Special Beef Noodle Soup @ Pho Pasteur

Review Series: Chinatown Challenge

Just around the corner from the Dragon City Mall in the heart of Toronto’s Chinatown is a small Vietnamese restaurant called Pho Pasteur. Despite its size the restaurant is hard to miss; the front of the business is plastered with red, white and blue signs that shout out to any passerby that Pho Pasteur exists, it is a pho restaurant and it is open 24 hours. Out of all of the Vietnamese restaurants I have visited as part of the Chinatown Challenge series I was most excited for this one. Pho Pasteur was highly recommended to me by both the founder of this blog and my Vietnamese girlfriend’s father. Needless to say I was expecting a great bowl of pho as I strolled into the restaurant.

Pho Pasteur as seen on Google

While the signage outside was intense the inside of the restaurant was barren. White walls and dark black chairs made me feel as though I was in the cafeteria of my old high school. The restaurant was completely free of any decorations with the exception of a few hanging plants. Pho Pasteur, like many small restaurants in large cities does not concern itself with things as petty as artwork or design, instead they focus on serving delicious food. This is why the restaurant was fairly busy in the doldrums of a cold November afternoon. My girlfriend’s Father, who lives in Chatham, Ontario, likes this place so much that he makes a point of stopping in whenever he is in the city. Bearing this in mind I anxiously scribbled down my order for one bowl of Pho Dac Biet before my I took my coat off.

Pho Dac Biet at Pho Pasteur - One of the best bowls of pho in all of Toronto

One of the big differences between Pho Pasteur and other pho restaurants I have been to while writing this series is the cost of a bowl of pho. I was surprised to see that the smallest size bowl was nearly $2 more than the $5 it is at nearly every other place. The price difference however was justified when a giant bowl of pho was plopped down in front of me. The first thing I noticed as I examined the bowl was how packed full of ingredients it was. Piles of chives, cilantro, onions, noodles and beef protruded from the clear beef broth. My mouth watered as I stirred the the soup releasing the signature aroma of pho into my nostrils. With thin rice noodles, golf ball sized beef balls and dozens of pieces of rare and cooked beef the pho I ate at pho pasteur was nothing less than perfect. The broth was sweet and light and worked well with the other ingredients to create a solid soup and one of the best bowls of pho I have ever had.

Pho Pasteur
525 Dundas Street West
416-351-7188

Category: Chinatown Challenge, Restaurant Reviews in Toronto