A banh mi is not $13 because it has half (or less) the amount of meat in a pastrami sandwich. Not a bad thing, I usually choose a banh mi to avoid gluttony.

Johnson seems to be taking the "the best defense is a strong offense" approach to this place. Doesn't really change that he and Hammond are doing what westerners do - take something "exotic" (to them), spending a lot to pretty it up, and pricing it way higher than any restaurants owned and operated by people within that very culture. As a bonus, he gets in a good dig about why no one should eat at Asian restaurants offering $6 pho.

Well done, white savior!

"the price of a bowl of pho... Isn't classicism."

maybe all of this is true, but it's also why i frequent asian places that serve a large asian clientele. i'd rather go to 'rainier restaurant & bbq' and hope one day they get a decent bar and bartender and still pay human prices for a good meal without the other fuss.

If this Chef is younger than 41, he has never been to Saigon! $6 bowls of Pho are possible because the immigrants who own/work at those places work day and night for very little money. If they raise the prices, their restaurants fail, because most of their clientele can't afford/unwilling to pay more. It's ridiculous to say cheap pho's broth is made from powder, as if Vietnamese people will put up with eating that crap!

A good follow up to this article would be a blind taste test of pho, going from cheap to expensive. Hell, it'd be informative just for finding good pho in town.

Incidentally, $15 is about what you would end up paying if you ordered a Singapore Sling in Singapore. That's the wrong kind of authenticity.

This has got to be one of the worst most poorly written "reviews" that I have ever read. Is this "reviewer an exgirlfriend or something? How did this even get
published? Do editiors even proof read what these idiots write?

It just seems like some kind of bad witch hunt.

Awful, terrible review. Again this writer is an idiot....... Oh wait, I am not a writer, can I have an opinion on her skills or lack there of? I am also white so I have that agaisnt me.