Great place for Thai food, the Thai Coffee is perfect, and the appetizers are always piping hot and flavorful. Definitely a great spot to hit up for Thai food.

I am new to La Mesa and have been tasting my way around the area. I have tried three Thai places since being here, and this one is my #1. Been back a few times and it’s consistently delicious. Would 100% recommend.

I love this place! My favorite dishes here are Tom Yum shrimp soup and Hawaiian Fried Rice. Everything is very clean, fast and very tasty! All dishes are fresh and large portions. All the people who work there are very nice and polite. The best place for Thai food! Highly recommend!

Excellent place to eat, absolutely the best Thai we have had in San Diego! Very clean and great to dine in or take to go! I highly recommended it!

It's a tiny hole in the wall, but arguably one of the best Thai restaurants in the area. A bit pricy, considering sizes are extremely small. That's the only downside to this place. We had Pad Kee Mao with beef, Tom Kha with shrimp, side of steamed rice, mango and sticky rice.

Great food. I have been here many times and always love it. My go to is now the yellow curry and the crispy basil chicken. Given them a try, you won't be disappointed.

LOVE! They are GF-friendly for most dishes, and this is a huge plus. Fast, kind service and all-around delicious. Highly recommend!

My favorite Thai place. Crab Pad Thai is my go to.

Excellent food

I am new to La Mesa and have been tasting my way around the area. I have tried three Thai places since being here, and this one is my #1. Been back a few times and it’s consistently delicious. Would 100% recommend.

Great food

LOVE! They are GF-friendly for most dishes, and this is a huge plus. Fast, kind service and all-around delicious. Highly recommend!

Excellent place to eat, absolutely the best Thai we have had in San Diego! Very clean and great to dine in or take to go! I highly recommended it!

BEST thai food in san diego and workers are super nice

Great food. I have been here many times and always love it. My go to is now the yellow curry and the crispy basil chicken. Given them a try, you won't be disappointed.

Great place for Thai food, the Thai Coffee is perfect, and the appetizers are always piping hot and flavorful. Definitely a great spot to hit up for Thai food.

My favorite Thai place. Crab Pad Thai is my go to.

Small place. Does have seating for 2, but would not take a group. Most business for take out.

Super legit Thai food with high quality authentic ingredients. The Tom Kha soup has real galangal, Kafir lime leaves, and lemon grass! Love that they’re not skimping on that with great prices too.

¡Excelente sazón y servicio!

pretty good Thai food for San Diego. I prefer all the Pacific rim restaurants up in San Francisco

It’s worth the chance.

The flavors are there and it’s what most would want when getting Thai.

I had an issue with the order and they quickly rectified it with excellent customer service.

So happy I finally found a Thai restaurant that makes a wonderful Pad Grapow. Can’t wait to try some of there other offerings.

Located in a cozy neighborhood area..food tastes clean and good..not overpowering of any particular ingredients..thumbs up!

This is the best Thai food in the neighborhood. The only complaint I have is that they close at odd hours, like 3-4:30pm some times.

The food was quite tasty and fresh. The Pad Thai had great consistency of the noodles and tamarind flavor. I will be coming back.

Always fresh, always tasty and the workers here are always friendly. Our favorite take-out Thai food in La Mesa.

Really amazing yellow curry

I work down the street and this is my absolute favorite place to come for lunch! Always friendly, quick and delicious.

New favorite Thai place in town. We love the pad see ew, panang curry, and mango iced teas with boba.

Did they change ownership? It’s so different than it used to be and not as good. I used to absolutely love this place. I paid for extra veggies and usually that comes with the veggie mix and I don’t think I got extra veg at all. It was all a bunch of carrots. What happened?!! The flavors seem different too. It’s really, really salty. I’m so sad as it used to be soooo good.

The food was good. Portions were large. Service was quick and friendly. In all, a very solid experience.

The food is always outstanding

The food is delicious, highly recommend it

Very good Thai food, friendly service

Just discovered this place not too far from Lake Murray. Great food, nice people. Will return!

Delicious food made with love and care! I love this family owned Thai place. The restaurant is a little cozy so it may be better for take out. The portions were good and the taste was phenomenal! I'll definitely be back. Thank you for your service!

FOOD IS NOT AS GOOD AS IT USE TO BE!!! YHEY DID NOT EVEN OFFER SIRACHA WHICH I WANTED FOR MY COLD!!!

I don’t usually do reviews anymore but my meal was amazing. I apologize for the lack of pictures but I finished my whole meal before I could take any. That’s how great the food was. I ordered a pa Thai with no egg and mock duck along with a wet papaya salad. Best Thai food around in my opinion.

Good, reasonably priced food.

