Cholada Thai Beach Cuisine

I have to admit we come here for the casual beach vibe as much as the delicious food. Cholada (meaning beautiful lady in Thai ‚) is housed inside a little wooden shack on PCH imparting an authentic Pattaya or Krabi ambience. The waitresses embody all the grace and humility one might find in the land of a thousand smiles itself. Small and intimate there is also a lovely patio that is heated and very pleasant in warm weather. Very good curries, tasty and tactile noodles, lovely spring rolls, good soups, weekly specials. You really can’t go wrong with any menu item. We always try to end our meal with mango and sticky rice if in season. This quirky little restaurant with warped wooded floors, beautiful locals and dated pictures of the King of Thailand as a young man is simply charming .Kap kun ka :)

Really good Thai. Very casual for a nice spare of the moment lunch. Took mom here. Loved the tum yum seafood soup and pad Thai. Also liked the beach feel. It’s also good to take to go and enjoy at the beach as a picnic. The soup is best to enjoy at the restaurant. Friendly waitress. The restaurant does need a minor remodel though. Enjoyed the food nonetheless.

Love this gem! They are always cutting fresh basil in the front, giving you the aroma of fresh Thai ingredients as you enter. Authentic. Have brought many friends back here that love it. Coconut rice would be a nice edition here

Great food, great service!
My absolute favorite is the Shrimp Pad Thai.
Servers are so kind and welcoming.
Plenty of parking if you come at the right time.
I’ve never had a problem with waits.

My 200^th Review! Actually its 201, because I am positive that I reviewed this place before ! Why did my review disappear, Unilocal?
Moving on…
We love this place so dang much
Cholada Thai is a funny little beach shack along coastal Hwy1. Just a little north of Santa Monica Pier, and well worth the drive to get some decently priced& delicious food ! There is a weird derelict hotel next door and Cholada has a bit of patina as well, but don’t let the shabby exterior keep you from experiencing the delights within .
The Golden Bags are our favorite starter. Savory ground chicken and pork, presented as a crunchy coin purse. The sweet rice viegar& chili dipping sauce makes for a complex and haunting flavor. Umami.
«Messy curry“has thin noodles in your choice of curry, we enjoy the texture– slurp! Thai spaghetti is good for lunch. They also have «sticky rice». We love it in the Tom Ka Coconut soup ! The shrimp here are so good !!! Really fresh, Big prawns.

I’ve been coming here for about 6 months now and honestly, the food is great. But for customer service, it sucks. It sucks so bad. It’s best to come here during the day when it’s not really that crowded. Then you and your friends meal will actually come out at the same time.
I had an incident here where I came here with a group of 5. It took us 20 minutes to get seated and 30 minutes for the lady to come to our table and take our order. This is the best part, after waiting 45 minutes for our meal to come out, my friend Jason’s food comes out. He’s polite and wants to wait for us. 20 minutes later my food comes out. I want to wait for my other 3 friends. 30 minutes later my friend Elizabeth’s food comes out. Jason’s food is already cold because he wants us to eat together. We wait another 5 minutes and decide to leave. I don’t find it rude whatsoever because we all want to eat together. Poor Jason waited almost an hour for ALL of our food to arrive. 2 of my friends didn’t get their meal on time. Very late and extremely rude. You don’t wait over an hour for your food when 3 out of the 5 people in the table has their food
I realized 2 girls sitting in another table were starting to complain too. One of them said «how come they got their food and we didn’t?»
Don’t ever come here when it’s busy. Trust me it’s NOT worth it. And because of this experience I will never be coming here again.
Later that night we were starving. We were determined for Thai food. We Went back home (because we live like 45 minutes away from Cholada) got some Thai food and all of our food came in a timely manner. At the same time!
Don’t come here during the evening when it’s packed. NOT WORTH IT

You have to eat here at least once or 10 times to try all the yummy food. It’s cooked perfectly & fresh. Service over the many years has always been good.
It might be small & not fancy but as I said its all about the good food.
Sadly the bus girl not so nice. But server & Chefs get all the credits…

It is my favorite Thai place on the West side. I go for their vegetarian/​vegan options and so far everything has been delicious and portions are big– I split it with my mom.

