Citrus & Spice

So So sad. They are closed. One of my favorite restaurants in Marin. No point in talking about it since its closed.

This is my favorite Thai place around. I usually get the yellow curry or the eggplant, both are really really good!
We came here for lunch quite a bit when I worked nearby. It’s great for a big group.

Wowzers!
This place is yummy and super fresh! The peanut sauce was incredible and the coconut soup was superb. Tasty Thai with a California twist!!!
I would have given this place 5 stars, but the service could have been a little better. Its either they over wait and rush you, or they are nowhere to be found. Other than that I will be back fo sho!!!

I feel bad giving this place only one star, as I’ve often heard my mom raving about it, but… If I’m to give an honest account of my experience here, one star is appropriate.
I ordered the squid pad Thai and the squid was RANCID. I’m not talking «questionably edible,» I mean, it was really, really spoiled. The smell. Rancid.
The service was less than stellar too. First of all, our waitress couldn’t speak or understand English very well (which I’m usually fine with, but…) and ended up giving us the wrong drinks. Second of all, it took forever to get the food (which ended up inedible the first time, anyways!)
I ended up getting the chicken pad Thai the second time. It was good, but I wasn’t that impressed. It seemed fine if you’re into mellow, California-​style Thai.
I will say, though, that the décor was very nice.
Overall, I can’t imagine going back. I’m sure this place has it’s merits, but I’m not going to be shouting them from any mountaintops anytime soon.

Slow service. Great interior. Disgusting bathroom. Good food. Good portions. Don’t come if you are in a rush.

I’ve tried many Thai restaurants in San Rafael, and Citrus & Spice continues to be my go-​to place.
The food is always tasty, fresh and very consistent. I’m a vegetarian and they offer pretty good choices. My favorite items of the moment are the basil eggplant dish with tofu and brown rice, and the papaya, apple, jicama salad.
They have yummy appetizers too like the sweet potato fries and curry empanadas. Delicious!
I’d give it 5 stars, except on a few occasions service has been a bit sluggish, but nothing too bad. Always, it can get a little loud sometimes, especially when the chairs are being moved in and out from the tables.

In a sea of not-​so-​inexpensive restaurants in downtown San Rafael, it was great to find a nice place to have dinner and not spend $ 100 for two! I think we spent $ 50 or $ 60 with a drink each and an appetizer before the tip. Food was great, service was excellent. It wasn’t too loud. My only possible suggestion is they take out 2 tables along the wall so all their 2-​tops aren’t so close together. Other than that it was terrific.

I love this place!
My friends and I were driving around trying to find a good Thai place to sit and talk. We just thought about Citrus and Spice that our other friend recommended to us a while ago. We came in and we just loved the decoration. Menu looks good. Food delicious. They have several kinds of beer, wine and other drinks. I loved the sake-​tini and how they represented it. Music is good and very friendly service. One of us order the Chiengmai noodle and he just loved it! I just loved everything we ordered. I think the owner is from the Northern of Thailand that’s why he knows how to cook a lot of good Northern Thai food. We had a good experience overall. Awesome place!

Very good food, horrible service. Took over an hour to get our meal.

Found this place on Unilocal.Boss wanted to take me out for bday lunch and since I go to Sol Food way too often, looked for another yummy place in San Rafael.
Citrus & Spice has a beautiful interior and seemed like it’d be great for dinner. We were seated right away and both took forever deciding what to get. The menu had many options but we both decided on getting combo plates. I got a spicy chicken dish w/​rice and a salad. Bossman got a pad thai w/​spring rolls. Neither of us talked much cause we were way into our foods. They took longer than you’d expect but the food was delicious and presentation was gorgeous. I had a Thai Iced Tea and even that looked almost too pretty to drink.
I’d def recommend coming here if you’re ever in SR and don’t want Puerto RIcan or Mexican food.

This was the best Thai I have had in SO long!
My mom and I met here for dinner tonight and were totally wowed.
We’re both Thai food enthusiasts so we’ve tried our fair variety of the cuisine, and we were both incredibly impressed. The food was fresh, flavorful beyond belief and lovely presentation.
The restaurant was pretty hoppin’ for a Thursday night and yet we walked right in and were immediately seated, and our courses all came out promptly.
We split the prawn fresh rolls which were plump and full of fresh, delicious ingredients, including whole prawns, with a side of some nutty savory dip (not peanut sauce, which is nice to try something new).
Next we split a special of the night, Trout over mashed sweet potato, asparagus, baby corn, steamed broccoli and other veggies with spicy chili sauce. It was mildly spicy, PACKED with flavor, and absolutely spectacular.
Lastly we had cashew ginger chicken which was perfect. The chicken was light and great texture, crisp fresh veggies, light broth and brimming with flavor. The shards of ginger gave it a delicious punch every few bites.
We had these over the brown rice which was rich, dark and hearty.
I’m thrilled to have leftovers for dinner again tomorrow!
The flavor was out of this world.
You HAVE to try Citrus and Spice in San Rafael!
Our lovely server also informed us that there is a second location in Berkeley called Gecko Gecko with a slightly different, but equally fantastic menu. I can’t wait to try it out!
If you love Thai food, fresh and healthy cuisine and tasty food packed with spice and flavor, then you MUST check out Citrus and Spice.

