Tags
banh mi, food, Mau, restaurants, San Francisco, the Mission, Vietnamese food
My favorite analyst in the office, A., has been on a banh mi kick for months; he eats them 2 to 3 times per week! That boy has consumed more banh mi in the past several months than I have in my entire life! As for me, I’m still trying to explore new Vietnamese dishes.
There was barely anyone in the office on Friday. The female attorney, C., had already mentioned the previous week that she was interested in either trying out the Vietnamese restaurant that I like (Mau) or having a liquid lunch. A. heard that we were heading off to the Mission via BART to lunch at Mau, so he wanted to join us. We were chatting so much on BART that we missed our stop and had to go back! Mau opens at noon; we arrived about 12:15 and they already had a decent amount of customers. Although Mau DOES have banh mi during lunch, A. actually was wanting to eat soup, such as pho, because he was feeling a little under the weather. He eventually settled on my favorite soup, hu tieu (xa-xieu pork, chicken, shrimp and ground pork in a garlic chicken broth). I had another soup called bun rieu (minced pork, dried shrimp, gulf prawn, tofu and rice noodles in a chicken-tomato broth). C. went with the bun thit nuong (grilled lemongrass pork with vermicelli noodles). The 3 of shared the Hue rolls (grilled lemongrass pork, shiso, mint, scallion oil and fried shallots in a steamed rice roll) and the papaya salad (green papaya, poached shrimp and calamari, Thai basil and peanuts). Of course, we were given a plate of fresh herbs and bean sprouts for all of us to garnish our dishes with. Nothing was spicy, but very fresh. They enjoyed everything, but particularly liked the Hue rolls and the hu tieu. Although I liked my bun rieu, maybe the chicken-tomato broth threw me off a little. For drinks, we each had a 33 (Vietnamese beer). We finished the rolls and the salad easily. A. downed his hu tieu , but neither C. or I made much headway in ours. Our lunch took a leisurely 2 hours. The bill came to $28 apiece, including tip (it’s not a little hole-in-the-wall place), which didn’t phase any of us.
Am I over Vietnamese food yet? Is A. over banh mi? The answer to both is “No!” I might go back to Mau this weekend ’cause now I want the bun cha again!