Dirty bathrooms, a few crumbs here and there, spacey staff, these are things Gothamist can forgive if the food is good. But stories about cockroaches and unapologetic staff - those are turnoffs. Our friend Tamara reports on her visit to East Village Thai restaurant, Elephant:
Living in NY you understand that roaches do live among us, however it is NOT something you want to see crawl across your table, your friend's shirt and up the wall when dining. Unfortunately that was the case at Elephant last Saturday evening. The worst part of the situation was the host's unapologetic way of handling the incident. We received an insincere apology and confirmation that the incident had been "taken care of." Nothing was comped - not even the martini that spilled during the shuffle. The food may have been good, but certainly not good enough for me to return to this establishment.
Yikes. The Elephant's own website proclaims "Our funky East Village bistro has French and Thai fusion cuisine," so therefore, funky = cockroach-infested. Good to know. And how come these things never seem to happen when food critics are around?
The only legitimately cool use of a cockroach we can remember is from three years ago, as a fashion accessory. And by cool, Gothamist means "insane."
The Elephant is not listed in the city's searchable database of restaurants (so you can check violations) but we'll be keeping our eye out for what the Department of Health says. Gothamist on NYC restaurant violations.
