Everyone’s got their own indices for quality of life in Ukraine.
The World Bank has its Ease of Doing Business rating. Transparency International has its Corruption Perceptions Index.
My index measures the availability of Vietnamese cuisine in Kyiv. Until recently, life was miserable.
I challenged Maud Joseph, who writes restaurant reviews for the Kyiv Post, to find Vietnamese restauraunts because I could find none. She found two – but both are far from the center where I live and work; one is in Troyeshchyna and the other is in Borshigivka. I was looking for one in the center when, lo and behold, I recently ducked into the Bite & Go cafe, a hole in the wall establishment just around the corner from the Kyiv Post.
There I was pleasantly surprised to find the newest items on the menu included Vietnamese beef pho soup and fresh shrimp spring rolls. Even more pleasing, the chef working the kitchen is Vietnamese. So I ordered the beef pho soup for Hr 89 ($3.17) and a spring roll for Hr 49 ($1.75).
The pho tasted authentic. As for the spring rolls, I’ve had better, but their version is delicious also.
Until last month, the Bite & Go served only typical deli fare – turkey, pastrami and other types of sandwiches – with salads, french fries and other items.
I hope the Vietnamese addition is the start of a trend.
Bite & Go has only 18 seats, but it has a prime location on 1 Taras Shevchenko Blvd. near the intersection with Khreshchatyk Street, now with the red neon “pho” sign out front.
What’s in pho? It’s a bit like borshch in that everyone’s got a different recipe. But these ingredients are common:
- rice noodles
- lean beef
- beef broth
- green onion
- ginger
- cilantro
- jalapeno peppers, red and green
- bean sprouts
- star anise
- basil
- fish sauce
- red chili sauce
Here are some places to go for Vietnamese cuisine in Kyiv:
Bite & Go
1 Taras Shevchenko Blvd.
9 a.m. – 11 p.m.
Kitaika
16 Zlatoustivska St.
12 p.m. – 11 p.m.
BMT
44A Zodchykh St. 10 a.m. –
10 p.m.
Sapa
61/2 Mykoly Zakrevskoho
St. 11 a.m. – 12 a.m.
