THE SAD TALE OF TALÉ THAI
Talé Thai, a restaurant that had been around for almost exactly one year on Amsterdam Columbus between 84th and 85th Street, has closed down. The restaurant apparently stopped serving around July 4, and the windows have now been papered over.
It’s unclear what caused the place to close — the phone is still working, but no one’s around to pick it up. Given that it lasted for one year, it may simply have been unable to renew the lease.
Yelpers gave it mixed reviews, from “Finally, viable UWS Thai food below 96th!” to “Awful food, great service,” which brings to mind an old Woody Allen line: “Two elderly women are at a Catskill mountain resort, and one of ’em says, ‘Boy, the food at this place is really terrible.’ The other one says, ‘Yeah, I know; and such small portions.'”
Our tipster Ruth said: “A shame — it was one of the few good inexpensive restaurants around.”
Upper West Siders have long lamented the dearth of quality Thai restaurants in the neighborhood. The ones that have opened in the last few years don’t tend to last very long. Clearly this is a Thai-restaurant kind of neighborhood. So what gives?
Thanks to Ruth for the tip and photo.
Actually, it was on Columbus–not Amsterdam.
I live nearby, and find that Land on Amsterdam is the best Thai in the neighborhood. I went to Tale a few times and the food was heavy, not very fresh and overpriced, even if reasonable in comparison to many. The license name that was up in the window was Chinese and stayed the same when this place changed from its just previous incarnation (Japanese–also poor quality, dry, stingy portions, etc.) to this–Thai. I think the problem is that the food just wasn’t good enough. Also, that space has been MANY other restaurants and they never seem to stay very long…it needs a refreshing face-lift and some food with fresh ingredients at a reasonable price. Lots of other restaurants nearby do quite well.
Sad to say, it has become increasingly difficult for new restaurants to survive their first year or two. Clearly, these operators spent a fortune on building a beautiful establishment. There will be a new restaurant in that location called Casa Pomona, which will feature the cuisine of Spain. We wish them well.
They close mostly because they are not very good. Land hangs around because it caters well to Americans, but really it is a very bad representation of Thai cuisine.
Tale was awful, for the most part. And it was empty most of the time.