Present Restaurant

Took the family to Present a few days after the big snowstorm of Jan 2016. Had heard that the food was very expensive for a Vietnamese restaurant (it was, especially given the large number of inexpensive Vietnamese restaurants in the Falls Church area) but that it was really good, so we gave it a go. When we entered, there was water all over the floor and water was leaking through the ceiling. After being seated, we were brought water and then promptly forgotten about by the waiter for 10 – 15 minutes.
After finally flagging the waiter down, we placed our order, with my wife and daughter ordering the same vermicelli dish (bun thit nuong cha giao aka #13 Banquet Vermicelli) but with my wife substituting tofu for chicken for her entrée. The meal was served by a different waitress, who delivered the dishes and left us to eat our meal.
Although my wife and daughter had ordered the same menu item, albeit with the difference in chicken vice tofu, my wife’s dish didn’t include the crispy spring roll that is a standard part of the dish. When I brought this to the waitress’ attention, she then proceeded to repeatedly argue with me about why my wife should not get the same items on her dish because ‘what people usually order is different’. She then told us that she would bring a spring roll but would charge us separately for it because she didn’t want her manager to get angry with her for giving us a spring roll (even though the item is a standard ingredient in the dish). When I challenged her logic as to why my wife should not get the same items with her dish given that we had ordered the same dish with the exception of a change in meat to tofu, she continuously used the excuse that this ‘was not what people usually order’, and that she would not provide the spring roll because she didn’t want the manager to get angry with her. I informed her that her explanation made no sense and asked her if her manager would be more angry over the loss of a spring roll which was a normal part of the meal or over a bad review for atrocious customer service. She stated that she didn’t care, but that if we wanted the spring roll we would have to pay extra for it.
I am amazed that a restaurant was willing to anger their customers and risk the loss of future customers over such a trivial issue, especially since the spring roll is integral to the dish and not a special request. To make it more perplexing, when the receipt came, no matter what she was referring to regarding what ‘people usually ordered’, we were still charged for the exact same dish that comes with the spring roll. We will never return to this restaurant since the food was no better than any other Vietnamese restaurant in the area but was nearly twice as expensive, the entrée size was much smaller, and the service was slow, rude, and refused to provide us the food items that we ordered and paid for. Unless you like being gouged for no reason, then avoid this place and go to one of the MANY other Vietnamese restaurants in the area (especially given the diversity of restaurants in Eden Center).

Decent vietnamese, but it’s further than eden center from me, and eden center has much better offerings.
Still, a cute small restaurant, service is good, and they have some original offerings (duck dishes that I haven’t seen elsewhere, among others). The garden rolls and spring rolls are standard, but nothing really stands out. Too much noodles/​not enough pork/​shrimp in the garden rolls. The duck was good, but was not a fan of the sauce it came with. Presentation was great

It’s tough finding good Vietnamese that’s not phở or mi in the area. We loved it here and unlike most Asian places, presentation is important and great. The canh chua ca was great and almost like mom’s maybe a tad on the sweet side. We’ll probably pass on the imperial autumn rolls next time (just not as crispy and hot we thought it would be), but the goi ngo sen was phenomenal. Definite must… we’ve had viet at a similar place in merrifield related to several brothers and must say Present far exceeds with freshness and authenticity. Must try viet in the area.

Doesnt get better than this for a good price elegant eatery.
I mean the menus item titles are legenday «Far traveling shrimp»
The food is incredibly good as well.
Im not someone who cares about service, but man the service was overpowered (means good). Not overly attentive, and just peacefully nice. Kind of like an old nice butler. Check it out friends.

I’ve been meaning to try Present for the longest time and finally got the chance to do so. The food here is superb! We came when it opened at 11 on a Saturday and were immediately greeted by two employees. The service is great and our waiter gave us helpful suggestions for first-​timers at the restaurant. He gave us lots of options on the menu and was the friendliest.
The #3 Imperial Autumn Roll was suggested because of their handmade rice wrapper and I loved it. I wrapped that with lettuce and dipped it in the fish sauce. We also got the #16 Seaside Banquet Vermicilli which came with grilled shrimp. You get lots of shrimp and they’re a decent size. For soups, we got the #26 Sleeping Duck on the Golden Pond, which was an egg noodle with roasted duck. You get a whole duck leg with some extra meat, and the broth was perfect.
Also, if you check in on Unilocal,you get a free dessert. We chose the fried banana with coconut cream topping. Highly recommend if you’re a sweets person.
I’ll be coming back for sure to try some other dishes!

