You know you’ve hit pay dirt when a chef hunkers down over a big steaming bowl of rice noodles with fried egg rolls and seafood and decides – at first slurp – that one of her new life goals is to eat her way through the entire menu. All 300-plus items.
Especially impressive is that the first 147 will feed you for under $10 apiece.
Welcome to Saigon Bowl or as it is alternately known, Dong Khanh. Here, bowls of rice noodles,egg noodle soup and fried rice ($4.95-$6.95) can fill the heartiest eater. The combination rice plates include grilled pork, pork chops and roast duck ($5.95-$7.95). And the substantial salads $7.95-
$12.95) are generous enough for two. The food is flavorful, fresh, filling and affordable.
Some items go up to $19.95, but those are specials. Most entrees are $8.95-$12.95. Three can dine sufficiently for under $60, tip and beer included. For us, “sufficiently” means absolutely no room for dessert.
A cheerful place, Saigon Bowl seats 100, give or take a few four-tops. Booths line the exterior walls, and conversation is often animated. Service is cheerful and efficient. As one aromatic set of scents after another wafted by, we grew hungrier and hungrier, making it all the harder to choose wisely. So we chose too well.
Starting with Vietnamese egg rolls ($4.95), we waited until the steam from the interior mix of ground pork and vegetables subsided, then bit into the crunchy crisp outer shell. Divine. Two large shrimp rolls ($2.95) followed, an intermezzo between our second fried item, stuffed chicken wings ($6.95).
This is a dish only the most ambitious cook would try to make at home. The meaty, leglike portion of the wing is separated from the bone with surgical precision, then pulled up over the top of the bone to form a pocket stuffed with a mixture of crabmeat, scallions and mild soy. The combination is a delight to the taste buds.
We could have, should have, stopped there. Alas, gastronomic curiosity wouldn’t let us bypass the duck salad ($7.95), slivers of moist and tender roasted duck atop a mini-mound of shredded Asian cabbage, carrot, red bell pepper and cilantro, lightly dressed with a rice vinegar and sesame oil blend that highlighted the flavors of the vegetables and complemented the duck. The bird’s crisp outside skin was divine.
Understand, the salad and egg rolls could have been a meal. Ditto for the stuffed chicken wings and squid salad ($8.95); we’ll try that next time.
We rounded out our two-hour dinner with one rice noodle bowl of egg rolls ($4.95); one rice noodle soup bowl with seafood, barbecued pork, chicken and duck ($5.95); and a rice noodle bowl with sliced beef stir-fried with lemongrass.
Of course we didn’t eat it all. This place is amazing, and on weekends the wait can be long. Food this good is worth it.
Staff writer Ellen Sweets can be reached at 303-820-1284 or esweets@denverpost.com.
Saigon Bowl
VIETNAMESE | Far East Center,
333 S. Federal Blvd., No. 134,
303-935-2427 | $4.95-$19.95 |
Open daily, 10 a.m.-10 p.m. MC,
Visa.
Front burner: Cheerful, efficient
service. Fresh, flavorful
food.
Back burner: Parking near the
restaurant is hard to come by,
and cars without handicapped
parking tags often use the handicapped
parking spaces. The restaurant
is otherwise accessible.
