You get off to a bad start when you have 'by the sea' in the title of your restaurant and you are lucky if you will even smell the salt air let alone see a sea!!!

Okay we went for lunch around 3 PM and the place was empty. They had a sign wait to be seated and it took some time for someone to acknowledge us. There was a little to do about the menu since we had a groupon that said nothing about 'only dinner' which we discovered was changed after we bought ourgroupon. The manager came out and said he would give us the lunch menu like he was doing us a favor.

In any case, red being my favorite color and the predominant color of the decor is red, it made up for the menu 'fuss'.

Our waitress Ailene G was pleasant and did her best to make the whole meal but sadly she couldn't make up for the food.

We started with a dumpling appetizer $7.00 which really was very bland. Anthony had iced tea--without ice ($2) and I had a diet coke ($2) He ordered the Pepper Steak ($10.95) and I had the Fried Rice combo ($12.95) Anthony said he liked the Pepper Steak while I found the Fried Rice combo dry and tasteless. The combo consisted of 1 shrimp, 1 piece of meat and 2-3 small chicken strips served with onions, tomatoes and two slices of cucumber.

The check came to $36.99 while minus the groupon it was $5 and change and we left a $10 tip. Having been given the dinner menu first I thought the prices were very high and they were almost double the lunch prices. If the food is made the same way as the lunch meals were it is a losing proposition. It is a new restaurant in the area where there are Italian restaurants, the PomperdaleDeli across the street, steak houses, seafood restaurants, a German restaurant, etc. With the groupon it cost us $31 for lunch

Thai Moon By The Sea needs something special--actually good food at reasonable prices--if they want to make it here.

Meanwhile, right now, Cabo Blanco is the best restaurant deal for lunch!