Pro: Food is good and wide range of selection that you don’t see at some other Viet restaurants. Great customer service and definitely catered more to dine in than quick carry out.
Con: On the pricey side but you’re paying for their customer service. Portion is also smaller than other places.
Overall solid place to take family for a nicer Viet restaurant to eat family style.

We really enjoyed everything about our first visit to this place the weekend of Thanksgiving. First of all, the greeting we received on the way in (from the manager/​owner?) was so warm and caring. Our service was fantastic and everyone was friendly and patient and helpful.
The food was very good and also reasonably priced! And so were the drinks.
And the restaurant is quite beautiful on the inside, especially with the soothing fountain noise.
I can see why this place is the #1 ranked restaurant in Falls Church. We will be back!

Great service, great food, and great atmosphere.
We had the Hen Xuc Banh Da, Bo Luc Lac, Vit Sot Me, Ca Chien Nuoc Mam Xoai, and Canh Ca Thia La. Everything was tasty, but the highlights were the Bo Luc Lac and the Canh Ca Thia La.

Cow on the field was excellent. The beef was so tender and melted in the mouth. We also ordered the the tamarind and orange duck, which were both good. Another dish we ordered was the chicken garlic lemon grass, the sauce was amazing.
The restaurant manager and hostess were very friendly. We will definitely come back to try other dishes and desert

I don’t know why I haven’t been back to Present sooner, it might be because I live near Eden Center and I’m completely spoiled for great Asian restaurants. I would describe Present as more «Vietnamese Fusion» vs. the more traditional spots at Seven Corners. The dishes are reasonably priced, well presented (thus the name, I guess?) and the service is very attentive. Oh yeah, and I forgot to say that the food is very good! I’ll be back, hopefully it won’t be another five years this time!

Excellent! I got food to-​go from Present Restaurant and loved it. I am obsessed with vermicelli rice bowls and I ordered the Seaside Banquet Vermicelli (Rice vermicelli with grilled marinated jumbo shrimps served with bean sprouts, chopped lettuce, shredded cucumber and peanuts served with fish sauce). Sooo delicious! I got my fiancé the Country Banquet Vermicelli, which came with the same ingredients, except chicken instead of shrimp. This meal tasted so healthy and delicious. We also got a Blue Paradise Seafood Summer Roll (A mixture of shrimp, minced pork, and crabmeat rolled in a thin rice wrapper and fried until crispy) as a starter and loved it.
My food was ready quickly and they offered me water as I waited for the food. I also loved the ambiance of the restaurant and would love to visit again and dine in in the future.
I would love to visit Present Restaurant again soon! I’m thoroughly impressed!

Good presentation by the restaurant of tasty food. Worth trying out.
Pleasant, peaceful ambiance during lunch makes it a nice place for lunch dates. It looks as if it has good potential for night time meals as well.

This place is so deserving of 5 stars.
Love this place, and I’m gonna tell you why.
For starters the food they serve is prepared well, and it tastes great. Our service we received was great, they were patient and very alert. It’s kind of cute inside too. If it’s you’re first time trying Vietnamese food then this would be your go to. You won’t be disappointed.

Present is definitely a good restaurant to bring someone for their first Vietnamese experience because it is more Americanized in many ways compared to the restaurants found in the Eden Center up the road. The décor is nice and clean here with an indoor pond/​waterfall and they always have the most beautiful orchids! The way they present their menu is really what makes them unique, along with the traditional Vietnamese name of the dishes, they have long elaborate (and quite creative) names for all of their dishes. For example, their duck noodle soup is Sleeping Duck in Golden Pond. Definitely makes things less scary when the food is described in this manner. Overall, the food here is decent, but pretty Americanized. It just also feels like their trying way too hard to impress. But being Vietnamese, it’s easier for me to put on a brave face and deal with the horrible service that is to be expected at many of the competing restaurants in the area for the better food. I think that for what they offer, Present is a good place to start if you’re trying Vietnamese food, particularly something other than phở, for the first time.

