Final Pho Round 1: Brodard Chateau vs. S Vietnamese Fine Dining

Welcome to OC Weekly's Final Pho. Sixteen pho shops chosen from the more than 100 in the county; four critics who know what the pho makes a good bowl of Vietnamese noodle soup. The chosen 16 will face off in each of our brackets, two by two. The...

When the weather gets hot, the noodles get cold. And here are some of the coldest. Yu Chun — How cold is Yu Chun’s mool chic naengmyun? So cold that it gives you an ice cream headache. So cold that the tangy beef broth builds up in soft drifts in...

No secret in Little Saigon is more closely guarded than the recipe for Brodard's spring-roll sauce. Ask what's in it, and you will be met with an icy stare and another question: “Why are you asking?” This is a substance that defies not only...

Nem nuong cuon 4life. Photo by Edwin Goei In the ebb and flow of Little Saigon, Brodard was the Rock of Gibraltar. Since Diane Dang and her daughters opened this restaurant in 1996 at the Mall of Fortune—behind a 99-Cent-Only store in an alleyway...

When H.L. Mencken coined that oft-quoted aphorism “Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach,” he obviously hadn’t met chef Haley Nguyen. The woman does both—and then some. She’s currently a faculty member at Saddleback College and a successful...