2023 has barely started…and we’re already drowning in a tidal wave of madcap National Food Days!
The year’s very first day, Jan. 1, was National Bloody Mary Day. (Which considering how much you celebrated the end of 2022, might or might not be something you can rationally face.) Jan. 2 was National Buffet Day – though why, I cannot fathom. It also was National Cream Puff Day. Jan. 3 was National Fruitcake Toss Day, whatever that might be.
The month continues with National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day, National Spaghetti Day, National Whipped Cream Day, National Tempura Day, National Curried Chicken Day, National Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day and more. Many more.
Finally, on the last day of January, it will be National Pho Day – a day that, not long ago, would have been a puzzlement to just about anyone who wasn’t Vietnamese.
The first thing you have to know is that pho is not pronounced “foe” (as in “fee-fi-fo-fum”). Rather, it’s pronounced “fuh.” You want to demonstrate that you didn’t just emerge from the primordial slime, you gotta say “fuh” when ordering your pho.
The next thing to know is that pho – like Jewish chicken soup – can come in sundry forms. It’s always built around broth, rice noodles, herbs and usually meat, beef or chicken. But not always. You go to a vegetarian Vietnamese restaurant, there won’t be any meat. You go to a modernist restaurant, you might find pho made with shrimp, with pork or with lamb. Here in SoCal, it’s all right. This is the land of culinary reinterpretation.
As with the taco, pho is an essentially simple creation that’s been re-created in a multitude of ways – though goodness knows there are many classic versions to be found in Los Angeles and Orange counties, which are said to have the largest Vietnamese population outside of Vietnam. And, like the taco, the origin of pho is open to dispute – though noodle soup with meat is such a global concept, pho could have originated anywhere, at any time in history.
What’s not open for dispute is that it’s the national dish of Vietnam. Pho is generally believed to have originated in the north, largely through street vendors, and then it was spread worldwide by Vietnam War refugees.
Broadly speaking, there are also two versions of pho – the Hanoi style, and the Saigon style – which differ depending on the width of the noodles, the sweetness of the broth, and the use of herbs and spices.
Culinary historians have suggested that beef was first used in pho as a result of the French taste for meat. On days that beef wasn’t available, chicken was the protein of choice.
Everyday street vendors could be found carrying incredibly heavy mobile pho kitchens on wooden poles. One of the poles supported a cauldron over a wood fire. Hanging from the other were noodles, spices and serving bowls. The vendors were always men, all of whom wore the same felt hats called a “mu pho.”
This wasn’t so much a dish as it was a ritual. And it still is.
That said, vendors selling pho on the streets of SoCal aren’t really a thing. Fortunately, it’s served at plenty of local Vietnamese restaurants, where the pho will warm you on the chilliest of days and inspire perspiration to cool you on the hottest – with a taste of global culinary history in every bowl.
With that, here are the places I turn to when pho is called for:
Vinh Loi Tofu
11818 South St., Cerritos; 562-403-3388, www.vinhloitofucerritos.com
The menu tells us the cooking at Vinh Loi will lead us to “A better way of life,” as we “indulge in authentic, flavorful Southeast Asian cuisine prepared from fresh ingredients and bold spices.” Which is what Vinh Loi is very good at.
Putting aside my mixed opinions about tofu in particular, and vegan meat substitutes in general, this is fine chow – a small selection of dishes, drawn from the extensive world of Vietnamese (and to a lesser degree, Thai) cooking.
The menu is about as minimalist as a Vietnamese menu ever is. Rather than dozens of pho noodle soup variations, each with a different combination of meat, there’s just one – the Ironman Pho (love the name!), a vegetable broth, with rice noodles, tofu and “beef” slices, topped with onions (both white and green), cilantro, beansprouts, basil, lime and jalapeño.
It’s one of five soups on the menu (a very busy section) – a lemongrass and chili soup called Kevin #1, a curry soup (my personal favorite), a noodle-less vegetable soup, and a wheat noodle ramen soup, which comes with fried shallots (an unexpectedly elegant touch).
