Alysa's Pho and Banh Mi ( QUADRA LOCATION ) — Restaurant in Victoria

I ordered here for the first time this evening. With such a high rating online I’d hoped I’d found a Gem. However I was sadly mistaken and me myself will never return to this location. I ordered two pork and prawn salad rolls with an extra peanut sauce. A banh mi sub with chicken. As well as just a beef broth.

The few pros were the sub was very flavourful with a nice soft bun. Good portion of chicken and properly filled with veggies.

Second and only other pro was the beef broth did have some very pleasant flavour.

Cons, many pieces of chicken in my sub were fatty and chewy. The salad rolls come with that disgusting sliced pork that resembles some weird deli sliced meat instead of just nicely thin sliced real pork roast. As well as their peanut sauce wasn’t bad, but also wasn’t what I would call good either. Compared to proper tasting peanut sauce this stuff was extra salty not really peanut like at all and was also really quite runny. And last but not least the customer service was really also not great. When I called my order in I didn’t realize the menu online wasn’t their correct menu which we sorted out when I arrived and they were actually pretty good about that. However when I simply asked if I could put a squirt of sauce in my broth and some chili flakes I was rudely blocked and was told we don’t do that here. You got take out so you take it, we don’t do that here he said once more. I was quite surprised considering how much I’d just spent on my take out including a decent tip for just grabbing me my meal. I didn’t eat in store so they didn’t really have to give me much customer service but I tipped like I had eaten in restaurant. Actually one more last and final rude move was providing no spoon or napkins or even asking if I needed any. I’ve realized many places aren’t giving out cutlery anymore unless actually needed but I got broth so it makes sense I would maybe need it so would have just actually been nice if they’d asked. All together not a grand experience at a new restaurant and I personally won’t return and would not highly recommend them. I do wish them well in the future and hope they work out some negative issues within their...

I don’t normally write negative review unless the experience is very bad. For my particular first visit during my Victoria weekend trip, I was little bit surprised on how “normal” the foods are. Overall I would rate my experience a solid 3 stars if it wasn’t for the final mistake on getting cash change.

A group of us visited the restaurant thinking a 4.7 star rated (August 28, 2022) would at least provide adequate tasting. Two people ordered well-known pho (rice noodles), and the outcome were normal but not exceptionally “authentic”, it felt really western washed with the soup quite dimmed of Vietnamese flavour. Others ordered one would expected broken rice lemongrass chicken/pork-chop, and to little to our knowledge, the meats were exceptionally dry and non grilled tasting. I personally hasn’t seen a Vietnamese place calling “cut pork thigh meat” as pork-chop. The meat loaf were extremely blended, and we couldn’t texture any physical meat content, it was more like flour cake to certain perspective.

All to that, we still think the place deserves a solid 3 stars, as it feels like family owned local business until the paying came. For one, the service was friendly and nice, but the waiter has really showing difficulty even just understanding basic request like extra spicy sauce. However, the paying part was little awkward, where the waiter was asking us to tap tip percentage on the card machine when we were paying with cash. And as most would expect, waiter takes the cash, brings back the reminders and one decides to tip accordingly. And yet, when we handed over the cash, the waiter was asking what percentage we would like to tip…and we were very confused on the conversation…Then after, the waiter brought back our change, and we caught surprised such our change was $0.32 short (seemed to round up to nearest dollar). We were little angrier about this minor missing delta, but decided to continue to tip the service and not to confront with the waiter. Since we were lucky to visit the beautiful island...

We were visiting from Vancouver spending the day in Victoria and wanted a warm bowl of pho. We were searching on google for a highly rated pho restaurant and came across Alysa’s with stellar reviews. From the start, the screen door was broken and we had trouble even getting in. Once we got in, we were not acknowledged by staff at all and seated ourselves and grabbed a menu. Once we were ready to order, nobody came by for 10 minutes to take our order or pour water/tea and we were unsure whether this was a fast food establishment where we order at the front and self-serve our own water at the side. The place was not busy at the time either, only about 1-2 other tables dining there. The server finally took our order. We ordered 2 bowls of pho and 1 salad roll. The salad roll was delicious, and the pho was generous portions but the soup broth was lacking flavor. Prices are quite steep for pho at $15 for a large and $13 for a regular, not to mention cash or debit only. Once again when we were ready to pay and get our leftovers to go, the server did not come by for another 10 minutes. We ended up going up to the front to pay and asked for two take out containers to package everything ourselves and staff did not offer to help package anything either. Maybe we have it too good in Vancouver and are spoiled by great pho and efficient service, but this is just our two cents. Overall, quite a...