A Pho Long Tweet Explained in List Form
Apr 8, 2009 St. Louis, missouri, restaurants
stlbites Pho Long attempt 3=success. Preferential treatment was had! Apparently you want to ask for Nuoc Beo for the best pho. It’s the skimmed fat.
@stlbites I have no idea what any of that meant
- Pho Long is a Vietnamese restaurant.
- Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup.
- Today was the third time I’ve attempted to go with my Vietnamese coworker, and the first time we’ve pulled it off and eaten.
- We got preferential treatment because he is and speaks Vietnamese.
- Nuoc Beo is the fat that congeals on the top of the boiling broth. I found this out today. Vietnamese people want it, but in America they skim it off. It makes it tasty, or as my buddy Van says, “testy”. I thought he was talking about testes at first, and I’d never heard of testicle Pho.
- If you ask for it they will give it to you in a bowl on the side with scallions.
Side note: The Vietnamese language is apparently very up down for lack of a better descriptor. First word up, second word down. They actually accent mark the words this way. So Bánh xèo is sort of slurred up for the Bánh, and down for the xèo. Americans pretty much pronounce it all wrong, and to actually find all the special characters to write Vietnamese words correctly would be a chore.
Side note 2 (hooray for the Lou): When we stepped outside I asked Van, “So Van, if 10 is the best Pho you’ve ever had and 1 is the worst, where does Pho Long rank?” Van said it’s an 8 or 9 and, as he commutes to St. Louis from Los Angeles, and lived in Vietnam until he was 16, his opinion far outweighs mine.
Tags: Pho, Pho Long, Twitter, Vietnamese
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April 8th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
Did you get him down to BMS, so he can try the best Banh Xeo StL has to offer, yet?
April 9th, 2009 at 11:17 am
love pho long, it’s one of my favorites….the owners speak English very well, they’ve lived in the US for 20ish years….had a large jewelry design business in LA, crapped out and moved to STL 8-9 years ago…..they’ve got the jewelry place next door. Some of the waitstaff are not as verbal. Never really noticed a problem in communication….3x huh?! wow. wonder what’s up with that…
Great Pho…..I like tendon and brisket which is a special order. Nice people, good hours of operation, great food, cheap eats….what more can you want?
April 9th, 2009 at 9:10 pm
Three times? That surprises me. I’ve been to Pho Long with my husband at least half a dozen times and the service has never been less than wonderful. It’s one of our favorite Saturday lunch places.
April 10th, 2009 at 6:42 am
I think you both misunderstood. I love Pho Long. It’s one of my favorite spots in St. Louis. I have a Vietnamese coworker I’d been trying to get to go so he could tell me if it was, in fact, as good as I thought it was. It took three times before we finally ate there because one, we didn’t manage to go; a second, they were closed (as they are now on Tuesdays); and the third, Wednesday, we finally ate there and had the great meal I knew we would.
April 10th, 2009 at 6:43 am
Banh Mi So #1 is too far to get for lunch from our job. I’ve been trying to get him to go on a weekend, but he’s so tired of driving from living in LA that it hasn’t happened as of yet. He even has me drive his rental when we go to lunch with a group because I can’t take my own car (a truck).