Why did we dine here? – Pho Ha Noi is a Vietnamese restaurant located in an outdoor mall Vietnam Town Plaza in San Jose. The area is full of high quality Asian restaurants and shops. Their pho is some of the best in the SF Bay Area. This restaurant also has a location in Cupertino and added Palo Alto in 2023.
Last Update: November 2019
We are big fans of Vietnamese Pho Noodle Soup. Slowly but surely, we have eaten at many of the San Francisco Bay Area’s best Pho restaurants. Here’s our constantly evolving list of the top 10 in search of the Best Pho San Francisco and beyond. Please leave comments with suggestions for other places we should try.
Why did we dine here? – Gao Viet Kitchen is a Vietnamese restaurant in downtown San Mateo. The same folks run several, casual Ben Tre restaurants in San Mateo and Millbrae.
(Which we like for casual fare.)
Why did we dine here? – Far better Pho than San Francisco! The SGV (San Gabriel Valley) is home to some fine Asian cuisine. We passed by Pho Filet on our last trip and ate there in 2018. Only 3.5 stars on Yelp, but way up there in our books.
Hanoi Vietnam is known for its dynamic street food scene. The language and culture are definitely big barriers to going it on your own. A street food tour was definitely a must.
We took our hotel’s Street Food tour to sample the local restaurants in the Hanoi Old Quarter. This was a fun and useful tour. We dined at several places that we would have been scared to approach ourselves. The guide explained the different types of local food and asked us about specific items we wanted. It lasted about 3 hours, cost $30/per person and included all food and drinks. Cheaper than other tours we saw.
Why did we dine here? – Ben Tre (A city in Vietnam) has three locations on the San Francisco Peninsula.
Why did we dine here? – Noodle Heaven! Best Pho? Momofuku Noodle is part of David Changs Momofuku empire. We choose this restaurant due to its accessible menu and moderate cost. We were not interested in his higher end places.
Why did we dine here? – Pho Ao Sen is renowned to be one of the best Vietnamese Noodle houses in the San Francisco Bay Area. We finally got a chance to visit them as we were passing through the East Bay. Last visit was in summer 2014.
Why did we dine here? – Turtle Tower is a popular Vietnamese restaurant in San Francisco with several locations. Hà Nội Style Vietnamese Cuisine is their focus. We dined at the original, located in the heart of the gritty Tenderloin District of San Francisco. It moved down the block and reopened in June 2013 and added banh mi sandwiches. Our last visit was in February 2014.
Pho Miss Saigon is an inexpensive Vietnamese noodle place in downtown San Mateo. You can order a bowl of noodles and have them in 5 minutes, making this a good alternative to fast food.
