertising not starting yet, and I mentioned that their web site still said "Coming Soon". "But we just got a phone number yesterday", she said. Really?
Conclusion
Pei Wei wasn't an authentic Chinese restaurant; the replacement is a non-authentic Thai restaurant. Fort Lauderdale won't know the difference, because none of the Asian restaurants down here are authentic. The Pad Thai at Big City Tavern is about the same as this stuff.
As much as I detest the Quick Service model, at least I could get up to get a sauce or a plate if I needed it. Here I was at the merci of a woman who couldn't understand me, and by the time I could get her attention I'd already moved on.
As an offering. The Pad Thai Lunch Special at Coco Asian Bistro was better than this in every way.
