Phuong Trang

Coming from a foodie who grew up eating homemade Vietnamese food then moving from OC to SD, it was difficult at first to find a decent Viet restaurant that served different options than just the standard phở, however; this place is my go to place when I miss my mom’s food.
Bun Rieu– Good. Flavors are on point. Wish more tofu and the chunks of ground pork/​egg mixture were given, but overall kudos to the chef for getting flavors correct.
Bun Bo Hue– Good. Flavors are also on point. There are some missing meat elements that go into the traditional dish and lack of red color in the soup, which makes it not look like Bun Bo Hue at times.
Wonton and Eggnoodle Soup– Delicious. No complaints here. It’s a Chinese inspired dish with the duck meat, so there’s sweetness to the broth.
Broken Rice Dishes– Pretty decent! The wrapped shrimp paste should be crispy though, but overall a satisfying dish if you’re craving rice.
Spring rolls and eggrolls– Tastes pretty much standard. Nothing special and nothing bad about them either.
Vermicelli dishes– Decent, but this dish uses fish sauce as the main sauce, so if the sauce is mediocre then the dish is mediocre.
Fish sauce– It’s ok, but most restaurants make shortcut fish sauce for usage, so that’s not their main concern to get all of the components in.
The desserts– Can’t go wrong with any of their coconut desserts. My favorite is Che Ba Mau. Yummy!
Service– Good for the most part if you come in as they open or during the weekday randomly. They are super busy during the weekends and peak lunch or dinner hours, so the wait time can be long. Due to that, service can be slow because they don’t seem to have a lot of staff to cover all of the tables. The staff are nice though, so cut them some slack unless it’s absolutely ridiculous. Other than that enjoy yourself!

Service is horrible. Servers saw me twice trying to get their attention. .they kept walking as if they didn’t see me. Ruuude.
I left feeling really gross.. food must be swimming in msg. 2 hours later still feel uncomfortable.
Eater beware

I used to go here all the time as it was down the street from my condo. For San Diego Vietnamese food it wasn’t bad at all and hit the spot. The menu is pretty large and has sufficient choices.
It’s obviously not Orange County caliber and doesn’t have the same options and ingredients but pretty good and does the job nicely. I’ve taken a number of friends here when they want Vietnamese food and they are always happy. Good place to go for decent priced and solid Viet food.

This is still my favorite restaurant! It was definitely crowded with at least 12 parties before me. I arrived at 7p on a Sunday, which is understandable because cold weather brings out the hunger for good, hot phở.
The good thing about this place is that it rarely changes — same decoration, same owners, mostly same food menu, and same process of waiting, ordering, eating etc. You know what to expect with service so I don’t hold that against them that you have to wait or have to catch the servers attention.
I do believe the 13 parties would have all stayed waiting patiently if the outside area had an enclosed, heated awning to stand outside in. It was cold last night and crowds were standing in the small entrance way hoping their party would be called soon. It was sad to see multiple parties leave for that reason.
Surprisingly our party of four, all bought soup and the total bill was $ 34! That’s definitely worth the wait!
Please build a designate waiting area and install heaters during the winter!

What can I say? I love this place! Their buttered fried chicken wings are to die for! I have tried a few dishes here like their wonton soup, which I absolutely love! Their phở, baked catfish, clams, eggrolls (They were ok. Nothing beats A Chau of course!) and so on. All the food that I have tried here are so yummy! Asian food at its finest! Their service was okay. Staff are mostly friendly, but sometimes, they dont tend to you as much as they should, but when they do, they take care of you though.
Oh before I forget, this place is my #1 place to get café su da at. They still make it fresh to order, unlike other vietnamese restaurants nowadays where it is premade. You can just tell how fresh their café su da is. I love it sooo much!

One of my favorite Vietnamese restaurants! I literally come here with my mom all the time. Anyways, I was here a couple of days ago with my mom and we go walnut shrimp and the buttery garlic chicken wings.
The chicken wings are a must get!!! It may take a little longer than it should usually take but it’s totally worth every penny!
The walnut shrimp was great as well but I just wished my shrimps were a bit crispier.
The employees here always seems like they have to be waved down. We literally have to call them to come to the table for everything me they don’t ever check up on you. Maybe that’s just how they are. who knows? As long as the food is good!

Came here per Unilocal search.
So before I begin i came here with a group so my review is gonna be biased a bit because I did not get phở. Instead I got the grilled chicken over rice plate which was really just whatever. The chicken was a bit dry. There was a lot of rice and salad which is good but overall the plate was okay. Not too tasty. Not a huge fan.
We went on a Tuesday (?) afternoon around 3 o’clock. It wasn’t crowded at all thus my large group of 11 was able to fit easily. They gave us awkward round tables so the people in the center had awkward seating.
It took a while for the staff to get our attention to simply order our food. And we did have to get up and go ask for the check at the end. Which is somewhat surprising since the place was so empty and not busy at all.
All in all its just a meh place. Probably won’t come back. Been to better so yeah.

