Pho

Nice place, good service, I had house special with beef, tomato and tofu, lovely taste, quite Asian. Nice decorations inside. Beef is a bit too hard, and I tried my partner’s Phở, is not as good as the Phở House beside Highbury station.

Okay, a few more visits under my belt and my order hasn’t ever been wrong again.
I enjoy my food, but think it’s a bit pricey to be honest. Plus the service at Angel is never great. It’s always fine, but I’m never impressed.
I’ll keep coming because I love the spring rolls, and it’s convenient when I’m in Angel — but if I could get to another branch, I’d take the opportunity.

If you want the BEST Phở in London, I highly recommend Phở in Islington to you! While I lived there, each month I would crave this place and order one of the best dishes on the menu: Ph tái lăn (Flash fried steak with garlic) (Hanoi style)!

Our first time on a Friday night! Great people watching spot in Angel. Super attentive waiters who show a genuine interest in you and what you are ordering. Also help you if you dot know how to eat it! Super trendy place. Fresh food and so tasty. My boyfriend doesn’t like spring rolls and he loved the prawn and crab super spring roll! We also had squid for entré, Goi Ga chicken salad and the combo phở! Great beers to wash it all down!

Compared to some other phở joints I’ve been to, I thought this was pretty alright! We popped in randomly looking for a quick lunch. All in all, it was good! I got the brisket/​rare beef phở, loaded with chillis, sprouts and basil.
It was fast and while it took a minute to get service on the sidewalk/​outside area, the food was served hot and delicious. It didn’t blow my mind as the best phở ever, but it was definitely good and worthy of going again.
No one really checked on us and we had to chase someone down for the check, but I’m finding that typical to British food service (something I’m still getting used to) and won’t hold that against them.
Plus, it’s close to home, so… now I want more phở!

Phở is always good for a good filling broth — and today was no exception.
I went in with my mum — who has been vegetarian since the day she was born — and that’s when things got messy. Despite confirming thrice that the food was vegetarian — there was still chicken in it and my mom was almost in tears (we are Indian so it’s a religious thing for her)
The waiter that took our order didn’t give a damn. He just turned away and went to get someone else. Although the manager came by and was very nice and offered to comp our meal, this waiter was the worst part of it.
Kudos for fairly good food and a lovely (French?) manager. And they were lovely about the whole thing — really appreciate it!

delicious spicy warm and healthy too. welcoming and attentive start. delicious juices also green tea ice cream

Definitely not your (real or figurative) Vietnamese grandmother’s Phở!
Maybe not bad for soaking up some alcohol on a Friday night if the location is convenient for you. But just don’t come here for the food.

I stopped in here instead of another restaurant when it was pouring rain outside. I had the garlic beef phở. The broth was very flavorful, but the noodles were not as good as could be (a bit thick). They also have a good selection of fresh fruit juices and cocktails. I would eat here again if I was in the neighborhood but wouldn’t make a special trip.

Decided to try Phở today as I hadn’t been there for a ling time. I enjoy Vietnamese food as it uses a lot of fresh herbs and spices and also quite light and Non-​greasy.
Phở advertises itself as Vietnamese Street Food. The menu is extensive and it has a good selection of drinks. We were bit upset to learn that Phở don’t do pot of tea and settled for two cups of green tea.
I went today with a friend and we ordered two starters to share — the brilliantly fresh Chicken Summer Roll with Peanut Sauce and Pork Spring Roll with Soy Sauce. The dishes were superb. For mains, we had the Broth and I had the Spicy Chicken Phở which was pretty good. They do two kind of noodles — Phở which is the thick flat ones and Bun which is the thin Rice noodles.
The staff are friendly and ambience nice and modern and is a short walk from from Angel tube.
Around £9−10 for a main and £4−5 for a starter. Pretty OK for the quality and quantity.

