Saigon City...meh

One of the pleasant surprises I've found in Broward County is the ethnic diversity that exists here.  Yes, we all think that Dade is more "ethnic" and Broward is more "white", but I've found that Dade's "ethnicness" is strictly limited to Latin American and Caribbean nationalities, while I've found there to be more East Asian, South Asian, European, and even South African enclaves in Broward County.  Want Romanian food after going to a Romanian church service? Just head over to Hollywood (where you can also get Turkish and Armenian cuisine).  Want Korean barbecue or a jug of kimchee? Just head west on 595 and you have your pick of about half a dozen places.  Chinese bakery, Pakistani pizza, Filipino cuisine, or German schnitzel?  All in Broward County, along with Peruvian sandwich shops, Italian-American red sauce joints, Jamaican patty stores, Haitian bakeries, Trinidadian roti shops, and a few other ethnic eateries.

One thing that there seems to be at least twice as much of in Broward as there are in Dade are Vietnamese restaurants.  Dade County has about three worth mentioning:  Hy Vong (the gold standard), Miss Saigon (the chichi, bougie, rachacha, prissy option), and Little Saigon (barebones, good, and cheap).  In Broward, it seems as if every self-respecting foodie or gourmand that I speak to has his or her favorite Vietnamese eatery, including myself.  This past saturday evening, I had the opportunity to sample Saigon City with some friends who are self-professed Vietnamese cuisine connoisseurs having lived in Houston, which reportedly has one of the largest populations of Vietnamese immigrants.  I had been longing for pho for approximately 3 months, especially pho containing my newfound Asian food obsession, soft beef tendon.

Now, it is curious that a country with a delicately nuanced cuisine such as France would colonize a country with similarly delicate cuisine as Vietnam (or Indochine as it was called back then).  Many people can't seem to find the charm in Vietnamese cuisine because it is so simple and delicate, and if prepared poorly, it can taste pretty bland.  Vietnamese cuisine, like Japanese cuisine, also depends heavily on good quality, fresh ingredients to get optimal flavor and texture.  The embodiment, in my opinion, of the Vietnamese food philosophy lies in a well-made bowl of pho: an umami broth redolent with star anise and black cardamom, chewy rice noodles, onions, and various cuts of meat topped with a measured dose of nuoc mam (fish sauce), sliced chiles, and torn basil and culantro leaves.

Saigon City, while satisfactory, left a bit to be desired.   There was one table of Vietnamese diners, but everyone else - including our South Asian waiter - was non-Vietnamese.  It was more authentic than the chic Basilic located by Lauderdale By The Sea, but the flavor wasn't all there, and the presentation was lacking a little.  Cha gio (fried springrolls) were scrawny and had unappealingly pale wrappers - not the fat, golden-brown morsels that I'm used to seeing at the better Vietnamese restaurants.  Vietnamese coffee with sweetened condensed milk came pre-mixed and served in ice - not in a little coffee drip balanced on a glass and dripping into several inches of condensed milk and served with an extra glass of ice to pour everything in once it was finished dripping, as is traditionally done.  

I was happy to see "special" pho listed on the menu, which is known as combination pho elsewhere.  Besides containing strips of raw beef that cook in the hot broth, this type of soup is supposed to contain impossibly thin ribbons of tripe, slices of tendon, meatballs, brisket, and other cuts of meat along with the traditional rice noodles.  The last time I had a combination pho was with a Chinese friend of mine who brought me to Saigon Cuisine in Margate (highly recommended, although Vietnamese coffee was also served pre-mixed), and we partook in a bowl brimming with exotic cuts of meat, some soft, some slightly chewy, others melting in your mouth like gelatin, but nothing even remotely close to being rubbery.  Saigon City's version had me searching for my favorite cuts of meat, and I was rewarded with only two thumbnail-sized pieces of tendon, and two vermicelli-thin strands of rubbery tripe.  The broth was satisfactory, but not memorable and definitely not hot enough (pho should be so hot that you burn your tongue on it if drunken immediately).  John's pork chop was satisfactory, and his banh mi (baguette sandwich) was also okay.  Another friend's lemongrass chicken looked like something out of PF Chang's, and no comments were made about it other than it was really spicy.

While a cut above some Vietnamese restaurants, I wouldn't say that Saigon City makes it to my list of some of the best in South Florida, and judging from the clueless white guy at the table next to us squirting a 1/4 cup of hoisin into his pho, I'd say that this is not a meeting place for the seasoned Vietnamese cuisine aficionado.  However, every cloud has its silver lining, and my experience at Saigon City led me to the discovery of Maxim Oriental Bakery, authentic-looking Silver Pond Chinese Restaurant, and a Vietnamese market within the same strip mall

Saigon City

4301 N State Road 7 (441)

Lauderdale Lakes, FL 33319