Favorite
Southeast Division’s Mekha Grill turns out a truly stellar, full foot long banh mi for a mere $7. Sweet, salty pork marinated in ginger and lemongrass cooks down into a thick, meaty stew, topped with carrots, cucumbers, jalapeno and stuffed into a light, crunchy bun. It’s one of the best lunchtime steals in the neighborhood. Read more...
Favorite
Joining a cadre of excellent Asian food at the south end of downtown near Portland State, upscale Vietnamese cocktail joint Anchoi boasts a drink menu from Hale Pele pro Blair Reynolds, paired with turmeric noodles, rice bowls, and banh mi. The renovated space is the spiritual opposite of the 68-year-old Cheerful Tortoise next door, with matte blues and blacks offset by shiny, clean Read more...
Favorite
This cheery little hole in the wall, snuggled between a cigar garden and the All Ways Warm stove shop, is a gold mine of inexpensive banh mi, flavorful soups, and lesser-known Vietnamese bites. The not-so-secret house treasure is banh khot: golden, crisp-edged Vietnamese seafood mini-pancakes that aren’t often found at Portland pho houses.Beyond the grub, Nam Lộc is mostly all about iced Read more...
Favorite
Vancouver’s Pho Le has been around in different locations since 1991: a family-run spot that looks like most every strip-mall Vietnamese restaurant, bright and clean as a dentist’s office. Pho Le delivers the quintessential pho experience: the beefy nourishment, the great gingerbread spices, the eye rolls of happiness. You want the fully loaded dac diet (“super bowl”), or the surprisingly delicious vegetarian pho, which Read more...
Favorite
There are few constants in our world, but the perfection of the addictive fried squid bites at this long-standing Viet-Chinese dining room on NE Sandy Boulevard comes close. Flash fried so lightly that their sweet-salty-peppery coating practically fizzles on contact with your tongue, you’ll battle for every last teeny tentacle and sweet onion shard. Read more...
Favorite
In 2015, Tapalaya chef Anh Luu added a Vietnamese spin to this New Orleans-inspired restaurant’s brunch menu, inspired by her childhood in New Orleans and her Vietnam War refugee parents. The Asian/Cajun flavors offer a fun, Mardi Gras bead-strewn alternative to another East Burnside Southern brunch favorite a few blocks away (without the two-hour wait). Don’t miss the eggs sardou Read more...
Favorite
A veritable Rose City titan with three locations across Portland, Pho Van sports a lighter, less-assertive broth with hints of anise and clove that flick the back of the tongue. The noodles have a stellar, springy texture, with flavorful, marbled meat throughout. Bonus points for best “to-go” pho, with the raw round steak packed in a separate plastic bag and Read more...
Favorite
This pert strip mall dinner spot from the Hà VL family extended its breadth of rarely seen regional Vietnamese noodle soups. Look for two different soups each day—“Dry Chicken Noodle” to delicate central Vietnam fish noodle teeming with salmon and Asian knife fish—plus banh mi, smoothies and bubble teas, and, critically, Christina “Ha” Luu’s fantastic Vietnamese iced coffee, dripped to Read more...
Favorite
You know what’s good? Hearty French beef stew. You know what’s even better? Bo Kho, a rich Vietnamese beef stew swimming with carrots and stalks of lemongrass, amped up with a sweet-and-spicy mix of Asian flavors, from star anise to five-spice powder. Each mixing bowl–size order at this humble Northeast Portland standby comes with a mini baguette for proper dunking. Read more...
Favorite
SE Division Street’s gleefully inauthentic banh mi joint is crammed with happy 20- and 30-somethings scarfing Kobe kimchi dogs and slurping stiff drinks spiked with five-spice and Thai tea syrup beneath dim lights studded with spent Sriracha bottles. The spot reaches its oddball zenith every Saturday night. That’s when Baby Ketten Karaoke stretches a white sheet across one of the bar’s Read more...