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When we lived in Edmonton, we went to Pagolac several times a month. It was the only place that could satisfy my satay pho cravings — and still is.
Pagolac has Chinese food on its menu but I think it’s the best place in Edmonton for Vietnamese food. There are places with good pho and places with good bun but Pagolac serves both consistently well. Most dishes run about $10.
Quick Vietnamese primer:
Pho: rice noodles in clear beef broth with thin slices of beef (choices of rare, well-done, fatty flank, brisket etc.) and other options of tripe, tendon or meatballs to add both flavour and texture, topped with paper-thin slices of white onions and scallions.
I think a good pho is distinguished by a broth that’s full of flavour, simmered for hours with star anise, charred ginger, cloves and cinnamon.
Bun: cool rice noodles without the broth, usually topped with grilled meat and spring rolls with shredded lettuce and bean sprouts underneath. A “dressing” of fish sauce, lime juice, sugar and chiles comes on the side which I usually just dump right into everything.
I forget what number it is on the menu but this vermicelli bowl is one of Jason’s favourites: (from clockwise) lemongrass pork, crispy spring rolls, grilled meatballs, and beef la lop.
La lop, my friends, are the leaves of the betel plant. They’re wrapped around spiced ground beef and turn black when grilled. It’s a strange, tasty concoction of textures.
And here finally, my beloved beef satay soup. Oh I was one giddy diner when it arrived steaming hot in front of me.
I have yet to find satay pho like this anywhere else. The soup is thick and complex, peanuty with a spicy kick, topped with perfect slices of rare beef and raw tomato wedges that cook in the broth as you slurp it all up. It’s not a pretty dish to eat — Jason says it look like I have the flu when I’m devouring it, runny nose and all — but it’s soooooooo gooooood.
I’ve had satay pho at other places where the soup tastes like hot water with splashes of hot sauce and peanut oil floating in a film on top. Bleah.
Pagolac has one location in Chinatown and another on the south-side that’s worth visiting if you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to eat Vietnamese food in a former steakhouse, still adorned with velvet curtains and heavy wood chairs from the ’70s.
If anyone can tell me what the laughing cow with earrings is all about, I’d love to hear about it. I’ve seen it used as a mascot at several Vietnamese restaurants but haven’t been able to find out its significance.
Pagolac, 10566-97 St., Edmonton, Alberta, (780) 425-1540 and 9642-54 Ave. (780) 433-8899.
That looks like #68 – my favorite Bun as well. For a truly luxurious meal, ask for extra noodle, or extra spring roll (with the Pho satay, ask for extra noodle and it comes in a monsterous sized bowl – the one they use for #26). As for the Pho Satay, that style first was brought into the city by Oriental Noodle House, that does a version that is fiery and spicier than the Pagolac version.
In Calgary, Saigon Y2K has a slightly inferior, but similar version to the Pagolac version of Pho Satay.
Pagolac is an Edmontonian classic – good stuff. Still, as good as the food is, the interior is just NASTY. Between the 80s drab decor and the garbage bags covering holes in the wall, it’s just not very pleasant. All the more reason to focus on the pho I guess
Where can you now get Hot + Sour soup to equal that which was made + served at the old North China rest. on 120 th and Jasper in Edm.?
It all looks so tasty! This is the kind of place I have trouble convincing people to visit as the exterior scares them off. It’s not representative of the tastiness inside!
Not sure what the significance of a laughing cow is. All I know is that Laughing Cow is also a brand of cheese and its earrings are little wheels of cheese. How odd.
@yen – I’d call the pho satay at Saigon Y2K highly inferior instead of just slightly. Not quite as bad as the “broth + chili oil” that everyone else serves, but definitely nowhere near on par with Pagolac.
@Jason – fair enough, but it’s the closest thing to that style that you can find in Calgary. The Vietnamese in Calgary isnt anywhere as good as Edmonton imo.
Personally, i prefer the roasted peanut + coconut milk + chilli oil version to anything else they serve in Calgary. Pho Que Huang at Franklin Mall/T&T has my favorite version.
A French symbol of cheese, adopted by the Vietnamese, much as Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse has been by China as a recognizable cartoon character.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Laughing_Cow
Official site, but you won’t care…
http://www.lavachequirit.com/la-vache-rouge/fr/accueil.html
A rather thin cheese from the Jura mountains, often sold in small foil wrapped wedges.
Is the Southside location same quality of food and different just for the decor eccentricity? I live quite close to the Southside location. It looks awesome- have to get someone to go with me- hubby can’t do Asian at all due to severe shellfish allergy.
I think the quality of food is the same at the south location – but service can be slower.
Mmmm, I just about passed out looking at the satay stew… I love the combination of things on the bun too.
the satay pho looks so much like a laksa
I think y2k’s satay may have changed, I had a bowl at the Macleod x Glenmore location that was unlike my previous “what do people see in this” experiences. Dark, lots of richness from the coconut, all in all very good. People I work with drive from DT to 65 Av x 9st N.E. for the Satay at Vietnamese Village on a regular basis; hey refer to it as crack soup they love it so much.
Just came across this post while searching for a soup I had the other week at a Vietnamese restaurant here in Oregon. Aside from #19, the dish had “satay” in its title but I noticed it had a distinct pho flavor so searched those two words and viola, your blog!
Thanks so much for talking about this delicious soup. I’ve become addicted to it, just like you, and am trying to find ways to replicate it in the kitchen. I asked the folks at the local Vietnamese store and they said they don’t cook it (or like it much) and that it’s more Thai than Vietnamese.
This restaurant, by the way, makes a very hearty satay pho, not watery and thin
Try the Pho Satay (has to be rare, none of this rubbery beef) at Mina’s which is in the strip mall just south of the Holiday Inn Express and Calgary Honda dealership on Lake Fraser Drive SE. The restaurant is across the parking lot from a Tim Horton’s and Original Joe’s.
The broth is good..none of that chili oil in broth that you get elsewhere.
Also try their beef spare ribs….extremely tender and tasty.
I have found two really good pho soup dishes (North Vietnamese wet style) sadly both are in Calgary. They both have beef and seafood arranges in a soup in the same manner you described in this article. I have been looking for something simuler in Edmonton for years now and can not find anything, I will try out this place and see what I can find with seafood in it as well.
If you are wondering the two places in Calgary are the “Bucrat Saigon” (may have miss spelled this) and Saigon “Y2K”. I make a point at stopping when I visit Calgary.
There is a PHO place Just off of 10117 101 St NW just off Jasper, Moon Garden that has a pho satay that looks exactly like that, minus the tomato. I fly from Vancouver to eat it
#20 Rice noodle with Beef in Satay Sauce
I think I am in love with this soup
I have tried over 20 different PHO places in hope of finding one locally as good, have not yet. Makes me sad