Thai Pad & Coco Sweets

The food is okay. But they put too much oil in it. But I do like the drink it really good though.

When ever I crave for authentic papaya salads. This is where I go get them. Mango salads are yummy as well. Bön appetite!

Great food, great price, and portions were huge. Everything was flavorful and tasty. Will definitely will come back.

The bf and I went here for dinner. This is a causal self serve place. So you order at the counter and grab the utensils you need and take a seat. The food comes out to where you’re sitting. Just make sure to clean up after yourself.
The pad Thai with chicken was okay. It wasn’t as flavorful as other places. You do get a decent amount, but not so much authenticity. It wasn’t Americanized but lacked the traditional taste of real pad Thai.
The bf’s beef basil was okay as well. His dish came out with a bowl of rice and had more flavors than mine. His portion was pretty generous as well.
If you order your drink along with the entrée, it’s cheaper. And this is where things got screwy. So we were charged twice for our drink, but nothing came out at all. :/​
We were refunded the 2^nd drink that was in error and given another drink. Thank you for this. Perhaps I had a not so pleasant expression on my face this particular evening. lol. All in all. The guy who took our order was cordial and pleasant.
Parking was plentiful since this side of the complex isn’t too popular. Sweet Hut will be on the left hand side of the complex while Thai Pad & Coco Sweets will be on the right hand side. It’s somewhat behind iHop too.

Food
~$ 23 for Beef Basil, Chicken Pad Thai, and a specialty drink.
The Beef Basil was better than the Chicken Pad Thai. Maybe I just like beef more. The pad thai was not as sweet or flavorful as I remember. I also like more peanuts and sauce in my pad thai. The beef basil was good. No complaints. Both had pretty large portions for thai food.
Décor
It’s like a cafeteria. You order your food and sit. I like getting my own water instead of having a server.
Service
The cashier got my order wrong and charged my specialty drink twice. I got cash back and he gave me another drink. Great service for honest mistake. I honestly like self serve places more than sit down. Tipping is dumb.
Would I come here again?
Probably. Convenient location and ok prices. Self serve means I don’t have to look at the stupid waiter’s face.

Came here one night to try it out after hearing so many good reviews! my husband ordered their kapoon which he swears by now, and I ordered the Thai citrus chicken. The portions weren’t very big for paying $ 9 each per entrée, but it pretty tasty! I also ordered the mango coco drink which wasn’t too bad.
I only gave it 3 stars bc there was nothing that really stood out to me and they didn’t have many varieties either! Def. Not a big fan of the self serve. wasn’t sure if you had to clean up after yourself when we left.

This place is amazing best food great service is excellent staff I already have a favorite her name is Kaitlyn my favorite is Tom kha Kai soup and a thai iced tea to drink

The one thing I love eating here is their phở. Their phở is always the bomb dot com. They are a little bit pricy so I think the phở is the one thing that is worth the price.
The interior is very modern and the staff is always super friendly and welcoming.

Drunken noodle with chicken was flavorful and not too sweet. Curry soup was good but not hot enough temperature wise. It had lots of noodles, had to ask for additional broth. Coco Mango Jelly drink was amazing.

I’ve been hearing good/​bad things about this place so I was finally able to try it out.
First impression walking in was the layout of the restaurant. It was very different then most Thai places. Very modern.
When I got to the counter, the cashier handed me a menu and I find it very awkward standing there and having someone stare you down when you’re trying to figure out what to eat.
My girlfriends and I decided to order the lemon grass chicken $ 7, and also an order of papaya salad $ 7. The lemon grass chicken tasted okay. Too many bell peppers and not a lot of meat. Papaya salad was delicious! I’m very picky when it comes to my papaya salad. It has to have the right amount of ingredients and coloring or I’ll probably throw a fit. We decided not to order any desserts or their specialty drinks.
Pretty much self serve. You get your own water, plates, utensils, napkins, entrées. I guess on their slow days is when they’ll bring your food out for you because there is a big sign that says «Pick Up. «
All and all, I will definitely be coming back for that papaya salad!

