Sweet and Sour in Boston

Ever been to a restaurant and you look at the menu and are completely terrified/confused at to what to order? Since you don't know what's good and are too afraid to just point to a table next to you and order what they are having, you end up ordering something that is familiar even though it might not be something the restaurant (or cuisine) is known for. I believe this happens a lot at Vietnamese restaurants, because I see items like Pad Thai and Chicken Fingers and Pork Fried Rice on menus. While it's not bad to order something just to be safe, don't you want to order something that the cooks in the back are more likely to make for themselves? Or maybe you are just curious about Vietnamese food and want to know what some good dishes are to order. Here's a little guide to help you along.

Pho



Probably the most popular item at any Vietnamese place. It's the greatest noodle soup ever, at least in my mind. Perfect for breakfast, lunch or dinner. It's simply just rice noodles in a chicken or beef broth with some onions and meat of your choice. Served with bean sprouts, mint leaves, lime, chili sauce and hoison sauce, it's the most personable meal in the world. No one eats their pho the same way as anyone else. You add whatever you want and slurp it down. (Don't be afraid to slurp, it's not considered rude. In fact, the more slurping the better.) For the meat, Pho Ga is simply Chicken Noodle Soup. Pho Bo is the beef version, but you can get different types of beef cuts. For example, Pho Tai is rare flank steak that is cut very thin. You can tell the quality of a Vietnamese restaurant by how rare the meat is when it comes out to your table. The broth is so hot that it cooks the meat when you mix it all up right before you eat it. The rarer it is, the better it is. If you don't like to see rare meat in your noodles, you can order Pho Chin which is well done beef. Bo Vien is beef meatball and you can have it alone in the pho or add it to any other Pho Bo choice. I normally do and I judge most restaurants by how many meatballs I get. For a $1 or $2 more per bowl, I like it if I have more than 4 pieces of Bo Vien. If you are feeling adventurous or just love various types of beef, get Pho Dac Biet, which basically is the kitchen sink in Pho Bo. You get tripe, tendon, flank, brisket, tripe and bo vien all in your bowl. This can also be called Xe Lua, which literally translates into "Large Train" in Vietnamese. This is the XL, or extra-large bowl size. If this little write up on Pho still confuses you, a better write up can be found here.

Appetizers

Of course, everyone has heard of Cha Gio (Egg Rolls). The Vietnamese version are normally smaller and thinner than the Chinese versions, but made in the same way. A filling of pork, mushrooms, rice noodles, carrots and other vegetables are placed inside a wrapper and rolled up and deep fried until crispy gold, brown and delicious. These are normally served with lettuce, pickled carrots and Nuoc Mam, fish sauce. I like to wrap the lettuce around the egg roll, add some of the pickled carrots and dip into the nuoc mam. If you are afraid of the nuoc mam (and I know it doesn't smell like the greatest thing in the world; be sure not to spill some on your clothes.) Just eat the egg roll plain or try the Goi Cuon (Spring Rolls) which are served with a peanut flavored dipping sauce. The spring rolls are shrimp and/or pork rolled into rice noodle wrappers with some lettuce, rice noodles and some mint.



Banh Xeo is a fried crepe dish that can be a meal for one person or an appetizer for multiple people. Shrimp, pork, bean sprouts are pan fried in a crepe batter and flipped over like an omelet. Similar to the egg rolls, lettuce and pickled carrots and nuoc mam are served with it and the banh xeo can be wrapped up and eaten with your hands.

Bun and Com (Rice)

I put bun and com into the same categories because they are served basically the same way, except one is in a bowl and the other is on a plate. Bun is rice noodles and com is rice. You can order Bun Thit Nuong, which has grilled meat (either chicken, pork or beef) served over the rice noodles that lies in a bed of veggies (carrots and lettuce mainly). A side bowl of nuoc mam comes with it that you can add however little or much you would like. Mix it all up and eat. I normally like to add a Cha Gio to my order, which means that the restaurant will add an egg roll that is cut up into 3 or 4 bite sized pieces and added to the bun. Com Thit Nuong is basically the same thing, except the meat is not cut up into smaller peices. So normally you'd get a grilled pork chop served over a bed of white rice.

Banh Hoi

Let's say you like both the Bun Thit Nuong and the Goi Cuon, but can't decide which one you want. Well, you can order the Banh Hoi. Basically, it's the Vietnamese version of fajitas. You get rice noodle wrappers, a bowl of hot water, a plate of cooked chicken or pork or shrimp, and some rice noodles and veggies. You dip the rice noodle wrapper into the hot water, lay it on your plate, add some meat and veggies and rice noodles and roll it all up. Dip it into some nuoc mam and you are all set. Very simple and a fun meal to order for a group of people to try it out. Remember, Vietnamese food is not fine cuisine dining. It's slurp, get messy, talk to your friends and enjoy your meal dining.

