Pho Madison

I have only ever gotten their chicken soup, and i have ordered it many times! It is delicious! I always crave it on a cold rainy day or when I’m sick, and i swear it heals me right up. I love that you get to choose what and how much of everything goes in it. they give you a little baggie of bean sprouts, lime, basil, hot sauce, and some others, and a to-​go box of noodles. it gets a little expensive if you buy it all the time, its $ 11 for a quart but it is well worth the price! (and as for a quart of soup its rather cheap)

I really loved the beef phở. The flavor was outstanding. Better than New haven phở. The owner is a sweetheart and very hard worker.
The atmosphere was lacking and the bathroom was downright dirty. It would take so little to clean this place up.

I love when the focus is FOOD! Basically I love me a dive.
This place is not 100% authentic in spice level as a Vietnamese joint, but, it’s a great fresh affordable option adding much needed food variety in this area.
The Good:
1) Fresh! Oh so fresh Vietnamese-​ish style food. Quality ingredients.
2) not fancy, not pricey, bigger portions.
3) family run, caring owner.
My husband has never had Phở, and had no problem with the spice level which I thought was a bit lacking. Since he isn’t a huge fan of fish sauce, and had a sore throat he was happy to have a mild warm soup and control his own spice level. He felt that the broth was not bland as some other reviews have said, and in fact, was quite nice to taste the subtle flavors without a lot of salt. Still to ME this was too Americanized, lacking some snap that I associate with Phở, (fish sauce? Lime? Hot pepper?) but to HIM he was happy and satisfied all around. We’d def go back when in the mood for comforting soup.
My green papaya salad was huge, and loaded with shrimp. Everything was very fresh. This was a light and Americanized interpretation of this popular dish. If you aren’t into bold funky tastes this will hit the spot but I needed to add hot pepper and wished for a little more fish sauce. ((When I make it at home my recipe uses garlic, fish sauce, and hot pepper all of which weren’t in this dish.))
Overall I’d def go back for fresh light fare, and enjoy it for that, and not expect 100% authentic Vietnamese flavors.

I LOVE PHO!
My favorites are the #1 and the #10 (with the roast pork). I order from here at least twice per week and although the summer rolls can be a little different depending on who rolls them, they are consistently DELICIOUS.
This is my #1 take out place for lunch. I don’t always check in because I often send my husband or assistant to pick up my lunch. The food is ALWAYS GOOD and very reasonably priced (cheap)!! If you like Vietnamese food and are in the Madison area, this is definitely a place you need to drop by and try.
You will be glad you took my advice.

Delicious vegetarian soup with tofu. You can crank up the spice with jalapenos. Cannot wait to try the bahn mi. The atmosphere isn’t anything to write home about, but the food is amazing.

Moved to the CT Shoreline a few years ago from the Wash DC area, and have been searching for good Vietnamese food. Had the Phở on a cold rainy day, it was delicious. Next the grilled pork, then the Bahn Mi.
I recommend this place. Plus, the owner is great to talk to.

Delicious phở, banh xeo, pork chop all around. She loads up as much food as she thinks we can eat. She is a super sweet hard working mom of 4 who is trying to run a business to support her family. Kudos to her for making amazing phở.
Only comment I would make would be for her to make authenticity an option for us Vietnamese folks. Authentic phở has some weird stuff in it that you would be scared of but one taste and you don’t even care because it is an addiction!
She said she is scared that nonasians are afraid of the tendons that come with original phở.
Awesome takeout, done in literally 5 minutes.
Yeah so service can be slow during busy times and no you won’t get a hello because she’s the waitress, hostess and owner and cook.
Relax, you’re not at the Four Seasons.

Very disappointed returned after a year and a lot of changes quality has gone down prices have gone up — had the beef phở — very little beef.

I’m visiting Connecticut from Florida and needed a big bowl of comfort food to warm up my body and soul! This place did it! I had a giant bowl of broth, noodles and beef. Yum!!!

We stopped here on our drive from Boston to New York and I’m so happy that we did. The food was fresh and delicious. We felt like we made a new friend, the owner was so friendly and caring. She gave us tons of extra food for our road trip and lots of good advice.

Sorry, I really dont like the food.

It pains me to say that this will be my very first Unilocal review that I’ll be doing since creating my account in 2013 or so (the quality of the food compelled me to do so).
A little background — I live in the Bay Area on the West Coast with a huge abundance of awesome phở places (Yummy Yummy, PPQ anyone?). I’m visiting my girlfriend on the East Coast, and before she would take me to pretty good phở places so the East Coast, by no means has lower quality phở than the West Coast.
Maybe I’m spoiled with eating good phở throughout my life on the West Coast. Maybe my girlfriend has been taking me to the good places in CT. Maybe, this place’s Phở Tai was just inconsistent. Among a group of four, however, we unanimously agreed that the phở (3 Phở Tais and 1 Phở Ga) just sucked. To put into context, we ALL dumped hoisin and sriracha into our soups because of the taste. I’ve never done that out of sheer necessity in my life.
The broth was beyond watered down, so the noodles, themselves, also suffered from lack of taste. The meat was very average, can’t really say it was good nor bad. Additionally, I ordered what I believed to be a Viet Iced Coffee (as people may know, Viet Coffee tastes strong and IS strong). One, the waitress messed up my order and had to remake it (maybe it was during the rush of replacing my drink, the messup occurred). Two, I was basically drinking what tasted like instant NesQuik coffee with cream and LOTS of sugar (I felt the sugar bits as I drank the coffee).
I normally tip 15−20%, and instead of not tipping at all, we graced them with a sub-​10% tip which, in my opinion, was extremely generous. Maybe it was just a bad day, and maybe I’m spoiled with eating at a good phở restaurants (I mean this place does have a 4 star at the time of this writing), or maybe this place is just subpar. As always, take reviews with skepticism as everyone is different; however, I, personally, will not come here again even if I lived around the neighborhood.

