"The first time I came, I had only been a vegan for less than a month. At that time I wasn't able to realize how superior Pho Da Son was compared with other Buddhist restaurants. Now, after I've tried several others Buddhist restaurants in New York City, it's clear Pho Da Son is among best. In fact, I often speak nostalgically of the food there, and tell all my vegan or Buddhist friends that we need to plan a road trip to Montreal just to eat the food there again.\n\nThere is plenty of seating, with a classic food court style counter maintaining more than 20 selections. Food is prepared ahead of time, and is entirely self serve. So you grab a plate, choose what you want, and heat it up in the microwave. There is also rice noodles, Pad Thai and white rice available in the fridge. I wrote down a list of food I can recognize from the selection:\n- Stuffed bitter melon\n- Pumpkin\n- Mushroom\n- Tofu cake\n- Tofu Skin (red tofu skin is a little sweet, I think it's trying to be char siu, and brown tofu skin is savory, cooked in soy sauce)\n- Taro\n- Mixed vegetables cooked in coconut curry\n- Mixed vegetable stir fry\n\nIn addition, the people there are super nice. At first they thought I was Vietnamese so they didn't pay much attention to me. However, when they realized I was not, and that I wasn't familiar with the setting, they helped me pick some food. They also reminded me there were noodles in the fridge, if I didn't want rice. They topped it off by helping heat up my food in the microwave (given I didn't know how long to heat).\n\nThe food had such an influence on me that soy nuggets have now become my go-to comfort food. I will definitely be back!"^^ . "0"^^ . "2018-02-11T00:00:00"^^ . "2"^^ . . . "5"^^ . "1"^^ . .