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Carroll St (F, G)
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Consistently good Thai food. The restaurant is cute but on the small side and I prefer to get take out. I like their veggie summer rolls and my latest favorite entree has been pad cashew nut. For those of you who crave the spicy dishes and think food is just never hot enough, order from the spicy section of the menu and I don't think you'll be disappointed.
They have a good lunch special as well, main course and two appetizers for only $7. Most importantly they get your food ready in about 5 minutes.
Not a date place, more of an established relationship or business meeting place. The food arrives about five minutes after you order it, so I'd recommend an appetizer like the fried tofu or taro veggie parcel (fried wontons with taro and veggies). Take advantage of their decently priced wine / beer menu too.
The curries are very good, and they have a SPICY section of their menu that is highly recommended if you are a fan of food that makes you cry.
The only dish I don't get here is the pad thai, which has been slimy the past two times I've ordered it. Other than that, highly recommended cheap thai food!
I'm being nice with the two stars. I came here on a Sunday evening at 8pm on a date. Place was busy and loud (kids yelling and being annoying etc) but we were starved and wanted good thai food....we were disappointed on 2 counts...1-atmosphere and 2-cold tasteless food!
The BBQ chicken satay sticks were COLD, OLD and rubbery! eww! Then we had the seafood salad and it was warm, not sure what was up with that but calamari and squid salads are usually on a bed of cold lettuce not warm on top fo the lettuce and soggy...weird.
The waitress was slow as hell and kids screamed at one table while at the other a loud couple and their third female guest shouted their conversation over the kids screaming at the other table. My date and I pretended not to notice, politely, even though we were both very disappointed.
Never again, one and done, thanks!
The pad see ew here is excellent and, at $9, a fair price for the neighborhood. I've eaten this dish up and down Smith Street and Em's is by far the best. The service is incredibly fast (almost too fast if you want to sit and chat) and the waitstaff is very friendly. Go on Monday or Tuesday for 1/2 price bottles of wine.
I ordered from here one night due to a serious jonesing for Thai. I was thisclose to ordering the pumpkin rolls, but decided against it due to seeing the duck roll on the menu - I love me some duck. And of course, some Pad Thai. The delivery took a liiiiiiittle bit longer than I would have liked, but the food was pretty solid. The duck roll was delicious, I could have had an entire meal of those. The Pad Thai was good, nothing special, but a good meal. I'd order from here again if I needed some Thai.
I LOVE this place. I have tried 4-5 different Thai places in the neighborhood and I always go back to Em. Their service is fast, atmosphere is nice and the food is always consistently good. Also a great spot for delivery. Make sure to try their pumpkin dumplings.
I've had a lot better.
I have been ordering delivery from here for over 2 years. It's been getting worse and I usually order 1 of 3 dishes. Not sure what's going on, but it's really bland and takes 45 minutes (and arrives cold). I ask for my food extra spicy and it is tasteless. I would have originally given Em 4 stars at the beginning, but it has trickled down to 2. Looking for another Thai delivery in the neighborhood.
Beautiful space. Really quite remarkably modern and tasteful.
It's not uncommon to find people eating lunch by themselves (just like in High School, awww) and reading a book. That'd be me, 'cept no book cuz I don't want to get my pages dirty. I just stare straight at your table and I don't even pretend not to listen in on your conversation. Pwahahaha.
The lunch special is an okay value. Decent food--- all the stir fry dishes taste more Chinese than Thai. When you ask for it to be spicy they just give you Vietnamese hot sauce on the side. Meh.
Polite service.
Em Thai's quirky-looking menu posted outside drew us in. The menu also said "DUCK" (as in poultry, not the verb) in huge letters, which lured us (we love duck!). The white interior seems sterile at first, but I really liked the flora-inspired minimalist decor. It was also nice to run into my friend, who lives in the area and dubbed Em Thai as the best Thai in the 'hood.
The appetizer sampler ($10) was like a tray of crispy fried happiness: no less than 17 pieces of tofu, fishcake, crabcake, taro bundles (MMMM!!), chicken-shrimp fritters, and veggie dumplings, served with a trio of dips -- great value and I'd totally recommend it for a group.... Or if you're gluttons like us.