To the ranters: We all KNOW this isn’t a legit phở stall in a dirty back alley of Ho Chi Min City made by a man in a yellow-​stained, sweat-​soaked tank top while smoking and surrounded by barking dogs. We know that! It’s a sleek, family owned chain in London that sells it’s own tasty noodle soups and a pretty good summer roll too. I’m sorry you feel a high level of hygienic standards lowers food’s quality.
«Comparison is the thief of joy» my friends. Judging it on it’s own, and not against others, I like their phở. I like I can get a big spicy bowl of vegetarian noodles (something that can be very difficult in Asia). And you know what? It tastes good. It’s never been of poor quality. I can walk into any branch of Phở Café and know I will not be let down. I can meet up with people and know everyone is going to find something they like. I like the staff communicate with me about the fish sauce (also another difficulty in Asia).
It’s convenient, it’s filling, it’s well priced and it tastes good.
So there.

This place was fine. The food came quick and was decently priced by London standards. My group all had wok noodles (prawn, chicken and tofu) and I think everyone was reasonably satisfied. The service was brusque, but efficient. I would recommend Phở for a quick bite, but they have lots of competition in Angel that I have yet to try.

Ahhh. The Majesty of phở! diluted yet again by westerners looking to «whiten» and «brighten» this traditional South East Asian delight. I’ve eaten some of the best phở of my life from the dodgiest, back-​alley, Manhattan Chinatown dives. Been served exquisite broth in giant bowls in random pawn-​shopping centers in the suburbs of Denver. Had countless noodles in Northern Cali, Oregon, and Seattle. All prepared by some half-​toothless grandma in the back, yelling in a raspy voice!
In sum, phở is a naturally beautiful dish by the quality of its ingredients and its simplicity. However one of its best qualities is grit! GRIT! Which brings me to my review of Phở* (now a chain throughout London).
WHITE! Pure and simple. The menu looks good. cohesive. all the elements you expect from a proper phở-​joint, but overall «White Washed.» which is why you never see tendon or organ meats in these types of posh places. I got the standard phở on the menu and immediately had many critiques.
1. Portion was too small: your first indicator that they may be something wrong with your local phở joint. No size options! a REAL working class joint should have 3 sizes. S, M, L. Phở* serves what would normally sell as a Small, for a Large prince.
2. Broth too thin. I could tell the broth was was too thin because the color was too clear! traditionally, «cloudiness» is avoided in phở broth but it shouldn’t be at the cost of color and flavor. Richness of the broth missing and WAY over spiced. Too much Cinnamon/​anise is a quick way to ruin a phở broth, its a common rookie mistake– Phở* failed at this.
3. Meat was cut wrong and undercooked. Typically in phở-​joints meat is cut in slices or cubes against the grain. this gives a great mouth-​feel and easy to eat. With-​grain-​grain brisket gets too stringy. Especially when not thoroughly cooked soft?
3. Extras: Any average phở goer will know that «extras» are part of the game. Extra meat, extra noodles, etc. are all ways for people to customize their soup and make it «theirs.» In a vietnamese-​run place no server would think twice if you asked for an extra of anything. usually costs 1.5 or 2 GBP/​USD. at Phở* I asked for extra noodles, primarily because I was still hungry. The server looked really stitched and said «I will ask my manager but you may need to buy a whole new soup.» !!! Madness!!! especially since many sides are listed on the menu.
4. Cilantro/​coriander was bolted. meaning it was picked too late and allowed to go to «seed.» this is a HUGE pet peeve of mine. When in this state, cilantro has a overwhelming bitter and «soapy» flavor which ruins food. gross.
5. noodles too wide and flat. just strange
Overall sub average food. Save yourself the trouble and money, go to Song Que Café
134 Kingsland Rd!
putting my harsh Asian food critical whip aside; service was very friendly, ingredients fresh, and coffee was amazing! The Iced coffee is some of the best I’ve had in London. strangely