Family Style Options

Whenever I used to eat out with my family, my dad would order 4 or 5 different dishes and some white rice. This is a great way to try out different Vietnamese items and it again is a much more fun option than everyone having their own dish. Here are some of the dishes I love to order: Bo Luc Lac, cubes of beef sauteed in fish sauce, Canh Chua, a Vietnamese sour soup made with seafood and pineapple, Tom Rang Mua, fried shrimp (with head on of course) in a salty spicy covering, and Ca Kho To, fish cooked in a clay pot.

So there you have it. A quick little guide to ordering Vietnamese food. And don't stop at just the dishes I've listed, try whatever sounds good too, or ask your waiter what they think is good. Or, if you are still afraid to order something different, just got the Banh Mi. You can never go wrong with a good sandwich. (You do know what banh mi is, right?)

Our friends Annie and Jay went to Pho Basil on Wednesday and told Abby about it on Thursday. Well, don't you know we just had to go try it out ourselves on Thursday. It was freezing cold outside, and nothing is better to warm you up than a nice big bowl of pho.

Located on Mass Ave, right before Boylston in an area that I have not frequented that often. There are tons of ethnic cuisines here, but we normally pass by because parking is a pain in this area and it's a little bit of a walk from where we live. Well, it'd be like 15-20 mins, but we are lazy.

It must have been our lucky night though, because we found parking right in front of Pho Basil. As you walk you, you see a very clean and modern dining area. As we were sitting down, I noticed right away that the tables don't have the typical Vietnamese pho look. Meaning the collection of chopsticks, spoons and condiment rack is missing. Sirachai and hoisen sauce were present along with a fork and knife. I read on yelp that Pho Basil was mainly a Thai place that served Vietnamese food, and looking at the menu proved me correct. While there were quite a bit of Vietnamese dishes on the menu, it just felt more like a Thai offering. Probably because the students in the area are more accustomed to Thai food would be my guess. If there is something familiar on the menu, then it will draw in the customers and maybe the diners will branch out and give something new a try. In any case, the prices weren't bad. About $4-$9 for appetizers and pho starting at $6.



We started with Goi Cuon. This is the Vietnamese Summer Roll as so many people call it...actually a lot of people call it a spring roll. (As mentioned in one of my first posts this is a huge pet peeve of mine.) Rice paper wrapped around lettuce, rice vermicelli, with mint and shrimp and pork. One of the best appetizers in all the world. Light and refreshing, served with a peanut sauce that has a little kick to it. This is something that is hard to screw up. Pho Basil, even though there seems to be way too much lettuce, does this justice. A wonderful Goi Cuon to start. The peanut sauce being one of the best I've had in Boston.



After looking at the menu, I was tempted to order the Bo Luc Lac or the Tom Rang Muoi, but since this is my first time here, I had to try the pho. We both order the large Pho Tai, with me adding Bo Vien for $2 more. This is a large beef noodle soup with thin cuts of rare flank steak. Sometimes when I add the beef meatball to the order, only one or two are added...here Pho Basil added like 4 or 5. Very good! The broth was incredible. I added a little Sirachai and hoisen sauce and a lot of lime juice. Tossed in some bean sprouts and mixed it all up to break up the clump of noodles and get the rare meat separated and into the broth to cook. Pho is such a great dish because everyone eats it differently. It's always fun to watch a pho-virgin. In any case, the broth was some of the best I've ever had in Boston. The noodles were cooked perfectly, and the meat was still rare when the bowl was delivered (this is a must for Pho Tai). I scarfed down the huge bowl in minutes. It was so damn good. Perfect for such a cold day, warming me up instantly.

I think I might have found my new favorite Pho place in Boston. While Xinh Xinh is very good on its own right and is still one of my favorites, their Pho does not match up to Pho Basil. I'll have to find out if Pho Basil's other Vietnamese dishes stack up...though that may be tough to do since I'll likely order the pho everytime I come. I give Pho Basil a 4 out of 5.

Nothing much on the food front for us. Friday night was spent drinking way, way, way too much, mainly at Jillians, but I can say that the BBQ Chicken Pizza was damn good. Jillians is a pretty cool spot. Pool and bowling and a lot of people trying to be trendy. You got a mix of young and old. The pool and bowling are kinda expensive, but Abby's red bull and vodka was $7. That's not bad in Boston. Not bad at all. I ended up spending way more than I needed too on shots and lots of beer, which lead to me being hungover on Saturday morning.

