The Saigon Kitchen — Restaurant in Bristol

A real mixed bag. Service was fine, good even, for the most part. Unfortunately the food was 50/50.

Hanoi style spring rolls with a super clear, light fish sauce were easily the highlight. These were fantastic. I'd go back for more of those alone.

Following on from that were the two specials of the evening, squid stuffed with minced pork and herbs, and hoi an style baked fish vermicelli, along with the bun cha hanoi (pork noodle soup). Unfortunately, the only taste discernable from the squid dish was dill, so stuffed full of it as it was, completely rending any work that went into the rest of the dish pointless. The Bun Cha was overseasoned, and the pork was 'swiney', clearly not terribly good quality meat, and easily the most disappointing dish of the evening. The hoi an fish vermicelli was very good though, cooked well with balanced flavours. We only had a bottled beer each so I can't speak to the quality of the wine or other drinks.

The final disappointment of the evening came at payment, when, after having the waitress ask if anything was wrong with the 3/4 full bowl of noodle soup she was clearing away, and telling her it was too salty, absolutely nothing was done to rectify this. Now, if I just don't like something I ordered because I wasn't sure what it was, that's on me. But if I don't like something because I can literally feel the moisture being sucked out of my mouth while I'm eating it due to too much salt, that's on you and you need to offer to comp that dish.

Overall I was very disappointed, but there were good elements to the evening, and I'd consider giving this place a...

My partner's food was nice but I had the special and it was a very unpleasant experience. Billed as squid with pork it was just a giant lot of sausage meat stuffed into a badly cooked and way too chewy squid case. It was very very difficult to eat with chopsticks because you couldn't separate the two parts and it was sliced into pieces but way too big to put into your mouth at once. The meat was seasoned with unpleasant and too strong bitter herbs so you couldn't actually taste any sense of pork or squid. There was a lime and chilli dip... Sounds nice.. just tasted like toilet cleaner. There were absolutely no vegetables!!!!!! And this expensive dish doesn't come with noodles or rice so that was extra! My partner's food looked lush, colourful, balanced and delicious and the waiters explained the traditional way to eat it. It felt like an event. (The pork meat balls).

Then mine came... Oh.. just a giant (euphemistic) sausage on a plate. No ceremony. No advice.

So, it looked off-putting, was difficult to eat, wasn't a full balanced meal and tasted terrible. No apology or offer to rectify in any way when I told them how I didn't enjoy and some of it was inedible. Just explained to me why it's like that.. silly me for not understanding!! I love Vietnamese food. This was Bad.

The dessert we shared (in the hope of getting something nice from the experience) was billed as passion fruit, but no passion fruit could be tasted at all. Just caramelly. Nice enough but not what it said.

Everything else about the place was great tho....

The menu is quite small, the food is tasty, mine was delicious, vegetarian noodles. The price is expensive for what it is. There are other restaurants cheaper and delicious in Bristol. £13.50 My friends had a special which fish and they said it was dry. £16 The desert a puddle made with beans wasn’t good and expensive. £6 The other pudding, was a simple traditional one and expensive as well for what it is. £6 The egg rice was nice but expensive as well. £6. They were suggesting eating the special with rice which I don’t like as combination personally. In my opinion they need to improve their specials and to offer a plate that is good enough by itself, without having to ask for an additional one. They need to accompany the food with vegetables instead of asking is to get another rice plate. They need to make sure that the fish is not over cooked because gets dry. The decoration is great, but I know other restaurants better in Bristol. The waitress was friendly and attentive. I won’t come back if the menu continues like this small, expensive...