Went to Present with my family last night (Saturday) for my early birthday dinner. It was super busy and we noticed that everyone who came had already called in and had a reservation. After arrival, I noticed on the Unilocal app there was a function to place a reservation– I will try that next time. The wait was pretty long– the host said approximately 15 minutes and we ended waiting for more than 30. A family that had a reservation came in while we were waiting and were forced to wait about 15 minutes after talking to the host. I overheard them saying that they didn’t know why they were waiting since they had a reservation.
After we were seated, we ordered 5 different dishes. We ordered Treasure from the Sea as our appetizer. It was my favorite dish of the night (probably because I love pineapple). The plating was really nice. We also ordered Mosaic Pathway (fried glass noodles with crab), Red Tamarind Path (fried shrimp with a tamarind sauce), Cow on the Open Field («shaky beef»), Gregarious Lemongrass Chicken, and Gift from the Sea on a Haystack (fried noodles with seafood). The meal was really delicious and each dish had its own unique flavor. I also used the Unilocal offer for a free desert and we got the friend bananas and coconut ice cream. I was not a big fan of the bananas but the coconut ice cream was so good! It had bits of toasted coconut in it. Definitely would return again as the food great and the service was exceptional.

Best Vietnamese place I’ve ever eaten at! I came here to visit family and DC and we came here during dinner time. They were really accommodating to our huge family.
Because we were a fam or like 20, we ordered three things of family style dinner options. The first of the apps came which were clams xao black sesame rice paper and that was a first for me. They don’t have it in the philly restaurants near me. Then came the zoi in pineapple. And the canh (sour soup), Bo luc lac, fired shrimp and pineapple and a bunch of other things started filling the tables. Everything there was really good.
I also ordered the banh canh with pork, shrimp, and crab. I loved the soup and the crab. The noodles were really firm and the shrimp was deff frozen and not fresh. The portion was really filling.
Service wise, our poor waiter was the only one to take care of us and he did a really good job but was running around the whole time. The restaurant was clean, cute, and amazing!

My family and I were invited for lunch here and boy was I happy we came. We ordered calamari and fried spring rolls for starters. Although the serving is very generous, we had to place another order of calamari because my daughter cannot get enough of it! My husband and I ordered Shrimp In The Fresh Ocean and Shrimp At Seaside, both presented fabolously. The dishes were not short of vegetable art such as flower-​carved carrots and artfully sliced cucumbers. My entrée, Shrimp In The Fresh Ocean, came with 6 jumbo prawns on a pineapple bed. What a presentation it really was! Such a shame that we devoured it! :-)
The quality and taste of the food was excellent and the service was outstanding! I will definitely recommend this to my friends and family.

Two of us had dinner on a Sunday night. I loved the ambiance and décor– very high end for Vietnamese and not matching the strange restaurant name. The place filled up fast. The tables are not close together which is so relaxing.
I got the fixed price meal: the spring rolls, lemon chicken, and coconut ice cream. My friend got the summer rolls and vermicelli bowl. Both rolls were amazing. I loved my chicken both for dinner and leftover for lunch the next day. The coconut ice cream was perfect to cool my mouth afterward. I’d return and get all three again.

How can you not adore this wonderful place!
The dishes have names like «sleeping duck on a golden lake» or «cow in the field» or «warm and genuine piglet.» When you are ordering, it’s the most wonderful thing to be able to read your order and have this sort of identification with it. Like, «yes, I WOULD order the sleeping duck!»
Then you get your food, and it’s just not like a cooke cutter Vietnamese place. It’s not expensive, but not cheap, and the food is just totally different from most Vietnamese places. Their vermicelli noodle bowls were the most delicious I’ve ever had, my sister had crunchy egg noodles cooked in a broth that was poured over them, with seafood. Yes, poured over them! How cool is that. The duck dish my father had was also wonderful.
Truly, every dish was like a present we opened as we ate. Come to Present.
FYI it is in a strip mall.

3.5 stars. I have to admit that I had decent experience here. I liked their pork vermicilli, and egg rolls. It is a huge portion that I turned into 3 meals. Not 1, not 2, but 3! I got pretty sick of it after the 3^rd time. Regardless good, and still fresh after a couple of days. I don’t have such luck when I tried previously to eat left over from Vietnamese places.
Pros —
*cute ambiance in restaurant
*good customer service
* tasty food
Cons —
*watered down/​Americanized Vietnamese food
*kooky names of dishes sort of through me a little bit — I so want to eat a Cow in a Golden Bath… this wasn’t really a name of a dish, but some were similar.
^^ more of a matter of personal opinion than actually being a negative thing.
I do not get the name of the restaurant. It doesn’t say much for the food or the type of cuisine it is.
I’m done… bye!