Mui Ngo Gai Vietnam _ Singapore Cuisine — Restaurant in Vancouver

The TRUTH vs the foodies…

I have been looking forward in trying this place ever since I heard there’s going to be a new ownership/ management change. And the restaurant is upscaling itself in terms of food, service and appearance?

Once again, never gotten around to coming here due to a busy business schedule and the holiday seasons. But after seeing so many foodies hyping up this place recently, I decided to put some effort into it and voila! Here I am!

This place is located on Kingsway and Victoria Drive (Directly across from McDonald’s). There are free street parkings available in the surrounding areas. Inside the restaurant is elegantly renovated; floral paintings as some part of the wall, nice warm colours, trendy British style furnishings.

Let’s see how accurate or if there is some truth to all the foodies hypes, here were the food I ordered;

Hot ginger tea & dried fruits. This herbal infusion idea didn’t work out too well in the tea cup, maybe a teapot would be more ideal. It was a mess in drinking this at the end. Peach lemongrass tea. It’s okay Crispy fried chicken wings. A little over fried and dry, not much taste besides the marinated taste. Okra with spring onion sauce. Pretty bland! The elders and vegetarians might like it. Special beef noodle soup. It came in a nice presentation bowl and that’s it. The soup base was weak, the cooked beef and briskets were tough and dry, the tendons were hard. Lack of everything for $23, it’s a failed, most pho places are better and cheaper than this. Pineapple fried rice. It’s okay, the prawns were a bit mushy and definitely missing that “wok hay” Bread. Normal little Vietnamese bread, good for dipping however menu said $3 but bill said $3.95? Authentic Singapore chilli crab (Dungeness bc crab). The crab meats were mushy, I assumed it wasn’t a live crab, it’s about 1.5lbs the most but got charged 2Lbs (if a restaurant is charging by the lbs, you got to show the customer the seafood before cooking), the preparation of the crab was done amateurishly. The only okay thing was the chilli sauce, okay not great. I don’t see which part of it was award winning? Definitely no chef cooked this dish, whoever cooked it can get on the next boat. For $49/lb, it’s a $98 failed right to the penny.

Overall, I was quite disappointed especially when I could see so much work and thoughts were put into this newly renovated place, yet it fell very short on all the hype up.

The service was friendly and quite attentive most of the time, but certain aspects could use a little improvement to reach that fine dining service level.

As for the food, they all definitely needed to be better especially for that price. Both of the signature dishes, the chili crab and special beef noodle, failed pretty badly. (Note: the ingredients being used and the food being served to the customers represents who you are as a chef.)

YES all the so called foodies and vloggers really over hyped up this place, bunch of amateurs. Have some respect for your audiences. Don’t tell me you guys’ integrity only worth the price of a free meal? (Facepalm)

I see the potential and vision of this restaurant, but to accomplish that vision, proper talents are required to give the customers that wow factor and “the experience” that they paid for. Those who’s willing to pay the higher end prices know their food pretty well.

Please accept this as a honest constructive criticism because I would love to see this business strive and succeed through honest feedbacks and adjust itself to the better. Wouldn’t it but nice to actually have a high end Vietnamese restaurant...

I go by this restaurant on a daily basis and just noticed this morning as it looked brand new and had a mix of Vietnamese and Singaporean food. I looked them up and was so excited to find Singapore Crab on the menu. I reserved thru Open Table for 7pm.

My husband I and were there bang on 7pm. We walked in and were blown away with the decor and how busy the restaurant was. We were really looking forward to a wonderful meal.

Another family arrived shortly after us. No one checked on us, greeted us nor could we make out where to check in.

Finally the bartender came to the entrance and started to seat the family who came in after us. They explained to the bartender that we had a reservation and were there before us.

We still waited and were finally shown to our table at 7.15pm. We received a menu at 7.25pm. The manager came back and took our order at 7.35pm. I asked for the spicy frog legs and was told it's in a porridge and I was fine with that and then the manager, said oh it's black frog legs. So after discouraging me from the dish, I asked her what are the popular dishes. She mentioned black pepper chicken, chili crab and the fried rice. We ended up ordering the Chilli Prawn, the Black Pepper Chicken and the Fried Rice. She was too rushed to take our drinks order, scowled at us the entire time and rushed off to get the food order in and clear another table. The fried rice arrived at 7.49pm just as we were getting up to leave in exasperation.

