Super Ngon Vietnamese Noodle Cafe @ 466 Crawford Drive · Awesome Beef Shin Slices

Chicken Pho

It was an impromptu meet up to try out Super Ngon Vietnamese Noodle Cafe, a highly regarded place for pho in Singapore.

Restaurant name: Super Ngon Vietnamese Noodle Cafe 

Address: 466 Crawford Ln, #01-08, Singapore 190466

Nearest MRT: 5 minutes walk from Lavender MRT station

Tel: 9152 6622

Hours: 11:00am - 8:00pm (Tues off)

Super Ngon Vietnamese Noodle Cafe is a humble little shop lot. Bare bones decor with little tokens of its Vietnamese theme like conical hats on the walls and as lamp shades. Its simplicity and austere interior felt like the pho places I've been to in Ho Chi Minh city.

Super Ngon has an illustrious neighbour - the humble pho shop is next door to the Michelin starred Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle.

The menu is simple - just three types of noodle, spring roll and drinks.

I am a pho lover.

But, first a disclaimer. My pho experience is limited to those I have tasted in Ho Chi Minh City, Hue, Danang, Australia, Canada and USA. Super Ngon Vietnamese Noodle Cafe serves the Hanoi version of Pho but I have never been to Hanoi before.

So, the first thing I noticed was the absence of the tray of bean sprouts, mint, basil, lime, green chili pepper, etc. I am a bean sprout lover (willing to pay extra for more) and I do miss my aromatic greens.

The soup was watery, sweetish savoury and beefiness was subtle. Cut fresh spring onion lent a bit of its signature aroma and taste. Truth be told, it felt a little underwhelming as I was looking forward to more robust beefiness and a more rounded body (using my favourite Pho An of Bankstown, Sydney as reference). It is beef noodle soup is it not?

The rice noodles were broad, soft, slurpy smooth and clean tasting. I love the nice texture and the taste - the noodles' sweetness complemented by gentle sweet savoury beefiness from the soup.

The pinkish lean beef slices were alright. Tender, chewy with a slight beefy taste.

It was the few pieces of beef shin that changed everything for me.

via GIPHY

The beef shin slices were soft-soft-tender, smooth, felt almost melt-in-mouth and released a gentle slightly "milky" rich kind of mild beefy taste and aroma.

It changed my mind about the bowl of pho which was somewhat underwhelming until this.

Overall, I like Super Ngon's beef pho. The soup though mild is not greasy and is not over laced with seasoning powder and MSG. The whole bowl felt comforting and something that I can rely upon regularly for a filling, tasty meal.

I also tasted a bit of the chicken pho which buddy ordered. It doesn't have the benefit of beef shin slices to lift it above its meek flavours (though the chicken pho has bean sprouts 😄 ).

                  

Written by Tony Boey on 5 July 2022