SUPER COOL people and place!! I love how considerate they are for all customers!!! I HIGHLY recommend coming here for food! Thank you and Hugs to the amazing workers at Hug Thai Express

This is our go to Thai food to go place. Tonights Cashew nut w/beef, the vegetables were absolutely terrible! Super mushy, very little beef.
Beef very tuff. No where near good. I'll give 1 more chance for them to prove better, or I'm done.

I don't know when the veggies were bought or freshly cut, but if I had to guess they were either cooked 2 hrs previously or it was nuked too much ??,but the zucchini, green onion and bell peppers were MUSHY. With only 4 slices of beef, it was disappointing.
My wife's Pad Thai w/beef was good.

Drunken noodles with chicken spice level 4. Was amaxing! Great flavor. We got it to go but the place looked nice and the staff friendly!

My favorites are Pad Thai, Pad See Ew, and Panang Curry.
Best Thai food ive found in La Mesa so far.

Tiny restaurant with refreshing and tasty Thai menu

My partner and I were craving thai last night and we had been staying in a hotel in El Cajon and a lot of the the thai restaurants around there had little or no curve appeal and had wanting reviews. I expanded our location and found Hug Thai and was immediately drawn by their menu and pictures on Google Maps. The drive to Hug Thai was short and easily accessible from the highway. The restaurant itself was small and inside and outside seating was available, but not for parties larger than two. We ordered a few appetizers (the fried tofu and eggrolls), pad see ew (level 2 heat) and green curry with mock duck (level 3 heat). The fried tofu was tasteless and hard to enjoy until the curry came along and I drowned them in curry. The eggrolls were amazingly fresh and hot, especially with their sweet and sour home sauce. The win of the evening were the two main courses. I fell deeper in love with green curry that evening and could not stop myself from eating my partner's pad see ew. The green curry had a delightful coconut flavor with the right amount of curry output. The eggplant was perfectly cooked and the mock-duck complimentary to the whole dish. My partner and I will be returning to this charming whole in the wall Thai restaurant. It was good and for any Thai food enthusiast out there. Try it!

We had their Pad Thai and Green Curry while we were here. Not only was their food good and flavorful, but the staff here was super kind and generous too!

It'll be well worth your time to make it down here if you're looking for a new Thai place to try out.

Incredible food, fast service, great portions. Definitely recommend and would return anytime

I am taking off a star because they are really afraid to make their food spicy. They ask you how spicy you want it from 1 being mild to 10 being very hot. But when I get my food it taste like level 3 or 4. I didn't even break a sweat. My experiences at hardcore Thai restaurants would be level 7 sweating profusely, level 9 eyes watering and slightly red, level would be what I call Thai hot and my lips would get puffy. ++10 Is Lao hot with all the symptoms mentioned requiring a creamy beverage to quench the heat. So if you really like spicy food, please emphasize you want it hotter than level 10 American hot. Tell them you want it Thai hot or Lao hot. Their food is delicious. They just need to stop being afraid when customers ask for spicy.

Cannot recommend the Thai tea and the pineapple chicken curry enough!

I order crab fry rice and it so delicious.

Wonderful Thai food, fresh ingredients and nice staff. Small seating space but very cozy. We usually order pick up. The green curry chicken is some of the best!

Ordered takeout as a recommendation from a La Mesa neighbor and was very happy we did! Food quality and flavor was outstanding, service was so friendly and quick. I only picked up, but the restaurant is a small storefront with room for maybe 8 total diners - hence Express. Will be coming back again and again.

Chicken Pad Thai
Do NOT sleep on the crispy chicken dish
Green crispy tofu curry

Best EVER !!! TY

Closed what this place is dinner only?? Not pleased.

I love this place! My favorite dishes here are Tom Yum shrimp soup and Hawaiian Fried Rice. Everything is very clean, fast and very tasty! All dishes are fresh and large portions. All the people who work there are very nice and polite. The best place for Thai food! Highly recommend!

Delicious!! Got the crab fried rice and Tom Kha soup! Thank you!

Used to be one of favorite spots. Ordered the usual Pad See Ew and drunken noodles: Flavor is still good however the portions have gotten A LOT skimpier and only 5 small pieces of beef in each dish. We are still hungry :((

Used to be one of favorites but my favorite dish has gotten a lot skimpier. It was always kind of pricey to me but the portion size made up for it. I continued to order favorite hoping that it was just due to shortage but not the case. I spend 20 dollars on a plate and still hungry afterwards.

Great food. Great service. Good price. Nice for a quick bite with on date.

Super reasonable prices for great portion sizes and amazing-tasting food! Weekend app specials are a highlight (so many egg rolls in an order and the fried pork ribs were 10/10). The red curry and crab fried rice (so much crab!) were also delicious. Absolutely worth a visit.

