A Vietnamese restaurant with a view of an ice rink offers a unique experience
by Richard Foss
A few years ago I was interviewing a grizzled veteran of many chili cookoffs, and he gave me some memorable advice about selecting one of the main ingredients. “You can ruin chili by using meat that is too good,” he instructed me. “First, some of the off cuts of meat have more flavor, and you need that in a recipe with so much seasoning. Second, this recipe was designed to tenderize meat by simmering it for hours, and if you start with tender meat, it stews to rags and loses its texture. If you use filet mignon in chili, you get a bowl of mush.”
It was with this advice in mind that I visited a Rolling Hills Estates restaurant that uses exceptional quality wagyu steak in Vietnamese traditional dishes. Though Vietnamese pho is very different from a Texan bowl of red, the traditional meats include beef tendon and brisket, both tough cuts that need a lot of cooking to soften.
To say that Pho Redbo is beef-centric is an understatement – there is only one item on the menu that does not contain cow, and that’s French fries. It’s not unusual for beef to be a centerpiece of Southeast Asian menus, and some restaurants in OC’s Little Saigon specialize in a meal called “seven courses of beef,” but the meat is usually sliced very thin and slow-cooked. Since beef in Vietnam is traditionally from water buffalos that have been used as work animals, it’s very lean and somewhat gamey in that country, the antithesis of exquisitely marbled wagyu.
The restaurant in a former Ruby’s Diner has a view of an ice skating rink. When we arrived for brunch some small children were wobbling around the ice assisted by parents and coaches. It was charming to watch, and the show continued as the kids were replaced by more experienced skaters who displayed graceful speed and precision. If you are looking for a place with a meal and a show, it’s a diverting spectacle.
The menu at Pho Redbo is short, and our party of three were able to order about half of the items on offer. We started with eggrolls and flaming wagyu carpaccio, thin slices of beef that were delivered on a hot plate and finished with a blowtorch. Carpaccio is traditionally a way of showing off the character of beef with nothing to hide it – sometimes it is seared, sometimes not, but whatever condiments are selected are usually on the side. Here the thin slices are lightly seared and then topped with pickled onion and a little cilantro along with a mild spice sauce. The fat was warmed but the time under the flame was too brief to caramelize it even slightly, which was probably by design. This brought out the creamy richness of the marbled fat, and the onion and cilantro were a well-chosen contrast.
The eggrolls were stuffed with ground wagyu and arrived hot and crisp with a moist filling that seemed to be entirely ground beef. I would have preferred some other elements, perhaps a little onion or vegetables, just to give a bit of variety in flavor and texture. These were not oily as they are at some establishments, and several dipping sauces are available on the table – but be warned, some of them have quite a kick.
Alcohol isn’t currently served at Pho Redbo, but we paired our meal with bracingly strong and earthy Vietnamese coffee, iced tea, and peach tea. The peach tea is a nice choice with the rich, fatty dishes, but I wished for the salted Vietnamese lemonade that might have been an even better match.
Our main courses were a bowl of the Japanese wagyu pho, the stir fry known as shaken beef, and a bowl of the beef stew called bo kho. Bo Kho is made differently, depending on whether it is served at breakfast or lunch, a thick stew in the morning with bread, a thinner broth in the evening with noodles. This one was on the thick side and savory, though not spicy, with large chunks of wagyu, carrots, and a topping of thinly shredded white onion. The portion was huge but most of it disappeared in short order, because everyone at the table was sampling it.
The shaken beef was a disappointment by comparison, because some of the signature flavors were missing and the texture was off. Shaken beef is traditionally seared in a very hot wok so it gets a slight caramelized crust, but this was soft all the way through. I’ve had wagyu that had that crust so I know it can be done, but either the wok was too cool or the time spent in it was too short. Shaken beef also usually has tangy notes of black pepper and garlic, but the dominant flavors here were bell pepper and onion. It was a decent stir-fry, but not the traditional shaky beef.
Pho Redbo offers eight varieties of pho, all with the same broth, but with different cuts of meat. When I found that they offered one made with Japanese A5 beef, the decision was made.
Japanese A5 is the highest quality, by which all others are measured. The thinly sliced meat arrived alongside a hot stone bowl of bubbling broth, with a bowl of thin rice noodles, onions, and cilantro on the side. You have the option of dumping in all the meat at once or treating it like shabu-shabu, swishing it in the hot broth to cook. You also can eat some raw, which I did before swishing a few slices and then dumping in the rest to cook a little more. As expected, the taste is mild and buttery in each case, sweetest and most distinctive when cooked least. The broth was very mild, presumably to avoid overwhelming those flavors, with just a hint of the star anise, cloves, and ginger that add subtle exotic flavors. A spice sauce is offered on the side, and in my opinion it added the missing piece to the meal.
So was this $49 bowl of soup worth it? It costs more than twice as much as everything else on the menu, but for someone who wants to experience top quality wagyu at different stages of cooking, it is enlightening. You may or may not decide that you must have Japanese wagyu at every opportunity thereafter, but you’ll know. On any return visit I’m more likely to order the combo pho with four different cuts of meat to enjoy the variety. I can be sure of leaving with leftovers whatever I order, because portions are generous.
The environment at Pho Redbo is very loud inside, but an outdoor patio offers a quieter environment, if not as good a view of the skaters. The experience here is one of a kind, and worth an excursion to try for yourselves.
Pho Redbo is at 550 Deep Valley Drive in Rolling Hills Estates, though the main entry is from Silver Spur Road. Open 11 a.m. daily, close 8 p.m. No alcohol. Fri.,-Sun. ‘til 9 p.m. Parking lot, patio dining, wheelchair access good. (310) 378-3225. RedboRollingHillsEstates.com. Pen
