The Real Lee Ahn

Two stars for the food and an additional star for the kindhearted lady preparing it.
As another reviewer has mentioned, the pad thai is really the only solid go-​to from this truck. I would steer clear of the other things I normally get from Chinese food-​trucks (eggplant chicken, sesame chicken, etc.) because they are simply drenched in a sauce that is indistinguishable from one dish to the next.
All that being said, the pad thai also really isn’t pad thai per se, more like… rice noodles with some chicken and sweetly sauteed vegetables and some Planter’s crushed peanuts sprinkled on top. The Pad Thai sauce comes from a bottle that does not even feign authenticity. Be mindful of all of this!
But the lady is super nice and she works like CRAZY. I found that this truck was consistently open later than the others along Spruce, so when you’re on that side of Locust Walk and want some Asian fare, take a chance with the few bucks in your wallet and develop an opinion for yourself.

I really enjoy eating their food — large portions for little price! Contrary to the previous posts, Le Ahn offers traditional Chinese food! Great taste and reminds me of family cooking as a college student. I recommend their tea eggs that is served with beef.

Tastes bad. Tofu is apparently not fresh. Rice is really dry and hard, again, not freshly cooked. They spill the same kind of sauce on every dish, making them taste almost the same. I feel a little bit sick every time after having it.
Unclean. They grab money, and then touch food with the same hand.
Overpriced. Simply vegetables would cost $ 4.5 (which is $ 3.5 in Yue Kee).
Won’t try again.

Food wasn’t the greatest, but not all that bad either. Some kinda garlic tofu, was a Lil bland, n brown rice was a mushy mess. Chicken n broccoli was ok for jj, but on bland side, n mostly dark meet, look like from a drumstick or thigh, I tasted the broccoli n sauce. Chicken wings looked prefried, not a lot of breading on it, n fried rice was on the hard side. I had some kinda tofu vegetable lemongrass soup, was on bland side but good n spicy. Very nice lady working in the truck.

Equally terrible as the other Lee Ahn place. Ordered beef with rice, sauce was overwhelmingly salty, meat was not tender at all. Will not return.

The Real Lee Ahn: Serving up MYSTERY MEAT everyday.
No, but seriously, my experience with this hell on earth cart left me wanting to save their listeria monocytogenes laced food in my fridge so I could chuck it right back at the owner the next day. Let me set up the story for you:
It was late, and I just got out of my 20^th class as a Penn student. It was raining, but hungry as I was, I knew it was time to try my first food cart in Philly. My excitement built as I found myself ordering General Tso’s chicken from the very friendly lady at The Real Lee Ahn. I proceeded home on the bus, fumes permeating through the bag… along with perhaps just a little bit of grease that may or may not have rubbed on my neighbor. Finally, I arrived home to devour this long awaited treat.
Bite #1– Although the dish didn’t look bad esthetically, my first bite into the chicken made me wonder just how long that soggy, pathetic piece of meat was sitting in a steamed container until I was dumb enough to order it.
Bite #2– As I lifted the fork up to my mouth, I caught a whiff of the most ghastly smell that took me a good four hours to actually forget. Upon cutting said piece open, I noted shiny, translucent scales– apparently, there were pieces of fried, rotting fish thrown into this smörgåsbord of bad food.
Bite #3– After ridding the dish of all pieces of squishy, fried fish (which was about half!) I went in again, but this time not without cutting it open to double check. To my surprise, the meat was dark and looked like crap. Now I know General’s is normally made with dark meat, but this stuff didn’t even qualify for meat. If it wasn’t squirrel and actually was chicken, I’m convinced it was the rectum (no, not the ascending, descending, or sigmoid colon, but the legit rectum still packed with… you get the point). Following this, my appetite was ruined/​destroyed/​ravaged. I felt like I needed to shower. I promptly threw everything in the trash and convinced myself to never be daring enough to try a food cart again… or for a month or so.
Lastly, doesn’t the name say it all? Selling the rights to the Lee Ahn name and then changing their minds and setting up shop as the Real Lee Ahn right next to their competitor over some trivial dispute… what the hell is wrong with these people? Perhaps they should be more worried that their food tastes like cancer.
Hate you long time, Real Lee Ahn!

