Pho Queen

The Phở Đặc Biệt is the bowl that explains the kitchen. Rare beef, beef balls, tendon, tripe, and flank arrive together over rice noodles in a beef broth, and ordering it on a first visit is the fastest way to read what Pho Queen can do. This is a Vietnamese kitchen on Portage Road in the Stamford end of Niagara Falls, tucked into a Home Hardware plaza a few minutes off the busiest tourist strip, and it cooks with more range than a single signature bowl would suggest.

Pho is the centre, and it comes in lanes. There is the special with its full mix of beef cuts, a cleaner rare beef pho, a clear-broth chicken pho, a version that adds beef balls to the rare beef, and a spicy-sour Tom Yum pho for a table that wants heat. Vegan pho sits on the same menu, which is rarer than it should be at a pho counter. Past the soups, the kitchen runs grilled rice plates — pork chop, beef short ribs, a sizzling grill plate — alongside grilled-meat vermicelli built with a spring roll and shrimp paste, a Vietnamese-style bánh mì layered with cilantro, cucumber, and pickled carrot, and fried rice. To start, fresh salad rolls bring shrimp, herbs, and vermicelli wrapped in rice paper with peanut sauce; the crisp alternative is a spring roll of pork, shrimp, and vegetables. Chicken wings come wok-tossed in spicy fish sauce, and the fried cream-cheese wontons land with sweet chili.