Houng Vi: That Was a Good Lunch
Sunday, January 15, 2006 22:12Every lunch group has one curmudgeon who takes lunch very seriously and is hard to please. We’ve named ours Dr. No for his habit of rejecting new restaurants out of hand even though he has a fairly good record of enjoying them once he has eaten there. After we read a review of Houng Vi at The Culinary Detective, the rest of us couldn’t wait to try it. But we had to drag the good doctor there kicking and screaming because they serve pho, which he insists is merely glorified tap water.
The broth used to make pho at Houng Vi is a little lighter and less greasy than served elsewhere. Plenty of varieties are offered, and, as Dr. No was pleased to see, Houng Vi also has a large menu of non-pho dishes on its snazzy picture menu. These range from a very nice shrimp, mint and lettuce wrap served with peanut sauce to a crab soup with rice noodles to various stir fries and fried rice dishes.
Every dish I have tried here has been tasty, but the general consensus is that The Thing To Get is the #32: barbecue pork over rice noodles with vegetables, peanuts, a sweet and sour dipping sauce and an egg roll. (The #33 adds a generous helping of the more interesting parts of the pig to the above.) Dr. No started off griping that his Thai iced tea was too strong but once the #32 arrived there was no complaining to be heard, only chewing and noodle slurping.
Good food is even better if it is cheap: lunch runs about $7 with tax and tip and a friend got dinner for four, including two beers, for under $30 inclusive.
Usually a restaurant gets its blessing if Dr. No comments, “That was adequate,” or “That was reasonable sustenance.” But it was outside Houng Vi that we heard him say, for the first time, “That was a good lunch.” There is no higher praise than that.
Houng Vi, 15180 Prairie Ave, Lawndale, CA 90260. (310) 978-8999
By Maribeth (see more of her posts).
Jonah says:
January 16th, 2006 at 9:38 am
I know someone like that, he doesn’t veto restaurants, but will often complain all through the meal about the minor details of the dishes. Same thing, a ringing endorsement for him is “that wasn’t too bad”.
Kristy says:
January 16th, 2006 at 2:38 pm
I love it. “Good food is even better if it is cheap.” For sure! ;) The Thing to Get #32 sounds absolutely delicious! How’s the pho here? I’m still trying to find a bowl that I like… any suggestions that are on the West side???
maribeth says:
January 16th, 2006 at 4:36 pm
I think Houang Vi’s pho is good because it isn’t so oily, but some people really like that layer of grease on top of their broth. You can compare it with the place across the street, whose name I think is Pho Hua, and whose pho I don’t like nearly as much.
Off-topic: does everyone’s browser see an annoying one-word long column of text to the left of the picture of the #32? It looked fine with Firefox at home, but looks pretty crummy in IE at work.
Jonah says:
January 16th, 2006 at 7:53 pm
The formatting should be fixed now, you had some extra stuff in the image tag.
Jonah says:
January 17th, 2006 at 1:24 pm
After your review, I stopped by Hound Vi today. That was a great lunch!
You left out one of my favorite parts, the drinks! I had the salty lemon juice with ice and it was amazingly refreshing. They also had salty lime and salty plum juice. I did stick with the #32 and I really enjoyed it.
The cold noodles went great with the warm BBQ pork and the sour sauce added a nice subtle flavor. Yum!
Zteve says:
January 17th, 2006 at 3:49 pm
Damn, and I worked in Torrance for three years looking for additional Vietnamese places besides Ms. Saigon and Hong Long. Bun is the best, the pork w/rice noodles is my standard dish, and the picture looks great!
Picorian G. Hobbes says:
February 5th, 2006 at 11:17 am
HV looks ghetto on the outside, but its a great value (around $5) and tastes decent when you’re cravin some of that pho action.
Man, in the westside (where i live)pho costs like 9 bucks.. highway robberage.
In the southbay (where i work), saigon dish is a good joint to grub V delights.
Jonah says:
February 5th, 2006 at 12:31 pm
Where is Saigon Dish? Any tips on what to order there?
The Survival Gourmet says:
February 18th, 2006 at 8:20 pm
I just went there this evening. I had the #32 and a bowl of the crab noodle soup. My wife had the combo stir-fry on the crunchy noodles and we split an order of egg rolls. With 2 cokes and a Thai iced tea, the bill came to $26.63.
It was my first time having Vietnamese food and it was really good.
Wish I had know that it was cash only though. Had to sprint down the street to the liquor store for cash. Still a good experience and right in my neighborhood.
Thanx for the recommendation because i would have continued to pass it up without stoping in.