We stopped by on a wed afternoon they we not busy and had a drink special. By an entrée get a drink for 2.99
As you know, it’s pay upfront and they’ll bring your food to the table. I got a curry noodle soup and he got a Penang curry chicken. For an app we got the spring rolls.
App: fresh spring rolls
They were longer than I remember and I didn’t care for the sauce at all. But inside there was chicken shrimp lettuce noodles and cilantro it seemed like. If they had a better dipping sauce I would prob. Order it again but I’m not gonna get that again when I can get be same at I luv phở for what I really enjoy.
Curry noodle soup: bomb bomb bomb came with cabbage. It hit the spot!!!
Penang curry: it looked really weird at first like super oily or something it was a good after you mixed everything up.
SERVICE: they were nice and helpful. But it took forever me reminding 2 guys that I didn’t get my app yet after I was halfway done with my entrée but I guess it’s ok. They didn’t even seem to feel bad or anything. Guess some people don’t care if I come back or not. Too bad

«Let’s skip out on the wiki fact fillers and focus on the food. I’m trying to find out what to order on the Unilocal app before the server gets back.»
[Time & Date of visit]: Weekday, 7ish.
[Party Size]: 2
[Location/​Ambiance]:
Though the sweet hut side has more lights and foot traffic, I think being slightly away from it keeps the noise level down. Not to mention more parking space.
Inside — Modern minimalist décor I believe. There’s two dining rooms, though they had the other closed off just due to it not being busy around the time we dined in.
Restrooms — Were kept pretty clean if any of you germaphobes are wondering.
Ambiance — Casual atmosphere, the décor and style setup feels like it’s catered to a younger audience vs your OG grandparents.
[Service]:
It’s fast casual — order and prepay at the counter. They provide you a table number. Afterwards, the food is brought to you, if they aren’t busy I guess. There was a pick up counter; but being one of three other tables, they brought out our food directly to us.
Food took a bit to come out, timing it was a little over 15 mins after placing it and paying. Hopefully you have a snickers for anyone turning into a diva for being hangry.
[Food Highlights]:
Papaya salad — Laos style — mild — This is made different than the Thai way, and even though they said they would make it mild, it’s Asian mild not American mild. Worth a try for you spicy food lovers.
Pad Thai — w/​beef — A generous portion for sharing for maybe 2 – 3. I’m glad their version isn’t overly sweet to mask other flavors. The noodles were cooked well, tender but not mushy. Use a fork to get the last pieces just due to how the curved plate it’s served in. For the staple dish of Thai restaurants, this is good.
Mangos over sticky rice (dessert) — I always crave this. Even though it’s pretty simple. The sticky rice was cooked just right. A little sad that there wasn’t much coconut milk. The syrup accompanying the mango’s is good to mix up with the sticky rice for each bite with a cut of mango. Though from all the other pics of fellow Unilocalers, they had their mango slices on top of the rice while ours was placed separate. A little more work, but still enjoyable.
{Summary}:
I can see how from word of mouth «old school» Asian friends weren’t terribly impressed with Thai Pad. And I think, that Thai Pad isn’t trying to be like every mom and pop Thai Restaurant around Atlanta. I think the crowd that is already coming to this plaza are younger and don’t mind having a fast casual Asian restaurant. I hope that they continue to be consistent on the food flavors, as I would like to come back to try different dishes. 4 stars overall if not just on taste alone.

I’m glad to see that this strip mall is starting to come back alive with the addition of So Gong Do, @Hair and now with the latest Sweet hut location.
Fellow Unilocaler Karly and I decided to switch up from our usual So Gong Do and went for Thai and I am so happy we did.
On this trip, we ordered the mango salad, shrimp pad thai, bangkok fish followed up with mango on sticky rice and the coco tapioca pudding.
First off, all of the flavors were on point! The Bangkok fish was crispy and meaty and the spicy basil sauce complimented it perfectly. This is basically the same dish as Spicy Basil Fish found in most Thai restaurants. The shrimp pad thai was also very good. It had a nice balance and the fish sauce was not overwhelming at all. The ratio of noodles and large shrimp was nice too.
I admit, I had my doubts on the mango salad since I usually stick with my papaya salad but this was delicious. The mango was the perfect texture (not too ripe as to be instant mush in your mouth).
The desserts were very good too, the mango on sticky rice is a classic SE Asian meal finisher and it was not heavy. However, if you are looking for something sweet, I would not recommend the coco tapioca pudding as it is juuuuussst sweet enough. But the sweetness from the mango/​sticky rice overpowers the sweetness from the pudding.
As far as the service goes: We asked the dessert to be brought out after our meal and the server/​cashier checked on us towards the end and asked when we wanted our pudding and mango. Kudos for remembering.
As previous reviewers said, this is a self-​serve restaurant and you are expected to clean up after yourself which is really not a hard thing to do considering that the same is expected at McDonald’s/Burger King/Wendy’s so I’m not sure what the other reviewers gripe is. Even if you wanna be a lazy eater and don’t put your dishes away in the specified buckets, the staff does come by and tidy up the areas.

