Viet-ing the refurbishments in N1

10 April 2012

This article was first published in June 2000

Hu'o'ng-Viet is the canteen of the Vietnamese Cultural Centre in Englefield Road. An Viet House is a solid, four-square, vaguely industrial-looking building set back from this largely residential road - all of which seems quite logical when you discover that in a previous incarnation this was one of Hackney's public bath houses.

Towards the end of April the restaurant closed for ten days and, while its regular customers held their breath and crossed their fingers, set about a refurbishment and repaint job. There is great potential for disaster when any favourite restaurant announces refurbishment. As a knowledgeable customer, you like the place for what it is, not what it might be. You are the one who discovered this particular eatery, and you relish showing it off to your friends as authentic; rough and ready; unpretentious - somehow seedy decor gives a solid endorsement to the quality of the cooking.

So when Hu'o'ng-Viet shut for a refurb it sent a flutter through the dovecotes of de Beauvoir Town and Hackney; media gulch waited with baited breath. And when the restaurant reopened, the news was good. Those sensible people at An Viet House have not succumbed to the lure of smart restaurant designers, there's no blond wood, no smart chairs, and menu prices haven't been hiked to pay for interesting new artworks. Hu'o'ng-Viet is still busy, and still sticks to a splendid formula of very good, very cheap Vietnamese food, informal surroundings and service that is both polite and gentle.

The menu is an epic read, there are over a hundred different dishes. Start with the spring rolls (£2.10) - small, crisp, and delicious. Or the fresh rolls (£2.80), which are served cold; they are larger, like rolled-up table napkins, the outside is soft and white while the inside teams cooked vermicelli with prawns and herbs. Ordering the prawn and green-leaf soup (£2.30) brings a bowl of delicate broth with greens and shards of tofu. Pho is the most famous Vietnamese soup, but calling this meal in a bowl 'soup' is selling it short.

The Pho is formidable here; try Southern white noodle soup with pork and prawn (£4). This is postgraduate soup: hot, rich, full of bits and pieces and with a plate of herbs and aromatics that you add yourself at the last moment. The other dishes are excellent, too; look out for saut?ed scallops with mushroom and bamboo shoots (£5.50) - this works exceptionally well as the earthy, musty taste of the mushrooms sets off the fresh sea-sweetness of the scallops.

You should also run amok with the noodle dishes - mixed seafood special (£5.50) brings fine noodles with squid, scallops and prawns; or choose from the stir-fried soft white noodle dishes, or the crispy fried egg noodles. Service is friendly and courteous, even down to the paper twist of jelly beans that arrives with the bill. All the food tastes fresh, it has obviously been freshly cooked and the chef has used spankingly fresh ingredients. There is a set lunch (£5) comprising a starter and a main course, accompanied by jasmine tea, mineral water or home-made lemonade.

If you had been standing in Englefield Road during the past couple of weeks as regulars ventured into Hu'o'ng-Viet for the first time since the refurb, you couldn't have failed to notice the continual hissing noise. Don't worry, it was just an endless succession of sighs of relief.

Huong Viet
Englefield Road, London, N1 4LS

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