We have not attempted to savour any Vietnamese cuisine when we started blogging. Know it’s shameful but Viet food doesn’t furnish a snap into our mind during that time. Not till we visited Hanoi……
There was a turnover of appetite and perception changes.
When Pho Hoa invited fellow foodies over for a sampling session, many thanks to Richard & Kampungboycitygal, we agreed hastily, wanting more recollections of the delicious bits and pieces of Viet fares we once encountered. Had a great time with AiWei , TingFang & Simon too 🙂
All the while, we didn’t know that…
Pho Hoa is the largest Vietnamese restaurant chain in North America popularized in almost every city where Asians lives. Thus, this franchise was actually originated from America, stressing on the servings of healthy authentic Vietnamese goodies. So for those of you who are pretty health conscious, I guess all of you are, Pho Hoa could be a good option.
The Booster
Vietnamese Coffee is a must try when you’re dining in a Vietnamese restaurant.
It comprises of a vietnamese filter, which is a small coffee pot. It looks like a hat and sits upon the top of a coffee cup. Inside is a chamber for coffee and room for hot water. Well, if you had insomnia after taking this like this sweet HER, you can blame this coffee 🙂
Vietnamese Drip Coffee with Milk – RM5.95
Vietnamese Drip Coffee with Milk & Ice – RM5.95
The dripped coffee was later poured into another glass of ice.
Thirst-Quencher
Six Treasure – RM7.95
The 3-Coloured Drink
Appetizers:
We were served with a selections of appetizers, highly recommended by Dennis, the man-in-charge 🙂
All were appetizing, with strong flavours and aroma that we, Malaysian taste buds are fond of.
Lemon Grass Chicken – RM7.95 (4 sticks per plate)
Very aromatic and flavoursome, thanks to the lemongrass skewers although we find the meat a wee bit dry.
Fried Spring Roll with minced chicken, vegetables and yam – RM3.25 per roll
Chris and I adored this most. Crunchy & crispy deep fried skin layering the generous tasty ingredients, making every bite a treasure.
Sugar Cane Prawn – RM7.95 (4 sticks per plate)
Smokey flavour that we enjoyed a lot.
Summer Roll consisting Shrimp, Chicken, Salad & Rice Vermicelli – RM3.95 per roll.
These were very healthy servings. And again, generous fillings in every nibble.
Main Course:
Their noodles are made from 100% rice flour & imported from Vietnam.
Each bowl of their soup is accompanied with fresh coriander leaves, bean sprouts, hot chili padi, lemon wedges and basil leaves.
Some rule of thumb before chowing down onto these pho:
1. Get a taste of the original broth first
2. Squeeze in the lime, chunk in the coriander leaves, bean sprouts, hot chili padi, and basil leaves, & mix ’em well
3. Taste it again.
4. Now you could opt for a flavour change again – Squeeze in their special sauce from originated from North America (the sweet sauce & spicy sauce). Just a little will do as you won’t want your soup turn too spicy. The spicy sauce was fiery. No joke.
the sauces mentioned above 🙂
Some of the PHOs we had
Phở Tái, Nạm
Noodle soup with eye round steak, flank.
Regular: RM13.95
Large: RM15.55
Phở Tái, Chín Nac, Nạm, Gân Sách (the Adventurer’s Choice – basically it has everything)
Steak, Brisket, Flank, Tendon, Tripe Pho
Regular: RM16.95
Large: RM18.55
Something for non-beef diners.
Special Items:
Phở Đồ Biển Chua Cay
Hot and Sour Seafood Pho
Well, you could skip steps 3 & 4 of the rule of thumb for this seafood portion.