Don't know never ate there. Dumb Google doesn't know if a location nearby is where I was at or not.

This place is straight fire 🔥 not "white-washed" like the rest around

Their crab omelette is great, reminds me of how my mom used to make it.

This was my first time with Hug and also first time trying a new item. (Since the Pad See Ew had such great reviews) It met the expectation and the heat level 3 was perfect (they do run on the spicy side as others have reviewed). Very tasty and fresh.

Absolutely love Hug Thai! Best green curry in SD by far. Their Hawaiian fried rice and Pad Thai are great, too. I especially love the messages on their takeout containers. 😊

amazingly delicious! I loved everything I ordered

Great food and great service. Never disappointed.

Wanted to get something to eat this evening was feeling in the mood for spicy. They didn't disappoint! Was fast and great tasting 😋 👍

Let me be very clear from the start. Their food was meh. My issue is their customer service. It’s happened to me a few times in the last month, I usually went there every Friday. And always had issue with the customer service with the same girl every time . But today is the worst customer service I ever had at any restaurant. Which is May 5th! Today was so far past horrible that I can honestly say I’ve never had this experience anywhere. Will definitely not going back. There are many of Thai restaurants in the area that do their best customer service.

Update…your waitress wasn’t friendly and she is so unprofessional. Don’t know how to treat customers. That’s enough to make me not going back

Ugh! I used to love this place and had proclaimed them my favorite TomKha. Part of the problem starts with the assumption of the tip in advance. I prefer to tip cash, so I click, "no tip." Well, the formerly cute Hug Thai offers you a customer service kick instead of a hug. I am hard of hearing and couldn't hear the cashier's flippant greeting. I had to get close to the plexi glass barricade where she was arranging thin paper napkins. She then took care of the two other patrons who came in after me. I knew exactly what I wanted as I have ordered it before.
Sadly, my salad was just a poor arrangement of untorn lettuce leaves, copious onions, lukewarm beef, and hot chili even though I asked for zero heat. My Tom Kha was supposed to be heat level 4 and it was hotter than when I had gotten a 6. The lemongrass stalks were left in. They are supposed to be seasoning; not an edible ingredient.
I had tried to go three days prior, but they were closed for lunch an extended time period and refused to open on time. They looked at us, but the cook kept eating while staff were arriving late. That should have been my warning to never return. My mom was right to choose to go somewhere else. Mom really does know best.
I will never return.

The food was absolutely delicious. They were short staffed, but every person was doing their best to get orders out in a timely manner.

My daughter found this place and I can honestly say it is our favorite Thai restaurant from now on. We had the Hawaiian rice, the fried pork ribs, the garlic chicken wings, pad Thai, and pad see ew. Every dish was delicious, I was floored I couldn’t find anything bad about it. I adore Thai food so I’m very happy to have this establishment so close😍 We scarfed it down so fast we didn’t get pictures so next time.

Tiny hole in the wall in a small strip mall. Very limited first come self serve table to eat in. Buying via an inside counter to carryout or dining in. Fabulous Thai food. Try the pad krapow.

Really good crab Rangoon. Tofu spring rolls were delicious but other options as chicken would be nice too. Ordered the Okinawa milk tea and it was very bland and weak. Curry was good.. so was the fried rice. Only reason for 4 stars.

Rude Crew late missing items

I’ve had a lot of Thai food in at many different Thai restaurants and this is actually my favorite I’ve ever had. The pad see ew and taro milk tea is fabulous. They could the noodles just right. There was one time where the sauce was a little on the salty side and they gave me credit for another dish, no questions asked. Very good customer service. Cut little place inLa Mesa. I highly recommend!

Ordered through uber eats. The coconut shrimp was great, and the pad thai was the blandest excuse for pad thai ever. It was so flavorless i was almost in shock.

Been here various times, never been disappointed. They adjust spicy level to your liking and everything turns out great! I tend to be kinda picky about the Thai food I eat so it definitely deserves the 5 stars I’m giving it!

In my experience the portion was enough, I am full! Fresh ingredients. Yellow curry with vegetables. I would enjoy more broccoli, only a few pieces. But you can add extra vegetables for a small upcharge. I will do that next time. Price seems fair for the quality, it's not "cheap" but the quality is good and it's convenient. I will definitely order again next week. The main thing is that the spices worked. kind of cleans out sinuses and feels like a metabolism boost. Subtle sweating on the scalp (Thai spice fans know the feeling) I feel cleaner and healthier after eating.

Quick service with incredibly fresh and delicious food. One of the best Thai restaurants based on my experience of regularly eating Thai for over 10 years.