Saturday night, following a midday drinking binge at a friend's housewarming party, we got home just in time to watch my Sooners win the Big XII championship. Bring on the Gators! About the only thing that went wrong last night was that Foodler and Gourmet Curry House really let us down. Craving some good Indian food, we jumped onto Foodler and made an order for Gourmet India. The menu of Gourmet India did not allow us to order single nan...instead we had to order catering portions, which meant 5 peices of nan. Whatever, we were hungry and we like Gourmet India. 5 minutes after I placed my order, I got a phone call telling me that Foodler was no longer working with Gourmet India until they fixed their menu...dammit! Fine, we went with the next Indian place on Foodler, which was Gourmet Curry House. Bad, bad, bad. The chicken tiki masala was bad and way too spicy. The vegatable samosa dry and had no flavor. The rice wasn't the typicaly Indian rice, more like Chinese takeout rice. The nan was good though. I give Gourmet Curry House a 1 out of 5.

Today, it snowed and was cold and we wanted some pho. Since we had to drive to run errands, we went to Dorchester for the Vietnamese food. We went to Sunrise Vietnamese Restaurant, a place we have been before. The pho was good, not great. Abby's broth was very different than mine, even though we ordered the same thing. Not sure if the combination of hoisen, sirachai and lime juice was that much different either. I give it a 2.5 out of 5. Worth giving a shot if you are in Dorchester.



Finally, my Top Chef recap. Basically...I'm not impressed. The breakfast amuse bouche was a good quickfire challenge, and while I agree with Leah that it is suppose to be only one bite, you shouldn't bring that up just to spite your competitors. Guess it worked in her favor because she won. (A note about Leah: They mention her great rack...I have yet to see it. Seriously, if you keep mentioning a great rack, you best show the audience the boys! Come on!) Rocco is a great guest judge, but he seemed off in this episode...not sure why. Probably just me though. The elimination challenge was kinda neat, but I agree with the bloggers on the interweb that that seemed more of a challenge for Next Food Network Star than top chef. Let's get back to the food people! I also didn't realize that Kathie Lee was on the Today show. (My sister Suzy said she's on the 4th hour...really? A 4th hour of Today show? WTF? Do we really need 4 hours of Today show?) Arianne, again showing nothing that would classify as being a top chef, did show some freaking smarts for understanding the time constraints of the challenge and made just a tomato salad. Jeff and Fabio both seemed to have done better dishes, and I even think Danny did a better job. I'm really sick of Arianne. And the dude who got kicked off, Alex, seriously, you are about to get married and you try to be on a competition? WTF? Either you are fully driven to win Top Chef, or you aren't. That didn't mean Melissa should have "thrown you under the bus"...but her point is valid. Alex should have been kicked off for crying after reading Richard's letter...I wonder if he was trying to apply to be part of Team Rainbow....And that brings me to the defensive Jamie. She seems like she has the chops to do something, but damn, you gotta take criticism a lot better. How many times in the past seasons did someone get kicked off earlier than they should have because of their bad attitude at the Judge's Table? Just stand up there, defend your dish and act like a professional.

Speaking of Rocco, there was an episode of Rocco Gets Real where he helped some lady make coddle (an Irish Stew). Abby's making that for dinner now. Will post pics of it later.

A couple of years ago I lived in the South End and I loved it. The South End is my favorite neighborhood in Boston. Parking is very doable, people are very friendly (very unlike the rest of Boston), and there are numerous restaurants and bars that range from extremely hip and trendy to casual. Pho Republique was a spot we would hit to start the night off, or if we were stumbling home along Washington St, to grab a night cap. Last month, after a year in Cambridge, I moved back to South End when we bought our new condo. We were both eager to start being more regulars at places that were only 2 blocks away from our place. Friday night, we started with Pho Republique.

In all the times we've ever come to Pho Republique, it was always for drinks, not food. I've never really looked at the food menu before, other than the fact that I was a little put off by the bowl of Pho listed for $13.50. Pho shouldn't cost more than $6. In Oklahoma, the average price is about $4. In Seattle, it's about $5. In Boston, because Boston loves jacking up prices for everything, the average price is probably a little more than $6. Pho, if you didn't know, is the quintessential dish of Vietnam. (I could write a lot more on pho, and I probably will in another post.) So, I realize that Pho Republique is not trying to be a traditional Vietnamese pho restaurant. It's a hip and trendy Asian fusion joint that is loved by locals and highly liked by reviewers. Since we wanted to start a food blog, we were going to finally eat at Pho Republique.