We ordered Phở-​to-​Go here on a lazy night in, which is a nice little option that they even promote via a loyalty stamp card. My fondness for the food here lies somewhere in between the authentic restaurants on Kingsland Road in Hoxton and the Vietnamese takeaway options in the city. The nem nuong meatballs were very satisfying as a starter, though they need to give you more than one dip for 6 large meatballs. The cha gio spring rolls were ok, but they only gave you 3 for £4.95, so definitely not as good value. I ordered the phở tai lan with flash fried steak, and my boyfriend got the phở chin with tender brisket. The broth comes separately from the noodles so you don’t have to worry about things getting soggy, and they even tied the peppers in a corner of the vegetable bag so I thought that was a very nice touch. The noodles had all stuck together by the time we got home though, so that was a bit hard to eat. We also encountered the issue that when we called to place our order, the person taking it down didn’t know the dishes by their English description and wanted the actual Vietnamese name, so we were concerned about things getting lost in translation. If they want to have the names in Vietnamese, they should at least put numbers by them on the menu! But they had the order ready to pick up in 15 minutes, which was a pleasant surprise.

Phở is your run of the mill good place to go for Phở. The sides were great. Summer roll s and grilled squid, but short of different to anywhere else. A strong plus is that they offer original rooster brand Sriracha sauce!
They are happy to customise your Phở be it you want to change the soup base or remove some meats. This was done with success and little confusion. However we did end up waiting over 20 minutes between our starter and main. It didn’t make sense to us and we were repeatedly told it was because there were lots of people that had arrived before us, despite us seeing people who were seated after us receiving their Phở before us :/​
They also took a while to deliver us our water, making out that they hadn’t forgotten when we reminded them for the second time. Yes the place was super crowded and the staff were busy, but it ultimately felt like the busy as a result of being inefficient, where people were just running around the restaurant trying to keep as much in their heads as possible. Not once did I see somebody write something down. You just tell them and they seem on the most part to memorise it before entering it into the orders computer.
In all, you don’t have many options when it comes to quick Phở on the go in Angel, and for the most part Phở is just like any other. That is perfectly decent noodles with soup.

If you want good phở: head to Kingsland Road, full stop. You’ll find better, cheaper and more traditional vietnamese restaurants. The quality of broth, meat and noodles leave something to be desired at Phở.
The staff was friendly but it took us about 40 minutes to get all four bowls of phở we ordered.

I’m updating my review after my recent experience with great food and bad service as the management responded to my review here in a constructive and polite way. Businesses who take their customers’ experiences seriously aren’t always easy to find, so Phở Islington earns a star for that.

Ordered: Phở Chin
Price: £7.95
Review: Been eating noodles ever since I stepped foot on this planet so its really hard to please me. Meh — the soup was so so, and the meat inside was definitely not so so but veering towards the meh meh zone. Noodles — quite generous on volume, but I don’t think I will be coming back anytime soon. Prefer Café East, City Caphe a lot more.

After attending the fantastic Unilocal Elite event here early in January I was eager to come back and try more of the food… but was also drawn in again by the unique Son Tinh rice spirits and Vietnamese beer available.
To my shock and horror, they’d sold out completely of their usual spirits! What?! No Phở-jito…I was gutted! However I figured it was a testament to the popularity of their drinks.
Breaking away from the Phở dishes, I ordered the Com Tam (broken rice), Car-​ri with tofu, which is a Vietnamese curry. The flavour was absolutely delicious, nutty and fragrant. My friend chose the tiger prawn bun (vermicelli noodles). Everything was fresh and bursting with flavour.
Another great aspect of this restaurant is the atmosphere: Music pumping through the speakers was a mix of older and current dance music, and with low lighting and a general modern feel, it was a refreshing change from the more ‘traditional’ type places on Kingsland Road. And in the end, I was lucky enough to enjoy a few Hanoi mules as they received a delivery of one of the rice liquors. Yum!

We tried the newly opened Phở at Angel, with great expectations, as we love both the area, and the Phở restaurants…
We asked the waiters for a quick service, as we had to go to the cinema after dinner. Little did we know that we would have to wait about 40 minutes for simple soups… And we only got them after complaining to the manager…
Upon payment, the waiter even made a mistake, which didn’t make us gain any time…
I hope they get their stuff right for next time we go !