text: While my experience at Thai Elephant was not terrible I have to say that after reading all of the glowing reviews I was disappointed by the food and service We went last night for dinner and it was packed there was a Dbacks game but it had already started by the time we arrived so I am not sure why it was so crowded Strangely enough even though every one of the or so tables in the restaurant was occupied there was only one server I really cannot stand when familyowned restaurants skimp on the number of servers possibly to avoid paying another employee it really makes the dining experience less enjoyable and even a little bit stressful If the food were superb like my favorite Thai place in Fremont CA where the service is spread really thin but the outstanding food makes it worth it we might have been less irritable but it was really frustrating to wait minutes to order and just to flag the server down again with a simple request eg asking for more water when we did not fall all over ourselves for the food nnFor our entrees we had the red curry with chicken and the drunken noodles with beef The curry was ok but it had way too much coconut milk flavor and not nearly enough of the other important curry flavors tamarind fish sauce curry paste garlic It was also not as spicy as we ordered it but this seems to be a common complaint The drunken noodles were also just average They were really underseasoned and just tasted like thin rice noodles with a light chicken sauce There was no kick or hint of signature Thai flavors All this being said the meat in both dishes was good quality which cannot be said about the meat at the restaurants counterpart Thai Basil at least at the Ahwatukee location we went to Also the dessert we had black sticky rice with pumpkin custard was phenomenal It was savory and sweet at the same time a flavor combination that in my opinion defines Thai food and was unfortunately not present in our entrees nnI still plan to come back to Thai Elephant and try some other entrees I am willing to give it another chance If it does not end up being a great spot for dinner it still might prove a great lunch place for standard Thai food at good prices