Thanh Thanh Restaurant 

Review

I was fortunate enough to be dining with Monica and our great friends Mike and Doreen Launer. We arrived at the restaurant shortly before 6 pm with no reservation and quickly sat and offered drinks, tea, and water. The restaurant was about half full getting ready for the 630/7 pm supper rush.

Mike and I ordered Vietnamese Iced Coffee, served the classic way, french pressed coffee, and sweetened condensed milk. The coffee is steeped then stirred with the milk and poured over ice, a great refreshing drink.

We ordered Vietnamese Spring Rolls, Chicken Fried Rice, deep-fried shrimp, Szechuan Chicken, Sweet and Sour Pork, Lemon Grass Beef and Vegetarian Chow Mien ( Crispy Style). I started with a bowl of Thanh Thanh amazing Beef Pho.

The spring rolls are not traditional Vietnamese Spring Rolls rolled in Rice Paper ( Cha Gio). Thanh steps it up and serves in a Chinese spring roll wrapper but uses the traditional Cha Gio filling, this takes it over the top in my opinion, as the rice paper is soaked in water before and tends to unravel in the deep fryer if not done properly. The Spring Rolls came out in less than 5 minutes after they were ordered, hot, crisp and served with pickled carrots, in my opinion are the best spring rolls in Edmonton

The next item to come out was my Pho, words can’t describe how wonderful this dish is, so complex in flavour from the beef bones, spices and vegetables, garnished with simple med rare beef, onions and bean sprouts it is one of the best bowls of Pho in Edmonton.

The next Item out was the deep-fried shrimp, these came out lightening quick, large flavourful 21-25 prawns fried and served with sweet and sour sauce, I found the shrimp to be a little undercooked on the batter but not the shrimp itself, the rest of the table was happy with this dish, my shrimp needed about 30 more seconds in the fryer, it was still very tasty.

The rest of our order came out in about 5 min after the shrimp, everything was fresh, flavourful and hot.

The Chicken fried rice, with eggs, onion, peas and celery, was fried perfectly, and the flavour was excellent. 

The sweet and sour pork is a hit with the ladies, it’s pork loin, not pork leg, it’s seasoned and dredged in a cornstarch mixture, fried and then topped with a sweet and sour sauce. The dish is not as greasy as it is in a lot of other restaurants. I believe this is one of the best dishes Thanh Thanh does, it’s not traditionally greasy, it’s light crispy and flavourful.

The Szechuan Chicken was a nice surprise, first time ordering this dish, chicken thighs, seasoned and dredged, fried and tossed in a sweet hot sauce. Everyone at the table enjoyed it.

The Vegetarian Chow Mein is done a little differently, wun-tun noodles are used, they are fried in the deep fryer, and the noodles puff up and are super crispy. Then the vegetables are stir-fried, seasoned, and a sauce is made and poured on top of the crispy noodles. Eventually, the noodles lose some of the crispiness but soak in all the flavour.

The next dish was one of my favourites, but not in the eyes of the rest of the table. Lemon Grass Beef, was tender and spicy, Monica did not like the texture, but Mike and Doreen thought the dish was ok. Lemongrass Beef has a unique flavour as it’s cooked with Rock Sugar, Fish Sauce, Oyster Sauce and chillies, it’s an acquired taste, but I thought it was amazing.

Final thoughts

The supper was great, this restaurant never disappoints, the service is great, and the food comes out hot and fresh. the bill for 4 of us with drinks was $145.00, we had enough food for another 2 ppl with takeaway. This will be the baseline of all food reviews. Thanh Thanh gets 8.5 bites of 10. One of the best places to eat in Edmonton, with great-tasting food, good prices and a locally-owned mom-and-pop restaurant.