• 4
• Flavorful Food

I had read about this place on happycow, and here's my Wheel of Life review. The set up is old fashioned as this place has been operating for over 10 years. The Thai food served at Wheel of Life is unlike the Thai vegan restaurants I eaten at in the greater Los Angeles area. The food here was much saucier (sweeter, more sauce) and with bold flavors. I kinda liked that, but then most of it was also a bit overwhelming. For instance the pad thai noodles we ordered was covered in a super sweet savory red sauce, unlike other pad thai I've had. There were chuncks of mockmeats, sprouts, and peanuts mixed in with the noodle. The tom yum "meatball" noodle soup was very delicious, actually. even though it probably had more salt than I am accustomed to. The soup had a very strong lemon-tomato-Thai spices taste. The noodle that came with it was an instant noodle kind, which was exactly what I had been craving that day. The "meatballs" had bits of crunchy watercrest inside and tasted so good. This was my favorite dish here. My husband and I were both underwhelmed by the fresh rolls. Actually if you are not a picky eater, the rolls are decent (with lettuce, thin cucumbers slices, and soy chicken strips - paired with a peanutty read sweet dipping sauce). But we wanted more... like fresh basil or mint leaves would make them "pop" (with taste) and more interesting. The steamed buns were good but not unusual of buns one can get at any Chinese restaurant. Warm soft bread with some kind of dark greens filling. Their lemon marble cake was very fresh and spongy. We both liked it but without the sugary lemon flavor icing. We also took away 2 kinds of their housemade soy jerky (the flat sheet kind was better than the spiral shaped ones).