This is our "regular" and I am actually quite surprised I haven't been back until now. But on this hot Saturday, we could think of nowhere better than some good old reliable Asian fare.
Food
We started off with the old favourite, Rare beef noodle soup (pho) ($7.00). The stock has great depth of flavour and the noodles are thin and slippery. Add onions, bean sprouts and some beef, and it's proof that simple is often the best. Next came the Chicken rice Hai Nam style ($7.00). This one was not the best, the rice being oily and the chicken fatty, but that great Hai Nam taste was a bit faint. Pretty soon, the Fresh prawn and vegetable fried noodles ($9.80) arrived. I was surprised that a few prawns came with this, as well as an assortment of tin veges (bamboo shoots, mushrooms, baby corn). The noodles were fine, but the sauce too oily and rich, overpowering the dish. Well, they've saved the best for last, the Vermicelli sheet with fried braised pork and salad ($8.50) was even better than we've last tasted. You take the crispy and juicy pork grilled over coal, wrap it in lettuce, add an assortment of mints, carrots, cucumbers and vermicelli, and pour a liberal amount of the sweet and sour nuoc cham sauce over the mix. And bite!
We washed all these down with their signature homemade soy-bean drinks. I prefer the nutty taste of the black bean while Slokky likes the mild taste of the white bean.
Stick with the Vietnamese offerings and you will be rewarded. I can also highly recommend their hot pots.
Rating - 7
Atmosphere
This is one of the more spacious place on the joint. It's certainly cleaner than its neighbours, but there's usually a crowd. Turnover is quite quick however so that shouldn't be a problem.
Decor is the usual cheap Asian chic, with wooden laminate tables, a huge assortment of condiments and utensils fight for table space with the thermos tea jugs.
There's an assortment of people here, families, couples, singles. All seem to enjoy themselves, and when it quiet downs, you can usually hear some soppy canton pop playing in the background.
Rating - 1.5
Service
The staff speak multiple languages. They handled our requests for small bowls, drinks...etc without any fuss. They were also very willing to explain how to eat the vermicelli wraps to us too.
Rating - 3
C-factor
All up, the bill came to $40.20. It's not the cheapest Asian around but they always offer above average food and pretty good service. That's why I keep going back. Add good company to that - bliss.
Rating - 1.5
Brownie Points - 13
Info
12B Henley Rd,
Homebush West
NSW 2140
Phone (02) 9746 5486
2 comments:
Now I'm not the terribly sensitive type towards service but I have found on three occasions the service at Ta Fong extremely rude.
We had decided upon dinner and had ordered and had found that customers that had come roughly 15, 20 and 30 minutes after us were being served and we were not. To our amazement we had waited an hour, consequently I asked what had happened to our order... and all I received was two words 'It's coming' in the snappiest fashion possible... lol it took a further 30 minutes, no apology, not even a friendly smile. The food was mediocre... and furthermore, I rose from my seat to find the bathroom, and I came back to find that my partner who was sitting at the table with an astonished look upon her face. She said, that the waitress dumped a coke can from another table on to my soup and had cleared the table without even asking... ! I went to the counter to pay and also ask why and how this can happen? the lady (I presume the owner) stared at me through her glasses and while frowning literally shot a short, and empty 'Sorry' and went back to hitting her little calculator '28 dollars'. Well that was it, I said you can't treat customers that way... then came the multiple finger pointing at me from this ridiculous woman while she obviously swore about us to her staff... I asked please don't point fingers its not only rude but it's not much of an apology either lol... she said 'so what? I can't do anything more for u' then she went and stood in a corner with her back to us... now that was weird.
This place has notes of compliments from customers on their walls... 9/10 are photocopies... I recommend not to go to this place, we swore we will never go and also let our friends know how terrible it is as well.
I hate bad service, as has been quoted many times before in my blog.
I hope your experience at Ta Fong is just a one off, as normally the service here, while not anything to write home about, is a notch above the crowd.
Nevertheless, I can't wait to go see for myself.
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