The appetizers lean toward the rolls, also five of them, one of which is made with “ham,” another with “beef,” and a third with “chicken” that’s got a kind of spongy texture. It’s improved by the good peanut sauce that comes with all the rolls.
Peanut sauce is happily vegan, though it does open up a world of allergies. Which is why there’s a section on the menu headed “Peanut Allergies,” detailing the availability of coconut sauce, sesame soy sauce, gluten-free soy, or something called VL Dressing, for those who can’t eat peanuts. So many dietary hoops to jump through there – vegan and peanut-free and gluten-free.
And the concern continues into the “Dry Noodles,” where we find that those with a wheat/gluten allergy can substitute gluten-free noodles, clear mung bean noodles, rice noodles or shredded zucchini, along with a gluten-free sauce. Dining out these days can be so tricky!
And for those on an old-fashioned diet, there are salads as well, where the vegetables are clearly vegetables. Though you do have a choice of various vegan meats to go in the salads. I chose vegan meat to taste. But I put it on the side, and stuck with the salad. It tasted fresh and real. It hadn’t been manipulated. For me, it defines, “A better way of life.” A vegetable that’s just…a vegetable.
Rice String Noodle Shack
11803 South St., Cerritos; 562-210-8246, www.ricestringns.com
Rice String is an offshoot of Phnom Penh Noodle Shack, on Cherry Avenue at the edge of Cambodia Town in Long Beach. By contrast, Rice String sits on the south end of Artesia’s Little India, situated at the point where Pioneer Boulevard meets South Street.
But where Phnom Penh qualifies as a “shack,” Rice String is the perfect restaurant for those nervous about trying something new. First, there are five types of noodles – thin rice, flat rice, thin egg, thick egg, and an egg and rice noodle mix. Then, you’ve got to decide if you want those noodles in any of 10 noodle soups, made with long- and slow-cooked pork and beef bones (or vegetables, if you want).
The Phnom Penh Noodles are listed as the “House Special” – your choice of noodles with pork four ways (sliced, ground, stomach and liver, along with shrimp). It’s an intense soup, Vietnamese pho on steroids, garnished with cilantro, scallions and garlic, with lots of sauces available to trick it up.
If that’s a bit too porky for you, try Noodle Soup #3, made with sliced beef and beef balls. Or, perhaps, the soups with fish, with chicken, with shrimp, or with mixed seafood – shrimp, fish cakes, surimi crab, squid, scallops and mussels.
And though noodle soup is the heart and soul of Rice String, it’s not the only noodly option. Consider, for instance, the Me-Ka-La, a dish of rice noodles, “three layer” pork, lettuce, cucumber, mint, pickled cabbage, bean sprouts, peanut and a hard-boiled egg flavored with the house-made garlic fish sauce. Though, for the record, it comes with a side dish of pork bone soup.
If you want beef, rather than pork, try the Ba-Bong, which is pretty much the same dish, but with stir-fried beef and onions, rather than “three layer” pork. Noodles are stir-fried as well, in the Me-Ka-Tang, the Loat Cha (made with tiny “teardrop” noodles, and the Student Noodles – so named because they’re filling and cheap. Though no more filling than anything else on the menu.
There’s also a selection of rice noodle dishes, though the noodles are too tempting to give in to what I think of as a Southeast Asian breakfast dish. More tempting are the three breads, which are remarkably, even mind-bogglingly good – a breadstick, a bread round and a meat-filled pastry that looks an awful lot like a South American empanada.
And that leads us into a secondary menu of dishes that are too much if you’re ordering noodles, but just fine if you need a smaller snack – or are eating with a good group of heavy forks.
The Shack Wings are about as good as wings get; they put our own Buffalo wings to shame, with their coating of shallots, jalapeños and fried garlic, their side of pickled veggies, and their dip of fish sauce with peanuts. Yeow!