Adding 1 star since my last review. In retrospect that night was exceptionally busy with all the graduations and families in town.
Since then I have returned. Service still sucks horribly unless you come with your vietnamese mother in law who knows how to demand service. The last time I went, I felt so bad for this non-​Asian family that was desperately trying to get the check at the end of their meal. After 20 minutes of watching them suffer through multiple waiters and waitresses, I told them to just walk toward the front register and pay up there.
The food isn’t bad. and they have nuoc mam wings (fish sauce chicken wings) to die for. The lau (hot pot) is okay. the giant ass cat fish is pretty tasty but generally on the flavorless side unless you use the special pineapple sauce which I’m not a huge fan of. Phở is average for what you can find in SD. but overall you just need someone to help guide the ordering process.
I do crave the wings time to time so I’m willing to add a star. Wait can be long so expect to hover around the door unless you know how to be pushy in vietnamese. It’s decent for what is if you don’t want to drive to SouthEast San Diego for vietnamese food.

I’ve been here a number of times a la Mr. J Raack after each and every Sun God back in college. It’s located along Convoy, aka the only place in San Diego to get Asian food.
We just went back here today to get some Garlic chicken wings, Phở Ga (chicken phở), and Ca Nuong (aka roasted catfish). The catfish was good to share with a huge party and they provide rice wraps and veggies /​rice noodles to roll your own catfish spring rolls. The wraps taste really good with the fermented fish sauce.
The restaurant is pretty large albeit feels slightly understaffed. Service was pretty good and accommodating and even though we had a wait for a party of 10, we still got seated in a fair amount of time. Overall, the food was great and well worth the wait. If you plan on ordering the roasted catfish, do call in advance or order it right when you put your name down for a table because it does take some time to prepare.

Awesome food but its hard to get a waiters attention.
For starters I got the fried egg rolls ($ 7.25) to share. It came with 6 eggs which are filled with ground pork, glass noodles, carrots and jicama. Served with Romaine lettuce, mints, cilantro and fish sauce. I love that the egg rolls are super crunch and they wrap the egg rolls with spring rolls wrap instead of egg roll wrapping. Its a more traditional this way and tastier.
And to share with my friend we got their char-​grill pork. Which is lemon grass pork served with cucumbers, carrots, radish, Romaine lettuce, cilantro, mints, noodles, spring rolls wraps, and fish sauce. The point of this meal is to make your very own spring rolls. You have to dip the spring roll wrap into hot water so it softens up the wrap, then you put the wrap on your plate. And you add the ingredient of your choice and wrap it up like your wrapping and egg roll, then dip it in the fish sauce and eat! Which is pretty fun because me and my friend compare our spring rolls wrapping skills, and make fun of each others when it looks weird. The pork was cooked very well, I love the lemon grass flavor!
Fish sauce, their sauce is a lot salty than what I would like it to be. I added a bit more water to it to dilute the saltness. And added some chili to it to give it some spice.
Overall, I like coming here for food. But service here needs improving. It was super hard for us to get a waiter/​waitress to give us hot water for the spring rolls, more rice, more water, or anything. At one point we had to get up to get their attention.

I tried the bun Bo hue soup here and it was a 7 out of 10. My wife got the chicken phở and she liked it. The fried egg rolls are good here, my two-​year-​old also ate a variety of different foods. There can be a line and a wait sometimes
Look forward to trying the beef phở here and maybe a noodle dish next time

I’ve been here a few times and this is a solid place. Everything I’ve had, including the Phở has been decent, but I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite place in town by far. The menu does offer more options than the typical vietnamese restaurant, incorporating more Chinese inspired dishes or so it seems. It’s also much bigger than the typical vietnamese restaurant and can accommodate more people.

The phở here is a bit pricier than other competing restaurants but the broth served here is pretty consistent, which I appreciate and like. My two favorites are the dac biet special and chicken flavors.
Bun rieu, which is rice vermicelli noodles with a tomato based broth and crab and/​or shrimp paste, taste pretty hearty and a perfect antidote for a chilly day. The salt can be a bit overpowering in this dish, so make sure the water cup has water at all times.

