Mekong Restaurant

Mekong Restaurant Restaurant Review:

If you doubt the popularity of the restorative soup pho (often served at breakfast in its homeland of Vietnam), just check out the line at lunch at Mekong, which resembles a cross between an elegant-casual Asian eatery and a hofbrauhaus. But pho, served with a plate of lip-tingling hot peppers, basil, lime and sprouts to doctor up the seemingly bottomless bowl to your liking, is just one option (albeit in several permutations, from rare sliced beef to shrimp, scallop and squid) at this spacious restaurant, broken into several rooms with contemporary Asian music filling the air. Lunch specials (scallops with string beans, spicy beef with basil sauce, and tofu with baby bok choy among them) include a choice of soup, steamed or crispy spring roll, and steamed jasmine or brown rice. Soft shell crabs (in season) and slow-cooked Louisiana quail are entrées that would cost more elsewhere, and vegetarian dishes like crispy tofu with onion in spicy lemongrass sauce abound. Familiar broken rice, flat rice noodles and egg noodle dishes appear as well. But Mekong deviates from many other Vietnamese restaurants in the U.S. with its roll-your-own spring rolls and selection of Belgian ale and other beers from around the world. And nearby. How many other such eateries state unequivocally that “Beer is the answer” on their menu? And then open a brewpub called, you guessed it, The Answer, a few doors down?