Zen Noodles & Sushi

This place was the best! It has been so hard to find another thai place that i enjoy as much as Zen. They had a large menu with so many great options. I wish they would bring Zen back!

I came here late one Sunday night.
It was very close to closing time and I wanted to eat in. They let me know that they were getting ready to close and when I said I knew that and I still wanted to eat in they did not take it the best. I received a grim look as if I were inconveniencing them. I guess my money was no good after a certain time or they cared more about going home than customer service.
I was served hastily and given my chicken teriyaki. The food I ate here was well below average. Some of the worst chicken I had ever eaten. I always finish my meals but this dish was not going to be one of them.
I thank Zen Noodles & Sushi for this experience as I will make sure to not come here again. There are plenty of other better Japanese/​Asian restaurants that are much better than this one.

I’ve been here multiple times with friends… and we keep returning because they LOVE the sweet potato maki… which i highly recommend. They are now byob, which is fine, but they used to have a full bar, so i was kinda let down to find that out. Usually the food (other than the sweet potato maki) is not anything that great.
…and tonight we had to wait over an hour for someone to take our order.
They also never came to fill our water during our time there…

Had a solid Pad Thai there.
tasty, nothing fancy and reasonably priced.
Food was fast, service good.
i think the thai stuff is their primary offering and would stick with that.
Im always a bit suspicious about places offering different styles of cuisines at the same time — so i would personally go to a sushi/​japanese place if i wanted sushi.

Don’t listen to these negative reviews. You don’t get food poisoning in 45 minutes, and incidence of tofu food poisoning are rare. whatever.
The sushi is good and fresh. The I don’t like avocado so they always modify my choices with no issue or complaint. It always tastes great, and although delivery OCCASIONALLY takes longer than they say, it’s usually really fast, 30 minutes or so.
Today I ordered green curry… I think it could use a little more coconut milk, but I liked it. The fried Filipino Rolls are good… I was really surprised by the flavor. .and speaking of tofu, theirs is good. Not the fleshy cubes you get elsewhere.
for a neighborhood spot, it’s solid…

Thanks to Zen Noodles, I’ve just spent the past 14 hours on death’s doorstep.
We each ordered the Pad Thai (mine had tofu… fiancé had shrimp), and we split appetizers. I became extremely ill about 45 minutes after eating.
The only possible culprit was the tofu, as my fiancé was (and still is) just fine. We won’t be back.

Great prices and quality of food. Generous portions.
Open concept kitchen with big old woks as light fixtures, it’s really neat.
I love this place, I’ll definitely be back.

I came here with a friend for dinner on a Thursday night.
The restaurant was a little empty and quiet.
–papaya salad: it was just shredded papaya and pieces of green beans on a piece of lettuce. It wasn’t as good as I anticipated it to be.
–vietnamese lemon grass salad with chicken: chicken was juicy and full of flavor that went well with the greens and sauce. A must try if you’re looking for a small salad to share for two.
–Indonesian Bakmi goreng: Stir fried egg noodles topped with bean sprouts, carrots and cabbage. Very good dish! It kind of reminds me of pad Thai.
The restaurant is spacious, clean and is BYOB!
Our dinner including tips was no more than $ 30. I would definitely come back to try their other Indonesian and malaysian dishes.

PHO IS GO.
Yes. I thought it was tasty. Was it the best I’ve ever had? No. But it was good, for sure. My boyfriend also really enjoyed his duck curry. I’ve been here a couple times and both times have been pretty solid. It’s a nice place to have around the corner for some convenient noodling.

Ppppth! That’s the sound of me spitting out the slop that Zen just delivered. I’ve had Lean Cuisines that tasted better (and had less rubbery chicken) than this.
Fired.

We order from Zen all the time, not sure why people go through Grub Hub, they deliver themselves… and are really fast. I’d definitely just do that so you get your stuff in time. We usually pick up, anyway.
I stick to the basics here usually… Pad Thai, really like Bamee Garlic Chicken, Crab Rangoon (could eat 10 of these), Chicken Satays, the sushi is actually really good, even delivered, but again, I stick to the basics. I wouldn’t go super crazy ordering weird things… I did try to branch out a few times and was never wild about them, but they are great for a delivery thai place when we get that craving! I can count on them for a quick, easy, yummy meal!

So I decided to jump on the «I’m too lazy to go out and find a restaurant» bandwagon last night and decided to use one of the delivery websites. Zen Noodles had the lowest delivery fee and minimum order so I said what the heck. I’ll go for it.
DO NOT order the vegan friendly Zen curry. It is one of the worst Thai (fusion?) dishes I’ve had. I thought the ingredients sounded interesting but I found out that what I had actually ordered was a vegan friendly dish with a liquid base that tasted like the milk left over after finishing a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch combined with a splash of curry. Not what I was expecting at all. To get my order up to $ 10 I also ordered some Tom Yum. I will say that despite my disappointment with the curry the soup was above average.
Another good side was that they ended up delivering about 15 minutes before the initial expected time on the website. I’m not sure how accurate they make the numbers but I appreciated the fact that it only took about 30 minutes to get my order instead of the expected 45.

It was a cold night when my friends and I tumbled inside for a hot meal. The place was nearly empty on a Saturday night and the 6 of us were seated immediately.
When we ordered drinks, I asked for hot tea. They didn’t have any. I’m sure right now your face reflects ours at the time. An Asian restaurant without hot tea? What? We must have given her a look because she reiterated, «It’s true. We don’t have hot tea.»
The food was ok, and I thought the portions were a bit small. It was FAST, that’s for sure, so as least I didn’t shiver long, hot tea-​less, before the hot food came.
Over it’s ok, but I don’t think it’s fabulous.

