Turtle Tower

Phở Gà Lòng: Chicken noodle soup with giblets 

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Chè Ba Mầu: Three Color Bean Dessert

Phở is the perfect supplement to a morning spent in recovery. After successfully concocting cucumber gimlets from scratch the night before, we ended up doing some sort of five hour mash-up dance marathon (the peak of which was probably an ingenious mash-up of "99 Problems" and "99 Luftballons" and whose nadir was most definitely a "Genie in the Bottle" remix, which somehow sounds more lurid than ever). Therefore, it was with throats sore from improvised karaoke and legs sore from artless swaying that we headed to the Little Saigon corner of the Tenderloin for something greasily soothing.

Turtle Tower is supposed to have the best chicken phở, which we were eager to try, already being fans of rare beef phở. It is also served up Northern Vietnamese style at this particular restaurant. This knowledge, combined with her general state of tiredness caused Rosie to briefly mistake a Ghostbuster's shirt on a fellow diner for a hammer and sickle. We discovered that Northern Vietnamese phở comes with only jalapenos and lemons, which was a shame since the bay leaves usually lend a much appreciated fragrance to the soup and bean sprouts are the perfect crunchy counterpart to the springy noodles. Cheney went the safe route and chose the regular chicken option while Rosie decided to be adventurous and get the addition of giblets. She then hoped anxiously that this did not include a fertilized egg, and was relieved to find only delicious chicken innards. The broth was incredibly soothing, and perfect for anyone feeling under the weather. Being overly ambitious, we both got large portions and surrendered halfway through due to the extremely generous serving of noodles heaped in the bowl. Overall, the phở did not seem too distinctive, just like a very good chicken soup, but at least it did its job this time.