We walk in and immediately see something we haven't seen before: open seats at the bar. I was stoked. Every other time we've been here, we stood behind the lucky souls who had seats and had to avoid being hit by the servers carrying the large hot bowls of pho to the tables that run along the walls near the bar. We sit down and I ordered my typical starter drink, a Belvedere and tonic. Our bartender Griff is a pro. One of the best I've seen in Boston. He's friendly to everybody, talks to the strangers the same way he does the regulars, and makes the drinks nice and strong. (Side note, the couple on our right were talking sports and didn't know anything about anything! Normally my big mouth would lead me into trouble as I interject the correct sport facts as well as my own opinion trying to make them feel inferior and stupid about not knowing anything. I contained myself tonight...lucky them.) After Abby ordered her drink, some type of mojito I believe, we sat for a while looking over the menu.

The menu had about 7 or 8 appetizers, a few different types of pho (including crispy duck which sounded yummy) and some rice and noodle dishes that had more of a Thai and Chinese feel than Vietnamese. I was really hoping to try something that was traditional Vietnamese done on a different level. Looking at the menu, the only dish that fit that criteria was the pho, and while I might have looked over the price tag this one time, it was way too hot for me to eat a steaming bowl of hot broth and noodles. Abby and I asked Griff what was on the Pu Pu Platter ($24.50). He replied that there are usually 6 or 7 items with a few twists added from time to time. Today's twist was a cold, spicy noodle appetizer. The other items were the Tuna Sashimi Springrolls, the Shrimp Shumai, Gyozas, Pot Stickers, Candied Garlic Spareribs, and Crab Rangoon Eggrolls. It was served with three sauces: soy sauce, garlic say sauce, and plum sauce. In about 5 minutes after we ordered it, a waiter was right behind us asking us to move our drinks so he can place down the Pu Pu Platter. If anything in that bar other than the "33" beer was like Vietnam, this was it...the fast service was incredible. I noticed this same speedy service for our unknowledgeable sports fans sitting next to us as their Tuna Sashimi Springrolls came out a few minutes after they had ordered.

The special item noodles were very good cold lo mein style noodles with a nice liitle kick of spice. The crab rangoon eggrolls were good, but a little heavy. I probably couldn't order a whole plate of them on their own. I really, really enjoyed the tuna sashimi spring rolls, but I have one small complaint: spring rolls are typically not fried. This is a pet peeve of mine. For some reason a lot of people think spring rolls are synonymous with fried eggrolls. I dunno why this is, but I have an idea that the crappy Chinese take out places that people are so used to labeled their eggrolls as spring rolls. Well at most Vietnamese places, the un-fried, wrapped in rice paper rolls are Goi Cuan, and are labeled in English as spring rolls. Cha Gio, the deep fried cousin, is labeled as eggrolls. Nothing major, just my pet peeve. Anyway, back to the appetizers. The size of the tuna in the sashimi roll was incredible. The roll itself was the size of a small burrito. The rice was cooked perfectly and the fried outer shell was a nice complement to the sashimi. Very tasty, with and without the garlic soy sauce. The gyoza was somewhat sweet and was a pleasant surprise. The pot stickers and shumai were very typical of a Dim Sum restaurant, and this is not a complaint at all. Finally, the candied garlic spareribs were very tasty with it's sweet bar-b-que type of sauce. The meat was cooked perfectly, with the bones falling right off.

We didn't come to eat dinner, so we only had the Pu Pu Platter. We came to have a few drinks and relax after a long week. I had another Belvedere and tonic, then I moved onto one of their specialty drinks. Lisa was our bartender now, Griff was talking to some locals on the other end of the bar, and she suggested bourbon on the rocks. I'm not manly enough for that just yet, if ever. What caught my eye was the Lychee Martini. Not extremely original, because a lot of Asian fusion bars are serving something similar, but I really wanted some lychee to snack on. I asked Lisa for extra, and she obliged. The drink itself is gin, lychido, lychee and lime. Was refreshing and sweet, but I could probably only have one for a night.

Now for the big surprise...the bill came. In our heads we were thinking it would be over $95. Roughly $10 for each of our 6 drinks, and $25 for the pu pu platter. It was only $80. Which, while not extremely cheap at all, anytime I can get Belvedere and tonics for under $8, I'm a happy man.

I will eventually try more of the main entrees I promise, but overall, I love this bar. The bartenders are great, the drinks are great, everything about it is great. One of my favorite spots in Boston.

I give it 4 1/2 stars out of 5.