Xich Lô — Restaurant in London

The worst place we have eaten at in a long time.

We were looking forward to trying out first Vietnamese meal. Ultimately, came out feeling like we were served something a POW from the war would have claimed went against the Geneva Convention.

The excellent Sukothai across the road was not open so we thought to get a fix from a Vietnamese meal. Afterall, how truly different can they be?

Well, the answer is light years apart. We went to order and had a vegetable curry and a vegetable noodles and vegetable spring rolls.

The spring roll was hot and really stood out as being the only dish that was. Other than that, barely any filling and served with a rice vinegar as a dipping sauce (which I will overlook as may be the tradition).

The noodles in the curry were luke warm (perhaps they weren't microwaved for long enough!) as was the actual vegetable curry. This was an abomination of a thing, something like a love child between a value brand curry sauce and some sweet potatoes, very dry tofu (possibly deep fried and like 5 day old bread chunks) with two (yes 2) button mushrooms and two little chunks of onion making up the vegetable part. Additionally there was not enough curry for the noodles which on hindsight was no bad thing as it was barely warm, completely tasteless (unless the colour yellow has a taste) and probably abused my human rights.

The vegetable noodles were again under microwaved, came with the same 5 day old bread pieces passed off as Tofu and a salad on the side which to it's credit was fresh.

The waitress was apologetic and offered to give me more curry sauce which I foolishly accepted as ultimately I didn't bother eating it as it didn't really address the actual issue of being barely warm, tasteless and almost devoid of actual vegetables.

We were sorely disappointed and would never return and highly recommend that no one else throws good money away which is what you will do if you order there. On the subject of money, value was very poor as the portions were not generous at all. Even if we had eaten everything, we would have come out hungry and the prices of almost £8 for the curry was double what it should have been bearing in mind the portion size, even if it had been edible.

If you feel I have been unduly harsh, feel free to check out my other reviews...

It was good to support another local restaurant today with a long overdue return to Xichlo for some fabulous Vietnamese food. Xichlo is a lovely friendly little cafe in the heart of Hornchurch town centre. We decided to visit on sunday and received a nice friendly welcome on arrival before being seated. We then looked at the menu to see they serve a nice variety of Vietnamese cuisine from starters , salads , baguettes , noodles , rice , curry & soups. We decided to order as we went along and started with the Taster Starter Meat Platter of grilled pork summer rolls , pork & prawn spring roll & chicken skewers accompanied by three dipping sauces. Each item was delicious and a great way to start. At this time we also ordered a Jasmine Tea and an Apple Bubble Tea which I absolutely loved. We then looked at the menu again and ordered a Crispy Pork Vietnamese Baguette along with a Chicken Green Papaya Salad and some spicy prawn crackers. We were then nicely offered a complimentary coffee so I had an Iced Coffee which was an absolute delight and a Vietnamese Filter Coffee. We next moved on to our main course where we chose a Chicken & Prawn Vietnamese Curry with sweet potatoes , lemongrass & coconut milk. Our other choice was the Pho Tai a Vietnamese Noodle Soup with thinly sliced rare beef steaks , clear rice noodles , fresh herbs and flavoured with a beef broth. Both dishes were absolutely delicious. As they don't serve desserts this rounded off a fabulous lunch. Next time your in town I would highly recommend a visit for either a quick snack or a nice lunch. The food here is amazing with every dish bursting with fantastic Vietnamese flavours and spices. I for one won't be leaving it to long...

I called up to order food yesterday for collection, the staff couldn't hear me so I had to go in (I thought it must be noisy from customers).

Upon entering, I found that the music was being played at such a high volume hence it's hard to hear anyone.

I had to repeat my order 4 times!

There were a few people eating inside so I don't understand the need to play music at such a loud volume.

The food was quite simple and disappointing for the price paid.

The Chicken Ca Ri had three pieces of chicken and two pieces of sweet potato. Not right when you are paying nearly £15 for this.

The beef pho was good, decent amounts of meat and the soup was pleasant. The bean sprouts were crunchy but the chilli had no kick whatsoever. It tasted like a very westernised and watered down pho.

We had a vegan pho, there was no tofu in it! Just two pieces of broccoli and a whole lot of mushrooms. This was really disappointing.

All in all I spent nearly £50, the beef pho was okay, everything else was a disappointment and I won't be ordering from here again.

Such a shame as it was really tasty a...