Pho Ba Dau

This place reminds me of a Restaurant Impossible episode. Family came in on a Saturday night at dinner hour. First red flag: the place was completely empty. Second flag was no one greeted us so we seated ourselves. Third red flag was we sat around for two minutes and no one came to give us menus; we had to ask for them. Seriously? We were the only ones there! There was an old dude hanging out at the counter and a younger dude dicking around watching tv. I wanted to walk out right then and there but didn’t want to seem rude. Maybe I should have because they were rude! This is how you run a business?
Prices were kinda high… Especially considering the low food quality. The only item that seemed reasonably priced were the burgers.
Our orders were finally taken and while we waited, my sister left to use the restroom and returned saying there is a dog in the bathroom. Isn’t that a health violation? Shortly after, an obese pug walked out and sat by my dad’s chair. My dad’s facial expression was priceless. Also, when the guy brought out tea cups, they were filthy with brown spots over the sides of the cups. I read others’ reviews saying dirty dishes and I was like, c’mon, its a vietnamese restaurant! But no, these cups were pretty dirty, even for an asian restaurant.
After waiting for twenty minutes, the phở was finally ready (kinda long to get phở ready, dontcha think?). My mother-​in-​law had asked for a small bowl of broth for the little one. So, the dude loaded the bowl of phở and the small bowl of broth on his serving tray, and placed a plate of raw meat on top of the small bowl of broth. When he removed the tray of raw meat, the plate was dripping with broth but he still served it like it was nothing. We all stared in horror and disbelief. Totally wtf moment for me. If the tea cup was as dirty as it is, imagine what the bottom of that plate was and the broth from the small bowl was lapping all over the bottom of it! Needless to say, my baby sister is not eating a meal from that bowl.
Then my burger came out. First thing I saw was the torn open packet of mayonnaise on my plate. They are serving me a burger with an already open foil packet of mayonnaise! Are you joking? See the picture for yourself! The foil packet was full of dust too. The way the packet looked, a rat could have chewed a hole in it for all I know. Patty was frozen, but the fries were uh… Surprisingly nice and crunchy. Yes… I ate my meal. With all the issues that came up already, I didnt want to reorder because for sure a whole can of worms would come with the reorder.
My dad was shaking his head and poking fun at the place. I felt bad because I was the one who suggested on trying this place so I paid. I will give credit where credit is due: no food poisoning. We still left tip because we felt bad — if they don’t change things, either the city will shut them down or they will shut themselves down.

Chicken phở was ok. It was plain and flavorless. Had to really put in all the add on to give it more flavors. The egg rolls was phenomenal. So tasty and oh so crunchy. Nice people and decent food.

Decided to bring my boyfriend here as it was our first time eating here. After reading their menu here on Unilocal we decided to give it a try.
It was 10am, & the tables were still filthy from the night before.
My boyfriend had to order 3 times because they didn’t have any oxtail, or lobster, or beef tongue… Really? That’s why we went in the first place. We then asked for hot tea and it comes back with a tea bag. Well. Okay then…
After we finally got our food I found hair in my phở.
Broth was okay but other than that, we will most definitely not be back.
If you want to eat phở in the Alum Rock area, drive past this place and just go to Phở 54.

This place is a fusion of Vietnamese, French, and American dishes. I would recommend the pork chops, chicken salad (appetizer), and phở.
The pork chops come with a side of soup or salad and the entrée dish is pork chops with red rice and fries.
The chicken salad taste like the Vietnamese chicken salad which has a lemon vinaigrette dressing.
The place has a nice atmosphere & there is a pond inside.

If not for their innovative menu, this phở shop would be no different from the dozens of other ones in SJ. Their menu truly deserves some recognition. Dishes like pan-​fried phở and Bouillabaisse phở set this place apart from the dozens of other phở shops in San Jose and the rest of the Bay.
Pan-​fried phở? This is the kind of food people dream about but never venture to make. Not this place. Since they are pan frying boiled noodles it takes a bit longer than most dishes to come out and the server was kind enough to warn us ahead of time. Crunchy squares of phở that are crisp on the outside and soft on the inside are served with a saucy stir fried veggies on top. Its kind of like the Chinese crisp pan fried noodle dish.
The rest of the menu seems to have everything from American to French to Vietnamese cuisine. There are burgers, a wide array of steaks, and soups for the main course. And for appetizers, there’s fries, eggrolls, spring rolls, and some other stuff.
The décor here could really use some work. The chairs and tables are older and are a bit sticky to the touch. Their décor is about as confused as their menu with blatantly obvious influences from Japanese, Hawaiian, and Vietnamese cultures. In the corner of the place, there’s a nice koi pond with fairly large fish.

