Anh and Chi–Vancouver

We visited Anh and Chi on a Friday night for dinner.  Ahn and Chi serves upscale looking Vietnamese inspired cuisines.  It’s located on Main Street in East Van.

We got there just before 6PM and saw the restaurant was already full with a handful of people waiting for tables outside.  We put our name down and waited patiently outside.  Luckily it was a nice evening with no rain.  They have heaters in the waiting area outside to keep you warm.

After about 30 minutes, we got a text saying our table is almost ready.  We proceeded to go inside the restaurant to wait and saw it was bustling with people enjoying their food.

Pics of the inside:

Bar area:

Partially exposed kitchen:

We got our table and our server promptly brought us water.  It was the first time we found a slice of cucumber in our water.  It made the water look nice but the cucumber taste was a bit unusual.

We ordered a few appetizers to start.  This is the Bánh Tráng Trộn Rice Paper Snack
It has rice paper at the bottom and topped with fresh mango, beef jerky, roasted peanuts, dried shrimp, quail eggs, fried shallots and some spices.

This was really tasty.  It had a nice kick and tang to it from the different spices combined.  However, we recommend you eat this right away and not let it sit too long otherwise the slices of rice paper will stick together like glue.  We learned it the hard way.

This is the fried chicken wings appetizer.  You get to choose 2 different sauces so we went with the butter garlic sauce.

It includes 10 pieces. The wings did not feel fried since it was rather tender with a light crisp skin.  It tasted more like broiled.  The wing sizes were fair for appetizer standards.

Next is the crispy spring rolls.

It came with 3 spring rolls cut in half.  The spring rolls were a bit skinny though.  It includes lettuce and some lemon grass which the server recommended we use to wrap the spring roll.

There were 3 of us tonight and we all ordered the beef pho. 

This serving size here is a lot bigger than the standard large size you get at other pho restaurants  Furthermore, there was so much beef!  It had maybe twice the serving of beef compared to other places.  The pho soup was also very rich and flavorful.

They use this fancy jacket for delivering you the bill.

Ahn And Chi is a different kind of Vietnamese restaurant with a more modern vibe to it. It is unlike the hole in the wall mom and pop pho shops, so come prepared to try something different.  The menu items are very unique, modern and specialized.

We will look forward coming back again to try their other dishes.

SFDD gives 4.5 out of 5 Delights.

Pho Cilantro – Vancouver

We were planning to go get some noodles at Hawker’s Delight but sadly they were closed for summer vacation.  We drove up to Fraser street instead to find some pho and settled down at Pho Cilantro which we’ve never visited before.

It was a Saturday afternoon. Easy to find parking here on Fraser street. When we peeked inside the restaurant, it looked rather empty. Just 2 guys in there eating pho.  We went in and immediately seated but felt really stuffy since there was no air conditioning at all.

Since it was so stuffy inside, I guess that’s why we were served iced tea. 

It’s actually just the same tea they would have served hot. It’s not like a sweetened iced tea in case you are wondering.

We first ordered a large rare pho with beef balls:

When the bowl arrived, the beef was already well done…  So much for ordering ‘rare’.  The soup flavour was not very deep at all.

Next we ordered the dry noodle. Vermicelli with pork and spring roll.

It looked nicely presented when it arrived with all the different colors catching our eye.  However, the salad part consisted of more than half raw bean sprouts.  It was too much bean sprouts to say the least.

The spring roll as you can see looked over fried.  It was so hard to bite into.  Furthermore, the spring rolls here had a strange taste to it.  Kind of sour. Which makes me wonder if the meat was bad.

Service was not great either. Throughout our sitting, the 2 people working just hid behind the counter with their backs facing the customers while playing with their phones.  We were waiting to make eye contact so that we can get our bill but after getting impatient we just went up to the counter to pay.  The server finally saw us at the counter turned around with a smirk and said ‘oh’…

Food was not good, neither was the service, neither was the facilities being so hot.  Now we understand why it was so empty on a Saturday afternoon during lunch time.

SFDD gives 2 out of 5 Delights.

Delicious Pho–Downtown Vancouver

We walked by Delicious Pho several times in the past and finally had a chance to try it out during Canada Day.  They are located on the east side of Robson street a couple of blocks away from the library.

The restaurant is rather spacious and clean.  We got there for a late lunch during Canada day so there was plenty of seating.

We started with a grilled chicken roll. 

It had large pieces of chicken inside with lettuce and vermicelli for filling.  It also came with a big serving of dipping sauce.  This was under the specialty roll section where you can choose the meat (chicken, pork, pork patty, beef).

We ordered soup-less vermicelli bowl with prawn and grilled pork.

It was a large serving.  You get three pieces of prawn and a bunch of pork.  The pork was cooked well and not burned.  Prawns were a bit bland though but that was an easy fix with the included fish sauce dip.

Next we ordered a small bowl of pho with sliced steak.

The soup was superb rich with flavour compared to a few other places we’ve been to recently.  The beef also came rare like it should, so that it can slowly cook itself in the hot soup.

Despite being downtown, the prices here are very reasonable.  The service was fast and straight forward.  Delicious Pho will certainly be our go to place when craving for Vietnamese cuisine downtown.

SFDD gives 4 out of 5 Delights.

Pho Ten - Richmond

Pho Ten is out in the South East part of Steveston Richmond.  We came here for dinner just before heading out to Silvercity for a Thursday evening movie.  The restaurant was quite empty since we arrived early, just before 6pm.  But patrons started  filling up the restaurant after about 6:30pm.

I ordered the lemon grass pork with spring roll over vermicelli as it was hot outside and didn’t want to be made hotter with pho soup. 

The pork was plentiful and had a nice taste.  They used really lean pork and was thinly sliced.  The spring roll was good too except it didn’t use the other type of rice wrapping that is used by Pho Tan on Main street.  The noodles were nicely spread out and not mushed together like some other places.

We also ordered rare beef, tendon and brisket Pho.  This is a regular size and had a reasonable portion for noodles.  

The beef could have been more tender though. The soup was had a more deeper flavour than some other Pho places we tried elsewhere.

Finally we ordered a prawn spring roll.

The spring roll includes sweet dipping sauce.

Pho Ten is in a small strip mall so parking is plentiful.  The service is fast and efficient.  I don’t think they take credit cards though.

SFDD Gives 3.75 out of 5 Delights.