Phở? More like noodles in water. Absolutely no flavor. This is the first time I had to add hoisin sauce into my phở. And it still tasted like water. $ 10.25 a bowl? Overpriced and the worse phở I ever had. I’ve been to good and bad phở restaurants. But nothing compared to the horrific phở here. If you enjoy phở like I do then don’t ever come here. Even if it’s the only phở restaurant around the area.
My boyfriend ordered Vietnamese iced coffee. It was some watered down coffee. Ridiculous.
Waitress came over to ask how the food was. We told her the truth — that there was no flavor. She said it was made just last night. Was that supposed to be redeeming on the restaurant’s part? She walked away without a sorry. Nothing done.
Have no idea why this place has 4 stars. Should be negative if that were an option.

I stopped in to pick up lunch, having heard good things about this place. The building is older, and she has made the space much cleaner looking then the previous occupants. I ordered the summer rolls and beef phở and waited about 10 – 15 minutes before they were bagged up and ready to go. The summer rolls were fresh and flavorful and the phở was tasty and enough for two meals. It’s a comfortable and relaxed spot to dine in and I wish her continued success. I am excited to try other dishes.

We came here after saw the reviews and the pics post on Unilocal.I was so happy to find a Vietnamese eatery on the shoreline. My friend, who grew up here warned me, this might not up to standard of New York city and West coast. I insisted we should give small business an opportunity. We ordered for take-​out, and it might be why we GOT CHEATED.
Décor: plain, which is expected as a Phở place
Service: very warm and friendly, this is why we even gave it 2 stars
Food: HUGE DISAPPOINTMENT! She gave us an apparently reheated LEFTOVER pork chop (#11), dry and hard like a log. We gave up after a couple of bites. The fried noodle was plain and I had to add seasons to make it more edible. My friend liked the summer rolls tho, but the peanut source was off.
Most of the items are now $ 1 – 2 more than the menu shown on Unilocal,which is very pricy compare to what they offer, and probably 20% more than other similar Phở places.
I really wanted to like this place, but by serving a really old and stale leftover pork chop ($ 10.95), she def. doesn’t deserve my business.

Eating the #7 (Phở Tak?) right now. It’s amazing. Adding this place to my weekly rotation.
No idea what other reviews mean about small portion sizes… It’s a ton of food for $ 9.

Best Vietnamese on the Shoreline. Next to Hammonasset Beach. Wonderful family restaurant. Phở is outstanding.

As much as it pains me to say this, I take back about what I said earlier in my review. This is not what the town needed. The town needed a decent Vietnamese restaurant and unfortunately this place ain’t it.
I’ve given this place enough tries and it fails on many accounts.
First, the portion sizes are a little bit too small. On more than one occasion I walked away hungry.
Second, the quality is quite bad. One good example was my last bánh mì sandwich which contained some type of ham lunch meat. It was really bad lunch meat, like the kind Oscar Myer sells prepackaged at the supermarket. It was bad. Did I mention it was bad?
Plus, their phở isn’t anything to write home about because it’s very bland. One time I informed the counter girl how I recently had a peanut satay type of phở at another Vietnamese restaurant, and she said she could provide the same. Unfortunately she merely handed me a couple packets of hot sauce. Big whoop de doo. That’s not exactly what I had in mind.
Lastly, the atmosphere inside the place is in need of sprucing up. There’s never any nice background music yet they have speakers mounted above near the ceiling. The wall decorations are cheesy and the soda cooler doesn’t help with the ambience either. If their food were great I could probably overlook a lot of this stuff but unfortunately it’s very far from great.

Decent new Vietnamese place down by Hammonasset beach. Not a lot of vegetarian options on the menu but we figured out some things with minor substitutions that worked for us and they were all good. They said there is a new menu coming soon and it will have a vegetarian section, so we will be back soon and see how they do! Worth stopping in!

First of all, it’s a miracle that a phở restaurant even exists in Madison. If you love Vietnamese food, and you live on the Shoreline, you’ll find this place a most welcome addition to the local food scene.
It’s pretty bare bones, like any decent phở restaurant should be. This is the owner’s first try at running a restaurant, and she’s just getting her sea legs. But for whatever shortcomings this place has, she makes up for them with her very warm
presence, and she is fantastic with kids (she has four of her own).
The food is solid. Not take-​your-​breath-​away great, but good. And my guess is it will get better over time. If you’re looking for phở, or green papaya salad, or Vietnamese fresh rolls, and you live nearby, you should be very, very happy.