It's a tiny hole in the wall, but arguably one of the best Thai restaurants in the area. A bit pricy, considering sizes are extremely small. That's the only downside to this place. We had Pad Kee Mao with beef, Tom Kha with shrimp, side of steamed rice, mango and sticky rice.

Cute little place, definitely will come back. I love the Tom Yum it’s a little different than I'm used to but absolutely delicious, and will perk you up! The crispy tofu was also great. I recommend highly.

really great and authentic food, they are kind and quick as well.

Traveling in for work I felt like having some Thai food and this place was incredible. They recommended the Pad Grapow Chicken with a fried egg and it was so flavorful. Mango ice tea and sweet rice with mangoes for dessert.

Very quick service and the food was really tasty!

Appears very clean and well-run! Food is fantastic, strongly suggest the Pad Grapow!

Awesome service in perfect food

Food didn't have much flavor. Pad Thai was really oily. Edible, but not really worth the money paid.

This place is an Asian treasure! All the food is superbly and carefully cooked and prepared. The Pad Thai's rice noodles are cooked al dente and saucy, and the taste is very authentic. The Crab Rice is so delicious and the Crispy Chicken Basil is a bomb! The drinks are very refreshing, especially the Taro milk tea. Moreover, the staff and the management are very accommodating and the service is great! This is the best restaurant so far that serves Asian cuisine in San Diego area.

Hug Thai took great consideration in our dietary needs (allergies), and the food was outstanding!! We get thai every Thursday and this will definitely become our new go-to place!

Beef salad was bomb and good price for the portion size. I'll be back to try more.

The drunken noodles and sticky rice is bomb. I love the Tom Kha and add sea food to it. The Tom Yum is great too. They also have Thai tee with boba. Love it.

So yummy and great customer service. I have had the red curry with veggies and tofu, basil eggplant with tofu, thai spring rolls with tofu and thai iced tea with boba- everything has been excellent. Their brown rice is super delicious too. Highly recommend:) Thank you hug thai!

The food was OK. The ingredients were fresh and crisp, the preparation was done well. However, there was very little meat or shrimp in the mix.

Very kind staff and the food was both tasty and refreshing. I ordered a bit too spicy for my taste, but it was so delicious that I just rolled with the punches! 😂

I tried the chicken Pad Thai with Thai tea.

Friendly. Homey feel. Delicious Pad See Ew! Perfectly simple birthday dinner.

I don't normally write reviews but this time I have to! I love everything about this place starting from the people working here, they are so nice, attentive and make sure you get everything just like you order. They go above and beyond and they do it with a smile! The food is to die for! My fiance and I tried multiple things but for the past few weeks we've been hooked on the yellow curry, I get it with shrimp and my fiance gets the combo with shrimp and chicken. It is so delicious! We love this place so much!

This place is seriously great. I’ve eaten at a bunch of Thai places in SD and I assure you this one is delicious and top notch : )

Try the Tom Kha. So flavorful, intense flavors and just amazing.

Ordered the crab fried rice. Delicious. I am a big fan of Thai food. I will be returning over the weekend to try another dish.

Super tasty well seasoned a real local gem loved the curry and mock chicken

Just ate at this place, absolutely wonderful. Usually when you go to a Thai restaurant you're going to get a good curry 9 out of 10 times. The real test of a good Thai place is how they make their Tom Yum soup and boy was this delicious.
The food for the price was absolutely worth it and their Thai tea was excellent but the boba may have been a tad too hard, but that's just me nit picking. See ya guys soon!

Edit 6/27/2020: Just went there again, the Boba is perfect and now there is nothing to nitpick!

Highly recommended!! This was my first to-go order from Hug Thai, and I was very pleased. I ordered the basics this time around: pad thai (spicy level 7) and a large thai iced tea with boba. It was delicious, and there was good attention to detail. The spice level was on point with my request, and the lime and chopped peanuts on the side were a nice touch. Also, the portion was hefty! I will be coming back to try other dishes.

This restaurant is very well setup to provide to-go service safely and efficiently. My interactions over the phone giving my order and in person picking up my food were both friendly and efficient. They also thoughtfully and respectfully observed social distancing precautions. I felt secure picking up my food from them.

Finally, the main dish was packaged sustainably with a waxed paperboard box in a paper bag. During a time when to-go and delivery is so prominent, I am very appreciative of more sustainable packaging choices. I highly recommend this restaurant for their delicious food, their attention to detail, sustainable choices, and for providing transparent and safe food service. Check this place out!

The food was ok. Could have used more sauce on the pad Thai. The waterfall beef was good, but the portion was not worth $10. The staff was very nice.

The staff are polite, clean area, fresh and healthy food and it taste really good. Recommended for picky eaters who wants to try quick but quality Food.