Simply Vietnamese

Been coming here since 2003, when it's original store was located in Englewood (Saigon Republic) and Fort Lee (Pho King).  Specifically, I come here for the pad thai and it never, ever, ever disappoints. been eating this dish forever, and i can never order anything else here. my wife does select different options from the menu, and she says they're all good.  it is pretty heavy on the peanuts, so beware for those who have allergies.  it's not your traditional pad thai, the noodles are stickier and thinner, but delicious nonetheless. i can never finish the whole thing, the portions are pretty big.

place was busy for a lunch during an extremely hot saturday after 4th of july. lots of families, so it's kid friendly.  staff is attentive and our waters were constantly filled.  the shrimp chips are delicious, and they offered another basket. i also had the thai iced tea, which was status quo as far as thai iced teas go.

hope this place stays around, unlike it's predecessors in Fort Lee & Englewood. I'll definitely be coming back...and I might even try something different, i've got my eye on the pho here...tho, some of my fellow Yelpers are not fans.

Well, I finally broke down; my craving for noodles finally got the best of me and I caved in and ordered pho from this place.

First of all, this is not my first Vietnamese venture. Vietnamese interpreter friends in Hawaii and my coworkers back in SD whipped me into a bún cha -oholic. I was the Yelp Dutchess of our local pho place...did I mention that we lived in Mira Mesa?

I ordered the "Beef Combo" after a few attempts at ordering pho tái. What I got turned out to be good, but it wasn't the Vietnamese I'm used to at all. As I unpacked everything, I noticed that there were lots of differences. First off, the beef was already IN the broth, so beef combo turned out to be pho chín, really. Some of my garnishes were already in the soup and the rest of the garnishes were stuck at the bottom of the noodle container. This is VERY odd, because usually the cook likes to show how fresh the garnishes are by seperating them...not hiding them in the broth or under noodles. The broth had a very odd flavor that I could only describe as a cinammon liquid smoke.
Odd. Not terrible, but odd.

I'd try the Thai food, but I wouldn't venture into anything Vietnamese from here again.

By the way, the correct way to pronounce pho is not "faux", it's more like "feu", as in pot au feu. You're welcome.

When in the mood for giant pho soup this is our favorite place to go. So glad that we found Simply Vietnamese after their other restaurant Mo Pho closed in Fort Lee.