Pho Saigon Star-Pho to go, Pho to eat in, and other good stuff!

mmm-yoso is not on vacation.  mmm-yoso is the name of the blog.  Today, Cathy is blogging, Kirk is doing something else, most likely eating and photographing the food; it’s what we do.

Hi.  Cathy is back… so, one day a few weeks ago when it was raining, The Mister called me and was going to be leaving work earlier than I had expected and I hadn’t even thought about dinner yet. "Bring something home" I told him…figuring, since it was a Tuesday, he’d get one (or three) of the $1.99 Tuesday only specials from KFC. {There is a poster, on one window only of your local KFC- look for it.} {It is an exceptionally good deal-2 pieces with  one side and a biscuit}{which is why we usually get three meals}  {sorry, digressing} Instead, he brought home pho!

Now, you must understand,we never had actually done pho as a take out item before.  We have seen many people walking in and picking up at just about every place we were, noting how much toppings we could see were given in the bags (a lot of bean sprouts)…but still, we always just ate in.

In late  March we saw a coupon online  at Get 1 free dot com and we were going to meet there for dinner, but Pho Saigon Star wasn’t open yet.  However, that night when The Mister went, it was open- and joy of joys-they had fried shrimp tofu as a side order on the menu.

Pretty much the only places that have fried shrimp tofu are Convoy Noodle House and Pho Pasteur Anh Hong (the place with tablecloths in the mall with K Sandwiches).  I got it once with Bun and was hooked.  It is just a shrimp paste inside of tofu skin that is fried.  Crunchy/crispy and the shrimp paste tastes like shrimp mixed with some sugar and fish sauce… it is just something I crave.

Oh, and as a side (or "appetizer" as I like to call it) it’s only $3.

Oh, here is the menu, along with a photo of  Tip Top’s paw as she waited for a precise moment to walk over it. For some reason, the website does not have prices. OH-THE NEATEST PART…look closely (click onto any photo and it will enlarge) or, go to the website- The menu is written in Vietnamese, English AND Spanish. I have never seen it this way, but it is neat. Therefore the fried shrimp tofu is, in Vietnamese: them chao tom hoac tau hu ky and in Spanish: adicional tofu de camarones.

So, anyhow, The Mister brought home Pho Tai (raw steak)(filete raro). (Small $ $5.50). Thinly sliced raw steak that cooks in the pho broth.  The broth was rich, slightly oily, and not too overly anise-y/5 Spice-y.  It was still very hot, to the point that when the meat was dropped in, a nice boiling effect came up from the soup.  We live about 7 miles from this place, with quite a few lights between here and there.   As you can see, the accompaniments of basil,  jalapeños, one lime wedge and sprouts was plenty.  The noodles were under the raw meat in the take out box.  This was a *lot* of food.  The large bowl is only 50¢ more and easily could feed two people. 

We got an order of the fried spring rolls (cha ngo)(taquitos fritos de puerco) ($5.50) which also came with a fair amount of accompaniments-there could have been more mint-  There was enough sauce though.  Some chili is in the sauce, so there is a kick to it.  The filling is quite a  meaty ground pork as well as having daikon and carrot in it.  The ‘to go’ packaging was perfect- they cut off a corner of the Styrofoam box, so that the thin egg roll skins stayed crispy.

Then, my meal- Bun.  How I so crave Bun sometimes.  Inside a restaurant, it is served in a large bowl with the lettuce/cabbage/basil/mint ‘salad’ on the bottom, noodles over it, then the toppings, shredded carrots, cucumbers, peanuts and whatever topping (I have had it with the fried shrimp tofu, at Ahn…#123D I think) this time, BBQ pork (thit nuong)(fideos de arroz con puerco de la barbacoa),

($5.99). It came in this Styrofoam take out box, and I had to dump it into a mixing bowl (as we had to do with the pho also) so as to get all the flavors mixed in…the noodles are under all of that BBQ’d pork which was *excellent* in flavor and cooking.  The salad as nice and crisp and flavorful with the herbs in it.

So, the other  day, we were hungry.  It seems to happen a lot.  I thought we should try Pho Saigon Star again and eat in.  We were the *only* White people. This is always a good sign.  This restaurant is located where Friars Road turns into Mission Gorge, near Kaiser Hospital, in the curved strip mall with the Starbucks, Jamba Juice, Petco, Coco’s, Rubio’s, Einsteins, Carl’s Jr.  You know where.  You’ve seen it.  

Very nice, clean interior.  Very friendly young men waiting on the tables.  Very much family owned and run.  everyone seemed to know everyone. … and there I was, White Girl with Camera.  Oh well,  they never asked me what the heck I was doing.  It seemed that whenever they came around to fill up water, each person did ask us if we had any questions and  were willing to give us information.

We decided to try the papaya salad with shrimp and pork ($5.99)  It came with the sauce on the side.  Unusual, but we saw the table next to us get it that way also.  The sauce had a good amount of chilis in it, and we put the sauce over the portion we had placed onto our plates and it tasted great.  I saw a lady at the table next to us adding sugar to the sauce.   I thought it was fine.  I tasted the papaya, shrimp and pork without any sauce and each ingredient had a good, fresh flavor on its own.

When The Mister was picking up that one day, he saw someone having curry and he had wanted to try it.  He got rice with chicken curry (com cari ga)(arroz con curry de pollo) ($5.99).  You could get it with noodles or French bread also, same price. The curry was sweet, with coconut milk and not very hot (spicy hot I mean). It had an excellent flavor, the chicken pieces were dark meat; flavorful.  There were potatoes and hot onions and cilantro served with it.  The sauce was not overly thick.  it was good, tasty, but not  like a Japanese curry sauce, which is thicker.  You needed to put the rice into the curry to eat it.

I decided to try Sir Fry crispy noodles, with everything ($7.50) (mi xao gio thap cam) (never mind Spanish). You can get crispy egg noodles, soft egg noodles, pan fried noodles or rice… with beef, chicken, pork, shrimp, broccoli, celery, bok choy, carrots, mushrooms, onions, cilantro…and a nice brown sauce.  Great flavors- and a *lot* of food.

But, we got dessert anyhow: the three colored one: pudding/sweet bean/green agar with coconut milk and ice ($3)

Nice and fresh.  We were asked if we wanted it with our meal or as dessert.  We asked to wait and the nice Young Man brought it out when he saw we were finishing up everything else.  The pudding (yellow part) was wonderfully flavored, the beans were not mushy and had good flavor, the green agar strips were..chewy…and the coconut milk was *so* nice.  It was a perfect ending.

Oh- the tea.  It is $1.50 per pot.  It is Jasmine.  It is loose tea with a tea ball inside the pot.  It is great.

..and, the weird thing.  The ‘muzak’ was in Asian style- those echoing stringed instruments.  But there were only 3 songs that kept repeating and one of them was *definitely* "Numb" by Linkin Park.  Every subtle note of it.  I kind of  found that strange….just an observation. 

Pho Saigon Star 10450 Friars Road , Suite E San Diego 92120 (619)640-2985 Open 7 days 9 a.m.- 9 pm.  website