Resturants: Ethnic and Specialty

Friend of pho?

Then you’ll find plenty to like in this Third World hideaway specializing in the namesake soup that’s a staple of Vietnamese cuisine. The menu lists 15 different varieties — huge, steaming bowls of broth chock-full of rice noodles, a variety of cuts of beef, bean sprouts, serrano chile, lime and fresh herbs.

Move beyond soup and sample chao gio (spring rolls packed with ground pork, rice vermicelli and mushrooms), mi xao (egg noodles) or tom va bo nuong vi (a wraplike beef, shrimp and veggie dish you cook yourself on a tabletop griddle). Other authentic options include a variety of hot pots, chicken with lemongrass and marinated shrimp with raw vegetables. To wash it down, order from the long list of Asian beers.

If you can tear your eyes off your chopsticks long enough, you just might see presidential woulda-been John McCain. According to a blurb on the menu, Pho Bang is his favorite Vietnamese eatery — and who should know better than a former POW who spent years savoring the native fare?

Tired of paying too much for junk food? Head to Bombay Grill, where, Monday through Saturday, you can enjoy a marvelous, all-you-can-eat feast for just $6.95. The buffet makes it a quick operation to fill your plates, stuff yourself and get back on the road.

Bombay Grill doesn’t try to trick you with the typical all-you-can-eat spread of dozens of mediocre dishes — quantity doesn’t do it if the food doesn’t deliver. No, the Grill serves daily selections including five vegetable dishes, three meats, soup, rice, breads, salad bar, and two desserts. The manageable selection means ample variety and quality control for the kitchen.

Tandoori chicken and beef curry are always winners. Saag pancer is a delight, blending spinach with Indian-style cheese and mild sauce. For dessert, try kheer, a delicious rice pudding.

Executive chef Patrick Poblete does a Southwestern-accented American comfort cuisine that is pure, rich indulgence with lots of heavenly fat.

This is Arizona luxury at its best, with surroundings to make every meal special. The gorgeous “cowboy” hacienda with its upscale dining room is tucked away at Paradise Valley’s Hermosa Inn.

Chef Poblete grows his own fresh fruit, vegetables and herbs, and the menu changes based on what’s the best of the season, with entrees that complement. Lon’s fresh fish includes swordfish, salmon, trout and more, butter melting slowly on crisp-grilled skin, soaking into pliable fingerling potatoes and nestling with fresh veggies.

Don’t turn down the pastry chef’s sampler, wickedly fattening with custards, mousses, cakes, gelati, ice creams and fruits.

C-Fu’s got excellent Chinese food, and then some. It’s got meals on wheels, and dim sum.

The huge restaurant becomes an autobahn during lunch seven days a week when the dim sum carts come careening out, their drivers dodging giant tanks full of fish, clusters of tables and quick-footed waiters clearing plates and refilling beverages.

Customers wave the carts in like taxis, choosing among the 60-plus items offered. Some ask for explanation; others just point and say, “Bring it on.”

Here are some hints: Chow fun noodles, Chinese broccoli, pork siu mai and baked barbecue pork buns can provoke drooling. Any of the dumplings stuffed with meat or seafood are sublime. Fried shrimp balls, sticky rice in lotus leaf, stuffed eggplant and turnip cakes are heavenly, too.

We’ve sampled in San Francisco, New York, even China — and C-Fu is definitely sum-thing special.

Good sushi needn’t cost an arm and a tentacle, although it usually does.

Happily, Ichi Ban turns the tide on steep-priced swimmers with its buffet-style sushi spread, a staggering array of Pisces-in-the-raw that will set you back just $13.95 at lunch, and $20.95 at dinner.

Except for the price, there’s nothing cut-rate about this all-you-can-eat fish fest that offers more than 50 items. The top quality selections include pale pink albacore tuna, bright red maguro, silky salmon, buttery hamachi, cooked shrimp, flaky kani, red snapper, scallop and eel. Other choices include baked salmon, gyoza, snow crab and tempura, as well as an impressive array of premade hand rolls.

Ichi Ban’s sushi buffet? We’ll bite.

Coyote Grill shows us why good Southwestern food will never be the flash-in-the-pan trend critics thought it would be back in the ’80s. Who could turn their nose up at citrus-crusted catfish in spicy orange chipotle sauce; or Southwestern beef Wellington, stuffing filet mignon in puff pastry with mushrooms and hot cascabel chile sauce? Not us, certainly.

No, we’ve got our schnozzes firmly buried in executive chef Farn Boggie’s steaming-hot onion soup, the rich beef stock splashed with Corona beer, soaking with thick croutons that taste of Pumpernickel, capped with melting Swiss cheese and served in a ceramic crock.

We’re happily face-first in a plate of decadent salmon, overflowing with huge chunks in puff pastry with mushrooms, spinach and parmesan cream.

The grill’s setting is pure Southwestern style — sleek with inset stained glass, copper accents and a big, inviting bar. After a few margaritas, we feel rowdy and ask to try Boggie’s “adventurous” selection — “Let the chef pick something for you. May or may not be from the menu (your waitperson does not know what it is, either).”

We’ve never been disappointed. Now that’s what gives a cuisine staying power.

Readers’ Choice for Best Southwestern Restaurant: Z’Tejas Grill