I had a day off work to do some running around and I found myself in Malvern at lunch time in between chores.
A quick look at the map pointed me towards a close by Vietnamese pho restaurant so I headed on in.
Pho Xua, Malvern, Melbourne, Australia
Right on the stroke of midday I was the first customer in for lunch so had my choice of the tables.
The menu is quite extensive but I soon decided upon an entree serve of beef wrapped on lemongrass and a chicken pho, along with a Saigon Special beer.
The piping hot beef wrapped on lemongrass came out first along with chilli and sweet chilli sauces. Despite the menu saying the serving size was 2 pieces I was given 3 pieces. The taste was very good and I found the chilli sauce to be a little too hot so stuck with the sweet chilli sauce.
As I was finishing my entree my pho came out along with bean shoots, mint, lemon and a small serving of sauces.
I loaded my soup up with bean shoots and mint, squeezed the lemon and tucked in.
By itself the soup broth was good but needed the additional sauces to give it a punch. With the sauces in the soup to bring out the flavour they bought a new dimension to the dish that moved the dial from good to very good.
Both dishes made for a satisfying lunch for a decent price.
The Saigon Special beer lacked flavour but went well with the food.