V Fine Thai

Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid! Avoid!
We had a 6 o’clock reservation and did not get served until 7:15. If we were not with another couple we would have left. As we sat at least 15 tables that arrived after we did we’re served, paid and left. I brought it to the owners attention and she just blew us off and blamed her staff. How she stays in business is a mystery.
The food was less than mediocre and not cheap. And paper napkins? Really?

Eh just got the chicken pad thai to go. not impressed because this is NOT PAD THAI. Even I make better pad thai at home than V Fine Thai. Price was 10.00. order was ready in less than 5 mins for pick up (that was a little fishy actually perhaps Chef Mike aka chef microwave) was doing the cooking???) I’m a little pissed because their version of pad thai is basically soy sauce noodles. what a sham
edit: just ate half of my lunch because I was starving. I threw the rest away because it was unedible. Never again Im actually really pissed off at this point because I felt like I just threw away 10.00 and I am still hungry!!! AHHHHHH
Edit: stay away lunch gave me some tummy problems :(

Avoid. Most items on the menu were unavailable, as they were out of many ingredients. Unfortunately, this also included all the basic ingredients for classic Thai dishes such as pad Thai, which was essentially noodles, soy sauce, and chopped peanuts.
The wait staff was confused and disoriented. There was confusion over who was serving our table. The manager disappeared, leaving these young girls to figure out how to explain and justify being «out of» the first 4 dishes we ordered, an embarrassing version of pad Thai, and two other incomplete meals– meaning what was described on the menu was not what was served to us. Our entire $ 70 meal was comp’ed for us. Even with such a generous offer to make up for the experience, we will never return.

we had a living social deal for v modern thai that was going to expire in a couple of weeks and we had a baby sitter for our four year old so it was decided that it’d be a good opportunity for a date night.
my husband called earlier in the day to see about making a reservation because that’s what it suggested in the LS deal. he left a message with his information to call back, but he never received a call. i didn’t know he called and called on my way out of work (around 430PM) and the man on the line took my reservation for 830PM.
v modern thai is kind of hard to find if you haven’t been there before. it’s not apparently obvious from the street as you drive by on congress. you’ll have to park on the street and walk.
the entrance to this place was really cool. it felt like you were entering a secret club or something. there were beautiful paintings on the wall on the way in which were very fitting to the thai culture. one was of buddha, the other of an elephant. it’d be cool of they had lights to display them in the evening.
when you get to a courtyard, the entrance is on the left hand side. we entered and were greeted by a thai woman who appeared to be the owner/​manager. she asked about my reservation and seated us at a table they were holding for us.
i felt like everything was off to a good start. date night with my love, nice atmosphere — - and then enters out waiter.
he starts with the usual «have you been here before?» i told him no. i asked if they have sticky rice and he condescendingly told me that i probably should have called ahead to check. then he asked us what we’d like to drink. i asked for a coke, and he obliged. maybe this seems petty, but, if you don’t serve coke and you serve rc cola you should probably let your patron know they’re not getting a COKE. just saying. i would’ve drank it anyway.
after he dropped off our drinks, he didn’t come back for a while. i don’t know what he was so busy doing because they only had a few tables occupied.
we ordered a couple of appetizers to start and they came out rather quickly. the waiter would just drop them off (one at a time) and before i could even get an «excuse me» in to say we were ready to order, he’d be half way across the room. finally, my husband got his attention to let him know we were ready.
now, about the food. i guess i have to put this disclaimer in here: i am half thai. it’s really hard for me to go out and spend money at thai restaurants because it’s likely that i can cook it better (at least to my liking) in my kitchen.
the chicken skewers (satay) with peanut sauce was really bland. there was barely any flavor at all. the peanut sauce was mediocre at best.
the crab puffs were interesting. after we left the restaurant my husband and i both agreed that we hoped we weren’t gonna get food poisoning from them…
the ahi tuna that is seared and supposed to come with papaya came with salsa (of the canned variety) and my husband almost broke a tooth because there were still bones!
the entrée we ordered was the garlic chicken stir fry. basically, a scoop of jasmine rice and chicken breast that was mixed with sauce and some vegetables before plated.
our waiter was pretty scarce during the whole time we were eating. the bus boy and bar tender came around to refill water/​soda.
when i did see the waiter, he was helping someone else move the tables around us away and stacking chairs to get ready for when this restaurant turns into a night club. this was after arguing with and then getting scolded by the owner/​manager lady with in earshot of us.
finally, he asked us if we were interested in dessert, but we just wanted to get the hell out of there.
he took our living social discount and handed us the check. no thanks, hope you enjoyed everything. nada. zip. zilch. after he ran our card, he dropped it off for us to sign without saying a word. and then when we stood up to walk out, he briefly made eye contact with me (and had an opportunity to say thanks again!!) but didn’t.
i don’t know how this place has been doing business in tucson for so long (some of the previous reviews go to show that this wasn’t a fluke).
i hope this review opens your eyes a little bit and please teach your servers about KRENG JAI! it’ll do everyone a bit of good.

I’ve never came home and thrown up from a meal before. This was the worst Pad Thai in tucson. It came with 3 miniature microwave shrimp and 1 jumbo shrimp. The lamb chops had no meat and was $ 30 for absolutely nothing. The only good thing was the Manhattan cocktail. The calamari was said to be «the best appetizer» they had but of course it failed to impress. The soggy breading and odd choice for sauce just didn’t work for me
DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY
I will never go back and warn everyone not to go. Our entrees took about about an hour and the wait was worth nothing.

