Joy's Noodles and Rice

Location: 3257 N Broadway
Cost: $18 per person

I'm not all that great at keeping in touch with old friends, especially when school gets busy. Luckily, one of them usually picks up the slack and organizes some large get together. A week or so ago my friend Faith rounded up the troops. We were going to hit up some new Japanese restaurant but there was this one girl who demanded we wait for her to go, and she couldn't come this time. Still, Plotsky, Ludwig, Ockrim, the Professor, Erika, Faith, Nitz, and I needed somewhere to eat. The Professor suggested we hit up this Thai restaurant called Joy's right next to his new apartment.

Logistics
Joy's is a two room BYOB place in Lakeview. They take reservations, and I suggest that you make them as the wait can get somewhat lengthy on the weekends. We made reservations for 7:30 and showed up at 7:35 to find out that they had given our table away. They were very rude to us, and we ended up waiting another twenty minutes or so for the table. I believe the industry standard is 15 minutes, and I understand we were late, but there was no reason to treat us poorly.

The server was pretty helpful and quick. The cost was what I'd expect from most Thai restaurants in the city. Almost everything was right around $9. What I didn't appreciate was how they handled the tip. We were a group of 8, and they added 20% to our bill. I expected this in some way, but it would've been more appropriate had a notice been listed on the menu or somewhere in the restaurant. On top of that, they added the tip after tax had been included, another move in poor taste.

The Food
We had a few rounds of entrees including the Spring Rolls, Chicken Satay, and Crab Rangoon. The rangoons were a bit small and overly crispy. The peanut sauce with the spring rolls was delicious. The satay was moist inside with a firm exterior texture. We wolfed these down pretty quickly.

The Spring Rolls

The Chicken Satay

 The Crab Rangoon

Between us we had the Drunken Noodles, the Pork and Broccoli, the Pad See Ew, the Pad Khee Mao, the Pad Thai, the Steamed Vegetables, and the Bamee Noodles. The portions on all of these were plenty, and most of them weren't too oily. My favorites were the Pad Khee Mao and the Drunken Noodles. They did a nice job of not overcooking the vegetables in the dishes. Plotsky was pretty pleased with his Bamee Noodles, and Nitz was a big fan of his BBQ Pork and Broccoli though I didn't try either of these. The general consensus was that the pork dishes were strong. I thought the Pad Thai and Pad See Ew were a bit bland.

The Drunken Noodles

The BBQ Pork and Broccoli

The Pad Khee Mao

The Pad See Ew

The Pad Thai

The Steamed Vegetables

The Bamee Noodles

Overall
The food was a little above average at Joy's. A BYOB Thai restaurant isn't so hard to come by in Chicago, so it's a bit hard to win me over. I didn't appreciate how we were treated or the policies they have on billing. Taking it all into consideration, I'm giving them 1.5 out of 5 Pearls.