Vietnamese duo - Pho Convoy in CV + return to Pho Hung Calli

This was one of those Fridays where I didn't want to cook...

or drive far, thus the closest VN place to us...

was our dinner destination that evening. The folks working there are always super nice and friendly.

We usually get the spring rolls (TC's choice) and the fried egg rolls (my choice). I noticed they've gotten rather stingy with the vegetable plate. Those lettuce leaves are HALVED, WTF. And there is only ONE mint sprig.   Poo to this.

TC's  bun with egg roll, which looks decent but plain from the top...

but when mixed, we could see that the restaurant seemed to be "cutting corners". There was barely any chopped lettuce, mint, or carrots. This was it. This was not after TC ate half. This was it.   Sigh of disappointment.

I got something different that night, the Chicken roll. Same as a spring roll but substitute the pork and shrimp with marinated chicken. It was okay but not too exciting. I was beginning to think this place was going downhill.

Bert's Pork Banh Mi - He's never ordered a banh mi here before so he was surprised to see it served this way, deconstructed.

Maybe they want you to feel like you've had a hand in customizing your sandwich?


Bert ended up liking his sandwich but would have preferred to have had it already prepared for him.

On another Friday night, we ventured to the west side of CV. Bert hadn't been to Pho Hung Cali yet, so here we were...


Fried rolls (with AN ABUNDANCE OF LETTUCE AND MINT, so TAKE THAT Pho Convoy!) and fresh spring rolls. Both were delicious.


Bert and TC also had pho which are not pictured. I mean, pho is pho. It all looks the same to me so just picture it in your minds.

This Shrimp salad, however, was something new that we tried that night. The nuoc cham was on the side, which was nice, so that way, the salad wasn't totally drowned. I liked the presentation where you can see every ingredient. The cucumber slices were also thinly sliced lengthwise which was interesting texture wise. This was a very light and refreshing salad and something I'd order again.



There are too many past visits to Pho Convoy (it's our go-to place since it's so close by) so no links here.

Previous visit to Pho Hung Calli:
March 2016

The restaurant was pretty busy that evening. The men working here are really nice and attentive. There are a lot of workers here!  I remember reading a disgusted review on yelp that same evening that the reviewer saw an older lady working there who seemed to be "saving" the lettuce leaves off the plates. Well now. Hopefully she was not doing what he thought she was doing, re-suing the lettuce. Nevertheless, we laughed it off and took our chances. Our lettuce leaves didn't seem to be used! I'm still alive and didn't keel over.  Sometime's it's funny reading the shit people write on that site.  So far, we've liked the service and the food...