My first visit was just desserts and that of course, lead to my second visit for the food. I had the coco tapioca pudding and it’s been addicting. It’s very similar to our Vietnamese «che» dessert which as the green rice noodles, the agar jelly, coconut milk, simple syrup, imitation pomegranate seeds and served with a ball of crushed ice to keep it chill. I love it and highly recommend first time goer to get that.
I also got the mango ice cream pudding, which is served in a bowl with chunks of mango and tapioca pearls floating around. Honestly, I thought my pearls were just a tad under cook, but overall, it was still enjoyable. Very refreshing.
So I came back the second time to dine in. It wasn’t so pack since it was a Monday afternoon so I didn’t feel so overwhelmed and rushed to order. But finally opted for the Laab (minced beef with tripe served with raw cabbages), Shrimp Pad Thai ($ 2 extra for shrimps, $ 3 for Shrimps and Chicken) and Fresh Shrimp and Basil Spring Rolls. Everything was delicious except the Laab, wasn’t a fan of it. The meat was dry and was a bit over seasoned with salt, I didn’t like the rice powder that was used it… it just didn’t taste good and I can’t exactly pinpoint it. I also thought the cabbage wedges were too thinly sliced that I couldn’t use to scoop up the minced beef with.
My mom loved the fresh spring rolls, they used fresh shrimps, shredded lettuce and rice noodles (not the thin vermicelli noodles). I think it gives better texture and holds it well.
The Pad Thai was nicely seasoned, just enough sauce that it isn’t drowning in it. Perfectly seasoned to my taste and a generous amount of shrimps for $ 2 extra.
The place is a pretty much self served. There’s 2 station next to the ordering counter that you can get ice water (no ice though), napkins, chopsticks, plates, bowls, spoons, forks, and condiments. The only thing that would do for you is to bring out the food. I like that better, you get to interact and not be so dependent on the server, especially if they’re so busy running around.

I was glad to finally check out this restaurant with my friend Sari S. I’m a huge fan of Thai food so it was nice to see a new place open up in the Duluth area. With minimum expectations, our visit turned out great. Sari S. ordered the Durian smoothie and I was excited to see the Jackfruit smoothie available here.
The restaurant itself has a fun vibe with all the unique and bright colored furniture and décor plus the colorful lights outside the restaurant that you notice as you walk into the restaurant. You are asked to place your order and pay for your meal upfront. Your meals are brought to you but everything else is self-​serve. There are plates, flat ware, glasses and access to water directly across from the register and all sauces are displayed there as well. When speaking to the manager, this was the approach the owners decided to go and their vision was to allow guests to relax and catch up while dining and not worry too much about their wait service since the majority of it is self-​serve. It’s not a bad concept and we did not mind it at all.
We both ordered the drunken noodles with chicken and the penang curry. The drunken noodles were on the sweeter side but I had no complaints. The penang curry with tofu was spicy but not too spicy so for fans who dig this dish, you won’t be disappointed. If you are a fan of authentic papaya salad, then this is the spot where you can get it. Personally, I can tell that they used a lot of fish sauce so I wouldn’t necessarily order it again, but if that is something you like about a Thai papaya salad, then you won’t be disappointed. Overall, the food was pretty good for the «American» taste buds. Looking forward to introducing more friends and family to this new Thai place in the near future.

The place certainly has a fun décor with lots of bright eye catching colors, the furniture is comfortable, and the overall place has great space!
First thing you need to understand, this is a self serve restaurant. You order, get a buzzer, and once your buzzer goes off, you pick up your food. Most importantly, proper customer etiquette is… to put your dishes away in the bins (located near trash can). Do not leave your dishes on the table expecting someone to clean it up. Please be considerate.
I dined in with a friend and we ordered: Pad Kee Mao (Drunken Noodle) — $ 9.50, Panang Curry — $ 9.95, Jack Fruit Smoothie — $ 4.95 and the Durian Smoothie — $ 4.95.
My impression on each dish and drink certainly varied, hence my overall review rating. The Drunken Noodle tasted more like a mixture of Pad Thai and an attempt at Drunken Noodle, thus making this dish just edible but not what I was expecting.
The Panang Curry was certainly spicy enough and thankfully we were able to get the tofu not fried. I actually enjoyed the flavor of this dish the most even though it was a bit spicy for me (I’m weak when it comes to spicy food).
A plus is that their smoothies are made with fresh fruit! My friend highly recommended her Jack Fruit Smoothie :) She thoroughly enjoyed it!
I had the Durian Smoothie and was disappointed. Yes, I love durian, the fruit that is essentially disgusting to a majority of the population. Durian is delicious when fresh! However, I could barely taste the durian in the smoothie, it was too watered down. I much prefer the thicker Vietnamese style where the smoothie has a thicker consistency.
Danny, the GM, was very friendly and knowledgeable. He gave us a complimentary dish of the Papaya Salad which according to him is a best seller amongst customers. Mind you although we tolerated the dish, it is not for the feign of heart and if you are not into a very exotic taste, I would not recommend this dish. This dish is based off of authentic street food. This papaya salad has a combination of sour (due to the tamarinds), spicy (ours was made less spicy), and fishy (due to the mixture of sauces). This dish will certainly awaken your senses. If you want to try something unique, this is a dish to try!
Though I was not as impressed with the various dishes, I am excited to come back again for the new ice creams they are going to create! Danny told us that they are going to make ice cream right in front of the customer, where you can customize the ice cream and toppings. Can’t wait to try! (and with this high expectation of ice cream, hopefully I’ll be able to improve this view and the overall rating :)

