Chef’s Secret

By far the worst Pad Thai I ever had… noodles were colorless and flavorless… I wasted the entire dish as I couldn’t force myself to eat it…

I’m not sure why this place has such low reviews… I went here during a lunch break from work and it was relatively empty (bad sign for some, but great for me and my coworkers because we wouldn’t have to wait to be served heh). Their lunch menu is a front and back menu with Thai, Viet, and Japanese options, so if you’re in the mood for Asian food this is the place to go!
I ordered something from the lunch menu – forgot the exact name, but it was string beans with spicy seasonings and a side of fried rice and a choice of an egg roll/​soup/​or salad. I didn’t expect there to be meat but they had chicken so that was a pleasant surprise for me :) I think the service was pretty good and the price is decent for lunch and would recommend this spot for a lunch break midwork!

Ordered delivery and the food was mediocre and cold. The delivery guy held our food for a solid minute while he yelled at my girlfriend for the place being too far away (he lied about it being about 50 blocks farther than it even is). Terrible service, turned me off from the bland food.

Went there today and enjoyed my food. The staff was pretty nice to me and as accommodating as possible. The lunch special was pretty cheap considering the neighborhood. Would eat here again. I only deduct one star because of the décor and music but other than that no complaints really.

I came for a lunch with my family and we had some delicious meals! We had the Thai Fried rice with beef which is tasty. The Pad See You is also flavorful. The Thai tea is also perfect.

TERRIBLE!!! The thai ice tea was diluted and the waiter didn’t even give us water until we had to ask for it. The spring roll vermicelli was not even vermicelli, it was just regular thin noodle. My friend ordered the massaman curry with beef on white rice instead of the fried rice, but the order came out with fried rice. WTH! The massaman curry was served on a plate with barely any sauce. The beef was WAYYYYYY over cooked, but the onions were not cooked enough. It seems like they just bought a container of the massaman curry paste and when a customer orders it, then they just cook it. The beef doesn’t even look like beef, it looked like pork to me more. Overall, I thought the msg cabbage soup was the best out of everything since you can’t mess up on it. Also, this is the first restaurant I’ve seen that has cups of full water set aside for the customers. (Can you imagine how long the water was sitting there for??) My friend even said that if you want to save your stomach, don’t come here.

To those who rated it two stars: you guys are way too nice! Be serious about Unilocal rating please;) One star is already an overrated complimentary. I am a foodie but not picky, so here is my experience: from appearance, it looks just the same as leftover. And taste, dare you to call it curry… plain as water. When you think things cannot be worse, then the smelly back part told you «yes it can be worse”@@

From my last good experience here, I decided to come back and try their basil fried rice. The dish wasn’t authentic at all and the chicken wasn’t even properly cooked. They tasted like Chinese fried rice which I didn’t expected

I come here often because it is close to my hotel. Good food, fast and friendly service.

The curry I had was completely tasteless and I had a hard time trying to find any meat under the mountain of rice.
This was, by far, the worst curry meal I’ve ever had.

I looooooooove the beef Phở Bo. Oh my god, the broth is excellent! I order it 1−2/week for dinner or lunch. I eat in and order take out. I brought my mom, who was born in china, she loved it too. Make sure you order before 10pm, it is a midtown place after all.

Not Phở Real: The Phở here is just over cooked Philly Cheesesteak meat with rice noodles in a salty broth. Not good. I can’t speak about the rest if the menu and I have no plans on returning to find out.

Formerly called Thai Nam, they’ve changed names to Chef’s Secret in order to serve other cuisines on their menu (Japanese and Vietnamese). They have regular midtown lunch prices (less than $ 10). Considering how the only other option near Grand Central for Thai food is Thai Toon in the basement of Grand Central, it may not be worth it to complain about this place if you really want Thai food.
I’ve only ordered Seamless from here, but the restaurant ambience doesn’t look like somewhere I’d really want to eat anyways. I’ve ordered the pad see ew and the noodles were a bit rubbery and not fresh tasting. My friend ordered the Miss Saigon chicken and she said the curry sauce wasn’t too appealing. So when places expand past their expertise and try to offer everything (in terms of cuisine) — maybe not the best idea.

two and a half stars. certainly not the most authentic thai food, but the pad thai is decent. salad with ginger dressing that comes with lunch special is blah. pad see ew is ok, but lacking in its flavor profile: it’s a touch too sweet and not too much else. you will be full eating here, but you could probably do better elsewhere if you want more exciting flavors.
Pro’s: decent lunch specials. convenient midtown east location. takes seamless orders.
Cons: flavors are very tame and not too exciting. no air conditioning on a somewhat hot day.

