::NEW (2023):: Refreshing updates, great food and fantastic service!
It took five long years before I ever decided to revisit this establishment, but what a great experience. Had a severe craving for Pho Tai (rare beef). My usual choices were not opened, so I figured I'd have to settle. However, it turned out to be a great visit. They had updated the entire restaurant decor. The sweet lady told us we could sit anywhere, was it was outside of normal lunch hours, so there were plenty of seats. Once we were seated, she provided us with menus immediately and asked what we would like to drink. After we received our drinks she came back shortly and took our order. Less than ten minutes later, she came back with our food. The Pho Tai soup had changed and was slightly less concentrated compared to before. The rare meat slices were not the paper thin kind, but had some chew to it. It was still very delicious! The Banhmi was delicious. But the highlight dish was definitely the grilled pork chops over rice and the fried spring rolls. They were so delicious. Ready to return to redo the whole experience again.
OLD (2018) - The short: Food is delicious, but wait time is horrendous.
The full scoop: So hard to rate. This place needs to be on an episode of Gordon Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmare or Robert Irvine's Restaurant Impossible. The food is delicious and authentic. The staff members are polite, but did not take ownership or accountability. Rating the food alone, this place is a 4-star. But, the service and management needs a lot of guidance and training. We waited almost 10 mins before being seated. There were 4 empty tables that needed to be cleaned off. We (my husband and I, as well the couple ahead of us) were very patient and waited for the staff to clean off the tables. After we were seated, a party of 10 people came in and were seated and given menus immediately. We were still waiting for menus. A few minutes later, the party of 10 had their orders taken. I started to chat up the table next to us and they were a party of three that had waited 20 mins...and have not received menus. They got up and left because they figured it would be another 30 mins before they got their food, since the large party had just ordered. I was really craving pho, so I convinced the fatty in me that it was worth the wait. Wrong decision. We waited another 10 mins before receiving menus. Then, 10 mins later, my husband's food came. He finished his food and about 30 mins later I asked the staff how much longer I would need to wait. He replied that I had come in at a bad time and that we did not make it known that we were seated first. In the restaurant business, you should not push the fault onto the customer. I explained the entire situation and he apologized. The waitress later came by with a cup of water for me. While she asked if we had ordered, another restaurant patron set a cup of water on her tray. She gave that same cup of water to my husband. When we left, the couple ahead of us had just started on their food.
Highly recommend management to implement a system to identify the status of each of their tables. The restaurant is well staffed, but they need training. May want to consider implementing a traffic light type system: red-stop to give table menus and take drink orders; yellow-slow down to take food orders; green-table received food (check in occasionally). It may be helpful to have the staff play some Diner Dash app game for training tactics.
Will be returning again in the future and would love to change my rating.
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