pho hung cali

We were down in Chula Vista on Father’s Day to drop off the kiddos after going to see Jurassic World at Horton Plaza. Have you been to Horton Plaza lately? It feels a little like a ghost town these days and the movie theater is totally old school – no digital signs, no TV’s showing you ads while you stand in line for popcorn, and more importantly there’s no one else there. You pretty much get the place to yourself. After the movie and dropping A and S off, we went out for lunch. Jake insisted he had no preference whatsoever, so I picked a Vietnamese place called Pho Hung Cali for our lunch.

Pho Hung Cali is off Broadway, not too far from Aqui Es Texcoco (another place I’ve been wanting to visit). We went in the side door by accident and it seemed like it was locked but luckily someone opened the door for us (hooray!). The inside of this place felt very cavernous. Tables are kind of spread out to make it seem like it’s taking up more space.

Also: hello Christmas decorations. Glad to see you’re still hanging around in June. Leave those bows up all year! 

We sat in a booth that was… uh… a bit short. The booth seats were longer than the tables which was really odd.

[espresso with condensed milk / $2.95]

I got my shot of caffeine on with some espresso and condensed milk. The only sucky thing about getting this is impatiently waiting for the espresso to drip, drip, driiiiiiiiip. 

[egg rolls / $5.95 ]

I feel it is my honored blogger duty to order egg rolls at every place that has them. 

These were served with your standards: loads of leafy green lettuce leaves and mint. Mostly I just loving wrapping mine in extra mint leaves and then dipping them in the sauce. These were a good version. Tightly wrapped, very crunchy, and a nice tasty filling. 

[rice vermicelli bbq pork bun / $6.35]

I didn’t feel like soup that day so I ordered us my other go-to favorite item: the rice vermicelli bun dishes. Since we already had an order of egg rolls, I went with just BBQ pork on top. 

I was a bit surprised to see the pork in nice, neat, rectangles. They use rib meat for the BBQ pork here and that was different – in a good way. The pork had a good grilled flavor and a nice, meaty texture. Some parts were kind of “stringy” though and it felt weird to eat the rib meat without the bone. I also felt like this was a lot less pork than you can get at other places but the boys and I enjoyed it. 

Pho Hung Cali
1060 Broadway
Chula Vista, CA 91911
619-585-1595
Open 7 days a week
Hours: 8am-9pm
Menu links: Menu 1 | Menu 2 | Menu 3