text: The atmosphere was nice and quaint although a little too dim for my liking Nice thick real wood tables lots of floral arrangements and art Mellow alternative music playing in the background nFor starters we had breaded fried calamari It tasted like beer batter or hush puppy batter I found the heavy battery squid ended up tasting like breaded cod from an English pub But my wife loved it It was redeemed by the sriracha aioli dip which was good The meat within was cooked expertly not chewy at all I just do not know about the cooks choice of batter Why not use a panko batter nThe selection of spring rolls was impressive and daring I liked that they were still built in the traditional style but with non traditional ingredients The smoked salmon and cream cheese was very good as was the one with crab avocado and mango Generous helpings of green leaf lettuce poured out the ends of the rolls The rolls were expertly wrapped and the curried dipping sauce was very good nAs far as phuf goes I am a purist I like the cuts of beef that most Americans shy away from I had the phuf dac biet The phuf here was okay I enjoyed the well seasoned scratch made broth and the basil sprouts and lime were very fresh but the meats are a different story I was disappointed at the lack of tripe and tendon in my soup only pieces of each and what little it did have was chewier and not as well seasoned as it could have been Tendon should melt in your mouth when cooked properly and it should be cut into little ribbons not big chunks Tripe should be very well trimmed so that it does not contain any off flavors It did have lots of meatballs My wife who has never liked Vietnamese meatballs liked them as I suspected she would since I did not think they tasted traditional at all They tasted store bought like something you would pick up at Costco The thinly sliced brisket tasted not too fresh like it had been in the refrigerator for half a week However it was the nice shade of pink as it should be when blanchedn My wifes soup meat was better than mine She had phuf mignon The steak quality was very good if you are into having non traditional phuf nAll that said I have to give huge compliments to the chef for the painstakingly beautiful presentations of every dish I saw I suspect the chef here has had a lot of formal training in French food and steak But he may not be a fan of tripe or tendon himself and therefore he may not fully understand how it should tastenAs far as value I feel a little cheated for a bowl of phuf is ridiculous when you can go to other Vietnamese restaurants in town and have phuf just as good if not better for The spring rolls here are during happy hour and were it not for the adventurous flavor combos I would say they are overpriced as well Do not waste your money trying the plain spring rolls here Be adventurous it is worth the extra buck or two nAll in all I would return here for a late night spring roll when I am downtown but that is about all worth writing home about