Pho Que Huong

I took my mom out to eat at Pho Que Huong. Neither of us had ever had Vietnamese food  before. We didn't know what to expect, but we were hoping for some good food. When we walked in, we realized how Americanized the restaurant was. There was a flat screen TV with football on and the setting didn't feel ethnic at all. We sat down and our waiter handed us our menus. He placed a fork and a set of chopsticks on the table. It took us a while to find something that really appealed to us. The names of the dishes on the menu were so foreign I cant even imagine how to pronounce any of it.

I didn't write down the name of my dish but it was some kind of noodle bowl with shrimp, cilantro, carrots and potato roots. It was good, but the taste was very different. After eating American food, I tend to have the flavor of that food in my mouth for some time. The flavor of this Vietnamese dish did not last very long. The potato roots seemed to eliminate all the other flavors. I decided to add some of their hot sauce for flavor. It made the dish taste better, but it was too hot! I ate all of my food and successfully ate it all with chop sticks. However, I don't think I will be going back to eat Vietnamese food soon.

The food itself was very different from American food. The taste and the materials used were unique to me. Also, eating with chopsticks is not a common American tradition. The restaurant itself was very Americanized and I felt comfortable eating there. I learned that a large array of vegetables are used in almost every Vietnamese dish. I expected the restaurant to be really ethnic setting wise. The food is about what I expected. I think syncretism is a good term to apply to this blog. The Vietnamese restaurant has blended traits from their culture to fit inside of our culture.