Tiger Mama – Interesting Food But Lackluster Service
My spouse and I visited Tiger Mama for dinner on a Saturday
evening in late November 2019. Tiger Mama is open daily for dinner, as well as
for Sunday brunch. We reserved a spot using the online Open Table reservation
system, which was a necessity on the busy night that we dined. Subsequently, on
the following night, we ate at Chef Faison’s neighboring restaurant Orfano, and
previously, we dined at Sweet Cheeks back in May 2017. (See our other
individual reviews of the Big Heart Hospitality Group restaurants.)
Tiger Mama opened in December 2015 in the Back Bay/Fenway
Triangle area. We stayed nearby at the Residence Inn Back Bay-Fenway, which was
a short walk from the restaurant. The space occupies a corner location, which
allows windows on two sides. Upon entering the building, a large multi-sided
bar offers lots of seating, with two high-top group tables (with turntables at
the center) nearby. The back half of the restaurant offers seating at raised
booths, regular booths, and tables, some of which share a wooden banquette on
one side, as well as some communal tables in the rear near the open kitchen.
Décor leans toward the tropical, with dim lighting, palm trees, walls of
greenery, and tin ceilings. The restaurant appears to offer seasonal al fresco
dining on the front sidewalk.
Tiger Mama serves Southeast Asian cuisine in a shared small
plate format. We ordered the Pad Thai Salad (interesting to see this as a cold
dish rather than the traditional warm noodles), Lamb Roti (delicious), La Tigre
Fried Rice (yummy but a bit spicy), Bun Cha (rice noodles, herbs/greens, and
broth containing pork patties and shredded carrots [which we assembled into
little lettuce wraps], served with pork fried spring rolls), and Khao Soi (a
little “soupy” and therefore harder to share, with noodles, greens, chicken), followed
by the Panna Cotta for dessert. The savory dishes were all pretty good,
although with varying degrees of spiciness; however, the Panna Cotta was
terrible (although presented adorably as a pumpkin). Tiger Mama has a full
liquor license, including fun tiki drinks (some of which are large format for
multiple drinkers), beer, wine, and cocktails; we also tried two non-alcoholic
drinks, the Indo Crush (really good, but they ran out of the ingredients) and
the Grapefruit Palomito (less interesting than the other mocktail).
Service was disappointing. As we were being led to our tiny
table set very closely to the ones on either side, we passed by several booths
that were empty; when we inquired about sitting at one of those, we were told
that they were reserved for parties of four. However, when we looked at those
tables just ten minutes later, they were all occupied by parties of two, so we
felt lied to, which was a terrible start to the night. Our (male) server
started off strong, but he eventually forgot about us as he grew more
interested in larger (and thus higher-tipping) tables. To further prove this
point, as each of the tables on either side of ours finished their meal, their
(female) server presented them with wet cloths to clean their hands. Our server
never brought us the cloths, even when we asked for them. We mentioned this to
the hostess upon leaving the restaurant when she asked how our meal was, but
she did not care that we had any constructive criticism.
Although we enjoyed most of the food at Tiger Mama, it is
hard to overlook the substandard service.
