House Of Pho in Stratford Serves Up Much More Than Delicious Pho

At a hillside shopping center overlooking nothing more fashionable than the far ridge line of the Housatonic River and Sikorsky’s helicopter factory steams a great bowl of pho. It’s a standard bo vien with beef meatballs, ordered lightly rich with small convex globules of transparent oil magnifying both light and flavor in the broth. I’ve recently dosed a bite with a slice of positively infernal green pepper. A less varied quarantine diet has apparently softened my usually spice-calloused tongue. My eyes are watering, and my nose is running. I’m in heaven.

Stratford's House Of Pho opened in February. As in 2020. As in one month before every place in the state shut down until - well, nobody exactly “figured it out”, but let’s say “made do” with the new reality. There’s a wood patio where the walkway used to be, facing south to catch the midday sun when I first ate there, last August. It’s hot, humid and I’m eating something that’s both of those, so naturally I add some red chili sauce to spread the bodily abuse around to something besides my liver. The chili sauce is mild, but adds the right spike of flavorful heat. I add more.

Worth noting: this is towards the end of the bowl. Most of the plentiful noodles, green onion, chives, and all of the provided bean sprouts are now gone. I like to start with the pho as basic as possible, as provided, to really get a feel for the flavors. It's the same reason I went with “light” on the optional richness scale of oil content at ordering, to see what the oil does without any other taste in there getting lost. I can report the most important ingredient in a bowl, the broth, is rich with a depth of flavor soaking into every other ingredient dropped into the bowl. I appreciated the subtlety of the blended ingredients for a while before I went mad scientist with the capsaicin.

What else do you like in your pho? Rare beef? Brisket? Shrimp? Tripe and tendon? Take your pick. It seems they, too, share my awareness of pho's curative properties, because in this House they respect hangovers. The "Morning After" pho ga includes sliced chicken, but I would encourage adding poached egg and possibly a $7 bomber of Sapporo for best results. It's 2021, and brunch is where you find it.

If a different mood strikes, House of Pho also has Mi soup (featuring a little backward accent on the "i" I can't seem to find on my keyboard, plus egg noodles in chicken broth, bok choy, pork rinds, and sesame oil), which can be ordered with additional sliced chicken, or pork wontons. Create your own character by dressing up your Mi with fried shallots, shiitake mushrooms, char siu pork, or tamago eggs marinated in soy sauce. Go crazy, really explore the room. It's your mouth, and I can't tell you what to do with it.

A large friendly picture of steamed bao greets you on the wall inside the restaurant, and you will probably want to get some - and I have, because bao is a gift to the world - although at $15 for four these are Good-Not-Great. You can't go wrong with pork belly bao, even if I preferred the crispy chicken, which you can also get in wing form as an app, with sweet&sour sauce.

Vermicelli salad and Com Tam rice courses can round out a meal for the especially hungry or anyone who came to share, but the current realities of specialty food supply during a global pandemic mean these aren't always available. Soothe the pain of loss with jasmine or high mountain tea, or drink a Vietnamese iced coffee and then go lift a train over your head because you suddenly have the energy to do that now. I'll be the one hunched over a steaming bowl a few tables away, moaning softly as I press a cold beer to my temple at an entirely inappropriate hour. Condolences are welcome but unnecessary - I'll be all better soon.

House Of Pho; 7365 Main St., Stratford; 203 290 4912; houseofphoct.com.