We'd just attended our uncle's funeral service and didn't want to go to VIP Oriental buffet afterwards, so...
we went here instead. First thing's first, our "uncle" was not really related to us by "blood" but was a very close family friend. In fact, when my dad first brought my mother over to the U.S. in 1968 after they got married, my uncle and his wife were kind enough to let my parents stay in their apartment in Point Loma until my dad could secure a place at the Navy Housing. Later, my uncle and auntie moved to the navy housing close to my parents' place. While many of the husbands were away at sea (over on ships, or in my dad's case, under in submarines), the wives kept each other company and took care of each others' children and even taught each other Filipino recipes.There are some photos in my mom's album of all four of them (plus my baby cousin) in Disneyland at night. I was in utero; my mom still pregnant with her firstborn.
While at his viewing the night before, I saw many uncles and aunties I hadn't seen for quite awhile. One uncle actually 'demanded' for me to do this respectful hand gesture (the 'mano po' in which you bring an elder's hand and touch it to your forehead) to my godfather (my actual godfather). OMG, it was as if he was treating me like a child. Cripes! I politely smiled and told him that I already greeted my Ninong. I wasn't going to do the hand thing. Anyhow, it turns out that the demanding uncle was a particular one who had attended my baptism and whose daughter later became my student, years later. Small world, eh. I asked my dad why he wasn't in the photos from my baptism party and my dad replied that all of the menfolk were all out in the back drinking!
So enough about that. There were no tables available, so we opted to sit at the electric blue lit bar. We got an order of shrimp spring rolls as well as nem nuong (a first for my sis who loved it), and a banh xeo to share.
The sauce isn't as good as Brodard's, but I like Pho Hiep Grill Chateau's version of banh xeo here a lot! It's very crisp and tasty.
More recently, TC and I were here with one of her friends. They'd just watched a movie at the mall and I took them here for lunch. We had two orders of spring rolls, one vegetarian for the girls (the friend just "turned" vegetarian, mind you; we'll see how long that lasts) and one nem nuong, which was just for me. TC ordered a bun with grilled pork (which had a wierd texture I didn't like); her friend got the "mock fish".
That "mock fish" sure looked wierd. It was supposed to resemble a slice of fish. It was soy shaped like fish and vaguely tasting like fish, but not. It was covered with a sweet and sour sauce. Her friend, KDD at all of her vegetables first before trying out the fake fish. She let me have a taste and yeah, it wasn't quite the real deal.
Note to self, never get the mock fish or any other mock meat. If you're going to eat vegetarian, you may as well eat vegetable based dishes instead of crap that attempts to look and taste like the stuff you're trying to avoid.
Previous visit to Pho Hiep Grill Chateau:
September 2014
I'm still thinking when we can go up to Orange County to have those nem nuong at Brodard's once more....sigh.
2 comments:
I don't quite get the "mock" meat stuff. Seems like they would have to do a lot of processing to make "mock" stuff and put in weird additives to make it taste like whatever they're trying to mock.
Interesting story about the guy trying to get you to the "respect" thing. I'd never heard of that but I don't think that's very surprising. Hah.
Mock meat is so wrong and yeah, just what exactly goes in that shit?
The respect thing, the 'mano po', I didn't grow up doing it since we didn't have a lot of relatives I could do it to, but I will occasionally do it to really really old Filipino friends of my parents, the ones who are straight outta the PI. They liked that stuff.
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