This place is disgusting. I ordered a lunch special for $ 9.95 that comes with a soup and salad. I ordered a spring roll vermicelli with cucumbers, lettuce and bean sprouts. When my food came, half of the bowl was filled with water. I don’t know if it’s water from the rinsed vegetables or from the noodles not fully drained. The rice noodles were soggy. The soup that came with the meal was a cabbage soup with salt which was very bland. It’s free so I can’t really complain.

It’s okay. Not inedible but definitely not worth going out of your way. My main complaint about the Phở is that the beef (I think they gave me pork by accident) was sliced super thin (which is fine) but mostly fat so I didn’t get really any meat. I agree with some of the other reviews — its not the real thing.
I also had the summer rolls (rice paper, steamed shrimp, noodles, lettuce, onion, basil) which were fine. They were large. Again, nothing worth raving about.
Overall, it was fine for a take out lunch before a meeting but probably won’t go back.
It was also very expensive for the quality of food. I paid $ 20 for the phở and summer rolls.

Meh … I was craving phở and a lack of options by Grand Central (or at least, a lack of knowledge on my part about options) led us here.
There were only two other diners in the whole restaurant and the back area didn’t even have lights on. The waitress was fine (although she did tell us that the cooks couldn’t give my son steamed tofu –only fried– despite the fact that we got miso soup with … you guessed it … PLAIN TOFU a few minutes later).
My phở was flavorless and I needed to compensate by putting progressively more and more Sriracha and hoisin (to no avail).
No return visits from me.

I agree with the other reviewers and really wish that I had checked out the reviews before stopping in. I ordered a Thai Salad and it was basically iceberg lettuce with disgusting peanut sauce dumped on the top. There was WAY too much peanut sauce sitting on top of the salad and it was so bad that I couldn’t eat it. I just pieced at it. Then my Pad Thai dish came and it was equally disgusting. I picked at that too and basically left both dishes untouched. My bill for these two lousy dishes was about $ 18. I don’t have a problem paying for good food, but this place is just plain disgusting. I wish that I hadn’t gone and will NEVER go back.

The Chef’s secret is they ain’t got authentic Thai OR Vietnamese food. They also got greedy and threw on some Japanese donburi dishes on there too. *shakes head*
I give up trying to find excellent eats near Grand Central. Donburiya was closed, so we gave CS a chance. You know it’s off to a weird start when the menu and napkin doesn’t have the name of the restaurant and you have to rely on their business card to remind yourself where you are again.
–Do not get #59a. Bun Suong Nuong. Their vermicelli noodles are stuck together, the cook forgot to soak it in cold water after boiling. A little overcooked. The grilled pork was okay. The bottom is loaded with vegies-​cucumbers and lettuce that aren’t very fresh. It would be better if they chopped up the lettuce finely instead of salad size chunks and put them ontop for better presentation instead of hiding them on the bottom. Boston’s vermicelli dishes puts CF’s to shame! Where is the bean sprouts? Lime? Other standard Vietnamese herbs?
+Chicken pad thai was okay. Correct noodles used, sadly on the hard end. Standard pad thai taste of America.
+Mom loved their beef kuay teow. It’s a wide width rice noodle dish similar to pad see ew. Their beef is surprisingly tender.
+Thai iced tea was good. Standard taste.
–Kitchen was really slow on our order. 2 waiters were really nice and attentive, noticed how after 20 mins or so neither of us had anything even though the other gentlemen who came in the same time got his order, and both rushed to the back asking the cooks what’s up without us prompting. Unfortunately it’s not the servers who make the most of the dining experience, it’s the food!

Satisfactory service. Frightening food.
Chef’s Secret draws in a lot of customers; they’re centrally-​located to a myriad of huge companies. Sadly, their location and affordable lunch specials can’t make up for lackluster cooking. Their beef ga prow with fried rice was clumsily made, hardly a shade of proper Thai, all dry rice and Chinese take-​out veggies and meat.
Considering how bad our food was, it might be a good idea for Chef’s Secret to remain a secret — at least until they get their act together.