I was looking for Singapore Rice Noodle. Got a pound of rice noodle with some yellow curry powder mixed in with a handful of random veggies. This review will serve as a reminder to myself not to do this again. She didn’t even include a packet of soy sauce to flavor this up with. Me –0/​The Real Lee Ahn — 1.

Ok, this really should be a 3.5 because I have just discovered something wonderful about this place: Curry Rice Noodle Soup. It’s a gigantic bowl of aromatic soup for $ 5. I mean, this DE-​LICIOUS.

I wish Unilocal allowed us to give half stars because the Real Le Ahn really only deserves 2.5 stars. It’s not 2 stars because it’s generally better than the Le Ahn across the street due to greater selection and larger portions, but it doesn’t deserve 3 stars because the quality of the food is not that great.
There are a few dishes that I would stick to while ordering from here. The Pad Thai is generally good, but be warned that it’s not really Pad Thai. The eggplant with chicken in black bean sauce is probably the best dish that they serve. And the roasted pork with rice is something quick that you can get when you’re running between classes. Otherwise, most of the other dishes tend to be overwhelmed with tons of mystery sauce (probably loaded with MSG).
Despite everything, the lady who runs the Real Le Ahn is a gem. She’s awesome and makes great conversation when you’re waiting for food. I guess that could bump its rating up to 3 stars.

Every time I see this food stand I am reminded of hip hop’s Roxanne wars.
Le Ahn vs. The Real Le Ahn?
As far as Chinese food on wheels goes this one’s not so great.
When I asked if they had brown rice, the reply was «I can put soy sauce on it, that’ll make it brown.» Clever, but, no, thanks.
Anyway, I prefer Roxanne Shanté to The Real Roxanne. So, you may be able to gather my feelings for The Real Le Ahn.

I always get chicken phở here. I wouldn’t exactly classify it as phở, but its a really good bowl of chicken soup. Not greasy, and you can tell the chicken came from a whole chicken (REAL chicken). Great place for a quick and extremely cheap lunch!

Terribley fake faux-​Chinese food, goopy sauces abound. but somehow I am addicted to the sweet truck lady’s egg lo mein with white «gravy». It’s a lot of food for under $ 4.
She also has hong shao eggs!

I’m on a mission to try as many Penn food carts as possible. I ordered a small vegetarian stir-​fry singapore noodle. It was a curry noodle dish (lightly curried) with some vegetables, lots of scrambled egg… and halfway through the dish… LOTS OF HAIR. No. I do not do hair cooked into my eggs anymore. That is a food trend that went out of style with tomato aspic.
I was already not loving the noodles pre-​hair discovery, they were mushy (both noodles and veggies) and too salty.
Plus I ordered a small and she charged me for a large… I tried to explain but it wasn’t worth the trouble for $ 0.75. Maybe I paid extra for all the hair (seriously, like three long black hairs cooked into the egg).
I gave it two stars because that is how I would have rated the dish without the unfortunate incident… otherwise, it was a no star experience.

Actually, if I remember correctly, there are three of these… the «Real», the «Original» and the «Lee Ahn’s».
All the history is probably lost by now… but this cart has an interesting method of making food, both steam the noodles/​rice and then pour a thick white/​brown sauce over the noodles or dish to complete it. Rarely do you get a full sauteed/​stir-​fried dish, although sometimes it was possible, depending on the dish. I prefer this one just due to the fact I know the owner after speaking with her (and she pops an extra treat into my lunch each time).
Service is a bit slower than other places (there’s only so much room to maneuver, and somehow she managed to cram a bit of everything from bamboo-​steamed snacks to dumplings in here…), but the wait usually isn’t bad except at lunch time.

FYI a few years ago Lee Ahn sold her truck to the nice people across the street. Then she decided to come out of retirement but they would not relinquish her name. So she decided to go the Kramer route with the name.
I much prefer the «Fake» Lee Ahn across the street. The Real Lee Ahn is more expensive, menu is confusing, and the food is not as good.

Excellent Chinese food truck, but be prepared to wait for a while. The story behind the name is that there’s another food truck across the street also run by a woman named Lee Ahn, but I don’t remember which one came first– which is sort of sad, considering the number of times I’ve heard the story.