Pho 99 Vietnamese - Daly City

The dish came with a decent amount of imitation crab, along with around four large shrimp and several slices of fish cake and squid. While I wasn't disappointed by the variety, I do enjoy fish balls in my pho, which I missed. Normally, I ask for about half the usual amount of noodles, but I didn’t make that request this time. In hindsight, I definitely should have because the dish was overloaded with noodles. This left very little room for broth, especially given the abundance of seafood, which was a bit of a letdown since I was hoping for a nice, warm broth on this cold, rainy night. The lack of broth wouldn't have been too bothersome if that were my only concern, but the broth itself was hardly hot at all—more lukewarm than anything. Isn’t the piping hot broth a key feature of pho, meant to cook the meat? In fact, the tea I ordered was hotter than the soup. I was surprised when my meal arrived just two minutes after I placed my order, which might explain why the broth wasn’t as hot as it should have been. Overall, I think I need to give Pho 99 another chance to see if I really like this place or not.