This rambling storefront restaurant in Linda Vista’s Vietnamese neighborhood offers an equally extensive menu of delicious dishes.

There is seemingly no end to the number of restaurants serving San Diego’s sizeable Vietnamese community, and this couldn’t make me happier -- not only is it an especially delicious national cuisine, but one that fits easily into my healthy-eating lifestyle. Anh Hong Pho Pasteur is one of the better ones I’ve encountered so far, and also one of the funkier ones.

Ensconced in a rambling two-storefront space in the same corner strip mall as the equally excellent bahn mi shop K Sandwiches, Anh Hong’s interior is a mix of campy Far-East glitz and comfy greasy-spoon informality. A red-and-gold arch separates the pink-tableclothed dining rooms; posters advertising menu specials and boba drinks are tacked onto the walls; the big round table in the center of the restaurant is frequently occupied by large family groups on very familiar terms with the staff. In fact, like many Vietnamese restaurants in town, the place feels very much like a family affair.

The “Pho Pasteur” part of Anh Hong’s name honors a beloved restaurant on Pasteur Street in Saigon that was famous for that classic Vietnamese noodle soup. Anh Hong does offer a full complement of pho in all its variants, and does them quite well. But that’s only the start -- for Anh Hong also honors that other tradition of Vietnamese restaurants: the menu that goes on forever. There are upwards of 200 numbered dishes, listed in a sometimes confusing mix of Vietnamese and English. But the staff is quite willing to help you decipher anything you need help with, and a little careful reading and mix-and-matching will usually see you through just fine.

For example: I adore plates featuring banh hoi, which are a fascinating pasta product in which very fine rice vermicelli are woven together into wide flat net-like strips. They typically come with an assortment of meat and vegetable goodies, plus lettuce leaves and herbs; you make bite-sized wraps of lettuce and banh hoi filled with the meat/veggie/herb mix of your choice, dip each in the little bowl of nuoc mam provided on the side, eat, and repeat. Anh Hong offers several variants of banh hoi plates with different assortments of featured meats, plus one -- number 123c -- designated Banh Hoi 7 Mon. I knew that “7 Mon” meant “seven courses,” as in seven different items to go into a wrapping frenzy over -- but alas, the seven included items were listed in Vietnamese only.

A quick consultation with the waiter assured me that this dish came with a little of every type of filling they offered with this dish, so I ordered and was well pleased. For the record, the seven items wound up being: char-grilled shrimp; char-grilled pork; char-grilled sausage; shredded pork skin; ground shrimp paste on a little spike of sugar cane; bean curd skin stuffed with ground shrimp; and the little Vietnamese-style deep-fried spring roll known as cha gio. You get just a small helping of each of those items, but taken altogether, along with the huge plate of lettuce, herbs, and assorted other pickled and fresh veggies that comes with the dish, it’s a whole lot of food! I had a great deal of fun wrapping and eating and wrapping and eating, and was well satisfied when I was done.

Other plates I like that I have tried so far include those featuring bun (thicker rice vermicelli, not netted together like the banh hoi but piled in a mound), and com tam (broken grains of rice, that cook up a little denser and more compact than whole grain rice). Each of these come with assorted toppings much like the banh hoi. Anh Hong also does a very creditable version of the spicy beef/pork/noodle soup bun bo Hue.

I’ve only just begun to plumb the depths of that lengthy menu, so I guess I’ll be making a lot more visits to that funky establishment with the equally lengthy name. Lucky me!

I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here three to five times.