Pho Dau Bo — Restaurant in Kitchener

We went on a weekend afternoon, it wasn’t too busy and we got a seat right away. They gave us our tea and menus when we sat down.

After we ordered, our food came pretty quickly. We got #452 BÚN BÒ HOẶC HEO XÀO XẢ ỚT which is Stir fried beef with lemon grass & hot pepper on vermicelli ($12), you can also ask for pork instead. I think we were surprised when this dish came out because lemon grass, from our previous experience, didn’t look like that. It was good but just not what we expected.

We also got #215 BÚN BÒ HUẾ which is thicker vermicelli noodles with beef, pork blood pudding in spicy soup ($12). I’ve had better versions of this dish, the soup was not as rich as other places i’ve tried. It just seemed like they had the pho broth and added some extra spices to it to make it spicy, which is not what the broth should be. It was still okay.

The portion sizes for both dishes were quite big though so we were very full afterwards.

Finally, we got the #806 Mango milkshake ($5). From what I remembered in the past, this drink was very thick and creamy. So delicious, but when we got this, it was super sugary and icy. Not what I remembered it used to be. I wouldn’t recommend this unless you are expecting mango slush.

Our waiter was kind and I was able to get pho for takeout which came out very quickly. I would recommend the pho over these dishes. My family and I usually come here for dinner but this time was just a bit of a miss! Still recommend this...

This is my favourite Vietnamese restaurant, hands down! The food is very authentic and you can taste the quality of ingredients. I don’t live in the city but I always make a stop here whenever I can. I had the pho, rice rolls, and spring rolls. The broth is what makes the pho, and boy, they nailed it here! Their pho, especially in cold weather will hug you and literally rebuild your soul. The broth is so beefy and flavourful that you don’t need to add Hoisin or other sauces. Doesn’t taste at all MSGy either. The pho comes in three sizes, S, M, L and they are all great portions for the price. The appetizer rice roll with ground pork is really great. Again, nice portion size and very tasty. The outside of the rice roll is thin but holds together nicely. It also comes with a pile of julienned veggies to add as a topping. The spring rolls are fantastic! I do have a #1 title holder for spring rolls in London, but as far as spring rolls go, this place would be #2. Spring rolls here are big and sooo meaty, you’ll never want to have one of those other spring rolls with mostly bean sprouts. My bill for the three items (all small size orders) came to $20.60 after tax! Come on! Can’t beat that anywhere! The entrance doesn’t look like much, but it’s the food that you’ll be coming back for...

As a restaurant owner myself, I feel very bad to rate another restaurant so poorly. At the same time, it speaks to how extremely disappointed I was with this garbage experience. I tried out this particular Pho Dau Bo due to their many great reviews - over 1,000 now on Google. The food was ok, however we found the staff to be rather unfriendly. That in itself is not a big deal but the real problem was that we found a sharp piece of steel wool inside one of our spring rolls! One of the individuals in our party discovered it when it stabbed her in the roof of her mouth! Unbelievable. Even more surprising was that the wait staff were not apologetic whatsoever. They just acknowledged that it happened and then offered to give us a meagre discount on the spring rolls alone (charge us for a Medium rather than the Large which we ordered). The owner seemed to observe the entire situation and did not make any effort to apologize or otherwise make up for this serious violation. Can you believe to find a piece of sharp metal in some food that you order and the restaurant staff is no nonchalant about it? Still felt obligated to give a 15% tip despite what a terrible experience this was. Won't be back unless I'm...