Looking for a tasty and reasonably priced meal without resorting to the standard pizza and fried chicken fair, Nancy and I stumbled across this restaurant while searching out "OK Chicken", a Korean chicken place located in a small strip mall with said "OK Chicken" on one end next to a Japanese sushi joint, a Dairy Queen, and finally, "Pho Dinosaur". "OK Chicken" had a sign saying that it was "Closed until for the notice" (sic). We walked down the line to consider the other restaurants' offerings, and into Pho Dinosaur to take a look at their menu. We were greeted by a Vietnamese gentleman who graciously offered us the menus to consider at the door, and as we said we were just looking at options at that point, he offered us a take-out menu to take with us.
We had then considered the more established Vietnamese restaurant closer to the center of downtown, but thought that the atmosphere and authenticity of Pho Dinosaur would be a better bet as I had seen a couple of tables with Asian diners, the other restaurant with none.
Returning, we noticed how fresh the restaurant looked, with it's modern tables and chairs, and were seated beside a wall with "brick patterned" wall paper.
We decided to each have the Vermicelli Bowls, Nancy with the large (we hadn't eaten since early this morning in Edmonton) Pork Spring Roll & Satay Beef, Chicken Vermicelli, and I with Pork Spring Roll & Lemon Grass Chicken, Satay Shrimp Vermicelli.
Both bowls arrived in fairly short order, brought by our friendly server (I assume that this is a totally family run business with the husband, his wife and one or two well behaved younger children present) along with two Asian tea cup sized portions of simple nuoc cham. Since this sauce had no additions like chili paste or shredded carrots, it looked like tea, and my wife very nearly mistook hers for same.
Luckily she commented as she reached for her "tea" that I thought we were only having water, so I was able to catch her in time!
A nice surprise were the "spring rolls" which were instead nicely formed little bundles similar to wontons or dumplings, very flavourful, with light and crisp wrappers. Each bowl had 8 of these very satisfying bundles. Though the menu were marked with "spicy chilies" for both dishes, we did not find them spicy at all, though with nicely seasoned meats and a mix-in of the table chili paste corrected the spice level to our liking. I suspect the owners tone down the spice level a bit as many Western palates may not be used to it, especially in a small Alberta town.
My shrimp had a really good amount of flavour, and it was apparent they were marinated, and came perfectly cooked on the grill.
The vegetables in the bowls were fresh and crisp.
The vermicelli bowls were certainly tasty and satisfying, and tasted more authentic than many I've had in the big cities. I'd like to have tried the pho to see if the broth is as authentic and tasty, but I'll leave that up to another reviewer, or our next visit to "Alberta's Dinosaur Capital". read more