Got Pho today, didn't like it. It was take-out and every ingredient was separated. Tried putting it all together and I'd give it a 4/10. The broth was awful. Maybe it's because it was cheap, but I like other cheap Asian foods. Am I missing something?
Anyway, are there other decent Vietnamese foods available that I should try? There's a decent amount of Vietnamese restaurants around here that I could try.
a banh mi if you like a tasty sandwich with a crunch. some peanut sauce and sriracha on there and i'm set
I might need to look into that. I'm terribly picky and need to find a decent way to eat veggies. I can only really do caramelized to oblivion (aka something like Pad Thai). Crunch has some sort of mental barrier for me that I'm struggling to overcome.
The pictures look great though.
oh bummer, yeah that makes things tricky. the veggies are pickled for the most part, so they have that specific kind of bite to them? not quite a raw crunch at least! i'd definitely say try one out, it's a very cohesive sandwich so you might be able to tune out each constituent ingredient
If you can get over crunch as a texture, pickling anything improves it remarkably. You can try it yourself too, take any vegetable, cut it into snack sized pieces, and put it in a dish with vinegar and a little salt for 30+ minutes. I really like pickled onion and pickled radish, the radish is mostly just crunchy tangyness at that point
Takeout pho sucks. The noodles never separate right and you can't get the broth at the right temperature.
All around a bad experience. Much better eating right out of the kitchen.
But yeah get a BBQ pork banh mi.
Alright, I'll try a Banh Mi from a place within walking distance tomorrow (I guess today), since it's so popular here. I'll report back on how I like it
I will try. I think I ordered from some place that tried to sell every Asian cuisine, which might be something that contributed to the problem. The best Chinese food I've ever had was some hole in the wall which didn't advertise or deliver.
Damn. I have to get cultured then. Either that, or eat Pad Thai until I die.
Pho really requires a good broth. That's the majority of it. It's not like a stew where you dump everything into it and the "base" is just whatever.
I've had killer Vegan Pho, so it's entirely possible to skip meat/etc. and just have the broth be good. You might want to try another place for the Pho.
I get Ramen this way and it's pretty good.
Get some spring rolls, and rice paper rolls those are always good. Especially if you can get the spring rolls with the spider web wrapping those are heaven.
Edit: Vietnamese cooking uses a lot of fresh herbs so be sure to be adding those in. Also it uses Coriander/Cilantro so if you have that gene ask them not to include it.
Vermicelli bowls are great, get them with lemongrass chicken for a good time. Like others have said, the broth for pho is where it's at, I would try some other places to see if maybe that one place had some subpar broth. Getting the pho served in a bowl with all the ingredients does improve the experience, but I get that it might be hard with the way things are now.