Uma Thai Restaurant

So sad it closed! Uma is one of my favorite restaurants. The food was amazing as were the prices! Does anyone know if it will reopen at a new location?

Affordable. Great service. Great pad Thai. Simple. Easy. Great place. Will definitely be back. Love places that nail it on the head.

I love this place! The owner is always so nice and food is incredible.
This is the number 1 Thai food place I go to in Ballard!!! The price is very reasonable!!!

SO SLOW!
I’ve been to Uma several times hoping it will get better. But it doesn’t. The food is mediocre. If you are looking to waste far too much time sitting in a restaurant waiting for so so good the. Definitely go here. Otherwise there are MANY other great options in Ballard!

Good Thai place if you’re in Ballard. Met a few girlfriends here for dinner, and of course, had trouble finding it (it’s tiny, on a triangle corner — look for the red sign) and even more trouble finding parking. Dammit Ballard.
Once we got inside, it was a nice experience. The woman who opened the door for us turned out to be our server, and she was very sweet and fast.
We ordered an appetizer of gyoza — they come with 6, only vegetarian, and are piping hot. Good though. I would prefer pork or chicken gyoza.
For dinner, cashew chicken and pad thai chicken. The cashew chicken was quite good, but a little rough with no knife — they only give you a fork, and some of the pieces needed to be cut. I also felt there were too many vegetables and not enough meat.
The pad thai was better, but again needed more meat to balance out the noodles.
The ambiance is cute, with wooden floors and big windows, but lacked something. it didn’t feel comfy. We stayed the longest out of everyone there, catching up. people seemed to get in and out quickly.
The prices are super reasonable though ($ 8.50 for our meals, $ 5 for the gyoza). If I lived in walking distance or worked nearby, I would get to-​go here regularly.

After eating at Uma about 40 times now, I figured I should write them a good review to ensure they stay in business! My husband and I eat get Uma take-​out about once a week and we just love it! The service is fast and friendly and the food always tastes great, especially the Phad Se Ewe, fresh rolls with peanut sauce, and Cashew Chicken. It all comes at a very reasonable price, too!

I walked down the street to order to-​go a few nights ago. It was okay. It got the job done for me.
I ordered the pad see yew… it was alright. Not my favorite but I enjoyed it just fine. I wouldn’t say I was in any way disappointed but I probably will forget about that meal pretty quickly. One thing I give them props on however is that I ordered a spice level 5 and they gave me the heat that I wanted! Most places seem to wimp out when I max out the heat factor so I give them a nod for that.
My friend ordered the Uma Garden. I had a bite and hers was pretty good!
I’m definitely will to try this place again, but it wasn’t anything that I would call home to brag about.

I walked in and ordered the Tom Kah (shrimp), Pad See Ew (beef), and the Green Curry (chicken). Total: $ 28 and change
The guy who I ordered from was really nice, told me the food would be ready in 15mins. It was ready in 10 and everything was delicious.
Everything I’d want from a thai restaurant!

Solid, cheap, everything was delicious. I’m sure we’ll be back! We had the spring rolls (perfectly fried, but the filling was bland — but with the abundance of sauces I didn’t mind), pad kee mow (I think??) wonderful big noodles, reminded me of the street food we found in Bangkok, and yellow curry (huge soft pillows of tofu and the 4* was spicy but still flavorful). The entrees were all around $ 8, which seems like a great deal for the quality of food! Another plus, they offer plain steamed noodles — perfect for a picky toddler! Only negatives were kind of slow service, but this seemed only due to a single guy handling the whole front end, and lack of sticky rice on the menu (forgot to ask, so they might have some off menu).

I quite enjoy this place! The first time I went there it was on the most terrible date of my life, but luckily the food was comforting and flavorful. I had the garden delight and it was so good I don’t even remember what my date was talking about. I have gone back three or four times since then and have tried the yellow curry (yum) and the fried tofu and spring roll appetizers (fried yum!) Love it and usually I have enough left overs to have it again the next day.