This place is not as good as it used to be. I feel like they nickel and dime you for everything.
They charge 50cent for cooked bean, 50cent for banh tuoi, $ 1.50 for tai rieng but the menu only said $ 1, dishonest!
As for the food, it sucks too! The $ 8 eggrolls have no meat. The phở have no flavor, the noodle where hard and their ox tail is half as what it was used to be.

We were in the area, and we actually read about Phở Ba Dau on Chowhound. Melanie Wong had given it a good review, so we thought it would be worth the drive.
The recommendation was for the Filet Mignon and Oxtail Phở. The filet was medium rare, thin, good quality without too much tendon. It also had a good amount of beef shank and oxtail. The broth was flavorful without being too salty or fatty, and it was not MSG — laden. Though you can ask for fresh noodles, I actually preferred the texture of their regular phở noodles.
We also got #2: Vietnamese bouillabaisse. The broth had good sweet shrimp flavor, and the phở noodles had the same texture with a good bite to it. It came with a lot of squid, which I don’t love, but overall, it was a nice seafood option.
I wish I had seen the lobster special for $ 14 before I ordered. I’ll probably go for that next time.
It’s a nice family owned place, and it seemed like their whole family was there on a Sunday night. The restaurant is actually pretty big, but it was completely empty since it was close to closing time. They were nice and didn’t rush us even though they were clealy cleaning up.
The surrounding area is not the greatest, but parking in the strip mall is easy, and that beef phở was pretty worth it. Also, they take credit card.

The Phở Dac Biet with Ox Tail and freshly made white noodles is very good with a side of raw meat and the soup broth is delicious, but they need to work on their service.

My parents had eaten here for dinner before and said it was decent so we came for a breakfast together, which doesn’t happen often! Unfortunately, this place was a huge let-​down.
Cleanliness: Unwashed tea cups (dark tea stain rims from previous drinkers) and confused/​antiquated thanksgiving and tiki themed décor.
Service: unremarkable, however our waitress did boil the bean sprouts for us! A star for her!
Phở was… water based broth! Beef flavor was inexistent. It was as tasteless as the tea… which also did not have tea leaves. Meat was obviously refrozen several times, the texture was rubbery and tough.
Pretty much the only thing that was enjoyable was being there with the family and the huge t. v had Cupcake Wars playing.

Was feeling under the weather but managed to visit my grandma after work and decided to feed my cold and my appetite to some phở; most healing, most comforting, most delicious soup ever. Located pretty much next to my tattoo parlor at the start of East San Jose off of Alum Rock.
A very extensive menu and I skimmed mixed reviews for pretty much every item but because my heart was set on phở, I ordered the phở dac biet (w/​everything). I got a large so I can give 30−40% of it to Gavin. Whether I’m under the weather or not, whether I’m on a diet or not, I always find creative ways to put pounds on this 5“1 frame of mine. I ordered a plate of onion rings… for? So I can top it on my phở, duh!
The broth lacked flavor. it lacked star anise and ginger but the meats were tender and I loved the fresh green onions on top. The onion rings had more batter than onion but it was fried nicely and it made a wonderful contribution to my phở.
Service was friendly.
Dinner was on a long-​time friend whom I haven’t seen in over 10 years. I just happened to see him and he walked over to give me a hug and to catch up a little. I can see that he still lives that lifestyle and we both knew w/​o saying that it was great to see each other but there was no need to further our contacts.

The bowls and cups are not clean… Very gross

Hugely disappointed bún tôm tht nng ch giò!!
TL;DR: I have always said «you can never go wrong with bún tht nng ch giò» and this dish is always my safe choice in any vietnamese reataurant when i dont know or dont want to try new dishes. However, Phở Ba Dau proved me wrong! The ch giò (eggroll) in their version of this dish is terrible, it’s stuffed with vegie, and kind of soft under the crispy cover. It’s the kind of eggroll you ordered from Chinese restaurant, or bought in a box from Safeway. It’s bottom line weird and not at all taste like Vietnamese rolls at all. I meant come on, Phở Hoa even has its roll right and it’s a chain restaurant.

