Pho Great Titchfield opened recently, i was quietly hopeful for a decent bite near Oxford Street. It was quite full, the menu looked promising. My initial impressions were it looked a bit smart, too many whitie staff and it looked like chinese chefs so was a tad skeptical as to how authentic the food would be.
We started with some Banh Xeo Chay. It was far too oily and the batter consistency was wrong. Personally i want these golden and crispy on one side and soft and fluffy on the inside. I was later told that they were shallow fried explain the greasiness and the crisp like texture of these anyways.
Sam followed up with the Goi Ngo Sen (lotus root salad). It was a tad lacking in lotus root and herbage and far too much iceberg lettuce. I had a Bun Cha Gio Nem Nuong (vermicelli with springroll and pork meatballs). Sam pinched my spring roll so i can’t comment on that. The meat balls were okay and interesting take on Nem Noung and the seemed fried rather than grilled. My real issue is with the noodles in the dish. They were not vermicelli noodles as i know, far too wide more like a thin spaghetti. Also i asked for the spicy nuoc cham and it wasn’t very spicey i don’t even recall fresh chilli in it.
Table placement: Fish sauce, chilli sauce, hoi sin sauce. No tissue box or help yourself chopsticks.
Herbage: Poor. Lacking variety (mint and coriander) and poor representation on sides and in the dishes.
Nuoc cham: A bit thin and watery but passable.
Should i have gone for the dish which is the restaurant’s namesake? maybe but i did spy a bowl going out and they used the same noodles i had in my Bun so it’s lost marks already. Maybe i’m being overly critrical? Would i return? possibly to give the pho a go befoe i write the place off completely and its a handy location…
as a real vietnamese you are well within your rights to be critical of a so called vietnamese restaurant
what i find most offensive is that they think they can pass oily chinese food with a spattering of greens as vietnamese
my take is that if they were really confident in their pho abilities it would be the only item(s) on the menu. at worst cơm tắm but that’s it
is this what i am to expect when i come visit you? (not that coming to europe to eat vietnamese food is high on my priorities)
ha ha i wouldn’t expect it to be too high on your agenda. you want to get some pie, eels mash and liquor into ya over here ;P
our experiences with vietnamese restaurants in london have been mostly disappointing… Sam says there’s a place thats pretty good and run by VCs in Shoreditch so we have to check that out.
it’s a vietnamese restaurant so variety aint all bad, i have issues eating pho in the evening though…