Thai Pad & Coco Sweets is a Thai restaurant and dessert café that opened May 1, 2015 at Gwinnett Station, the once-​barren Duluth shopping center next to Great Wall Supermarket that has exploded with new Asian restaurants, bakeries, and cafes over the past year including Sweet Hut (July), So Gong Dong (May), Snowflake Tea House (May), 89 Hot Pot (February), The Coffee by Hand (May), and North Dumpling House (coming soon). It was just a couple years ago all this shopping center really had was Taste of Phở (
) and a CD Warehouse.
Thai Pad & Coco Sweets replaces and expands upon the space previously occupied by Taste of Phở. The place has been renovated to be very colorful and huge. There are two dining rooms and I guesstimate seating capacity to be about 100. This is a cute, trendy restaurant that reminds me of Bento Café, the Taiwanese eatery on Jimmy Carter Blvd, because of its open, casual atmosphere and bright, vivid design/​décor that seems to be oriented towards young adults. The ordering counter is illuminated in a rainbow of colors. There’s both indoor and outdoor seating. The glossy white tables inside feature white, red, and black chairs. There’s also lounge-​like seating in the back, ideal for those just stopping in for sweet drinks and desserts.
The head chef and owners are Lao-​born Hmong who grew up in Thailand. «Pad» means stir-​fried in Thai. So as far as the business name goes, I guess «Thai Pad» (not to be confused with the pad Thai noodle dish) refers to the restaurant and «Coco Sweets» refers to the specialty drinks and sweet treats.
The food menu contains mainly Thai dishes, but there’s some Vietnamese cuisine as well such as Phở (beef noodle soup) and Fresh Spring Rolls (goi cuon — chicken, shrimp, noodles, and vegetables wrapped in rice paper). There are soups like Tom Yung Koong (shrimp lemongrass soup) and Tom Kha Kai (chicken coconut soup) and popular appetizers like Papaya Salad and Lemongrass Wings. Entrees examples include the rich Curry Noodle Soup, Bangkok Fish (deep-​fried whole tilapia), and curries such as Panang, Yellow, and Red Curry. Noodles are limited to Pad Thai and Pad Kee Mao («drunken noodles» — flat wide rice noodles) and there are a couple fried rice dishes.
Expect to spend about $ 5 – 8 each for most starters and $ 9 – 11 for most entrees. There are about 25 items on the food menu, so it’s a moderate selection. It’s not as extensive as a more traditional «full-​fledged» Thai restaurant like Thai Restaurant of Norcross for example. In this sense, Thai Pad & Coco Sweets is more of a fast-​casual Asian snack café.
On the Coco Sweets side, there are over 10 different «Coco Cups» ($ 6.25 each) and specialty drinks ($ 5.25 each) plus over a dozen fruit smoothies ($ 4.75 each, $ 0.50 extra for boba) and beverages including Thai Tea, Thai Coffee, Thai Soda, and cappuccino. All beverages come in one size and are served in disposable cups with plastic-​sealed tops a la bubble tea shops like Sweet Hut, Quickly, and Kung Fu Tea. Unlike those establishments, I don’t believe you can customize ice nor sweetness levels here.
A lot of the Coco Cups and specialty drinks include coconut, coconut milk, or coconut cream as an ingredient, hence the «Coco Sweets» part of the business name. Think sweet, creamy, and custardy. Coconut, jackfruit, taro, durian, soursop, passion fruit, and honeydew are some of the more interesting smoothie flavors.
I’ve tried the Pineapple Fried Rice ($ 9.50, beef version with onions, raisins, pineapple, yellow curry, peas, carrots), Mango & Sticky Rice dessert, durian smoothie, Tapioca Pearls Coco Cup (Naab Vaam — tapioca, red «rubies,» jello, coconut milk), and Coco Mango specialty drink (pandan jello, mango, coconut topped with fresh mango). I thought the Pineapple Fried Rice tasted A-​OK, the Mango & Sticky Rice was good, and the drinks were terrific. The Pineapple Fried Rice tasted authentic and the mango in the Mango & Sticky Rice was soft and ripe. The drinks were fresh and delicious. They were smooth and creamy with colorful and appetizing custards and jellies. The durian smoothie was surprisingly good. It was sweet with only a subtle hint of that unpleasant durian pungency.
The menu says to «Check for daily specials in display case» for specialty desserts. Unfortunately, on our visit, the display case was empty. :(
There were two snafus with our table’s order. My friend ordered a Curry Noodle Soup which was supposed to come with shrimp. The kitchen forgot the shrimp, so it was brought out in a separate bowl with curry broth. My other friend’s order was delivered to the wrong table, so she had to wait an extra long time for her entrée because it had to be completely remade. The server offered the dish that was supposed to go to the other table to my friend. Really? Haha. She declined the offer and instead asked for what she originally ordered.
I would come back to try more food. I do recommend the tasty beverages.

