BUN - my new favorite Vietnamese's Cuisine

Because of the geographic location,
VietnameseCuisine and Guizhou cuisine has a naturalThe environment did not seem too upscale, but
link; Vietnamese Cuisine would be my first choicerather a kind of homey feels.
besides Chinese. Nanshan in Chinatown, Saigon in
uptown and the PHO in my neighborhood are theThere are oil painting collections all over the wall,
restaurants I visit often. When I worked inshowing the owner's taste.
downtown Kansas City years ago, I went to a little
dirty Vietnamese's Pho place every Friday with myAlso a good place to enjoy quiet time for couples
Chinese friends, Compared to those so called(Will take my husband there next week, even us
American-Chinese food, a bowl of Pho is much closerold couples need some quality time alone now and
to my home town taste, and cured mythen)
homesickness a little.
From what I can remember, the Vietnamese'sHowever, the most memorable thing was the
restaurants are normally inexpensive, and perhaps notfood I tasted!
the best place to take your girlfriend for a date, theyBUN SOHO totally changed my impression of
are a level lower than Chinese restaurants in someVietnamese cuisine not being well-made. For example,
people's minds. However, my impression wasthis appetizer looks simple, but it seemed to be dried
completely changed by one Vietnamese restaurant:octopus, and taste so rich with plenty of flavors, I
BUN SOHO.asked myself, is this Vietnamese? Tony laughed and
One day, I went out with my friend Everlyn, shesaid that his dishes indeed are influenced by the
invited me to a nearby restaurant for a tea break.French and can be considered as more modern
Vietnamese. It seems French does have the Midas
My first impression as I walked into the restauranttouch. The combination of local dishes and French
was the time and effort that must have went intocuisine often has morphs into some better, new
the design. You can feel the sentiment through thedishes, just like New Orlean's CAJUN cuisine.
atmosphere that owner had in mind.My camera didn't capture all of the beauty of the
dishes; their online pictures speak to the real look of
I knew my first impression was right when I met thethe dishes. And most of them, I have never seen in
owner: Tony.any other Vietnamese restaurant. Their menu it is
TONY, native of Chaozhou, Vietnamese Chinese,also worth mentioning, a big thick, beautifully printed,
typical Scholar players.with nice pictures for each dish, looks like a very nice
elegant professional photography album. You can tell
The things he enjoys the most is the early morningthat the Menu is made by someone who loves food
tea and evening wine. Seems to have one thing onfrom the bottom of his heart. And you can get a
his mind, and that's to enjoy life to the fullest. Irough idea of the owner's own personality and the
categorize restaurant owners into two differenttaste as you browse the pages.
groups; one is the "Money Maker": This owner is in it
just for the money, the restaurant just a means toI didn't get to try every dish in the restaurant, but
inflate their bank accounts, very serious, every dayit's the only four-star Vietnamese restaurant selected
calculating the sales to the penny.by The New York TIME OUT's for the quality for
The other is the group that does it out of their lovetheir food. I found a great place for our next dinner
for food and people and the satisfaction garneredmeeting for my beautiful girlfriends, not to mention
when a customer is full and happy. They consider it aTony said he will give us a discount. To be honest, I
career, a family, all their treasures are kept there, athink their price is very reasonable and fair, as I recall,
place for them to meet friends and interact with allthe most expensive dish I saw was around $12.
sorts of different people.In the end, BUN has given me a new love for
TONY definitely is in the latter category.Vietnamese food. Maybe someone will say I am
Even a cup of tea is beautiful here: as if it's a snowadvertising here, but it is really worth a try, and it will
lotus in full bloom, he doesn't miss any detail of thisbe your loss if you don't.
art.