Review Series: Best Vermicelli On The West Side
Ossington has exploded in the last year: posh new restaurants and bars open weekly, and half the places you wander into are so fresh that your cocktail comes with a side of drywall dust. Gentrification is in the air, but so far Pho Tien Thanh still looks like the restaurant that time forgot. The lighting is fluorescent, an A/C unit takes pride of place above the door, the bathroom layouts are… unconventional. Luckily, you are here for the food, not the décor. And, as the busy lunchtime crowd attests, the food more than makes up for the lack of ambience. Local business people and office workers drop in for take out, families enjoy lunch together, hipsters take a welcome break from cruising the trendy shops and galleries.
Street view of Tien Thanh on Ossington
The trim and well-dressed proprietor arrives at the table bearing smiles and tea. In the warmer months, iced tea is offered as an option, which makes a pleasant change. My lunch companion doesn’t even glance at the menu. He’ll get what he always does—Rare beef soup. While pho is invariably the most popular dish on any Vietnamese menu, Pho Tien Thanh is particularly renowned for their aromatic and beefy broth. Here the raw beef is piled high atop the steaming bowl like a ruby. It is perfection.
But, I’m here to root for the underdog. My mission is to challenge the supremacy of pho, championing vermicelli as the ultimate noodle dish. So for me it is #58 Vermicelli with Meatball and Spring Roll [$6.25].
meatball and spring roll
As it turns out, “meatball” is a misnomer; rather the meat is formed into a long skinny cigar shape and colored a very bright shade of hot pink! But set aside any hesitation about the crazy colour and you will find that exterior of the meat is nicely charred from the grill, while the interior is composed of lean ground pork and cubes of pork fat, very much like a sausage. Redolent of garlic and anise, the “meatball”, is surprisingly evocative of Italian sausage spiced with fennel seed. The spring roll too has been formed into an unusually thin cigar-shaped tube, as slender as your index finger. Wound so tightly, the rice paper wrapper doubles over itself, creating a texture that is both crisp and chewy, which contrasts well with the strongly spiced, peppery filling.
Aside from the distinctive shapes of the meatball and roll, the Vermicelli dish initially appears rather bland, garnished only with a few pieces of pickled carrot, daikon and green onion. However a rapid toss with the chopsticks reveals a bed of lettuce, cucumber and beans sprout hidden beneath the heap of noodles. Act fast! If allowed to steam under the noodles, the greens will lose their crispness, and much of the pleasure of this dish comes from the variation of cool crunchy veg and warm slick noodle. Dressed with Pho Tien Thanh’s spicy, vinegary version of Nuoc cham, this dish really starts to shine. To further jolt the flavor profile, snag some of the Thai basil and saw tooth coriander from the plate of garnish that came with your dining companion’s pho. You might want to ask for a taste of that beautiful broth while you’re at it.
Pho Tien Thanh
57 Ossington ave (North of Queen)
416-588-6997
*Cash Only
ossington has some of the better viet restaurants in town. i hear the pho here is amazing though it’s not my fave vietnamese dish
their meat balls are not balls.. meat sticks!
Best pho I have ever had is here, I prefer the one that is pho ye yong or something. It is a special cut of meat that I can’t get anywhere else. The broth is to die for.