I came here for lunch with my parents today and didn’t really know what to order since I’m not a fan of phở. It was also a really hot day and anything brothy did not sound appetizing to me.
That being said, I went on to order their phở ap chao. This dish is pretty much made with phở noodles that they pan fry till it gets a little crispy. Then they pour some sauce over it accompanied by some beef slices and veggies. The food came out promptly, and it was a lot of food. Unfortunately, I did feel like they went overboard with the sauce because my noodles were drowning in them, causing them to lose their crisp. It was good, but I was really hoping for some crispiness to the noodles. Their beef was great though. Usually, I am hesitant with ordering meat especially with items like these because I think the meat tends to dry out. This place does a great job at keeping the beef very tender.
Overall, a decent place to grab some food. Not the best around, but still worth a try.

Been trying to branch out and check out some new phở places recently but so far, I’ve just been disappointed by every one of them. Phở Ba Dau had potential. Walking in, it looked like they were trying to make an effort to make it look nice. There’s this little pond/​fountain on the inside with tons of huge koi.
The menu is quite interesting. There’s phở and rice plates, but there’s also burgers and fries. One of my friends ordered a rice plate and it came with fries.
I was super hyped that there is oxtail in the phở. And there was hand made phở noodles! The broth was decent, it didn’t taste like the normal overpowering MSG taste that many phở places have which I liked. However it was a pretty light broth that could have had a bit more flavor. The noodles were wide cut and they were pretty tasty!
The service is typical of any phở place. They weren’t super quick or attentive, but it’s an Asian place so it’s not anything out of the ordinary.
Price-​wise it was pricy. But it’s because we wanted to try out a couple other things (we added a side of tendon which was just okay and eggrolls were nothing special). For 5 people it ended up being over $ 70.
TL;DR: meh. It’s okay, I’d rather go down the street to get some better phở. Unless someone really wanted to eat here, I probably won’t be back. They have some really tasty hand made noodles though!

I’ve never been so upset at a restaurant. There was only us and another couple there at the restaurant on a Friday afternoon. A young guy took our order and we waited for 25 minutes. The people who arrived after us got their phở right away. So I became very upset and asked the other guy if he had the status on our order. After checking their system, turns out that young turd never placed our order.
Hello. We were one of two tables there and never once did you check up on us and didn’t wonder why we were sitting there for so long staring at the walls.
HORRIBLE. Never going back here again. Waited 30 minutes of my life. Bastards.

Hella expensive place, and they did wrong order also, they charged w togo fee and tax, and end up, they put all wrong.

My first time coming here for some Ox tail phở thinking I would get more than one piece of Ox tail, but to my surprise, I only got one piece. Their small bowl of phở is like a child’s size and their large bowl is equivalent to a regular (medium) bowl in Oakland.
I give it a 1 star because their food was ok, but their service was horrible. We were greeted and sat down. A server didn’t come greet us until 5mins later. We placed our drink orders and food orders and didn’t get our drinks until 10mins later. After getting our drinks, our food took another 10mins to get out. We also asked for soy sauce and fish sauce to dress our phở, and we had to wait another 5mins for it. And when you’re hungry and starving this is a really long time to be waiting. It wasn’t very busy considering there were only 4 tables full when we arrived.
I will not be coming back here. I was lot satisfied and it did not hit the spot.

With the abundance of phở establishments in the South Bay, you need something to stand out and differentiate yourself from the others.
Some places make it up in size.
Some places make it up in cost.
And some places… well they just make it up.
Phở Ba Dau’s competitive differences are the fresh noodles and filet mignon. Here’s a tip — order the beef raw on the side. Trust me, it won’t be overcooked by the broth, and you can control the level of doneness. They also slice it thin, so be careful and keep an eye out if you don’t want to overcook it.

Phở Ba Dau = Phở Cong Ly. It’s the shop on Alum Rock.
Since the expansion to downtown SJ, this shop has gone downhill. The broth is rather watered down. It definitely does not taste like it’s made from slow cooked bones. The thick noodles are not like before. It’s chewy and dense.
We went here on a weekend and it was pretty empty. Maybe their old chef went to the new downtown location.
I’d follow him, if i were you.
2.5 stars

I do recommend their rice plates (steak with red rice).
So I ordered at Bun Rieu Oc here, not too long ago. And the soup was really savory.
What is unique about their Bun Rieu, is they use the smaller tomatoes and it gives it a more interesting flavor, it’s a different kind of sweet with a bit of a kick.
I wasn’t into the meatballs as much here. There wasn’t a lot of oc, but it was a decent amount, and they have the thin noodles instead of the fat ones which is a HUGE PLUS for me. Overall I was happy, I’d give it a 3 – 4, but I think I’ll try something else next time.