It’s a Thai restaurant next to the gw grocery which this plaza is getting big now. After all the café and Asian restaurant opened in this plaza.
The interior is pretty nice~ I think they try to make it looks kinda modern, comfort and colorful seating, bright lighting, and café style serving. They did attract a lot of young ppl and some big groups.
We went there on a Saturday, super busy! Then we realized they had a big party going on… About at least 50 ppl. Which this might matter a bit about our first experience…
We ordered the Tom yum kong, laap and Bangkok fish. After we order, they gave us a vibration flicker that never vibrate. They end up brought the food themselves… Then what’s the purpose using that?
They also serve the fish first instead the two starter… That’s also kinda weird…(I assume they are extremely busy so I forgive them this part)
Comes to the food… not the best I’ve had… In fact… I think it’s might even below average Thai food in Atlanta.
First, the soup… Tom yom kong… Taste like the premade soup base… No where near they one I had in Thai norcross.
Laap… My wife ordered it… She didn’t like it lol~ she said the picture looks better than it taste…
Bangkok fish, is actually pretty good, if I come back in the future, this is the one I would order again! Deep fried whole fish with soy base sauce and some green onion, onion and bell pepper on top. Well done.
We thought about the desert or drinks, but it’s really expensive… And you can always walk to another café nearby.
For this time… 3 stars is the most I can give it to them… Not sure if I am coming back or not… If I do, I hope things could be more organized and the dishes we didn’t try could surprise me!

This is such a cute place when you walk in. Spacious, modern and fun. My friend and I ordered beef fried rice, shrimp pad Thai, yellow curry and mango sticky rice for dessert.
I am a HUGE lover of Thai food. All of the dishes lack the flavors usually in authentic Thai dishes: sweet, tangy, spicy. I usually judge how decent a Thai restaurant is based on one dish: pad Thai. Their pad Thai was extremely disappointing. It was so bland, not sweet or tangy. The noodles were also very soggy and sticky. The fried rice and curry were… well edible but nothing special. I read really good reviews about the Thai iced tea but thought it was way too sweet. Lastly, the mango sticky rice was just alright, it was missing more of the coconut cream. But I appreciate that they had fresh sweet mango and the rice was very soft and sticky.
Overall, I would rate it a 2.5÷5. I will most likely not come back here.

My family and I got take out from here last night for dinner. We went to the restaurant around 7 or 8 and the place was pretty empty. There was only about one or two tables filled.
My family and I tried their beef drunken noodles, beef pad thai, papaya salad and phở. I found everything to be pretty tasty and flavorful and the portion sizes to be decent. The papaya salad was a little too spicy but I did have the option of either having it made mild, medium or hot. I chose to try the hot version. I think I’ll probably get it medium next time. I had the pad thai as my entrée and it was good but I wish there was more meat to it. I had a bite of my mom’s entrée, the beef drunken noodles and that was pretty flavorful. I also tried some of my husband’s phở. I found the broth to be a little too salty. My husband enjoyed it but also mentioned that it was a tad on the salty side.
Overall, I’m happy that this place opened because it’s right up the street from my parent’s house and I’ll definitely be back.