I really like this place, but am put off by the poor treatment of customers with coupons :(
We’ve never used a coupon of any kind, and have always had really good service
as well as food. so I’m sad to read that other patrons are treated differently.
As properly classified, this place is definitely Thai-​fusion more than authentic.
All their curries have really good flavor and don’t taste the same, unlike some of the other places.
The sauteed meats are never dry, and their soups have large portions.
Their pineapple fried rice is subtle, and doesn’t taste like it was cooked with
pineapple juice. The atmosphere is also really nice, laid out very similarly to
Sushiaholic in Novato, with curtains adding privacy and a bit more flair to the space.
Overall, I would have easily given them at least 4 stars, but I believe that a well-​run
restaurant should treat all cordial and paying customers the same way, regardless
of coupon or not. Besides, some of those customers could have been lifetime ones
that would have never found this place if it hadn’t been on a deal site…

Yum yum yum! Good Thai, Good Service.
However — It saddens me reading the reviews about their treatment to other customers with coupons. As a coupon user myself i know how frustrating it can be when a company who signed up to use a «Groupon» type service doesn’t honor their side of the commitment. They lost a star due to that.

Atrocious service.
I purchased a coupon from a deal site to use at this restaurant. My friends and I were looking forward to using it for a month.
When we get there and try to use the coupon, we were told that they were no longer accepting it as of an arbitrary date in early August. I purchased the coupon in late-​August. WHY DID YOU SELL IT TO ME IF YOU KNEW YOU WEREN’T GOING TO ACCEPT IT?
When I called BS on this policy I was told that it was my problem to deal with to try to get a refund from the deal site.
I was furious and wanted to leave but my overly-​nice friends wanted to stay and try the food anyways. I didn’t want to ruin their night so I let up and we ate extremely overcooked, rubbery chicken curry. The noodles were decent but the overall experience was still terrible.
I will never go back.

We had a nice dinner here with my husband’s friend once.
I wouldn’t say it’s the best Thai food ever… there are a couple that I feel are better, i.e. Arun in Novato and Arawan in Sausalito. However, this place is still pretty awesome and I also love their décor/​ambiance!
We ordered a few dishes to share, and did like them all.
Mango roast duck rolls, Satay, Classic Pad Thai, Pineapple fried rice, and a couple of delicious dishes from their specials.
I liked that they were creative and original in some dishes but didn’t sway too far away from classic Thai flavors.
The bill isn’t cheap… for a Thai restaurant, it’s pretty pricey. Having a
coupon helped :)
Will definitely be one of our dinner options in San Rafael from now on!

I had the pleasure of dining at C&S last night with 2 of my favorite people, and we had a fantastic time and a pretty good dinner. They have awesome brown rice. I had the sour and spicy soup. The broth was deep and good. I also had the shredded green pappaya salad. It was the best thing I tried. Very tart and crisp with tons of jicama. Other items ordered were the garlic chicken, which was tasty but unspectacular, the corn fritters, which were yummy, and the basil eggplant, which had the most amazing sauteed mushrooms.
I’m not a huge fan of Tha cusine– I don’t love coconut milk. I would try this place again and definitely order the papaya salad and that eggplant again.
Also, their wine selection is very good. We had the Haan Pinot Noir. It was a hit.

Wow! I haven’t had such a nice intro to a restaurant in a while. Citrus and Spice is great find!
My group of 6 arrived for a 5 pm dinner on a Saturday night and within half an hour the place was packed… families, seniors, and a group of 15 young women on a «Mom’s Night Out.» I can see why the place is so popular. Great service, terrific food, and reasonably priced.
I had a Tom Kha Ghai soup that was good, but could have been a little more authentic (straw mushrooms instead of the white button mushrooms would have helped). Following that, though, I had a dish that was out of this world: grilled salmon with eggplant and mushrooms. Perfectly cooked, seasoned and presented. I got brown rice on the side that was actually a red rice – again, perfect. Other members of my party had similar dining experiences. Everyone loved their dish, oohed and ahhed over the décor of the restaurant, the service, and the prices. Everyone said they would return, and a number of diners said they would bring guests from out of town to C&S for a special treat.
Run, don’t walk, to Citrus and Spice!

Last night we had dinner here w/​our friends David and Linda before hearing Pervez Musharraf at the Marin Speakers Lecture Series. They had eaten here before; we were new to it. The décor is clean and modern, w/​filmy curtains screening the tables from view.
We ordered the sweet corn salad and the turnip cakes, both from the specials menu. The salad was very good, but the turnip was unreal. It was probably my favorite dish of the night, w/​a luscious sauce, tofu, green onions and I forget what all else. David and Alan ordered different preparations of wild sea bass, one grilled and one poached, Linda ordered mahi mahi and I ordered a slightly spicy lemongrass lamb preparation. We ordered brown rice to share. The food was delicious. My lamb was mixed w/​green beans and red and green bell pepper pieces. The sauce was tasty. Everyone was happy w/​his or her dish. David ordered coconut ice cream and Linda and I shared bites. It was a delicious and satisfying dinner.

I had a weird feeling when I walked in and noticed a pretty bad smell. I parked fairly far away, so decided to stick it out.
The good: Combo lunch. I love variety, so getting fresh spring rolls with the pad thai was fun. The food was fresh but bland. Strange that every entrée on the combo page is chicken. Not giving us much of a choice, eh?
Not so good: Service. During lunch, there were two servers who were friendly enough, but I sat there for a while before the woman came up and said, «Are you ready to order?» And I answered with, «I’ll need a menu first.» She seemed flustered by that. It took even longer after that for her to return and bring take the order (she took an order of someone who came in after me first, which was a bit bothersome, but oh well).
Fine to try, but wouldn’t go back…

Okay. My initial 3 stars has been blown out of the water. The staff is so accommodating when I’m at a table for one which is 90% of the time. I’m always told to «take my time» even when I arrive at odd mid afternoon hours.
Their «exclusive» Virgin Pad Thai (olive oil and lemon) has completely won me over and they know how to cook noodles perfectly.