Pho Hoa @ Tropicana City Mall

We have not attempted to savour any Vietnamese cuisine when we started blogging. Know it's shameful but Viet food doesn't furnish a snap into our mind during that time. Not till we visited Hanoi......

There was a turnover of appetite and perception changes.

When Pho Hoa invited fellow foodies over for a sampling session, many thanks to Richard & Kampungboycitygal, we agreed hastily, wanting more recollections of the delicious bits and pieces of Viet fares we once encountered. Had a great time with AiWei , TingFang & Simon too :)

All the while, we didn't know that...

Pho Hoa is the largest Vietnamese restaurant chain in North America popularized in almost every city where Asians lives. Thus, this franchise was actually originated from America, stressing on the servings of healthy authentic Vietnamese goodies. So for those of you who are pretty health conscious, I guess all of you are, Pho Hoa could be a good option.

The Booster

Vietnamese Coffee is a must try when you're dining in a Vietnamese restaurant.

It comprises of a vietnamese filter, which is a small coffee pot. It looks like a hat and sits upon the top of a coffee cup. Inside is a chamber for coffee and room for hot water. Well, if you had insomnia after taking this like this sweet HER, you can blame this coffee :)

Vietnamese Drip Coffee with Milk - RM5.95

Vietnamese Drip Coffee with Milk & Ice - RM5.95

The dripped coffee was later poured into another glass of ice.

Thirst-Quencher

Six Treasure - RM7.95

The 3-Coloured Drink

Appetizers:

We were served with a selections of appetizers, highly recommended by Dennis, the man-in-charge :)

All were appetizing, with strong flavours and aroma that we, Malaysian taste buds are fond of.

Lemon Grass Chicken - RM7.95 (4 sticks per plate)

Very aromatic and flavoursome, thanks to the lemongrass skewers although we find the meat a wee bit dry.

Fried Spring Roll with minced chicken, vegetables and yam - RM3.25 per roll

Chris and I adored this most. Crunchy & crispy deep fried skin layering the generous tasty ingredients, making every bite a treasure.

Sugar Cane Prawn - RM7.95 (4 sticks per plate)

Smokey flavour that we enjoyed a lot.

Summer Roll consisting Shrimp, Chicken, Salad & Rice Vermicelli - RM3.95 per roll.

These were very healthy servings. And again, generous fillings in every nibble.

Main Course:

Their noodles are made from 100% rice flour & imported from Vietnam.

Each bowl of their soup is accompanied with fresh coriander leaves, bean sprouts, hot chili padi, lemon wedges and basil leaves.

Some rule of thumb before chowing down onto these pho:

1. Get a taste of the original broth first

2. Squeeze in the lime, chunk in the coriander leaves, bean sprouts, hot chili padi, and basil leaves, & mix 'em well

3. Taste it again.

4. Now you could opt for a flavour change again - Squeeze in their special sauce from originated from North America (the sweet sauce & spicy sauce). Just a little will do as you won't want your soup turn too spicy. The spicy sauce was fiery. No joke.

the sauces mentioned above :)

Some of the PHOs we had

Phở Tái, Nạm

Noodle soup with eye round steak,  flank.

Regular: RM13.95

Large: RM15.55

Phở Tái, Chín Nac, Nạm, Gân Sách (the Adventurer's Choice - basically it has everything)

Steak, Brisket, Flank, Tendon, Tripe Pho

Regular: RM16.95

Large: RM18.55

Something for non-beef diners.

Special Items:

Phở Đồ Biển Chua Cay

Hot and Sour Seafood Pho

Well, you could skip steps 3 & 4 of the rule of thumb for this seafood portion.

Regular: RM13.95

Large: RM15.55

Btw, the portion we had was actually smaller than what they actually serve as we ate lotsa starters ;P

Citygal posing with a REGULAR and LARGE bowl as Kampungboy joined in :)

If you're deciding to skip Pho, you could try:

Rice Platter:

Com Ga Nuong Cha Trung Hap – RM15.95

Grilled Chicken & Egg Cake

Desserts

Coconut Flam with Caramel - RM4.25

Light and not too sweet :)

Chocolate Banana Tower (Fried Banana with Ice Cream ) - RM6.95

Cendol Kem - RM6.95

Cendol, Red Bean with Coconut Milk, Gula Melaka & imported Coconut Ice Cream

Cha Gio Re Kem - RM5.95

Net Spring Roll consisting Yam, Sweet Potato & Mung Bean with Vanilla Ice Cream

We had so much Vietnamese Spring Roll in Vietnam. But we have not tried the sweet version, which was this. Recipe designed specially to cater for Malaysian sweet palate, the net spring roll was crispy, and with my fave yam and Chris fave sweet potato combination. It was a perfect match for our tastebuds ;P

Close to the authentic Viet cuisine?

Yes, in some ways.

Pho Hoa was originated from North America, thus there might be slight alterations of in terms of taste. Noodles were made from rice flour originated from Vietnam and that's a check. However, compared to Hanoi's version of beef pho, Hanoi's soup was very clear with sweet essence while Pho Hoa's broth is flavoursome (guess this matched our boleh-land's taste buds closely as we tend to go for very flavoursome bites). Spring rolls served in Pho Hoa are much more bigger than those in Vietnam (Vietnamese eats very little mah... haha).

If you question us on comparison again...

It's different somehow :)

Overall, we enjoyed our dinner here. Service was attentive and food was decent as Viet food ignited a conscious choice to health and well-balanced meal.

Pho Hoa

First Floor (behind Borders)

Tropicana City Mall