Although I was happy to try the tamarind duck, it was a bit too much crispity stuff for me, and a little too sweet to eat a whole plateful. I'd still recommend it if you were, say, eating family-style in a group. We also had decent pad kimow (drunken noodle) w/ just the right kick and took advantage of happy hour -- $3 spritzy mojitos and $2 singha and some other beer (although my boyfriend smartly chose the $4 stella instead).
i have ordered food from this place over 50 times in the past 3 years. Pretty much the same dish, Chicken Pad thai, spring rolls, and mango salad.
I have never had a bad meal. It is very consistent and always arrives quickly. I feel I order from there when i am really hungry and do not want to wait for food, because it always comes so fast.
I can only recommend the 3 dishes above as they are the only ones I have tried. I did try some other thai food in the area for variety, but EM is the best in the hood.
Great food
Great prices
Great drinks
Great decor
Great staff
Its that simple and it all equals five stars
In this neighborhood, which is totally saturated by Thai restaurants, you'd better bring your A game. Em Thai came up Em Pty last night.
The portions are small, which kind of worked out, because the food was suboptimal. The tasty pumpkin peanut sauce was totally undercut by the tough, leathery duck it covered. The Pad Thai, the bellwether of Thai food, was rather bland; the noodles tasted more like plain buttered noodles.
Paid way more that I do around the corner at Joya, and liked the food about half as much - or less.
Don't let the slick web site fool you.
Really good food, the mango salad... YUMMMMMM. The service and prices are great, I go regularly.
love loveee love this place.
cheap & amazing !!!
love: taro veggie parcels, shrimp dumpling soup, pad see ew- and basically everything else i've tried.
also good mojitos !
fave thai place in the 'hood.
I came here for lunch with a friend and was pleasantly suprised. The decor is quiet and serene, and dare I say a bit unusual. White walls with colorful branches running down walls and a large plant arrangement create a quaint, clean look.
The lunch is fantastic. For 7-8 dollars, you get a beautiful plate with a spring roll, two dumplings, and your dish. Spring roll was crispy and fresh, contrasting with the dumplings which had a salty kick and tender, easy finish. I had a shrimp dish with greens and oyster sauce. Great balance of flavor and a suprising bit of heat at the end which did not overwhelm but did leave me feeling heat. Perfect. Portion size is optimal - I left completely satisfied but not under nourished. Service is attentive though not intrusive. With green tea, bill came to $20. Recommended!
This is a very good restaurant with just the right size portions. But they seem to put MSG in their food. Everytime I go there, I fall right asleep when I get home. They have amazing curry puffs. They have a bright atmosphere where they can open doors that go right out to Smith St to let air circulate through the restaurant. Th restaurant has lots of good things about it.
I'm a loyalist now. I ordered take-out last night and arrived home to find that instead of giving me a mango salad, they gave me a mango dessert. I called them up to let them know, and they delivered the mango salad for free (in under ten minutes!), and encouraged me to try the mango dessert - "it's sweet and very tasty! You'll like it!"
I suppose this is the minimum level of service one should expect from a restaurant. But believe me, it's so rare to find that when I actually do experience it, I'm rewarding it.
They were right, it the dessert was tasty. But not as good as the mango salad.
I went to Em with my friend who is on break from Peace Corps because she was craving Thai and she wanted it right away. I was slightly nervous to let her down since this was her first Thai meal for a year but everything went well. Everyone that came with me enjoyed their meals. We went on a Sunday night so it was pretty calm. The decor is fun, I agree with Amy about the moma store resemblance. Even the take out menu has an interesting graphic design.
Our waitress was just attentive enough to make everything flow smoothly.
I had the Pineapple Curry w vegetable and tofu and it was delicious and filling.
This place looks like it came straight out of Domino magazine -- i.e. beautiful and dumb. I'd never have thought it would have food that good, at such low prices. I'm usually a pad thai stalwart, and really appreciate the creative Thai menu at Em (crispy noodles in peanut sauce are awesome). Plus, our party of 5 spilled a glass of thai iced tea and then a glass of water -- and they handled it with big smiles both times.
My whole house is addicted to Em Thai.
The Sunday ritual is to recover from the weekend's insanity on the couch with spring rolls and dumplings.
I could seriously eat it every single day (okay, maybe just every other day). They are super nice, whether you're dining in, taking out, or having it delivered. And they're fast!