The food was just okay. I’ve been on sort of a holy war of trying to find good thai food in wicker park. This was one of the places I tried as a result. All in all, their pad Thai was pretty good, but it wasn’t anything spectacular. Pad «Siew» (as they spell it… I don’t think I’ve ever seen it spelled that way before) was gummy, and I’d pass on that in the future.
It didn’t satisfy my hunger for great thai food, but it was good enough at the time.
At least when you order here, spicy means spicy. Be prepared for that!

GrubHub order nightmare.
I really like the food here, which is why I wanted to get it delivered.
Order placed 9:03 p.m. Estimated delivery: 9:53
Call placed to confirm order at 9:50. «Driver is on the way» was the response from the person who answered the phone.
Called Zen Noodles at 10:20 p.m. to inquire about order. Closed. No answer.
Contacted GrubHub Customer Service at 10:22 for reconciliation. They will issue refunds if your food never comes, FYI.
Delivery driver calls at 10:28 to say «five more minutes.»
Food arrives at 10:31, approximately 40 minutes late.
The food is delicious, but this is an experience that has definitely ruined my chances of ordering their food again. Since we don’t live close by, I probably won’t go in the restaurant again. It’s too bad, too, their food is yummy.

It was ok. Nothing spectaculor. I like that it’s BYOB… But i tried the plum wine they offered and it was delish. had the shrimp pad thai. just enough shrimp one less i would have complained.
all in all its ok.
Oh and they kick you out after ten. My friend told me this while we were eating and i was like NO WAY… exactly at ten they came to our table and told us they were closed. I was shocked.

Meh. Not bad but overall it was pretty run of the mill.
It’s BYOB so that’s an automatic 3 star rating and the food was good but not standout excellent. I’d be totally fine not going back again… but then again if I found myself there a second time I wouldn’t be disgruntled either.
The 2 guys I was with had some meat & rice dishes… even though they were both craving sushi prior to entering. Their dishes were cheap but pretty darn small, probably the smallest I’ve seen at any Asian restaurant. I had the Shitake rolls, Miso Tofu, and mango with sticky rice. The shitake rolls were just okay, the Miso Tofu was good, and the sticky rice was great but something about the place just doesn’t inspire me to go back. Maybe that I felt like I was starving again 2 hours later?
I don’t know, worth a try on a rainy day but don’t psych yourself up for any 5 star experiences.

Friend in from town, wanted to hit up Piece, however with a 90 minute wait, they decided to swing by Zen Noodles across the street instead.
Having seen the place and noting that it served noodles and sushi, I was excited to try it out to see if it would become a staple Asian place that was local!
The décor of the plac was brightly painted colors and looked fairly trendy and fun, with an attentive hostess who was able to make change for the ridiculous new parking meter rules in the area.
Opening up the menu, I found myself looking for a nice bowl of udon (Zen Noodles and Sushi, so must be Japanese right?) Unfortunately, my presumption was WAY off. What I found was that this was a Thai noodle place that served up sushi as an additional on the backpage. So no udon for me. I’ll live. I like Thai food too. It was interesting to note that there was some Filipino dishes (lumpia, pancit) on the menu as well, however I was feeling like getting something I knew and loved, so I settled on Thai food.
I proceeded to order the Red Curry dish with chicken, and waited eagerly to dig in. Literally in not even 10 minutes, the dish arrived, but here’s where I became seriously disappointed…
My expectation of thai curry is a few things — flavorful, spicy (like really spicy), creamy and rich. This curry had a very light kick, had some flavor, but the curry tasted watered down… Severly watered down. It was more like a liquidy flavored broth/​soup, and not the curry that should be presented as Thai food.
Verdict: I will not be coming back here again for Thai food. Granted this is one dish, but it is one of my favorites and I was not impressed. I’m curious about the sushi, but with so many places focused on doing sushi well in the city, my guess is that this place won’t be worth your money either. There are much better places to do Thai food for the same price. Thanks, but no thanks Zen.

My favorite Asian restaurant in Wicker Park/​Bucktown. Love to stop in here while shopping (Zen Noodles is a few doors down from Akira Chicago.).
This place is consistent. The service is spot-​on and quick. The food has been excellent every time. This is the restaurant where I first fell in love with Thai Basil Chicken. I have also tried their Ginger Chicken, Drunken Noodles, Aloha Roll, Caterpillar Roll, and others that I can’t remember. I have also tried two of their smoothies and added boba (Tapioca balls) to them. The tapioca is not the best, but that’s not really why I go there: I go there for the food.
The atmosphere seems very intimate, yet relaxed. If you’re in the area, definitely check this place out.

My hubby and I were both famished after visiting with friends and happened to be parked right between Aberdeen and Zen Noodles. He asked me if I was hungry for bar food (Aberdeen) or noodles (Zen Noodles). Like he even has to ask this carb whore? Ummm, noodles… duh!
We were seated within minutes in this near empty restaurant on 8 PM on a Monday evening. I was excited to see they had sushi on the menu and was really wishing I had an iPhone so i could look Zen Noodles up on the Unilocal app to see if the sushi was good. Nothing worse than bad sushi and my crappy tmobile phone.
I decided to play it safe with an order of steamed vegetable dumplings and some hot and sour soup (tasty on this very cold evening). Both weren’t anything special, but did the trick of filling my tummy. My husband ordered some sort of Indian noodles, which I didn’t think were anything great, but he did a pretty good job of cleaning his plate.
Not a place I’d go out of my way for, but if I happened to be parked right outside again I’d give it another shot…