eating in

I love pho, rare beef pho (pho tai) to be exact.  Whenever I go to a Vietnamese restaurant and I decide to venture out and try something different, I inevitably regret straying from my mainstay order of pho tai.  Eating out, I like going for food that I wouldn’t normally make at home, and with pho broth taking hours to prepare and pho being dirt cheap, it’s one of my top choices for a quick meal outside the house.

In my neighbourhood, there are a number of Vietnamese pho places in old Chinatown.  My favourite place for pho tai is a tiny, unassuming place I’ve described as a shack.  Walking into Que Ling today, I was pleasantly surprised to see that they had renovated inside.  It’s a decent reno and I think I can finally bring my husband here without him questioning if he’ll get food poisoning (he says I have low standards, I just like ethnic hole-in-the wall places).

I’ve come with others before and we’ve sampled other dishes, and the best thing to eat here is the beef pho (other dishes were average).  The broth here doesn’t shy away from strong Asian flavours, including star anise, which I find is often muted in other pho places.  The broth is so flavourful, I was licking my lips as I drove home, trying to capture the taste of any remnant flavours.  Just don’t come here before you have an important meeting, as you’ll have pho breath for the rest of the day.