I can never decide between the Red Curry or the Khee Mao, but trust me, whichever dish you order, I guarantee it will be delicious. And make sure to order the Thai iced tea - it makes an excellent dessert!
Since moving to the neighbourhood I've been wanting to try all the restaurants, but with this place right down the street, I fear Em Thai will be the only place I'll know to take people to when they visit.
At least I know it will always be yummy!
i love how brooklyn makes the best of small spaces, how they turn around what could be claustrophobic and make it minimalist and slick.
em is one of these places!
the prices are cheap! (apps are $4-$5 and dinner is like $8).
dinner for 2 with apps was only $27. amazing!!!
the wait-staff was really nice too. and clean bathrooms are always nice!
definitely recommend for a cheap but yummy/hip date.
oh, and the curry puffs/tofu pad thai were awesome.
Are we talking about the same place? I LOVED this place, I only had a month in Brooklyn so I made a point to go back to this place a couple times. Maybe it is because I went when it was slow, but I loved it. The Pumpkin Coconut Shrimp Dumplings made me wet myself, and the curry was good as well.
This place is pretty damn good! Great service, good food. Anything with duck in it is good. Pad kee mao is my fave, as well as Duck Thai Herbal. And they play some bangin' music (Always be my baby by mariah carey). Classics are good like tom yum soup and papaya salad.
I ordered from em yesterday at work. I'd placed an order from Brooklyn Bread that took over an hour and a half and then I got attitude from the delivery guy that he was standing out front for "15 minutes." sure buddy. 15 minutes in a driving rainstorm that was not at my address which I stipulated several times. "4th Street" becomes "Court Street" really quickly to some folks. After I canceled the order I quickly called another joint cause I was starving at this point. Em came through. I placed the call at 2:33 and had a solid lunch special of Pad Ginger sitting on my desk by 2:50. That's good delivery and in the rain.
The lunch specials are pretty great. They come with rice, the main dish, a spring roll, and 2 gyoza type dumplings. And it's 7 bucks. I had to order another spring roll order to get the delivery but I was hungry enough to do that anyway so no sweat there. Em is solid. And yes, Joya is now greasy and not that awesome. I think Song has taken away their eye on the ball.
em totally rips. the service is very attentive, the food is the best thai ive had in brooklyn and it comes out so quickly you barely have time to polish off your first very tasty sake mojito. they have an excellent happy hour from 5-7:30pm (i think every night, but definitely on the weekends) wherein every cocktail is 3 bucks and a singha is 2.
the decor is supercute moma-store style and contributes to the overall awesomeness. oh and everything is cheap, too!
This is probably the hood's best Thai. I rarely have a quibble or really take note of staff, but I've had a number of disappointing experiences with Em's. That said, the food delivers--and Em delivers--so we've worked out a mutually satisfactory detente.
In a city of sometimes over-the-top Thai restaurants with complex dishes and absurd prices, Em is the gold standard of what a Thai restaurant should be. Simple, delicious meals, fair prices, and a delightful staff. Highly, highly recommended.
Yuck
Couldn't agree more with Uncle B. I think Joya is really overrated and SO effing noisy it's almost pointless to go unless you're fluent in lip reading. I also find their food to be extremely greasy. Yuktown! 'Em is totally underrated. Cheap and delicious with a much better atmosphere. Their specials are great too. Beats the ginger out of Lemongras, obviously.
Timely delivery even to the fringe. Green Papaya Salad is right on. Spicy Basil Noodles good, good. Red Hot String Bean is seriously spiced, wonderful full flavor and yes, Red Hot from start to finish. The Golden Tofu has an interesting sauce, provided w/ wrapping lettuce, might be missing something, basil? Finally glad to have a neighborhood alternative to lower Manhattan's Pong Sri which serves wonderful food. Can't wait for an excuse to check out their eat-in. About the cost, I'll go with "Em Thai is less money for a family than so many lesser places -- if you know how to order Not Too Much." Enjoy -and- tell them your Hot-ness!
I so wanted to love Em Thai because they were the first place I noticed in the neighborhood that serve mock duck. It wasn't that it was bad, but the dish we ordered with mock duck (pad kee mao) was totally underwhelming. The sauce was way too sweet and not nearly spicy enough. The mock duck was okay, but I've had better elsewhere. However, I must give them credit for a truly delicous mango salad and a more than adequate spicy string bean dish. I may or may not return, but if I do, I certainly won't order the kee mao, which is a shame, because it's generally my favorite dish.