Its been a while since my last visit to V, but had to praise then just the same. I’ve lived in Tucson my whole life and I’ve never wished summer would never end, but that’s the case. Love the summer menu at V so much, I wish summer wouldn’t end.
I’m a huge fan of the watermelon salad; watermelon is a must during the summer and particularly in the hot and dry El Pueblo. It’s sweet, delicious and healthy. It’s sprinkled with mint, red onions, and cilantro. I add Thai chili peppers on account I like spicing life up a bit. I’ve been adding the chicken skewers with peanut sauce to round out my meal. The cucumber and mint water is very refreshing, but I like some Phuket Beer to end the day.
As always the crew at V is first rate. They know great ways to pair meals with drinks, make sure your welcomed and feeling better than being at home. At home I prepare the meals and do the dishes. Here at V, you can leave that to the best crew in town. Thanks V for maintaining a high standard at V. I’ll be stopping in shortly.

She led me down an alleyway,
Shades of a green brick back drop on display.
Neck reclined back, looking all the way up.
Methinks, «Very cool entrance, that’s wassup.»
So I’m excited, I’m pumped.
Some guy sitting outside is slumped
Over his food, accompanied with his alcohol
Shoots us a smile, goes back to watching NFL football.
We walk inside. It’s virtually empty.
Decent decorations. Waiters all seem sketchy.
Brush it off, order waters and a coke.
Water tastes gingery, soda tastes like a watered-​down knock-​off. Is this a joke?
The crab puffs… no way. It was a struggle to down just one.
I’m not a huge fan of cream, but it wasn’t that… they were way overdone.
Usually, I’d wash it down, but wait… that won’t work.
Cause the server lied to me about having Coca-​Cola… jerk.
Where are the waiters? Why is everything taking so long?
This place is starting to feel like a front for dirty old men to get their nasty on.
Could it really be a secret bordello?
Maybe if service was better, we wouldn’t speculate. Server? Anyone? Hello?
At last the main course! It’s time to dig in.
The pad thai is a tad salty, the chicken lacks flavor, this is a sin.
If I ever come back here, it will be to get a drink in the alley.
Food and the inside are a big thumbs down. No encore. Finale.

From now on if anyone asks me why I go to the same restaurants over and over again I’m going to tell them V Fine Thai, that’s why.
Let me preface this by saying I’m a huge supporter of downtown. I live downtown, I work downtown, I eat downtown, I play downtown, I love downtown. But I’ve been here 3 times now and each time is worse than the one before and tonight was the last straw.
Wanting to try as much as possible, my dining companion and I ordered the Chicken Sa Te, Cashew Chicken and Crying Tiger Salad. I specifically asked that the Chicken Sa Te come out first so we could pace things and enjoy the other two items we’d be sharing. After half an hour and after I saw a four top nearby (sat after us, ordered after us) nearly done with their entrees I asked our server about the appetizer. She seemed to think it was odd that it hadn’t come out yet and said she’d check. Another ten minutes went by and still nothing. She came back to our table and couldn’t believe we still hadn’t seen our starter. About five minutes after that she came over with it, apologized and said she’d take it off the bill. I let her know that I was going to be pretty upset if our other two entrees were quickly behind, and she said, «I can’t imagine they will be, I specifically said you wanted to start with the Chicken Sa Te.»
And so we dug in… to the most flavorless chicken I think I’ve ever eaten. Sure there were grill marks, but no grill flavor, no flavor at all really, and the peanut dipping sauce followed suit. Weak and watery. Mine is better. And wouldn’t you know, just as went in for first bites, there was our salad and Cashew Chicken. The guy who ran our food over clearly knew we weren’t thrilled and asked if there was anything wrong. I explained that now we have an appetizer, an entrée that’s going to get cold and a salad that’ll be wilted by the time we get to it. He apologized and explained that a big party (of 8) threw off the kitchen times and now things are coming out in a strange order.
We finished up the app and moved on to the Cashew Chicken where things didn’t get much better. First of all, it’s a breast of chicken, not nicely sliced pieces as you’d expect from a Thai restaurant. And it comes with a steak knife. I’m sorry but you shouldn’t need a steak knife to cut chicken. Add to that the fact that we were splitting the Cashew Chicken and our server only brought one knife, it was precarious to cut and enjoy it together at the same time. And so we shared the steak knife, in order to cut through a dry chicken breast, trying to soak up as much of the sauce as possible. And here’s about when I lost my shit. First bite… it was terrible. Throwing a dry chicken breast that has no flavor and a few slices of squash and a handful of cashews on a plate is uninspired, uninventive and lazy and charging me $ 12 is offensive.
Two stars instead of one because the salad was good. I would have flipped over tables if they screwed up mixed greens sliced beef and dressing.
Our server ran my card and we were out of there. No good-​bye. No thank you. No «Gosh I’m really sorry we messed that up tonight, I urge you to try us again because that’s so atypical.»
Downtown could benefit from amazing Asian food, but as far as I’m concerned it’s not at the corner of Congres and Stone. Those who spend hard earned money on an evening out deserve better.