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Pho Hung
Rating Details »
Category: Vietnamese [Edit]
Neighbourhood: Chinatown350 Spadina Avenue
Toronto, ON M5T 2G4
(416) 593-4274
- Hours:
Mon-Sun. 10:00 a.m. - 10:00 p.m.
- Good for Groups:
- Yes
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Attire:
- Casual
- Price Range:
-
$
- Good for Kids:
- Yes
- Takes Reservations:
- No
- Delivery:
- No
- Take Away:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- No
- Good for:
- Lunch
- Alcohol:
- Full Bar
14 reviews for Pho Hung
I've been coming to Pho Hung for several years now, and am still very happy with the restaurant. I've been to several others in the neighbourhood and still feel that Pho Hung's quality of food exceeds what others have to offer.
On my last meal there a few days ago, I had the rare beef/fatty brisket pho. The stock was delicious: flavourful, hearty and fresh -- the perfect accompaniment to crunchy beansprouts and toothsome vermicelli noodles. The amount of meat in the soup was plentiful and just right. Generous portions of thinly sliced rare beef and fatty brisket were piled on top of a large bowl of soup. "Small" here is plenty for a satisfying meal.
The grilled pork vermicelli noodles ("bun") are also delicious. If you are a vegetarian, you don't have to miss out, either -- their small vegetarian menu offers satisfying options. One of my favourites was their deep-fried tofu vermicelli dish, with deep-fried spring roll. I am no longer vegetarian but still eat that occasionally when the mood strikes -- it's that good. Just be careful about the fish sauce, or go in knowing you are most likely going to bend the rules a little.
My achilles heel is their vegetarian spring rolls ("C18" on the menu) and their hot Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk ("82" on the menu). Both are treats. And yes, I do actually have the numbers memorized by this point!
Prices have gone up in the last few years, but they are still really reasonable.
One caveat is the service: it is set up more like a fast-food place (get in, get your food, get out) than anything else. Don't expect to have a leisurely meal, especially at the peak of lunch or dinner hour, or on the weekend.
Pho Hung is a great starter place for anybody getting into the delightful dish known as Pho. It's clean, well lit inside and the menu offers an assortment of vietnamese dishes from Bun, Pho, Broken rice and they are well known in some circles for the crispy chicken wings and their spring rolls. The Pho is consistent here, perhaps not the best broth in town but it is always hot, served quickly and tasty. And another plus is that the beef is of good quality and slice paper thin!!
Noodles are not fresh nor do they have saw on their herb plate these are minor inconveniences. Plus during their peak times one can feel like a cow wading through their wham bam thank you ma'am service. And lately their prices have been creeping up in that it is no longer a steal to eat here as it once was. But if you're just getting to Pho or vietnamese food in general, this would be a good place to start before branching off.
This is similar to the review I gave for the Annex location....
Firstly, I lived in Vietnam in 2003-2004 and am familiar with all types of Vietnamese cuisine (I make my own and go out to eat Viet at least 1-2 times a week). This is perhaps the most overrated Vietnamese restaurant in Toronto. The portions are smaller and costs more than at other restaurants. I paid $9 for a bowl of noodles on Spadina (pho bo kho). That is simply outrageous.
The menu is vast, as it is at most Vietnamese restaurants. Normally very busy and loud. Service is typical of this type of food genre.
The Pho - broth is very good, though fresh noodles are not used. The portion size is smaller here than at most Vietnamese restaurants in Toronto. The "Choo Choo Train" (Xe Lua) on Spadina and others in Old Chinatown serve fresh noodles -- both are better options.
The Fish Sauce (which is served with everything not labeled 'pho')- not strong enough in my opinion, seems diluted -- as is the hoisin sauce.
There are a number of better places on Spadina/Dundas (Xe Lua, even Pho Pasteur), though if you are on Bloor, it may be the only option for pho.
I haven't tried a lot of pho places and I don't know a lot about Vietnamese food, but what I do know is that I love Pho Hung! By far some of the cheapest, delicious food you will ever eat, with generous portions and quick service. I really wish I could remember the number of the thing I always order. It's the Vermicelli noodles with grilled beef and spring rolls. The small is really a large, so I can't even imagine how big the large would be. It's about 6 dollars and they bring this tasty sauce to the table that you put over the noodles. I always mean to try something else but it really is SO good that I can never sway from it.
I've been with people who have ordered soups, or other items and have never heard any complaints so I think it would be hard to go wrong here! Their mango milkshakes are also a nice addition. They always bring tea to the table and sometimes in the summer it's iced tea (I feel like I'm constantly talking about iced tea in my reviews, but what can you do). This location is always pretty busy but I've never had to wait for a table and the service is pretty efficient :)
This was my original Chinatown goto Pho place! I completely forgot the name until I seen it in the recent reviews on the welcome page. Awesome! This place rocks!
The pho here is delicious. The price is right. The spring rolls are good. Meh what else is there to say. The service is alright. The location is alright -- clean enough for me.
This place is nothing special but it was one of the first Pho restaurants I tried in Toronto and I was lucky that I walked into a half-decent one when I did. This is a good quality restaurant but there are no aspects about it that make me want to yell out a suggestion to visit it.
Best price/size/taste ratio Pho in town!
Prices $5-9 for a Pho bowl.
Their Pho is supersized: Small - is Large, Medium - is XL, and XL is probably a gallon of Pho.
Never tried anything except #6 there, and always keep taking it - and it as good as it gets!
