Song Huong

This is one of my favorite Vietnamese restaurants! The food is really authentic and they serve some dishes here that I haven’t seen at other restaurants.
I have been coming here for years for the bun bo hue. There is always a lot of meat in the bowl and the soup base is delicious. It comes with a mix of sliced vegetables including banana blossom instead of the usual bean sprouts. The phở is delicious as well.
I love the pork and spring roll vermicelli bowl. The charbroiled pork has a lot of flavor and the vermicelli noodles are thinner than other places and the texture is more al dente. The spring rolls I think are made with rice paper which gives it a more unique texture.
I haven’t quite acquired the taste for raw beef yet but the dish is really good from all the flavors; the acidity, basil, fried onion/​garlic and peanuts.
The shrimp salad rolls are really good here as well because they add some fried garlic and onion to it which adds a lot of flavour and they have some Vietnamese ham inside too.
Remember to bring cash!

Best bun Bo hue in the city. Their phở is pretty good too. I like the fact they have the tapioca dumplings with viet ham or wrapped in banana leaf. Try to the raw beef salad and bring cash!

Bún Bò Hu, Mid Vietnamese assorted meats noodle soup. Very authentic taste as Restaurant Owner is from Mid Vietnam. Good clean & simple dining area. Good & fast service. Foods are very delicious. Spring roll made with Rice Paper wrap, the correct way, a bit chewy when cool dow then deep fried. Recommended! !!

I love phở, and I love to try out new phở restaurants. I’ve been to quite a few phở restaurants all over, and this place has the best phở I’ve ever tried. Just the most rich, flavourful soup there is. The raw beef dish is excellent as well.

Not all phở are created equal. Vietnam is a large country with distinct styles depending on the region. When I want something from the Hue region, this is the restaurant I come to.
Hue is the former Nguyen royal capital of Vietnam from the early 19^th century until 1945. Bun bo Hue is a popular dish from Hue. I highly recommend it. It is unlike any other Vietnamese noodle soup that you may have had.
Other items that are must orders:
Raw beef salad (I know someone that just orders two of these for dinner)
Spring rolls (unique due to their use of wonton crepes)
Tapioca dumplings

Super love the pork & shrimp tapioca dumplings steamed in banana leaves!
It’s number 51 on the menu. But once in a while you will find some of them do not have shrimps.
Remember, number 50 and 51 are different; not only because number 50 has Vietnamese ham & no banana leaves, but the textures of the dumplings are not same!
The Bun Bo Hue is good too, but it’s a bit spicy for me.
Hours:
Sunday to Saturday 10am — 9pm, except Tuesday (Closed)

My new favourite Vietnamese place in the city!
I fully creeped out people’s Instagram photos prior to going, so I knew what the best dishes to order were, though. The lady at the restaurant even smiled at me knowingly as I confidently named off the items from the menu that I wanted. Wink wink. Yes, this girl knows and loves her multi-​ethnic food.
Everything was super!
— The spring rolls were deep fried and a fun snack.
— The raw beef salad was spicy, refreshing and AMAZING. The husband was not sure about ordering raw beef at an asian restaurant in Forest Lawn (which was a perfectly legitimate concern), but I told him that ‘NONE OF THE INSTAGRAM PEOPLE got sick, so we will be fine also’ :) And I am happy to say no casualties happened after the dinner, so this restaurant passed with flying colours! Yay!
— The Bun Hen was my favourite! Baby clams with vermicelli in a shrimp paste sauce. So. Good. And SO addictive! I will go back just for that dish.
— A phở soup with lemongrass grilled chicken that I only had one taste of. It was good, but was the weakest of the four dishes.
And did I mention that it was very reasonably priced? In a city like Calgary where eating out costs more and more these days, I find it very rewarding to find great food at a reasonable price.
I don’t do baseball, but Song Huong hits a home run for me on all levels: flavour, cleanliness, value and authenticity!

My fellow friend and Unilocal Elite is bang about this.
I did a double take when I saw the price of their Large Bun Bo Hue was $ 7. I haven’t seen this before. They highlight that this is their specialty. I thought it was ok.
My group went to town on their appetizers: Cha Gio (spring rolls), Banh Bot Loc (clear noodle shrimp and pork dumplings in banana leaf), and Bo Tai Canh (beef tataki). This family do all of them right.
This restaurant is well worth going slightly out of the way from the main 17^th Ave area.
I’ll have to join Steven N. on his next outing because I too want to try their other menu items.

Craving an extremely large hot piping bowl of Bun Bo Hue?
You’ve come to the right place my friend. Song Huong is a bit far out in the ghetto, but if you don’t mind the adventure, the Bun Bo Hue here is bomb-​diggity.
The regular size is $ 7 something but XL is $ 10 something. Go for the XL, you won’t regret it.
I didn’t get a chance to try the other phở or vermicelli dishes so can’t really comment on those dishes. Will update this review accordingly when that happens.
4 stars. 4 big ones!