Waaaaay too sweet for my palate. I ordered the Uma vegetables with tofu as my «meat choice». The vegetables and tofu were plenty and filling but so was the peanut sauce. I thought I was drinking a bowl of melted peanut candy. I was only able to handle 3 to 4 bites before packing up the rest to take home and dilute it with more vegetables and loads of rice.
I couldn’t bare to give Uma Thai 1 star though b/​c service was awesome. The waiter was friendly, quick to serve and fill up water, and checked up on us often.

HUGE portions for your money (and the food itself isn’t half bad, either)!
In all honesty, though, I walked away from Uma Thai impressed (and very full). The rama is a-​ma-​zing. Really delicious peanut sauce. The pad thai was a little bit milder than I’m used to, but it was by no means bad.
The star system is a little bit wonky at Uma — for the noodle dishes, 2 stars is like 1 star. For non-​noodle dishes, 1 star is like 2 stars.
Very friendly service, and lots of magazines available for you to read while you wait for your food!

I’ll start by saying I’m not a huge fan of thai food, that’s more my wife’s department. We just moved to Ballard and it might have been our first night here that we went to get some thai food and our building manager tipped us about uma thai. Since this night we’ve been back a couple of times and I’ve got take-​out once or twice. This review is about my overall experience and not just about one night.
My wife always orders the pad-​thai and based on her response she has always liked it. She’s had the chicken, tofu and veggie ones and they were all good, I think we’ve yet to find a better one. Myself, I don’t really have a favorite dish, so I just order pretty randomly. I’ve had green and red curry’s, a bunch of fried appetizers and noodles and everything was pretty good. They ask you how spicy you want it and they’ve got it right everytime for me. The meat in the curry is good, the veggies are tasty en the curry sauce has plenty of good flavours. About the appetizers I can only say it is what it is. It’s not awesome, it’s not bad, it’s just fried stuff.
Combine this good food with a friendly staff and I’m giving Uma thai 4 stars. As I said I’m not a fan of thai food, but when my wife wants thai there’s always plenty of good options on the menu for me that never disapoint me!
ooh one note: If you google them and lookup their menu online, odds are it’s a different restaurant with the same name. I think the menus are pretty similar, but still. We picked something from the ‘wrong’ menu for takeout and even though they didn’t have it on their menu they made it for us. great service!

My husband and I moved to the neighborhood this week, and haven’t quite gotten our kitchen situation settled yet. When I got a craving for Thai, to Unilocal we went. Fortunately for my near-​constant desire for pad thai, there are several Thai restaurants to choose from within walking distance. We ended up picking Uma based on its proximity, due to the heavy rainfall that only seemed to get worse as we stepped outside (welcome to Seattle!).
It was close to 8pm on a very soggy Wednesday when we dined, and only a couple of other tables were filled — a mother with two young, surprisingly well-​behaved children, and a pair of middle-​aged ladies — but there seemed to be a fairly steady stream of takeout customers, as well. Our server was very friendly and attentive throughout our meal, and our food came out promptly.
We started off with Singha beers and spring rolls. The spring rolls were cooked PERFECTLY and I absolutely loved the sauce that came with them — sweet and spicy with peanuts.
For my main course, I had chicken pad thai (3 star spiciness). I definitely would have preferred more spice, but I ordered on the safe side. It was one of the best pad thais I’ve had in a loooong time. The portion was huge, also, and I took home about half of it. I will definitely be going back for other variations!

Uma is our go-​to Sunday night takeout spot. Their takeout is super quick, and they are always so friendly and open the door for you as you leave (even if you don’t totally have your hands full with delicious food).
I can’t say I stray too far from my green curry with chicken, but when I do the garlic chicken or Pad Thai are both great choices. Their spice levels are fairly consistent (their 3 star is like a 2 star at most other places).
BONUS — if you pay in cash you get 10% off your bill. DOUBLE BONUS — they have a punch card (10 entrees and get your 11^th free!).

