Hello Vietnam Restaurant — Restaurant in Christchurch

We are 2 Vietnamese who visited Christchurch from Sydney and we are well familiar with what authentic Vietnamese food ought to be. We did not have much expectation upon entering the restaurant in a new city, all we had was a massive craving for some good Viet food and boy did Hello Vietnam knock our socks off. The spring rolls were fresh and you can't go wrong with adding a bit of chilli oil to the dipping hoisin sauce (note: it's rather spicy but woah it was great). Next up we had the spicy vermicelli soup with beef (or Hue noodle soup) and THIS, this gotta be the closest rendition of the dish to authenticity that I've ever come across through my many years of living in Perth, Melbourne or Sydney. The broth was on point and so was the meat. Everything from flavour to texture - this dish ticked them all. It was so authentic that I thought the chef must have owned a teleportation device and teleported the bowls of noodle all the way from Saigon to Christchurch in a blink of an eye. No jokes! We walked out of the restaurant feeling extremely happy and gastronomically satisfied. If we were living here in the city, we are sure that the restaurant would count us among their list of regular customers.

Now to the staff: the staff was great. I noticed that the lady was paying close attention to the pace of our meal so that our orders and drinks could come out at the right time. For example I did not have to wait for more than 2 minutes for my dessert to arrive after finishing my noodle. The restaurant was also very clean and comfy.

Overall it was a great experience and money well spent. And this came from a Vietnamese who has an appreciation...

24/10/2017 - I went to have dinner at this Vietnamese restaurant after reading the reviews as it is highly rated by the customers. Maybe I expected too much from this highly rated Vietnamese restaurant as I found both dishes were kinda bland (I was hoping for strong flavors). Slightly disappointed but nevertheless edible. The fried squids and fresh spring rolls are a hit for me. You can never go wrong with fresh spring rolls. The fried squids - very tasty and the coating is not thick (unlike other Asian restaurant). Limited parking spaces and I do strongly suggest to make a phone reservation before going there. Any walk-in customers might need to share a table with other strangers. They do get busy from 6 pm to 7.30 pm (peak time for them). Also, they charge $0.50 for a takeaway plastic container. To avoid this extra charge, I strongly advise that you finish your dish/ meal and if your friends or kids can't finish theirs, well.... finish it for them.... Lol....

Would I go back? Maybe. I had better Vietnamese food before, and this is definitely not the best or the worst. For me, the overall taste is average. But, everyone is different and will have...

We ordered set menu 2 for 6 people. The time between each dish was around 15 minutes and there was only single that looked to be about the same size plate as they were serving for one person for all 6 of us each time. Serving this way left us hungry in between each dish. When we asked the owner for bigger servings he said he we could ask for more at the end if we were still hungry, we were still hungry but didn't ask for more as it would take to long for it to arrive so we just asked for dessert ate it and left. For the most part the food was good, just it wasn't served quick enough and not enough of it for us to enjoy it. At $39 a person it's not good value for money. We won't be...