Regular: RM13.95
Large: RM15.55
Btw, the portion we had was actually smaller than what they actually serve as we ate lotsa starters ;P
Citygal posing with a REGULAR and LARGE bowl as Kampungboy joined in 🙂
If you’re deciding to skip Pho, you could try:
Rice Platter:
Com Ga Nuong Cha Trung Hap – RM15.95
Grilled Chicken & Egg Cake
Desserts
Coconut Flam with Caramel – RM4.25
Light and not too sweet 🙂
Chocolate Banana Tower (Fried Banana with Ice Cream ) – RM6.95
Cendol Kem – RM6.95
Cendol, Red Bean with Coconut Milk, Gula Melaka & imported Coconut Ice Cream
Cha Gio Re Kem – RM5.95
Net Spring Roll consisting Yam, Sweet Potato & Mung Bean with Vanilla Ice Cream
We had so much Vietnamese Spring Roll in Vietnam. But we have not tried the sweet version, which was this. Recipe designed specially to cater for Malaysian sweet palate, the net spring roll was crispy, and with my fave yam and Chris fave sweet potato combination. It was a perfect match for our tastebuds ;P
Close to the authentic Viet cuisine?
Yes, in some ways.
Pho Hoa was originated from North America, thus there might be slight alterations of in terms of taste. Noodles were made from rice flour originated from Vietnam and that’s a check. However, compared to Hanoi’s version of beef pho, Hanoi’s soup was very clear with sweet essence while Pho Hoa’s broth is flavoursome (guess this matched our boleh-land’s taste buds closely as we tend to go for very flavoursome bites). Spring rolls served in Pho Hoa are much more bigger than those in Vietnam (Vietnamese eats very little mah… haha).
If you question us on comparison again…
It’s different somehow 🙂
Overall, we enjoyed our dinner here. Service was attentive and food was decent as Viet food ignited a conscious choice to health and well-balanced meal.
Pho Hoa
First Floor (behind Borders)
Tropicana City Mall
wow this is one of my favourite beef noodle bar! Just Awesome! 🙂
Oh, I missed Vietnam Pho, during my visit to Ho Chi Minh last year, every lunch also took Pho, yummy yummy.
that's really fast of U dear. 🙂
i love every bites of them. esp the appetizer
Wei, how u type out the Vietnamese writing one? Value for money the portions that they served.
I had Vietnamese food recently but they don't have pho… craving for it when I read ur post…*sigh*
I had a less than pleasant experience with Vietnamese food. But your pictures of the food look so nice, I might just give it another try! 😉
BBO~
generous portion of meat, noodles and soup 🙂 yum
Sonia~
We didn;t manage to visit Ho Chi Minh. Maybe we should have spend longer time in Vietnam 🙂 This city would be much more developed I suppose. Us too! We are not sick of pho! hehe.
aiwei~
haha. Gotta do this when I can actually remember ;P
The Spring rolls was delicious hor? 🙂
Simon~
I didn't type it out. Got it from their online menu 🙂 A little different, so have to compare that with their Malaysian menu.
I don't think I can finish even their regular portion if I ordered it ;P haha
mimid3vils~
Vietnamese food without pho?
remember to try pho next time! perhaps you could try pho hoa's? I've not tried other Viet restaurant in M'sia for the time being. haha ;P
Will start venturing for more since our perception changes. hehe
Bangsar-Babe~
Maybe you should give it another shot 🙂 Perhaps you'll start liking it. ^^
Hmm you had more types of desserts and drinks than my last visit! 🙂 But how is the pho compared to the ones in Vietnam eh?
i love the beef noodles too! i loaded with tonnes of chilli too…hehehe
nothing beats a good bowl of Pho
pho is pronounced as "ferrrr" hehe. cute rite
Had tried their chicken noodle when visited Hanoi last year.. Kinda like their rice noodle which we cant fine in M'sia.. Oh, nevertheless, I love to eat Viet rice!!! Yummy!!!
iamthewitch~
haha. we wanna try out more different desserts. Can't say no to desserts! 🙂
The pho here and in Vietnam are different in taste. The version in pho hoa are actually more flavoursome with added sauce. We still prefer Vietnam's version of clear sweet broth full of essence. hehe.
xin~
say yes to chilies! high 5! 🙂
Leo~
high 5 to you too! 😉
kampungboycitygal~
I was quite surprised when he pronounced it as "ferrr". The vietnamese will say "fuuu" instead. ;P
dunno who is right ^^
JC~
yea.. their rice noodle is great rite? great texture too. Sarawak has good rice noodles too 🙂 I've tried that in Miri. 🙂
vietnamese food is so nice..yum yum~
had the pho before. the chilli is good!
Didnt knw they hv so many desserts!