Great Pho! A+
Usually eat there once or twice a week, and been like that for almost 5 years. I usually always stick to the pho, but shakes, springrolls, bun are all good. They also have this deep fried fish dish that is amazing! hidden Gem.
They lose points for the following:
They jacked up the price because of their popularity.
They aren't opened past 10pm.
Recently their cutlery smells like bleach such that every time I go I have to wash them again with the tea.
The last point is a major dissapointment for me, and I've been meaning to talk to the owner about it. But... still not enough to pull me away.
Clean, quick service. Okay food but yeah I've noticed the prices have increased too. Very busy and loud place. Cash only.
I've become kind of obsessed with pho in the past year or two, and Pho Hung is probably in my top five places to go. It's kind of out of the way for me, otherwise I would go there more, but it's a great joint in Chinatown.
Pho broth here is definitely hearty and cozy, if I can even describe it as such. Some pho places make a broth that tastes like they used one of those broth cubes and called it a day. Pho Hung's broth tastes as though it's been simmering all day and absorbing all the flavours and spices. Soooo delicious.
And I've had some of their non-pho choices as well, and was super impressed. I think I had a curry tofu deal once and it was SO good that I kept eating even after I was full and then felt as though I would explode.
My only irk with this place is the service -- I've found it to be kind of slow and wait staff could be a little friendlier. Then again, I've heard that all the tips go to the owners, not to the servers, so that could explain why they don't try harder.
Also they aren't a late night pho place which is kind of annoying. They close really early which forces more people to go to Xe Lua down the street, which is open 24 hours.
Regardless, come here for the food, and don't be surprised if there's a crowd -- it's a huge U of T hotspot.
I've ate here many times and by far the best quality is the insanely cheap prices. Though with it being Chinatown you have to wonder if the inexpensive dishes are a result of low-quality food. Regardless I enjoy eating here and find the atmosphere to be pleasant. The food arrives quickly and I have never spent more than 20 bucks (including tip). Oh, and the Vietnamese ice coffee is a must! Many of my friends eat here as well, so that confirms for me that this is place to be if stuck in Chinatown.
This busy Vietnamese eatery in Chinatown is always packed, and with good reason. Pound for pound, Pho Hung is probably one of the best values in Toronto. For under $8, you can feast like a king on huge bowls of pho, large plates of bun, or one of the meat and rice plates.
The gigantic menu (which is really more like a book) features hundreds of items (including pigeon!), but 95% of the people I've seen either order some form of pho (noodle soup with meat, sprouts, and basil) or bun (vermicelli noodle bowl with meat, cucumber, sprouts, peanuts, and mint). The spring rolls are also excellent, and as soon as you sit down to order, a fresh pot of complimentary tea will be delivered to your table.
I think of Pho Hung as "fast food Vietnamese" because the flavours aren't quite as delicate as other Vietnamese places, it's a little greasier, and while the meals are satiating and delicious, there's not much in the way of frills. The atmosphere is also classic Chinatown (ie: bare-bones) and the cleanliness of the washrooms is touch and go at best (or, better put: try not to touch anything if you have to go).
Pho Hung is a super quick meal and it's cheap and decent. Usually cheap and quick in Chinatown means dirty, but it's a pleasant, clean experience. This is the kind of Vietnamese joint you can take Vietnamese friends to as well as students and American tourists alike. And you don't hear that often.
Also, lots of great vegetarian options that don't taste like cardboard or compressed dust.
And if you like coffee, Vietnamese coffee is the bomb!
Can I help but love pho from these guys? I can't. Naturally, there a bunch of other good things on the menu, but I'm stuck in a delicious rut.
This time was the second time I have been here. The first time I had the pho with rare beef, well done beef and tripe - eww. eww and weird. But actually not that bad tasting; whether I would order it again in the same incarnation, I doubt it. This time around, we came in after a night at the AGO and after this season's first real snowfall, so we were aching for a good pho. This time I had the one with rare beef and brisket. Better choice. The broth was so rich in flavour, the meat was tender and fatty (the fatty part kinda irked me a bit but I looked straight ahead and ate it anyway.) That soup coupled with the fresh basil, sprouts and sauces provided made for a great way to warm up. While we were slurping those up, (they came to the table almost immediately), the spring rolls arrived - perhaps the best I have ever tasted. For real. So goddamn crunchy! And filled with noodles and stuff! And greasy the way it should be! Finally we chose to be adventurous and got this pan-cake with shrimp and pork. I don't think it was quite what we had imagined. It was some kind of omelette that had periodic shrimps and a piece of fried pork or two. (i literally got a hold of one measly piece of pig). The consistency of the egg was kind of mealy and crispy and (don't know why different rules apply here, but they do) too greasy. It was also filled with bean sprouts. We did manage to finish off most of it, but I wouldn't order that again.
The weirdest thing happened at the end of the meal, though. We over ordered by ordering the large soups (at 8 bucks - a steal) and I was trying to temper myself, so I left some beefy, soupy goodness in the bowl to take home; my friend was even silly enough to give me the rest of her unfinished soup so the booty would have been that much more great. But when I asked the waiter to pack it up he said that they didn't allow their customers to take leftover soup home with them. I asked him why and he intimated that some folks had gotten sick from the soup after it was no longer hot and/or when they ate it at home. What the H? I can't say I felt wonderful right then, after having just wolfed down most of that bowl and at the same time I was pissed that I didn't finish all my beef. Strange. Anyhow, I'd still go there again, just keep that in mind when you go.