Came across Song Huong in a food blog/​yelp binge last night and so we trekked over today for dinner. It’s cash only, but there’s a 7 – 11 in the same complex so that shouldn’t be a problem.
I was very excited about the rare beef salad. It’s a Vietnamese carpaccio and it is such a delight. Crunchy minced peanuts, red chile’s, cilantro, lime, shaved onion and sweet vinegar dance while the cool and tender beef melts in your mouth.
An absolute standout and something that will keep bringing me back again and again. The portion is extremely generous for $ 12.50, so if you can’t share it, you may only need some spring/​salad rolls. No digestion problems either, for those concerned.
The boy ordered the lemongrass chicken vermicelli soup. The broth had that exotic magic of sweet, salty and creamy while still being clear. Perhaps a little too salty after hot sauce was added and cuts of chicken could be a little better, but overall really tasty.
I had the Bun Bo Hue everyone keeps raving about. My unfamiliarity with this dish meant it didn’t resonate with fond memories, which I think may be necessary since it wasn’t anything special to me. Tried the blood cube. Not my thing, but I’m guessing this is part of the appeal. For those who are trying this the first time, it’s a cheap enough mistake to see if you like it ($ 8 for the regular bowl).
Across the board, the prices are the most reasonable you’ll find and the food is worth the trip, even if they were inflated.
Décor is cute. Green walls, faux flowers and lights with a little grass hut for the till.

Good authentic choices. They offer a lot of items you don’t find at other restaurants. I can’t say it’s always the freshest, but it will do.

I love authenticity in this place. I always get bun bo hue and its perfect. Spices and hebs are exactly how it should be. Service always quick. And prices are cheap compared to other places. Portion sizes are more than enough to satisfy my craving. Family run businesses are where its at. Love this place!

Song Huong is a simple and very authentic Vietnamese restaurant. Walking in, my boyfriend and I were the only non Vietnamese customers, which I take as a good thing. We were greeted and seated quickly, and our drinks were out within minutes of ordering. I had the Vietnamese coffee and it was delicious! Not overly sweet like other restaurants tend to serve it.
I ordered the salad rolls and they also were hands down, the best and freshest rolls I’ve tasted. We were told they are made to order, never ahead of time and just refrigerated.
My boyfriend had a traditional dish which included blood cube. I’ve never seen blood cubes before and apparently it’s a popular item. I can’t say I’m a fan, it tasted gelatinous and metallic. But that’s just me. I get squeamish about organ meat and blood products.. .
Back to the dish my boyfriend ate, other than the cube, the dish was fantastic. Hunks of pork and tons of veg.
There were quite a few other original dishes that I haven’t seen served other places, most including pork, so maybe this isn’t your spot if you’re not a pig fan, but I’m sold on the salad rolls and coffee alone, and will traverse across the city again to have them.

Don’t let the location of this place scare you off (nestled in a sketchy looking strip mall), this place is known for their authentic bun bo hue that even my parents make the long trek here to enjoy the soup (from their house, not from Vietnam lol)
The décor is typical of any small Vietnamese restaurant — scenery of Vietnam framed on the walls and green plants scattered around.
Normally when my family dines together, we each get different dishes so we can sample a bit of everything but this time my mom, sister and I all got the bun bo hue and my dad went with the spring rolls and grilled pork on noodles.
Our food came out pretty quick and was accompanied with freshly washed herbs. I couldn’t wait to see how the soup compared my mom’s (and even my grandma’s!). I wasn’t disappointed at all. The meat was juicy, noodles were cooked perfectly and the broth was flavorful and just the right amount of spice/​heat.
You honestly get a belly busting amount of good food for ~$ 10 (depending on what you order), just keep in mind this place is cash only

How many people out there are fully acquainted with Vietnamese food? If you answered yes, how many of you know what Bun Bo Hue is?
From Wikipedia:
«Bun Bo Hue (literally: Hue style beef rice vermicelli) or more specifically, bun bo gio heo (literally: beef and pig’s knuckle rice vermicelli) is a popular Vietnamese soup rice vermicelli dish. The predominant flavor is of lemon grass. The broth is sometimes mildly spicy, rarely very spicy, and occasionally not spicy at all.»
Whether you’re Vietnamese and craving this or you want to try something new it is probably safe to assume if it isn’t coming from a Vietnamese persons home kitchen you’ll probably want to check out Song Huong.
Song Huong provides authentic tasting Bun Bo Hue, this is their specialty and this is what people order probably the most off their menu. I know people from all over the city that travel just to grab a bite at this place.
Décor is mediocre but who needs a fancy looking restaurant when the food itself sells. The location is not too big, about 3 tables on the right side of the restaurant, 4 tables on the left and I do believe two larger ones in the middle to accommodate larger parties.
When you’re there grabbing your Bun Bo Hue don’t forget to look up the Spring Rolls and order some of those too, I mean, this place has to have the best Spring Rolls in the city! The rice wraps they use there aren’t your typical ones that most Vietnamese restaurants use, the type that they use is similar to the ones you will get with Salad Rolls but fried, talk about delicious and authentic tasting!
As well, if you’re looking for more appetizers check out the steamed dumplings that they have there — very tastey and comes with sliced Vietnamese pork as a compliment to the dumplings.
If you’re in the area, definitely check this place out — you might even see me there!