One restaurant closed and another one opened. King Yen is gone and Andy's Pho has taken it's place. Because we love soup, and we love it Vietnamese Style, or "Pho" as well, we had to give this newly opened place a try.
You can tell it is a start up restaurant... not much fancy going on here. Not much has changed about the atmosphere. There is new menu and less decorations, but the tables and basic layout, as well as some of the photos on the wall are pretty much the same. The condiments on the tables are not on EVERY table, yet. Mentioning to the waitress that it was a little bland, she told me that some renovations were in the plans and would b taking place in months to come. I didn't mind that this place was not so fancy. I mean. really, this is the way of business, small business, in America. I know sometimes people get huge loans and hope for the best, but it is also common that people simply start up a business with what they can afford and then they work hard to make a profit. If they do a good job, before they know it they are remodeling, expanding or at least adding to the employee roll and taking yearly vacations, with a low overheard because they started small. It's freedom to do this...(and of course, many other things,) that makes living in America great.
Andy's is definitely an work in progress... which is a good thing. But most of all, as the sign says, it's Pho. I happen to think that Pho is fun to eat. And wouldn't you know, Pho is pretty much what they serve here, I mean, pretty much all that there is on the menu. However, we did order a crispy noodle veggie dish too. I should mention that you can get have your Pho prepared for you with various add-ins too, like meatballs or fried egg, if you like. My guess is that they will make it anyway you want them to. For opening special, ( to get people to try the Pho they love to make,) they had special prices, so our Pho was one or two dollars cheaper than the regular menu price. That was a nice surprise.
Here is our dinner:
Pho comes with Thai Basil and Mung bean sprouts, lime and Jalapeno peppers that you put into the broth yourself... if you like. I love the sprouts and basil and jalapeno and lime in my soup so much I sometimes add these to my Ramen noodles when I make that at home.The crispy noodles were smothered in fresh stir fried vegetables.
They have serveral different Pho selections, and even serve it with the meat rare, if you like. (Not my kind of thing. Ususally I get chicken with is always good, but today we shared, and we also ordered it well done.) It was well done, but it was also fatty. We did not know if maybe that was the way it was supposed to be. I might stick to chicken in the future, but Geo didn't mind.
We also ordered a Iced Coffee drink which was really tasty.
It was realy sweet, more like a dessert... but Yum!
Pho....(pronounced "fa" ) is soup in a big bowl with lots of noodles, and soup, like Campbell's advertises, is simply, "good food!" There are a lot of Pho restaurants in the area, so they do have some competition and will have to work on sprucing up the place to gain public appeal, but the service was great and Spokane is definately curious about Pho!
And, if you don't want to go in and order (to eat your food indoors,) you can use the drive-thru!
However, if you go in, you can get a little bit about the history behind this place and Tony too.
I ordered Chicken Parmigiana, which came with a salad and bread.... and spaghetti.
Geo went with Chicken Alfredo. Instead of a salad he ordered bread... meanwhile, the pasta already came with some bread, so he had two.
The food was yummy. The atmosphere was comfortable and quaint.
I enjoyed the memorabilia, which could be found all around the room. I enjoyed reading about Tony's family and how it took them 11 days to travel across the ocean via ship when they immigrated to the US. I found myself wondering what this place is like a Thursday night when Adriano comes in and plays his music on the piano. I think it must be pretty special.
I have driven past for month's, each time reading the neon sign outside that says, "FREE SMELLS." This alone is rather funny to me. But, oh my! I just got back from Jimmy John's and I am still smiling! The sandwiches are great and all the other signs around the place, hilarious!
Jimmy John's is pretty much a sub and sandwich joint with an extensive repertoire. They are pretty much ordinary, bread is either white sub or whole grain sliced, and then their is a vast array of condiments whereby your sandwich, sub, or not, is made just the way you like them, and they are good! What more could you want? A pickle? They've got them too.
My boy loves pickles! Geo too.
The boy ordered bacon lettuce and tomato sub with extra bacon. He really liked it.
One of my favorite signs, (on the upper right hand side of this photo,) read, "If walls could talk we wouldn't need all these signs." The sign was shaped like a mouth. 
I was planning for a pizza party gathering over in the valley and needed some gluten-free pizza. Bucks offered it, so off we went.... to 13221 East 32nd Ave. Gluten-free pizza is not on their menu, and they do not make it in house, but it's advertised on a reader board on the side of the road. It's certainly a great option when it comes to people sensitive to wheat, because pizza is such a social food.
Pizza is just plain like able and appreciated...
