Decided to try What Da Pho today, instead of my usual Downtown Thai. I mean, cool name "What Da Pho", right? More like "what da phuk?" I made a special effort to be clear in my order of "three P7 pho, but please hold the meatballs and could you add a little extra tendon and tripe?" The dish, according to the menu has "raresteak, meatballs, flank, brisket, tendon & tripe." Middle aged male seemed like he understood perfectly and went away. When our food came, I started to eat, but soon began hunting for at least some tendon and tripe. There was none. I had ordered three of the same, and there were none of these components in the others either. Also, and not the issue, but there was only scraps of what appeared to be brisket in the pho, period.
I told the man, and after trying to tutor me in what tendon and tripe look like (I have eaten this dish in major cities all over the country for the last 30 years, often as it is one of my favorites), he sent a female out from the kitchen and I told her. She went back and brought a bowl with some tendon only, which she unceremoniously dumped into my bowl. I looked at her and told her the others were the same. This is when she called me a liar to my face by telling me, with an air of excited piss-off-edness, that "it already in there! we already put in there." I said, there's none in there ... zero. After quite a while, she came back with little bowls for the other orders, this time with some tripe as well as tendon in the bowl (still no tripe for me). Clearly, she was pissed bigtime. We finished out meal, wondering to one another whether we were now eating her spit.
When I got up to pay the check, I told the male that he had lost a customer and why. His response was seemingly to excuse himself by saying he gave the correct order to the female (ridiculous move, because it certainly appeared that he was an owner). I said that's not really the issue, because what mattered to me was being told flat out that I was imagining the absence of the ingredients (lying). Anyway, I told him he had lost a customer, and he said he would say something to the female. I told him I didn't really care, that it was his business - and I was done. He exited the public area via a door directly to the kitchen and slammed to door so hard i thought it would break the frame - everyone in the restaurant jumped (I later acknowledged the possibility that this was for her, not me ... but still terrible form for a restaurateur). While I was explaining briefly to the startled couple sitting closest to the checkout, the female reappeared and proceeded to tell me she was not a liar, etc. I told her I didn't say she was a liar, but that she had effectively called me a liar. She started going on about how they had been here 40 year, or some such shit (why? I didn't care and this didn't address any issue whatsoever).
Maybe they just had a bad day today. Going back to Downtown Thai if I want pho in Winston. read more