Pretty good Thai food, I’ve eaten at many Thai restaurants and this ranks pretty well. The service is pretty nice and they’ll listen to what you have to say.
— Tom Yum Soup: This was the only one I didn’t like that much. It was too sour and a little too salty.
— Cholada Broccoli: w/​Tofu, and this was really good!
— Kow Pad Sapalod: fried rice with chicken, pineapple, and cashews: this dish was alright. The rice felt like it had a little too much water cooked with it and the fried rice overall was sort of plain.
— Gapow Catfish: This was also pretty good! The fish was fresh and spicy and nicely seasoned.
I’d recommend this place if you’re craving some Thai in Malibu

Cholada has the best Thai food in Malibu. On one hand, the portions and quality of all items on the menu will leave you satisfied if what you are eating is your only concern.
On the other hand, though, the restaurant and staff are not welcoming and seem to be in a rush at all times. The chaos is especially highlighted by the limited floor space and the unpleasant sight of the host giving back massages to the chef in the room adjacent to the dining area.
The building the restaurant finds itself in is in need of renovations, both inside and out and so is the parking lot.

We love getting Thai from Cholada. We live up in the canyon so it’s convenient and tasty. Their green curry is delicious and for $ 2 extra you can add a ton of vegetables, so worth it if you don’t want to eat rice. Rather spicy so be careful! The Cholada Wraps are SUPER yum too. I’ve ordered the Glass Noodle Soup about 5 or 6 times and mostly it’s awesome but I’ve had a few times where it was lacking in the broth department, which is a bummer when you’re looking forward to «Soup». Either way, I’ve been eating here for 10+ years and will keep on doing so!

Came here after a beach adventure .
It’s the only Thai restaurant off PCH once you’re out of Santa Monica, so even on a Sunday night, it was packed.
The food itself was fine. My Panang curry was a bit bland, but of more concern to me were the tiny portion sizes and exorbitant prices.
It was over $ 30 for 2 small curries and a single order of rice.
It’s clear that the success of the restauraunt is due to lack of competition in the area. I won’t be returning.

I really, really enjoyed both of my visits to this quaint, beach-​side restaurant. What a gem!
The first time, my boyfriend and I split veggie pad Thai & veggie Mussaman curry. YUM. I’m a huge pad Thai fan, and when it’s done right, I’m a fan of the restaurant for life.
The second time, we brought my mom who was in town for the week. She also LOVES pad Thai, so she got that and enjoyed her left overs for days afterwards! I got the Mussaman curry again — couldn’t have enough of it the first time! My guy ordered the Lahd Nah and we both loved the savory flavors! We all split the tofu cholada wraps as an app and loved the peanut sauce to dip them in.
Whenever we go to Topanga Beach, you better believe we are stopping in for a bite!

The seafood soup is awesome. The fish and crab legs are really fresh. The portion is decent. I would come back again when I visit Malibu.