The egg rolls and spring rolls come with the same sides. There’s a fried Cornish game hen. And a bunch of fried rice dishes that kill.
Pho Daily
5345 Long Beach Blvd., Long Beach; 562-336-1572, www.phodailyla.com
Pho Daily is a Vietnamese destination (with another branch in Gardena) in the heart of the Long Beach Cambodian community – Cambodia Town, though there’s not much of a town to speak of.
But no matter where Pho Daily was situated, it would still stand out, simply because it has a menu several times larger than those found at most soup and noodle shops. The pho dishes (rice noodle or egg noodle) total 31 possibilities. Which can be amended with 29 add-ons, and 20 appetizers. Along with seven stir-fried noodle dishes, 11 vermicelli dishes, 18 rice dishes, and 11 vegan options – and you’ve got one heck of a big menu. With not a tortilla in sight.
Then again, there’s a lot of beers (28 of them), Korean fruit wines and soju, fruit shakes, juices and teas. Which may relate more to the Gardena branch, which is open till 4 in the morning – a decidedly post-evening morning destination.
Our own in Long Beach closes at a more modest 9 in the evening. But it does open at 10 in the morning, for those who crave pho for breakfast. And, really, why not?
Pho at Pho Daily is the Vietnamese version of Jewish chicken soup – therapy for whatever ails you, a happy pot of long-brewed soup stock, long-cooked veggies, a tangle of noodles, sundry herbs and spices, and even more sundry meats (rare steak, well-done brisket, flank steak, brisket point, beef tendon, tripe and meatballs), all of which show up in the top-of-the-menu combo. From there, fans can mix and match the meats as they wish. Or shift gears to chicken, barbecue pork, oxtail, wontons, roast duck, deep-fried tofu, shrimp, squid and fish.
There’s an option for noodles and soup only, for those of an ascetic bent. But for me, it’s in for a penny, in for a pound. I like everything in my pho that will fit.
The stir-fried noodles follow this formula as well, with numerous permutations, the most fun of which is the choice between crispy egg noodles and soft egg noodles. It’s like one of those mood rings they used to sell in one-with-the-earth shops – whether you get soft or crispy speaks of your mood that day. Maybe.
There are rice dishes as well, and lots of them. Plenty of vegan dishes too. Though it doesn’t seem hard to at least turn the rice and the noodles vegan – just pass on the meat.
And I do have a fondness of the score of appetizers at Pho Daily – particularly the Sriracha hot chili chicken wings and deep-fried pork wontons, the Hainanese chicken and shaken beef with french fries.
Pho Little Saigon, aka Pho Redbo
11700 South St., Artesia; 562-402-7888, www.pholilsaigon.com
You go to a restaurant with “pho” in its name for a hot steaming bowl of, you know, pho.
And, when you’re here, include the duo of chicken noodle soups, and there are 25 pho variants – well above the average, offering an option for anyone, including those who want their pho meatless. (The vegetable pho also comes with tofu, to give it more heft, I suppose.)
The pho is mostly beef-based – filet mignon, brisket, trip, tendon, beef balls, flank, and beef charbroiled, well done and rare. But there are options, one of which is a seafood pho, a sort of Vietnamese bouillabaisse, made with shrimp, crab meat, squid, fish balls and fish cake.
The two chicken noodle soups aren’t exactly what you’ll find in a deli, though there’s a near overlap in the sliced white meat chicken pho, and less in the chicken and shrimp pho (for the record, a very fine combination).
You can also opt for traditional broth, or spicy broth in the style of the City of Hue. Or just spice it yourself with the sauces on every table. From there on, it’s much tasty fun to move into the appetizers, 10 of them, including the requisite spring rolls with pork and shrimp, and my favorite charbroiled pork rolls, which have a tasty burn on them (a dish that’s even better when you use some of the hoisin like dipping sauce the rolls come with).
