The boys wanted Vietnamese for lunch as they claimed that they have not have one for a while. So, we went to An Nam Restaurant for lunch.
Nanzaro wanted to have an Ice Vietnamese Milk Coffee for his drink. It costs $4. I told him he can get his coffee from McDonalds on the way back but Nanzaro is very stubborn. When he wanted something, he will insist on getting it.
Vietnamese Milk Coffee is served with the above special dripping cup with condensed milk at the bottom of the glass. Since Nanzaro wanted the Ice Milk Coffee, they served the ice in another glass.
After the coffee finished dripping, I told Nanzaro to stir the coffee to dissolve the condensed milk. Then he added the ice to the coffee. He was quite disappointed and kind of regretted as what he got is only half a glass of Ice Milk Coffee as in the photo above.
I would prefer the Ice Milk Coffee from Pho Han which is only $2.99 and it came prepared in a glass already. At least the glass is full and not half.
Nanzaro and I got the Special Seafood Dry Noodle. This is $8.50. It has generous amount of … seafood like prawns, artificial crab meat and squid.
The Special Seafood Dry Noodle is the one with soy sauce and fried shallot and fried garlic which I love.
Arkensen had a large Mix Beef Rice Noodle Soup as usual. The large one is $7.50.
The noodle soup comes with a side of bean sprouts, basil and lime wedges as usual. They are fresh.
The bill came to $32 before tips. An Nam Restaurant accepts credit card.
They have quite a number parking at the back.
BUSINESS HOUR
7 days a week
11:00AM to 10:00PM
Hey Ben, you know what would be good? A little tutorial on how to drink the Vietnamese Ice Coffee. I recently had one and forgot what to do with it.
Actually a whole series of ethnic restaurant etiquette would be good. There’s a lot of little things that would spare your followers embarrassment such as not turning around chopsticks when picking things out of common plates, hovering over the dish, etc.
For Best Vietnamese, you should try Phnom Penh 金邊小館 in Chinatown. They won all the awards in town.
Affordable and they also have the best chicken wings in town. I won’t go anywhere else for Vietnamese food after trying Phnom Pen.http://www.dineouthere.com/restaurants/phnom-penh-cambodian-vietnamese-restaurant-in-vancouver-chinatown
@JOHN – everything I learned in life (recently) I learned from Youtube [wink]:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuGQ-ebKbac&feature=related
Japanese restaurant etiquette (humor):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAJeUONc3b0
😀
Normally, I find most of your reviews to be quite helpful and positive.
However, I’m quite disappointed with your very negative title about the coffee that would make some people stay away from a good restaurant.
It seems like you are so cheap, that if you went somewhere else, and spent an extra $1, you would have gotten a full glass of coffee. Could you have asked for some more hot water and fill up the glass? Or that you dont mind spending the extra money in gas to goto McDonalds to get it.
If you went and got an Espresso, or other drink anywhere else, you be paying that much, unless you prefer the Mcdonalds, or Timmies.
It seems alot of your reviews lately focus on how chintzy you are.
Hi Ed:
Yeah, maybe you are right in that the title of the post sets the tone of the write up even the first read is read. Actually, I can relate to what Suanne wrote and she was writing from the angle of our personal family thoughts and experience. Certainly not from the angle of a “food critic” because we are not.
Have you seen this famous picture before?
The full article is found here on this link. This billboard was erected in front of Starbucks headquarters in Seattle by McDonalds in their opening salvo of a recent coffee war.
Yeah, incidentally McDonalds is calling $4 coffees dumb (their word, not mine). I guess for HALF a glass of coffee for $4, what would one call it? Given this comparison, I think Suanne has been really kind describing this half-glass of coffee … notwithstanding that she is also my wife. 🙂
Ben
$4 for half a cup of coffee is indeed expensive if the coffee is not one of the best coffee you ever had or the restaurant doesn’t have kick ass ambiance or decor to justify the price.
I like to read food blogs such as this one written by family folks not food critics, because family folks tell the truth from their perspective that is similar to most people’s . Food critics can be quite pretentious.
I think it might be useful to remember that the bloggers doing this blog and going to restaurants out of love for gastronomy, out of their own pockets paying for meals, also have 2 children which..to feed, clothe, etc. So the focus on value or at least if one pays alot of money, that it is better quality food to make it worthwhile.
I came from a family of 6 children, where we only went out as a family to eat a full meal, less than 6-8 times annually. 2 of those meals were annual banquets organized by my father’s restaurant employer or a wedding banquent of one of their friends. I think my gastronomy as s child (growing up in Canada) began with those banquets + mother’s cooking in the 1960’s-1970’s when Asian groceries were rare outside of Toronto. We lived 120 km. west of that city.
Hi Suanne,
Thanks for the write up on another Vietnamese place that has the dry noodles or “gon low mein”. I like Thai Son’s.