Celebrated my husband's birthday at Thanying today.  We were seated in a very nice private corner, with a large table and cushioned seats.  The wait staff was polite and efficient, but obviously very busy as there were not many of them.  Food order was taken without any fuss; and we were spared the expensive recommendations which we often experienced at other restaurants.  Food was served very quickly, and as we did not have any appetizers, all the dishes came at the same time which was nice.  The tom yum soup did not disappoint; I think it is the best in town.  Their seafood was very fresh and succulent. The fried crab meat was fabulous, it had a nice hint of pepper but not over powering.  The blachan fried rice was a little disappointing though as it was not steaming hot when it came and the blachan was too subtle for my tastebuds. Nonetheless we enjoyed every one of the four dishes.  The decor of the restaurant is lovely, it is exqusitely Thai, and is a place where you can linger on long after dinner is over.  We did not have stomach space to take on the delicious dessert buffet and settled for iced red ruby instead.  This was a nice wrap up to a great dinner.  Thanying is one of the few restaurants where you are unlikely to go wrong if you wish to host a dnner; it has maintained its quality standard all these years.  Their service staff is clearly an experienced and motivated lot, and this makes dining a pleasure.

We had our departmental lunch at Thanying Restaurant today and I would recommend this place for people who wants a nice quiet place for lunch. We ordered the Tom Yam Soup, stir fry seafood with thai basil and peppercorn, chicken green curry, pineapple fried rice, phad thai, kang kong with bean sauce and finally mango sticky rice for dessert. All of the mentioned dishes are good, the stand out being stir fry seafood and chicken green curry. The Tom Yam soup was good too but for $10 per bowl for each person is on the steep side. The dessert buffet looks interesting and its only $9 per person when you order an entree but since we are going back to office, we chose not to stuff ourselves with too much sweets. The highlight is the service staffs who are always prompt and freindly. I particularly like to see service staffs who will remind customers about credit card promotion and discounts, I think these are value added services and I wish more waiter and waitresses will do that. 

1st visit: The first visit to Thanying, about 3 years ago, was a very good experience.

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2nd visit October 2011: Was quite another story.

Firstly, no knives brought for the beef salad - were we supposed to use spoons? Should not have to ask in a place supposedly as nice as this. But that was just the start of what was to follow. They brought out the soups and mains as we had just started with the salad, which was a major annoyance and basically set the tone for the dinner. Which is to say, a huge disappointment. At that point, we were pretty well angry and put off.

Then...finishing my Tom Yam soup, I nearly broke a tooth on something hard and gritty. Then another. Then another. I think is something inside the mushrooms. At one point there were 5 or 6 of these sand-like grits in my mouth. See the picture attached of one of these grits on top of my black wallet for contrast. Small, hard to see, poor photo, but clearly not something you want in your mouth or worse, between your teeth.

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3rd visit March 2012: Even worse.

Despite the bad experience, thought to give them another try. Ordered a variety of appetisers before the mains. It was nearly impossible to get the staff's attention, and the place was only half full on an early Saturday evening. Everyone around us were waving their hands trying to order. Ok, some nights staff are short, we can understand, and we weren't in a hurry.

After finishing salad, soups and appetisers, waited for the mains. And waited. And waited. And tried to get the staff's attention. And tried. And tried. Finally, one staff noticed us, and went over to the wait station, where (!) our mains had been for at least 10 minutes! Out there, in the open, as staff came an went all that time, with our food exposed to that, which is a no-no to me. And just wrong on many levels. And surely unhygienic. And completely wrong for a restaurant which purports itself as highly as does this one.

It gets worse.

The mains came, among them a chicken curry. It was raw. Not under-cooked - raw. I am not exaggerating. Unfortunately noticed only after both of us ate a piece. Which can actually be dangerous.

It gets worse.

We sent it back. Of course. They quickly and politely brought out a new dish of the same. Too quickly it would appear....again, raw! Ok, a combination of undercooked, and raw. Unbelievable.

I asked the waiter for a discount, only fair as we had the soup and salad. He agreed.

No discount. So he lied. We were in too much of a hurry to leave to notice.

We had dinner somewhere else that night.

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Look - we go to a place like Thanying for a special, not casual night out. When it turns out other than special, they loose customers. Like they lost us.