Pho Hiep Grill Chateau Happy Hour

Sometime last month, we three went to Pho Hiep in Eastlake. We had a coupon and Bert was excited to try his new favorite beer, Chau Tien again.  Check out my previous post here. That last visit was their first day of bar service...

I really like this fountain in their foyer...

This time we got to sit in one of the booths!!!

If you look up, you can see this...

Here was the Happy Hour coupon we wanted to use - $5 off anything in the menu (minimum purchase $25)...

We checked out their appetizers which really weren't that much cheaper during Happy Hour. Maybe .75 cheaper. Here is a WARNING - which kind of sucks ass. See those happy hour prices? Well, turns out they are only valid if you SIT AT THE BAR. And...since we weren't sitting at the bar,  no dice dooods.

Fuckit fk fk! I think they should put that somewhere on the coupon because we already planned what we were going to order! But oh well, that is life, eh. I also have to mention that our waitress that night remembered me and Bert from our previous outing the month before. Remember my old post where I wrote that I wanted my crepe without pork? She remembered that along with the drinks we ordered that night too. . She probably thought, "It's that bitch who made me take back the banh xeo!" I hope she didn't pull a "Waiting" move or a "Horatio Sanz special from "Road Trip"!  Actually, she was quite nice but I was taken aback that she remembered me. It's not like I go here a lot. This was only our 4th time.

Now I ordered the Goi Tom Thit (Pork and shrimp salad) because I wanted to try their version. It didn't have "mit" (green jackfruit). The portion was really small and it did not come with those huge toasted sesame rice cracker chips. Nevertheless, the salad was all right - it had sweet, sour and salty flavors along with the different textures from the crushed peanuts, shrimp, and pork.

We also ordered fresh spring rolls

This was the Ga Chien (crispy sweet and sour chicken wings). I guess eating at Que Huong really spoiled us. We liked QH's fish sauce wings (and their portions and prices) and these didn't even compare. They were wings that were covered with that Sweet Chili Sauce for chicken that you can buy at the Asian stores. The wings were still tasty though!

 

Here's a close up of that wing...

This was the biggest disappointment of all. They were out of the Chau Tien that night. In fact, we spoke to Kevin's wife (forgot her name; Kevin is the owner BTW) and she said that they did not expect the positive response to this beer. Initially they ordered only two cases of it from the distributor thinking no one would really order it. Now it looks like they're going to have to order waaaaay more because it's a popular choice. So...since there was no Chau Tien, he ended up getting the Newcastle Pale Ale.

TC got the Child's Meal (one of the versions) - Pho with Brisket. I had to ask the waitress to bring a plate of herbs because they DO NOT SERVE HERBS with the children's menu. WTF! I think they are dumbing it down for kids but then maybe they feel that most kid's won't eat the herbs. Man, what a boring ass meal if there aren't any herbs or sprouts in your pho.

Since we were still hungry, we ordered the pork rolls - Vietnamese pork sausage with vegetables and a fried green onion wrapped in a crunchy spring roll skin wrapped in the soft rice paper. The sauce was unusual (to me) - pumpkin sauce with peanuts on top. I thought the crunchy rolled green onion stalk was a bit of a distraction. As much as I like crunchy foods, I didn't like it in the spring roll because it made it too hard to chew, plus once you bit into the green onion, it got pulled out, leaving only an empty crisp inside.

Next time we go here (sans TC), we'll have to sit at the bar!