Pho Hoai (Bay Ridge)

Before we could eat cupcakes, we had to eat lunch, right?  So we headed over to a nearby Vietnamese restaurant that had been recommended to me by two of my friends (who don’t know each other). 

One of my must-orders when I have Vietnamese food is goi cuon, or summer roll.  Basically rice paper wrapped around shrimp, vermicelli noodles, lettuce, and at my favorite place shredded pork as well, you dip it into peanut sauce and just delicious.  I love when places give each person their own peanut sauce; I dip a lot plus it’s a dish that’s practically meant for double dipping, so this means you don’t have to try spooning sauce into your summer roll.

(While it’s true that LTS and I are beyond double dipping around each other, this dish is slightly messy enough that I think both of us would be a little leery of double dipping… the contents sometimes escape into the sauce and who wants to dip their summer roll into a bowl of sauce that has bits of noodle from the other person’s summer roll in it?!)

Cross section, in all its glory… the peanut sauce was extra delicious, and I didn’t note any of the mint leaves some places put in there (which I don’t like), but the lack of the shredded pork left these rolls a bit one dimensional in flavor.  I thought it was alright, but flat tasting, and I think LTS wasn’t enamored of them either.  Basically, we enjoyed them, but we’ve had better.

For our main course, we both opted for pho, which is a Vietnamese signature dish (or in my mind anyway – sorry if this isn’t entirely true).  BF calls it ‘dirty foot water’ because it tends to be a murky looking broth, but good restaurants cook the broth for hours on end, bringing about this deeply flavored, rich, soothing, delicious, awesome soup to which they add rice noodles, aromatics, thinly sliced rib eye, brisket, and your choice (based on the menu) of meats.  On a cold day, there is almost nothing better than this, and for certain, I can not replicate this at home (there’s something to be said for high turnover, huge pots of broth just bubbling away all day…).  This rendition was satisfying and yummy, though my loyalty continues to lie with my favorite place (and thank goodness for that- I would be mad if I liked this place much more since it’s so far away!).  Considering the price – something like $5 – it really isn’t a big investment to give this a try if you’ve never had Vietnamese food before. 

Yvo says: I didn’t expect it to be destination dining, and destination dining it is not.  However, it is solid Vietnamese food, and a good place to have in the neighborhood for cheap, delicious eats.  They also serve banh mi, but I was too full to consider getting one after lunch… darn it.  Good stuff, definitely if I was in the area, would try other offerings as well.  (And I will be in the area this weekend… and will be going back, haha.)  Don’t go out of your way for it, though.
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