Not once did anyone check up on us. The servers avoided making eye contact. There were 2 bussers who were rushing around, the restaurant was full, the kitchen was putting out food, the servers were not serving it and it was left on the pass.

When our first dish arrived, the fried rice arrived, the platter was FREEZING cold. I took bite and the rice was COLD.

I asked to see the manager. The same woman who'd taken our order came back. I explained the timeline. She nodded her head, did not apologize, did not offer to warm up the dish or bring out our other dishes. I told her we had been really looking forward to the meal, were extremely disappointed with the manner we'd been treated and then to have to deal with cold food was not right. She really couldn't care less and we offered to pay for our one dish, got up and left.

I have NEVER ever had to get up and leave. I love Vietnamese food. I love eating on Kingsway and love eating out whether they are hole in the wall places or high end fine dining restaurants.

I have NEVER been treated so poorly, and really cannot review the food, as we never got to actually taste it.

The decor is beautiful. If you are there to LOOK at the restaurant, it's a 5! If you are there to eat, it's a 0.

The menu is based on FINE DINING pricing, the service here is below the McDonalds across the street.

There is parking available at the back of the restaurant.

There seems to be a language barrier here at this restaurant.

They need to have a greeter or let you know where to check in.

The guests who DID receive their food appeared to be enjoying it.

The waitstaff ALL looked very harried, no one had a smile, they could be SO much more. I can see what they are TRYING to do. They have ALOT of work to do to get there.

I will not be back. I would not recommend going here. This is the ONLY time I have EVER reviewed a restaurant as...

Update Aug 28, 2025: received a By Invitation Only to taste their upcoming new menu items. 3 favs were the (1) clams in coconut fish sauce (a bit salty til the fresh bread loaves were served), (2) chilli crab of course- as this is my must-have have, and (3) curry squid. The 4th was my daughter's fav: the fish porridge/congee! Again, wonderful evening where we guests were treated to free new menu items, authentic Vietnamese fruit drinks, and lots of door prizes!! The best one was 2 round-trip tix to Vietnam!! Update: October 10, 2024 - tried a variation of the old restaurant's 3-meats platter. Delicious!! Update: April 27, 2024 - asked the manager to surprise us with anything 'new' or something they are experimenting with. I got Roti chicken and sticky corn rice. Wow!! So good I took one home as take out for the next day! This is my current fav dish here (in addition to their Singapore sweet n sour & chilli Lobster)!! It's the last pic.

Updated January 6, 2024: this is now my family's Go To Restaurant as kids have things they like as do the adults! Asked them to surprise us with whatever is on their menu (some new stuff that they're experimenting on): Bun Bo Hue spicy noodle soup, wonton noodle soup, a leafy 'dumpling' and a rice egg grilled porkchops dish. DELICIOUS!! Updated: been there again and did takeout another. Food is awesome so changed my rating to 5 stars!! I know it's a Vietnamese and Singaporean restaurant but I was keenly excited about the Singaporean food as we don't have too many options in Vancouver!

I had the pineapple fried rice and Salty fish fried rice. The pineapple fried ricelooked more colourful but honestly, the salty fish dish tasted BETTER.

I really enjoyed the chilli crab. Super tasty to which I could have easily poured the sauce onto a bed rice and that would have been enough. Price is steep but quality makes it worth the price.

The GOOD: the Singaporean fried rice dishes give any Chinese fried rice dish a run for their money (except honeymoon fried rice as that's top tier). Also, the mango and avocado smoothies are a wonderful surprise.

The GREAT: chilli crab, hands down my fav here.

The MEH: wish the portions were BIGGER but I get it... food prices are sky high already and these speciality dishes have pricier ingredients. So just wishful thinking on my part :-)

Lastly, some argued the prices are too high for what you get... I can only say that I spent almost $20 at Jollibee's for a simple burger combo (yes with...