I used to eat here often years ago. In fact, using a different account, I had left them one of their best reviews when they only had a few dozen Unilocal reviews back then.
Anyway, I haven’t been here for dinner in many years. We weren’t even that hungry tonight, but I was craving Thai and we were close by. So we came here about an hour before closing.
It was the two of us and we sat outside. We ordered some Drunken Noodles and Tom Kah Chicken. We asked for medium spicy on the noodles.
Food arrived quickly. Right away, I noticed that there was NO fire under the bowl. I also noticed that as they had poured in the soup, or as she had brought it to us, some of the soup had spilled out onto the plate under the bowl; that didn’t look nice.
The noodles were mild, at best. The soup was ok, but, as expected, it got cold quickly. Overall, food was pretty bland. It wasn’t what I was used to before.
The worst part about the whole thing was the Service, or should I say, Lack of Service. NOT ONCE did any server ask us if everything was ok or if we needed anything, like maybe some spice? NONE
The woman who took our order came outside once, and she was in the lower section but didn’t bother to come over to our table to ask if we were ok.
Finally, when they were ready to close, someone else, who hadn’t even taken our order, came over and, reluctantly, asked if we were ok. You could see that she really didn’t give a damn what we said; she just wanted to bring us the check. That’s it.
Anyway, we got our check, and decided to pay cash, since I had NO plans to leave a tip. I’m normally a good tipper, but I don’t tip just because; you gotta earn a good tip.
When I eat out,
If service is just just eh, ok, I’ll leave 10%
If service is acceptable, I’ll leave 15%
If service is better, I’ll leave 20%
If service is WOW, I’ve left as much as 40%
But IF service sucks, or it doesn’t exist, well, I’ll leave 57 Cents, as I did here tonight.
Look at the picture I posted with the receipt and the cash I left them. Even 57 Cents was too much. Lol

Great little place by the beach. I would recommend the shrimp in a blanket appetizer, tom yum soup, and Nam (crispy rice salad with chicken). The crispy rice salad is an absolute must try!
Free parking in their lot. Gets packed on weekends for dinner, so there might be a wait.

I’ve been passing this place for years and we decided to try it out. How many places are there in Malibu where the food’s decent and you can enjoy the ocean breeze and eat so close to the beach? Not many.
I was pleasantly surprised how busy this little «shack» was with obvious regulars and an awesome attentive staff. Everyone was super friendly and it felt like eating at a real beachside restaurant. Very cool island tropical-​feel inside with simple and casual décor.
And the FOOD! Being in Malibu Beach, I wasn’t expecting much, but I was so wrong. The Thai dishes were excellent and beautifully presented. And the portions were just right for the price.
We got their yummy pad thai (of course), the chicken panang curry, a papaya salad and drunken noodles with chicken. Washed it all down with some Thai iced tea and we were set.
You definitely cannot go wrong with anything on the menu. They really put out some solid tasty food and they are very efficient here, too.
OK, bellies full. Time to head to the beach…

Love this place. Friendly staff, nice location and amazing Thai food.
My favorite dish is the orange chicken, literally to die for.
Try the Thai tea if you like a sweet drink and the mango & sticky rice is a good choice for desert (as long as the mango is in season) =]

You may be weary coming in here, but I highly advise that you enter if you actually want some delicious Thai food that has been influenced by the fact that this next to a beach. What do I mean by that? Never before have I seen a Thai restaurant serve sea bass panang curry. Oh MAN was this delicious. The sea bass just perfectly soaked up the curry and it made every bite just absolutely fantastic.
We also ordered the drunken noodle (delicious), tom yum soup (amazing), and the basil eggplant (nomz). This place is amazing and highly recommended.
You may be a little turned off by the fact that you park /​walk next to trash cans and that it gets a little bit loud inside, but the food is top notch.

Hands down, my favorite Thai place in this country. You know what else is my favorite? Curry. And no I’m not being biased because of my Indian descent. When eating Thai for the first time I strongly encourage you to ignore the popular Pad Thai meals and explore some of the curry options. But Cholada isn’t my favorite just because of the Sapalod Curry dish I ordered (though shrimp and red pineapple curry is probably one of the best dual food combinations, ever) rather, it was the ambiance. I know I know, you probably expected that rationale. There is something about driving on the Pacific Coast Highway and coming across this gem that could be easily missed from its busted exterior. Now maybe I am biased because personally, I love eating in tiny little shacks with a rustic interior. The wooden panels and tiny eating space just added to the charm for me.
My friends enjoyed their Pad Thai and called it «better than average» and the Sapalod Curry I had was very succulent and delicious.