oh all right dave le, you win

i have been all worked up about the impending arrival of pho lang thang ever since i met dave le, one of the guys behind the operation, a couple months ago at arnold's. i am absolutely obsessed with vietnamese food and i have always wanted more of it in cincinnati. so when dave told me that he and some friends were going to be opening a place up in findlay market, i could not wait.

pho lang thent

today dave and friends had prepared a sneak peek of their food for second sundays on main. they didn't have their whole future menu available, and all i tried were spring rolls and the vietnamese coffee. but damn was it good. the spring rolls were perfect... chewy and crunchy and the shrimp was juicy and not overcooked. the vietnamese coffee was refreshing and cool and not too sweet. i am sold and i can't wait to spend all my free time stalking them when they open at findlay (which dave says should be sometime in july... hurry it up boys).

suzie wong's on madison

yum, suzie wong's is so good! i have to admit, i was skeptical about a "pan asian" restaurant run by the former owner of shanghai mama's (yes, i still hate that place and i have eaten there several more times since the last time i bitched about it so please no admonitions to give it another try. everything is bland and tastes like soy sauce and makes me sad. ok shanghai mama's rant over).

anyway, suzie wong's is excellent. i went with erin last week and since it is currently byob and prices are good ($2-12 for appetizers, $8-16 for entrees) we felt that we could splurge and get a feast. we had the following items:

• cambodian beef carpaccio: beef filet with fresh herb marinade, lime, extra virgin olive oil, and garnished with fresh basil and chili peppers. amazing! my favorite thing we had all night.
• thai green lip mussels: sauteed mussels in a tangy thai seafood broth. sooo good. the broth tasted like tom yum soup. we were eating it with spoons.
• malaysian chicken in a clay pot: chicken breast, sweet onion, green and red pepper, seasonal vegetables sauteed in a malaysian yellow curry and served in a country clay pot. awesome. so delicious. the curry was complex and savory and rich. erin said it reminded her of japanese curry, and she just got back from a trip to japan so i believe her.
• korean jap chae noodles: glass noodles sauteed with sesame oil, korean chili paste, and kimchi. eh. the only one i was not crazy about. not bad, just kind of bland. our waiter had to bring me some chili sauce to spice it up and it still wasn't that great. i've had much better at riverside and korea house. however, not bad. just not exciting.
• chinese broccoli in oyster sauce. wonderful. of course, i am a chinese broccoli freak so maybe not everyone would love this as much as i did. it was perfectly prepared, crunchy and delicate at the same time. yum.

the service on the whole was very good. there was one waitress we weren't really crazy about (she kind of got off on the wrong foot with us when we asked for recommendations from the fascinating menu and she told us to get egg rolls and calamari... boring... and she seemed to keep having conflicts with other staff). but everyone else definitely made up for it. they checked in with us regularly and really seemed to care whether we liked the food, and always made sure we had a fresh beer open.

the space is pretty similar to what it looked like when seny was in there... very red with christmas lights around, and a few asian touches now. it looks nice, and parking is easy. sorry i don't have any photos but it's pretty dark in there and i didn't want to use the flash.

i would definitely try to get there soon, not because it's going to close (i don't think it is) but because the current byob situation makes it such a good deal. we heard that they have applied for a liquor license so i am sure it is coming soon.

overall this place is awesome and an excellent addition to the neighborhood. they also deliver to a pretty wide area so if you are not in the mood to leave your house, you can maybe still enjoy their delicious food.

orient restaurant

didn't i promise a while back that i was going to start writing about all the lunch places downtown? clearly i was on the ball with that one. anyway i just wanted to give a shout out today to orient restaurant, which is your one and only choice for vietnamese food downtown. they also have a much more extensive selection of chinese options, and in my opinion it's the best chinese downtown. i think shanghai mama's is tasteless, inauthentic, and boring. it's chinese for the applebee's crowd. i realize people love that place though. don't hate me for my taste buds!

anyway, orient is this tiny little place that is always super crowded with mostly asian P&Gers at lunch. that is how you know it is good. actually, for like a year i refused to even set foot in the place because the dead plants and outdated decor convinced me that it was a front and did not really have good food. i was missing out because this place is tasty.

as i said, they do chinese and vietnamese. my favorite things to order there are the pho (aka rice noodles in broth), the stir fried egg noodles with a variety of meats, and the pad thai (it tastes different than most pad thais). all of these items are on the back of the menu. i also really like the shrimp with chili sauce on the chinese section of the menu. my friend eric who does not eat meat loves their vegetarian options, including the hunan tofu and the szechuan broccoli. eric also loves that they have cherry coke there (apparently this is hard to find).

apparently some of my coworkers went there a couple months ago and had a bad experience... they were out of a lot of things and the food did not taste that fresh or good. but i have been going there for over a year now and have never experienced that.

one of my favorite things about this place is all the sauces. they have four different sauces in little pots (regular chili sauce, smoked chili sauce, sriracha, and hoisin sauce) and i love to mix them into my food. it ends up being super spicy but really yummy. everything on the menu is pretty cheap, i think entrees are about $6-8.

orient is open 11-8 mon-sat, so even those of you who do not work downtown should be able to make it over. i wouldn't necessarily recommend making a trip downtown just for orient, but if you are in the neighborhood it is worth stopping in.

song long

ok so i have been dying to go to song long for like a year. i absolutely love vietnamese food and it is the only place i knew of in cincinnati (other than cilantro, which is good and cheap and fast but not life-altering). it is kind of in the middle of nowhere (for me) at reading rd. and section rd. in like roselawn or something.

finally last night i went. it was sooooo good. emma and i got the bun bo hue (aka "the jim special" which beth told us jim loves), which is a lemongrass and beef soup. it was spicy and cilantro-y and limey and excellent. everything was very fresh and flavorful. we also shared the cold summer rolls (goi cuon) which had both shrimp and roast pork in them. they were ok but i thought the rice paper was a little tough and the pork wasn't that flavorful and i think i prefer them with just shrimp. i also had a vietnamese coffee which you really can't go wrong with i don't think.

celia got the bo xao dam, which is described on the menu as: "sliced beef cooked in a rice wine vinaigrette. this sliced beef tickles your senses of sweet and teases your knowledge of sour." the best i can describe it is beef in this slimy sweet-but-not-savory sauce with hard boiled eggs and tomatoes on the side. she and beth liked it, but emma and i thought it was gross. we thought that maybe the reason we didn't like it was because our food was so strongly flavored. i don't know. i wouldn't order it.

beth got pho dac biet, which was a soup with chicken, rice noodles, and vegetables. it looked good and she liked it. i didn't try it. becky got mi xao, which was egg noodles stir fried with a variety of meats (shrimp, chicken, and beef) and vegetables. she really liked it but again i didn't try this one.

i was very pleased overall with the food. i would like to go back and try some more things on the menu, especially some of the fish dishes, the pho, the bun salad, and the grilled beef. those are usually my vietnamese food all stars and i didn't try any of them. but i was really really happy with my soup, it was everything you want from vietnamese food.

the atmosphere was fun. they had all these interesting things on the wall (family portraits, preserved butterflies, paintings, etc.) and a fish tank. there were a lot of colors and plants and things going on. it was pretty empty when we got there at 5:30 (we are grandmas) but it filled up. the service was ok, nothing special, but not bad either. just average. prices were very reasonable, i think i spent around $15 for half an appetizer, soup, and coffee.

overall i definitely recommend song long and i know i will be back. they have tons more things i want to try and the flavors were very fresh, spicy, and interesting. they also have a chinese menu with regulars such as general tso's, beef with broccoli, etc. in case you go with picky eaters.