Pho Gia Hoi, Eastwood

Eastwood has a rather high turnover of restaurants with the good ones staying around for many years and the bad ones changing every couple of months. In the last week, three new restaurants have opened including Pho Gia Hoi which is now the second Vietnamese restaurant to enter Eastwood’s dining scene. I had been craving Pho ever since my trip to Cabramatta when I missed out on eating it, so I couldn’t wait to eat here!


Pho Gia Hoi has three existing stores – one at Bankstown, Canley Heights and one at Haymarket near Chinatown. I’ve been to their Haymarket one before and was quite content with the value for money I got. Tonight is no different – they have a 20% off opening special which helps us keep to our budget spending. It draws in a large crowd though which means we have to wait 20 minutes for our table and by the time I sit down I am ravenous!

Fresh Rice Paper Rolls with Pork, Prawns (4) – $10

The menu has 149 items to choose from which is a lot bigger than the city branch. There are a great range of Vietnamese dishes along with classic Chinese ones as well. To kickstart the night, we order some rice paper rolls which come out 2 minutes later – impressive! Unfortunately they’re quite tasteless without the peanut dipping sauce provided. The fillings do nothing for the rice paper roll and I feel like I’m munching on completely bland boiled rice noodles.

Crocodile in Lemongrass and chilli sauce – $20

Our next dish is the crocodile and although it isn’t traditionally an Asian meat, it catches our eye. It has a strong lemongrass taste, packing a punch of flavour in my mouth but isn’t spicy at all. I find that the onions in this dish could have been cooked a bit longer but otherwise it was a delicious dish.

Special Pork & Beef with Rice Vermicelli Soup (Hot & Spicy) – $13

Next is our noodle bowl which is served in a huge bowl. The noodles and meat are well flavoured and there is a lot of coriander. I find that this dish isn’t spicy at all though and unexpectedly tastes a lot like Tom Yum soup.

Grilled Pork Chop with Rice 

One of the final dishes we ordered was pork chop with tomato rice. The pork chop is nice and tender but doesn’t taste like pork chop. Instead it tastes exactly like beef jerky, quite deceptive to the mind. The rice presented is close to a fluro orange colour. We discover that it has no tomato taste at all and is full of egg yolk taste instead. This dish is rather confusing all together, but adequate.

Beef Rice Noodle Soup – $11

After eating all this, we feel like we still have room for another dish so we get the classic Pho! This dish is hot and flavoursome and is served with a side of bean sprouts, lemon wedge and mint leaves. I like eating mine with hoisin sauce as it adds an extra layer of flavour. This dish is classic Vietnamese at its best!

Overall I am quite happy with Pho Gia Hoi. They do some dishes well and some not that well, but there is definitely potential here. Glad to know that there is finally a choice in Vietnamese cuisine for Eastwood and with 149 menu items, I know I’ll be back to try some other dishes.

Pho Gia Hoi
219 Rowe Street
Eastwood, NSW 2122
Ph: (02) 8084 2588

Pho Gia Hoi on Urbanspoon

16 Comments

  • Eugene says:

    Agreed on the rice paper rolls (well at the Canley one at least). Horrible.

  • JasmyneTea says:

    Seems pretty good, but I’m lucky enough to live close to Cabra, so I don’t see myself coming to Eastwood for Vietnamese any time soon 😛

  • penguinsaysfeedme says:

    Awesome – now I don’t have to trek out to Cabra for a good bowl of pho or bun bo hue!

  • This Gia Hoi looks so much more fancier than the ones at west. Haha. always love bun bo hue or even try their bun thit neung – its amazing!

  • VP says:

    bun bo hue nomnommmmm!!!

  • Thai says:

    This is full of craps!!! If there no other food in the world, i still wouldn’t eat their food again!!! i ordered dry egg noodles, but they gave me soup noodles…okay, maybe is a mistakes! So i told the waiter and he took the bowl away…a few minutes later, waiter gave me an other bowl…okay, start eating… Fxxking hell!!!! Is so salty and WET!!! They just pour the soup away and add the dry noodles sauce in it!!! I also ordered the sour soup ( Canh chua)…. The waitress told me they don’t have fish and they only have combination seafood when i order… Okay, to me, any seafood will be fine. I just want the taste of the tamarind soup…so i go ahead to order…. They served with a big hot pot like other vietnamese restaurant does….Wow!!! There’s no bac ha (a kind of vietname taro stem), no okra, no ngo om (vietnamese rice paddy herb)…. Okay, maybe they are seasonal vege, may not have them all the time…. But they don’t even have tomatoes, pineapple, bean sprouts, celery!!! Wondering what’s in the pot??? Baby corn, carrot and chinese pak choi (WTF i never see chinese pak choi in any vietnamese food!!! I’m wondering i went to a viet restaurant or chinese???)…. Okay…. I’m starving and too tired to complaint!! Again, i just want to taste the tamarind soup….tried the first sip…. FxxK!!!!! Is chicken soup!!! This shop is totally rip off!!!!! Don’t go,,,

    • It’s so unfortunate you had that poor experience. I must have been lucky on my day as the dishes I had weren’t as bad as your, however they were definitely far from perfect.

      Thanks for letting us know about the poor service with the noodles. We’ll be sure to never order those!

  • waiter please says:

    worst vietnamease restaurent ever, worst dinner out ever , not only that unfriendly staff and unhygicinc procedures disgusting……

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