Saigon Noodle Station — Restaurant in Little Rock

A new Vietnamese restaurant in Little Rock is very welcome — and for that reason, it's really unfortunate that Saigon Noodle Station is just not very good. The restaurant offers what might best be described as a fast-food version of Vietnamese food designed to cater to the American palate.

My bowl of rice noodles topped with grilled pork and egg rolls (bún thịt nướng) was tasteless. A tiny dish of nước chấm accompanied it, to be poured over the noodles, toppings, grated carrots, lettuce, cucumber — and the nước chấm was absolutely tasteless, with none of the appealing sweet-sour taste of well-made nước chấm with fish sauce, lime juice or vinegar, some hot pepper, and a bit of sugar.

Offered alongside the tiny dish of nước chấm were little dishes with a commercially made Chinese "plum" sauce — absolute sweetness and no other flavor — and a tiny dish of hoisin sauce. Neither of these is a traditional accompaniment to this noodle salad in traditional Vietnamese restaurants.

In addition the "crispy egg roll" was not at all crispy, but mushy, with a gummy wrapping and no appealing taste at all. An extra order of these egg rolls we ordered as an appetizer came with a dish of the sweet "plum" sauce and no nước chấm — totally untraditional for a Vietnamese table — and the egg rolls struck both of us as factory-made, frozen, and popped into hot oil in the restaurant, not made by the restaurant itself.

I'd like to offer a better review. I'd love to see another good Vietnamese place in Little Rock. We have several that are really good. But this competitor does not meet the mark.

This is a shame, since the people staffing Saigon Noodle are really nice and I'm sure are working hard to make a go of their...

As I was passing by this new little place caught my eye . I love Pho and am always wanting to find new spots . I ordered chicken Pho, crispy egg rolls , and fried chicken wings . The broth was flavorful and the soup came with all the normal fixings . Smaller in portion sizes, but still a good amount. The crispy egg rolls were good . Not great , but good . The chicken wings were good as well as seasoned . The restaurant is pretty small inside , but it’s very clean. The service was pretty good . We were checked out at the table . Not sure if they were rushing us or if that’s just what they do … but a few minutes later our waiter came back to the table asking us an awkward question about to go boxes .. they were filling up with customers and maybe we did linger a bit . The food was good but it wasn’t amazing …. 3.5 . I may go back and try something else...

Today I had the Pho Dac Biet which is basically the combo meat pho. The broth had a good flavor and the portion size was definitely enough to fill me up. I also tried their chicken wings which were just ok. There's not much seasoning on them but they do provide some sort of dipping sauce for them which tastes a bit like duck sauce. The sauce was a good and necessary compliment to the wings. The service could use some work since I didn't get a drink refill until I was almost done with the meal. And for half of my visit I was the only customer there so being too busy is not an excuse. I'll probably revisit for pho in the future. Maybe by that time the old Dickey's sign...