Located in Houston’s Chinatown, Phở Gà Đồng Nai offers phở gà made with organic, free-range Texas chicken. We sample both regular and khô (dry) varieties.

11528 Bellaire Blvd, Ste. G, Houston, TX 77072
(281) 530-2323
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8:30am–10pm, 7 days a week

Visited on August 28, 2018

With one of our team nursing a head cold, we followed up on a recent Eater article and headed west to Bellaire Blvd to load up on phở gà, Vietnamese chicken noodle soup. Phở Gà Đồng Nai distinguishes itself from its ample Chinatown competition by using free-range chicken and a state-of-the-art water filtration system for its broth. These extra efforts, plus the gleaming noodle machine enshrined behind a glass wall at a back corner of the dining room, verify the owners’ pride in their offerings.

Regular or dry? Keeping it simple, we ordered two bowls with none of the available add-ins, such as gizzards and livers. A large order of phở gà ($7.95) and a small phở gà khô (dry chicken phở, $7.95) were accompanied by a plate of steamed bean sprouts, leafy sprigs of Vietnamese coriander, lime wedges, and jalapeño, plus small bowls of a gingery, sweet fish sauce that inspires compulsive dipping. The bowl of phở gà contained springy noodles and slices of poached, light and dark meat with skin kept on in a fresh, clear chicken broth along with onions, scallions, and cilantro. The kitchen’s extra efforts tasted readily apparent, and this rates among the very best of the many bowls of phở we have consumed in recent months.

Phở gà khô consists of the various phở components served together in a bowl with fried onions or shallots on top and a brown sauce beneath, along with a small bowl of broth on the side. This dish is great fun to experiment with as you eat it: squeeze some lime into your bowl, enjoy a sip of the broth, dip a slice of chicken in the fish sauce, heat things up with a bite of jalapeño, and at last give into temptation by dumping the broth over the noodles and mixing it with the sweet, savory sauce beneath. At this point, you might as well start employing the various table condiments: sriracha, hoisin, sate. It’s all up to you but we suggest tasting at least a few sips of Phở Gà Đồng Nai’s sublime broth au natural before going hog wild with add-ins.

Besides its namesake phở, Phở Gà Đồng Nai offers a variety of appetizers, several other chicken dishes, and beef phở. Speaking of which, we noticed another diner trying the beef phở but also treating himself to marrow from a plate groaning under the weight of dino-sized sections of cow femur. We searched unsuccessfully for these on the menu, but we encountered this man at the cash register, and he informed us the kitchen uses these bones to prepare the beef broth and you can ask if any are around when ordering. We’ll strongly consider doing that on our next visit.