There’s a choice of banh mi sandwiches, which I don’t think of as an appetizer – order the beef, chicken or pork banh mi, with a choice of cilantro mayo or Sriracha mayo, and your chance of needing anything more to eat is minimal. Maybe a steamed bun with marinated pork belly, and you’ll be more than done.
But the apps are just opening acts for most diners, who’ll then spin into any of the seven “House Special Noodles” – complex mixes of many ingredients, served both small and large, including spicy Hue style noodles, made with beef shank, tendon, ham hocks, pork patties and pork blood.
If that’s a bit porkish for you, try the beef stew with rice noodles, a dish that would be right at home in any number of cuisines. Or the madcap Dry Seafood Combo in Oyster Sauce, packed with shrimp, squid, fish cakes, fish balls, char siu pork, chicken and quail eggs. With a side of broth, it’s a lot of goodness in one dish.
There are more noodles – 10 thin vermicelli models are fine for those who want their noodles a bit less demanding. I was well cheered by the 16 rice plates, which like the noodles, come with a side of broth. I couldn’t get enough of the charbroiled chicken over rice, which can be ordered with or without an egg on the side. And which was nicely washed down with the Vietnamese iced coffee.
Cyclo Southeast Asian Noodles
754 Pacific Coast Hwy., Long Beach; 562-494-1230, www.cyclonoodles.com
At Cyclo Southeast Asian Noodles, you order at the counter, fill several plastic cups with condiments from an area to the right of the counter, and then find a table inside or out.
If you want, to the left of the counter, there’s a glass-fronted refrigerator with coconuts in it, for those who want to increase their sense of being in Southeast Asia. There are sundry soft drinks as well. But mostly, there are noodles – and dishes that go very well with noodles.
The noodles are divided into Cambodian Noodle Soup and Vietnamese Noodle Soup, with soupless Thai noodles under the heading, “Fried dishes.” And actually, not all the noodle soup dishes involve soup. It’s a bit of a mishmash. But not one that should cause panic and disarray.
For the most part, those of us of the noodle persuasion know the dishes. The issue, as I said, is winnowing them down to just what it is that will satisfy at that particular moment.
As a point of departure, you should certainly order several of the very tasty, and very appealing, appetizers – crispy egg rolls filled with translucent noodles and veggies, shrimp and chicken spring rolls, intensely flavored beef on a stick (with a memorable papaya and carrot salad on the side), a deep-fried meatball called a “beef ball pop,” and a churro-like bread called ja-kwai, that’s soft and puffy and kind of silly – but also good, and maybe even essential to the meal.
And then, it’s noodle time, built around thin rice noodles in a tasty broth, with so many accessory ingredients, the noodles can get a bit lost. Lost in the swell of ground pork, sliced pork, dried shrimp, fish balls, shrimp and squid in Phnom Penh Noodles, flavored further with cilantro and crushed fried garlic. Or lost in the sliced beef, beef tripe and beef balls in the Beef and Beef Ball Noodles – all dishes with roots in Cambodia.
And if it’s Vietnamese pho that appeals, there are seven to choose from, including a house special with sliced steak, flank steak, beef balls, tripe and tendon – an homage to beefiness.
If soup isn’t your dish of choice, there’s a fine chicken salad with crispy noodles – you can get away from the soup here, but not from the noodles. There’s a cold noodle salad too, and a chicken lettuce wrap that comes with crispy glass noodles. Like I said, noodles linger almost everywhere.
And should you have a need for those aforementioned Thai noodles, under “Fried dishes,” you’ll find our old friend pad Thai, along with pad see ew, and a pad see ew variant called mee ka tang.
Whatever the names, the descriptions on the menu are good, and the dishes are very satisfying, especially for the money.
A lot of locals show up for takeout orders – there’s often a row of bags waiting behind the counter. And if you need to pass a bit of time waiting for your food, there are several flavors of boba, along with powerful strong Thai iced tea and Thai iced coffee.
Merrill Shindler is a Los Angeles-based freelance dining critic. Email mreats@aol.com.