After a day of kayaking, we were pretty darn hungry. This place is about two steps from my sweeties condo, and we haven’t tried it at this point. When I looked at the menu. The first thing that hit me was their prices… They are so low! So we ordered cashew chicken, green curry chicken spring rolls and the $ 1.00 side salads… No that is not misprint… It really is $ 1.00. The only thing I could say bad was the chicken in the cashew chicken was kind of dried out, it needed more sauce, and the portion wasn’t that big. but I must say for $ 7.99, it was a fine deal. it did have that delicious flavor that you look for in cashew chicken. The the $ 1.00 salad is a spectacular deal, I can order five of those and be nice and full. The green curry chicken was very nice.
We have eaten at Thai Thanni several times and like it very much, however, Uma Thai is literally half the price with just slightly smaller portions. So I say give it a try and your tummy he will be happy and so will your wallet. :-) FYI, I did this review on my Dragon NaturallySpeaking so if there are some errors, don’t be hating on my lazy ass :)

I’m not in the habit of spitting, but if I was, and I spit in Seattle, I’d probably hit a Thai restaurant.
There are so many, and they run the gamut from average to fantastic. Uma is right in between-​solid, delicious, and a very good deal.
We’ve come for lunch and dinner and the service is consistently excellent. The portions are generous and the flavors are all here. The only complaint I’d have would be the lack of heat, which is easily remedied by asking for the hot chili sauce and adding your own.
I like to eat the pad khee mao, it makes me do a little jig. Beau gets the panang curry, and slurps it up before I’ve had a chance to steal a bite.
In these frugal times, it’s great to have cheap dinner options. Thanks Uma!

Uma Thai was my first outside meal after 3 days of eating instant noodles and lean pockets due to Snowmageddon. I was pretty satisfied with my meal here. Our tom yum soup was on the sweet side, but I liked it because it had plenty of flavor and lots of ingredients. The pad kee mao was also really good — lots and lots of vegetables, and not too oily. However, the green curry was lackluster — it was certainly green and velvety, but it was very bland.
Service was fast, and prices were reasonable. I’ll probably be back.

I have really mixed feelings about this place.
My friends and I were not sure where to get dinner because we were just looking for a Thai restaurant in Ballard or Wallingford neighborhood. We came here because we saw decent reviews from Unilocal.
My feelings are pretty mixed. It seems like dishes are relatively inexpensive. For under $ 10, you have a variety of options to choose from including curry and noodle soup.
However, my dish — a noodle soup dish — which I REALLY wished that I could remember its name — just tasted horrible. The soup is pink, first of all, which came as a shock to me when I got my dish. It has some seafood pieces in the noodle soup. The noodle is really wide, which made it difficult to eat. (I really wish I had remembered its name. But i think it may be the last item in the noodle soup section.)
It seems like my friends enjoyed their rice dishes and those dishes are rather tasty. Good for them! I think if I come back here again, I will just stay safe and try their rice dishes.
Other than that, they only had one waiter so it took them forever to get our checks. The table next to us decided to just go up to the cashier and pay because they waited too long for them to collect the cards. We waited for about 15 minutes and decided to do so as well.
I had to say that Ive never really had bad experiences with Thai food before — but this one, I was utterly disappointed by my pink noodle soup!

Great lunch spot when you’re craving Thai in Ballard!
The server was super nice the whole time and his voice was so… soft. It was almost creepy… but it wasn’t.
In any case, I was very hungry because I probably should have eaten lunch about 2 hours earlier. I decided to order the combo special for $ 8.99. This included a tiny salad (greens topped with peanut sauce), some rice (it was good but not perfect), and two entrees of my choice (from their list). I decided on the Thom Kha and the Pineapple Curry. Both entrees were delicious and very filling.
Weird factor: The first glass of water I got was super warm. Almost hot. It was very strange, but also very welcome considering how cold it was outside.
The one slightly annoying thing was that the staff disappeared at one point (I was the only customer there) and I ended up walking up to the register because my card has been sitting on my bill for a pretty long time (and I was trying to leave).
Of note: I never pay attention to accommodations for kids, but the other day I spent some time with a friend of mine that’s a new mother… and I started paying more attention. In this restaurant’s case, I noticed the kind of cool looking changing station in the women’s bathroom. It’s got a cushion and everything! (See picture.)
So anyway. I love the food, like the service, and definitely like the place over all!