Bamboo Bowl

Pork Bahn Mi. Flavorless, chewy and dry pork, hard rubbery eggs, the veggies are not fresh.
I have no idea why we gave his place a second try. The good here is gross. I also bought chicken and egg roll bún. Yuck! The sauce is suppose to be sweet salty– their sauce is sour, tart, and disgusting. Never again.
Wish I could give this place a zero!

This was the absolute worst phở I’ve ever had! The broth was tasteless and boring! If you’ve ever had REAL good phở, stay away from this place. I’m really bummed to, cause it’s 30 seconds from my house. Bummer!

It’s a clean place but the food was bland. Tasteless phở and wonton noodle. You end up putting more soy and other spices to your dish. Price okay. Service was okay.

I’ve been coming here for months and after today I really doubt that I’ll be back. As I’m sitting at my table waiting to get my food the lady preparing it is eating while wearing the gloves. The same noodles she’s putting in someone’s bowl. Seriously? Way to grossed out by this.

Really disappointing. I’ve been craving a bahn mi for a while now and finally decided to get my fix. I ordered the pork. The bread was fresh and delicious but the pork was old, dry, dis colored and had chunks of cartilage or bone, not quite sure which. The taste was pretty bland and the egg on top was a bit rubbery. I also ordered the won tons. When I got home I saw they were over cooked and extremely hard. I was anticipating meat or cream cheese or something in them but it was just a fried wrapper. I tried but I gave them to the dog. When I arrived the staff was all sitting down to a meal in the dining room. I could tell by they glares that I was interrupting and they weren’t happy to get up to make my order. After she made my food she placed it on the counter and walked away and sat back down to finish her meal. It was awkward and I said thanks and left. Overall I wouldn’t go back.

Best Phở in town! Delicious and great service with home cooking. Comfort food with great family environment.

This place is great, the broth is perfect. I eat here whenever I can. Good service, nice people. I’m surprised they would have any bad reviews. Everyone in the place is always enjoying the food when I go there.

My friends and I went for the first time, and we were deeply disappointed in the service, and food.
We’ve had Phở noodles and Vietnamese food before.
My friends and I walked in, and were ignored for the first few minutes we had arrived. It wasn’t busy, as after the man noticed us, he asked how many we had. After giving the number he cleaned the table he was situating us at. After being seated, he had to go grab menus from another table for us to use, tossing them lazily on the table.
After much discussion and deciding what to order, we ordered.
The spring rolls were cloyingly minty, and it made my friend and I want to spit them out. It was also stuffed beyond belief with lettuce that honestly wasn’t fresh at all.
The fried wontons were overcooked, and had barely anything in them. Mostly wrapper, hardly any meat. And it was gross. It felt like a grossly over-​battered cracker.
The Vietnamese sandwich. Hardly any meat. It didn’t seem like a sandwich, felt more like a pick and choose. None of it was fresh tasting. It was bland.
Beef and vegetables. It was overcooked, bland and extremely chewy. The meat honestly looked like dog waste. And it was like chewing gum. The vegetables were wilted, and smelled awful. The rice was even overcooked. It tasted like it was scraped off the edges of a rice cooker and wasn’t cleaned right. Very starchy.
The basic Beef Phở. First of all, my friend is allergic to cilantro. So, she told them she can’t have it. Politely asking that they leave the cilantro out. They come back, and it was COVERED in cilantro. It took them 15 minutes to realize that none of us had started eating, because we didn’t want to eat without her. Then when they did fix it, the meat was extremely fatty, and bland. No seasoning. It was gross.
Then the shrimp Phở. It was bland. The shrimp of all things, tasted like fake crab. It looked like fake crab. The taste was just so… uninteresting. The noodles didn’t taste like typical, Phở Rice noodles.
And after everything that happened, when we got up to pay, the woman at the register was sitting on her laptop, or texting, she didn’t care. It was obvious. No one there wanted to be there. And as we were leaving, I saw the man cleaning tables with the same rag he used to clean ours, and it had stains and was nasty. No cleaning fluid or anything. It made me feel sick.
Will not be coming back here. Ever. Very disappointed.

AMAZING! I go here at least once a week. I can’t get enough! It’s light, healthy and all homemade. I talked to the owner and every day she drives to a market to get fresh veggies before she comes to the restaurant. I have never had Vietnamese food this good. I go here so much the owner knows my order! I recommend this place to everyone if you are looking for a quick, delicious and healthy meal!

Since our first visit in 2011 we have been back many, many times. We finally moved to this area (from Alaska) in 2014 and have since been going to Bamboo Bowl at least every other week, and we have taken every family member and friend that has visited. The service is good, and the food comes out quickly. I know some people have complained about «the crabby lady» but she’s really nice if you talk to her. She doesn’t go out of her way to make small talk, but seriously, try talking to her. She remembers our regular order and has since visit 2.
Everything we have tried off the menu is tasty. I am currently in love with the shrimp phở.
It’s a nice family stop for lunch or dinner. Especially on a cold, rainy PNW day. Perfect food for nursing a cold too.
Now I want phở again…

Love Bambo bowl so much. The place itself can be freezing and the atmosphere is not One of a classy restaurant but the food makes up for the weird atmosphere. I love the beef and the chicken and I’ve gone here for a long time.

