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I skipped breakfast on Memorial Day, and headed straight for lunch. This only exaggerated my hunger, however, and when I opened the menu at what I like to think of as the Train Engine Viet-Thai Restaurant, I was confronted with one of the most extreme bouts of indecisiveness I’ve experienced recently: Vietnamese food or Thai?

Everything on the menu was cheap, delicious-sounding, and a little adventurous. I went with the Seafood Tom Yum Soup. Unlike other tomato-red & hazy tom yum soups I’ve tried, this one’s broth was clear, and speckled with spice. It had the perfect combination of the zing of chillies and the sourness of lemongrass. The enormous amount of rice noodles, and particularly of seafood, could have satisfied the appetites of two. (Although, I’m proud to say, I ate a good 3/4 of it before becoming full.)

This soup, and the sweet-strong Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk — available hot or iced! — that I ordered with it, come with my highest recommendations. But if you’ve never tried any authentic Asian seafood dishes before, be prepared for tentacles. I thoroughly enjoyed the tentacled bunches of octopus, but would probably have been freaked out by them if I weren’t so used to the conveyor-belt sushi style octopus of Japan. The fishcakes, on the other hand, were much tamer and soaked up the flavors of the soup deliciously, as did the perfectly-cooked shrimp.

The Viet-Thai Restaurant has the kind of menu that makes you want to return again and again to try everything on it. In my case though, I’m worried that I’ll keep giving in to temptation and ordering the same tom yum soup every time.

Pho Xe Lua Viet-Thai Restaurant
907 Race St, Philadelphia, PA 19107
(215) 627-8883