I ordered delivery on Sunday 30 March 2008. I had the Spicy Basil Noodles and the Gaolden Tofu.
The Gaolden Tofu was fine, although it's pretty hard to get fried tofu wrong; it's a simple dish.
I was, however, extremely disappointed with the Spicy Basil Noodles. First, it had a large quantity of baby corn and celery in it. These are often used by Thai and Chinese restaurants as cheap filler to make the dish seem bigger with more vegetables when in fact they have skimped completely on the better vegetables such as peppers, and the like.
Of course, you expect with a dish like this to have a lot of oil, it's a part of the fun. However, these noodles had far too much oil. It made for lots of fat, which was filling, but not delicious.
Finally, the sauce didn't taste fresh; I wouldn't be surprised if it was pre-made. I've tasted Thai-cook-at-home kits that have made better sauce.
Perhaps it's a nice place to go; I don't know, I got delivery. However, if you are looking for a delivery option, I think this is among the worst Thai food that I've ever had.
I've only ordered from here once, but the Pad Thai was terrible. Hardly anything but noodles and had no flavor whatsoever. I figure if the Pad Thai is bad, I'm sure all else is too. For the same price, go elsewhere.
I sooooo love Em! Ok, I have to preface and say that my parents are Thai and I grew up eating Thai food, so I'm VERY critical when it comes to Thai restaurants. I've ordered a bunch of dishes from this place and I've always been happy. I can't remember the last time I went here (I used to go here a lot when I was with my ex; it's in his neighborhood), but I totally would go again if I didn't have to risk bumping into him again, lol.
This restaurant is, foremost, attractive. It's tiny, but they make good use of the space, and I love the white walls with the crimson and black PVC coral pieces creeping along the ceiling like an upside-down ocean. Anyway, the dish I ordered (green vegetarian curry) was not to my liking, but I think it had more to do with my tastes than the quality of the food itself. Everything was fresh and well-plated, but the mixture of the peppers and curry with the coconut milk just didn't make me happy. My brother tried some and loved it, and also thought his chicken and shrimp lemon grass soup was perfect, and not over-powering. By his recommendation, I would go there again and just order something I know and love. The staff is all right, but a bit immature around lunch time, as they were all sitting down from me and eating themselves. It's fine considering I was the only one in there at 4pm on a Tuesday, but it still bothered me a bit. Menu is expansive (with a gorgeous amount of vegetarian dishes) and moderately priced. The bathrooms are definitely ugly and awkward.
Carroll Gardens is also a beautiful neighbourhood with a lot of cool shops and eateries, so check it out.
This was some of the best Thai food we've had in a long time. My chang mai was delicious, if artery clogging. I was eyeing my man's massaman curry and thinking 'oh they just took the same curry and threw some pineapple in there' but when I tasted it it was actually quite different and very good. We did ask for our entrees extra spicy but we initially couldn't tell, the heat was a slow build, just the way it should be! Roti canai appetizer was also delicious. I don't know what else I can say delicious, delicious, delicious and we didn't even try their pad thai!
Good Thai food in the elk of Sea, Spice, etc. If you've been there, you've been here. Enjoyed the Mango salad - was sort of like a Green Papaya, but with Cashews and Mangos instead. Lots of good veggie options, a nice choice for a cheap, lite and healthy lunch.
great atmosphere.
perfectly nice and attentive waitstaff.
cheap as hell prices.
good menu.
TERRIFIC FOOD!!!
super clean and modern atmosphere but not sterile. I felt right at home with all the Crate and Barrel dishware.
the food is perfectly proportioned. enough to eat a whole plate and feel very full but not stuffed.
HIGHLY RECOMMEND!
Em's take-out menu prints a definition of the name, "The significant faint sound that escapes one's mouth after a good and fulfilling meal, usually proceeding a satisfactory burp." They can back that up. They do Thai as well as a lot of other places, which is great, and an entree is plenty to fill you up, so you'll not go nuts on the cost. No real surprises on the menu and a $7 lunch special (should never be over $6) keep it slow during the sun-times, but for dinner your in the right ballpark with a kooky, post-modern forest done in red and white.
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