I’ve been coming to the place for years. It is one of the better Vietnamese restaurants in the Convoy area. The food is authentic and tastes pretty good. I think it speaks volumes when most of the customers in the joint are Asian. Every time I come to this place it’s full of Asians.
Had some family and friends visit from out of town. The staff was very accommodating moving tables and chairs around for our large group of 16. It was a little hectic at first but we got situated and they systematically took everyone’s food and drink order.
Our food came out in a timely manner. They have good variety on their menu. Everyone was able to find something they like. Many of us ordered phở (steak, tripe, chicken, etc) because it’s been colder here in Murica’s Finest City of late and phở is great cold weather food. Others that weren’t craving phở ordered spring rolls, broken rice, egg noodles, and other dishes.
No complaints about the food from anyone in our group. I was so busy catching up with family and friends I forgot to take Unilocal photos. This place isn’t really known for it’s phở. It wasn’t bad, just isn’t as good as other places.
I picked up the check and the total wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. It did include the tip and they also itemized it. I rarely ever check the bill though. It’s a bad habit of mine that the wifey gets on me about. I pretended to scan it, but really it was a quick glance. Shhh… don’t tell my wifey.
Service was good. We had several servers that brought out whatever we needed, most of the time without us having to ask: extra limes, veggies, napkins, utensils, bowls, water refills, drink refills, boxes, bags and so forth.
The parking situation is a little better since the gym in the same plaza shut down. It can still be a pain at times though. You may be able to find parking on the street much of the time.
I finally remembered that Unilocal life when we were leaving and I saw a picture hanging on the wall rating this place «Critic’s Pick — Best Vietnamese» for 2012. I checked in (actually checking out) and snapped a quick photo.
This joint could use a facelift, but the restaurant is nice and clean. In addition, food and service are good, so the place still stays busy. As a result, the owner probably doesn’t think it’s necessary to redo the place.
Overall, I’m a fan. I’ll continue to come here.
Food: ⁴⁄₅
Service: ⁴⁄₅
Décor: ³⁄₅

If Phuong Trang specialized in fried chicken wings, they would definitely be crowned the KING of them all!
I came here on Halloween with my family because come on– who needs candy when your family is the sweetest bunch on the bag?! (Not until you end up paying the bill…) ANYHOW. We arrived around 8 PM, and luckily there was no wait (although the tables were filled).
We took a good 15 minutes to look at the menu because really… Phuong Trang isn’t just for phở. They have a HUGE array of dishes to cater anyone!
We ended up ordering:
–1 dozen of garlic fried chicken /​/​BOMB. Literally the BEST wings I’ve had! Not a lot of batter, juicy meat and PERFECT amount of garlic in each bite. HOT AND CRISPY!
–2 orders of phở (well-​done steak) /​/​LOTS of meat! Soup is hot (which I love!) and soup is clear and sweet. Big portion too, for the pricing!
–1 order of «house special» seafood/​meat noodle soup /​/​You can choose between egg noodles or rice noodles. Tip: If you like both, get half and half! They give you generous amounts of seafood and chicken! Broth is chicken, NOT beef! (Just a heads up. Not to be confused with their phở options.)
–1 order of Vietnamese Savory Crêpe (banh xiao) /​/​When I saw this on the menu, I freaked out. My family LOVES banh xiao and I haven’t had it in ages! It came out on a HUGE plate, stuffed with bean sprouts, pork and shrimp. Perfect amount for everyone to try (5 of us). Perfect crisp on the outside and don’t forget to add the fish sauce!
–1 order of house seafood stir fry /​/​This comes with an additional bowl of rice (weird, if you’re trying to share this dish family-​style) but it’s a good amount of crab sticks, meat and vegetables! Not too saucy, but a bit overpriced.
–1 order of stir fry beef vermicelli noodle bowl /​/​When the server dropped it off, we were all in awe but also super confused. Most places come with a few pieces of meat, and lots of fresh lettuce and shredded carrots on top. Lo and behold, all of this was hidden UNDERNEATH the massive amount of stir fried beef and onions! Worth getting if you’re not feeling soup but want some carbs and meat!
Pros:
–Great service! Our waiter was super friendly and really accommodating. I guess it was slow that day so he had the patience.
–Great flavors! Everything tastes like HOME. Perfect for rainy days or lazy days that require some flavors of your mother’s home-​cooking.
–Good pricing! For quality food like this, this is definitely great pricing! I came here about a year and half ago and prices have not risen yet! *Fingers crossed*
Cons:
–Can’t really think of anything… that is a first in a while!
Tips/​Observations:
–You can order chicken wings in advance by phone call if you are on your way to the restaurant!
–Parking lot is pretty spacious!
–Wait here might be pretty long on weekends for bigger parties. Come early if possible!
Overall, awesome place for phở! My dad ate here 20+ years ago when he first visited San Diego, and he still remembers it to this day! That definitely shows something about this place!

When it comes to Vietnamese cuisine, this place is probably the most authentic unless you want to go farther down south. It also have one of the most extensive menus on this side of San Diego. If you really want to experience Vietnamese cuisine, this is the place to go. They have so much beyond your regular phở shop. Parking in this plaza tends to be very difficult as with most places in Convoy. We ended up parking across the