Wow, I don’t care what the food tastes like. The hostess or server was like as cold as ice. I felt like I was doing her a favor by being there. Will not be coming back.
We ordered three bowls and an appetizer. I asked her if we could have the appetizer first because we were very hungry. She brought the three bowls and a few minutes later the appetizer. The food was nothing special. It wasn’t bad but not anything to give a gold star.
The cook leaned her head into the cashier area and poured some noodles into a bowl. She had long hair and did not have it tied back. Our entire meal I kept looking for one of her long hairs to show up.
I walked to the counter and paid the bill. Not even a thank you. I had seen the same kind of service bestowed upon several other customers so I’m sure I wasn’t receiving any special treatment.
Going out to eat and spending my hard earned money should be something besides having some food brought to your table by a server with no personality. I should expect to be greeted warmly at the front, seated, asked if everything was good, bad or indifferent. It should be a warm relaxing experience. It was not. I think maybe the people who live near this restaurant and probably keep their doors open with their constant patronage should take a trip to Seattle and try a real restaurant with real great service. They may not go back here.

Call me crazy, but I thought I’d give this place one more chance since so many seem to think it’s good. BIG.Mistake.
This time I ordered in – Lemongrass beef bun (vermicelli bowl). It was completely disgusting. I paid and left it after a few bites. The beef was BOILED – completely disgusting – rubbery, tasteless and a horrible grey color. No trace of lemongrass, or any, flavor. In all of the 20+ years I’ve been enjoying Vietnamese food, this was an all-​time low. I don’t think in all those years I’ve ever been served a dish with boiled meat. It’s usually always grilled nicely, or at least wok seared. Completely inedible.
The only trace of vegetables in the bowl were a few brown iceberg shreds at the bottom of the bowl, with a few bitter carrot shreds. There was a massive lump of vermicelli noodles in the bowl along with the grey meat and some fried onion bits. That was it.
To the people that give this place such good ratings — Seriously!?! Have you never eaten Vietnamese food anywhere else before? Hands down, this is the worst Vietnamese food I’ve ever had. Also, one of the only times I’ve ever left food almost completely uneaten. It had to be really bad to do that.
So run away, run far away and find some decent Vietnamese food someplace else! This place is horrible! Oh, and the crabby lady is still there, crabby and sour as ever. I’m seriously not sure how this place stays in business. I’ll be shuddering over the grey, boiled meat for a while to come…

The phở was mediocre here, I ordered the phở house special and they gave very little portions of beef, only three small pieces. The beef brisket is supposed to be soft and tender, but it was a thick cut and very chewy (tasted old too!). I loss my appetite after eating their phở noodles, the aftertaste reminded me of blue cheese! Eww! There are so many better options for phở, go elsewhere. This will be my first and last time here.

NO MSG. you heard that right, they don’t use MSG at all. Sooo amazing!!! The broth is amazing and the food is so fresh. I’ve been looking for a phở spot forever that doesn’t use msg and this is that spot. Super good prices to as well and has good variety of dishes. This will be my go to phở spot from here on out. Did I mention they don’t use MSG and the broth is the best broth I’ve ever had!
Super good customer service and very clean!

Very clean and the food was great. I had a phở with rare meat P6. Service was great too the owner was nice and much food came out quick.

So surprised by Bamboo Bowl! The man and I were toddling down the road talking about having some lunch when we zipped past this joint and flipped a quick U when we saw what it was rated. It was a cold and rainy day, perfect for some phở!
Inside it’s large and bright, and was nice and warm, which was a relief from the cold outside. We were promptly greeted by the proprietor and ordered some spicy dumplings, a banh mi, some vermicelli noodles an some phở. The dumplings are def a go to, get them, they are delicious! The banh mi was large and tasty, and unique as it was topped with a fried egg which I haven’t seen before on a banh mi. The vermicelli noodles were good, not amazing but good. The phở was delicious, the broth one of the tastier ones I’ve had. We spent $ 38 on all this, which is a pretty good value.
The Bamboo Bowl is close enough to home to make it a regular rotation for us. If you haven’t stopped in I really recommend you do if you’re in the area.

Pros
Was greeted promptly and
was taken in a timely manner
Establishment was clean
Food
Beef phở– stingy on the beef about 4 small pieces! Broth was average. Nothing special to it.
Wonton with spicy sauce– the wonton itself was good. Flavorful but not overdone. The sauce reminds me of the dipping sauce you get with gyozas. The «spicy» was just a dab of chili paste.
Wonton noodle soup– i got 4 wonton balls! The broth was average. Again nothing special. The veggies was still a little crispy. The noodle was cooked right, not soggy.
Overall I’m not impressed.

The Bamboo Bowl (Shortened to BB from hereafter) is a smaller sized sit down restaurant off of Seattle Hill Road in an easy to access area. Open seating, pretty quick service and nicely lit.
We ordered the sandwich, wonton soup with noodles, fried wontons & egg rolls. They all seemed very tasty. The wontons were excellent, eggroll were crispy, we’re definitely going there again. The only complaint, and honestly it’s the only reason why four stars not five, they don’t serve beer!

Probably been here 15 times ever since I moved here in February, still a 5 star. It’s so quiet and no one’s in here and that’s the part I love. Every weekend I wake up contemplating on getting a lunch at Safeway but why not go here and get Vietnamese food for basically the same price.