Pho and Scary Chinese Lady

Laura's post mentioning a hangover and Slade's post about Asian women and nails reminded me of Scary Chinese Lady, an infamous female version of Seinfeld's Soup Nazi.

Now, not everyone knows what Pho is so I'll explain. It's simply a Vietnamese noodle soup cooked with beef broth and magic. It's so magic, that it was the very first meal my buddy ordered when he got out of Huntsville. He called it "healing." I've never been to prison, so I'll take his word for it. I just know that if you have either a bad stomach or a hang-over, order a bowl of Pho and you'll be cherry.

I talked about Ramona, the smart girl who played down her intelligence to attract men, awhile ago. See, I have a problem. I don't know what is strange to people when it comes to food.

I hate brains. They have a horribly bitter aftertaste that beer will only make worse. The only way to get the taste of brains out of your mouth is to eat something like ginger candy that is strong in the opposite way.

I hate bile. It's almost as bitter. Why people cook with bile I have no idea.

I won't eat genitals. So if you order Rocky Mountain oysters or anything like that, I'll watch you eat them, but I won't partake myself.

Beef tongue is delicious if cooked right. Earthworms look gross, so I never even bothered trying them. They're what I put on my fishing hook. Why would I eat them?

I used to love octopus until I found out how intelligent those goofy looking dudes are. Sea snails are delicious, but jellyfish and sea cucumber are both horrible. Imagine chewing on a tire coated with sugar and you have jellyfish. Sea cucumbers are easier to chew, but taste like jellyfish without the sugar.

Tripe to me though isn't weird. It's normal. So I take Ramona to a Chinese/Vietnamese restaurant in Santa Barbara and order Pho for her. She looks into her food and says, "Zombieslayer, I'm never going to let you order for me again."

That restaurant that I took her to was the only place in Santa Barbara you could buy Pho from. Hey Thom, ever been to Saigon City in Bellevue? Best Pho I've ever had.

Anyways, it was run by Scary Chinese Lady. If you run into anyone who's been in Santa Barbara for more than five years, ask them about Scary Chinese Lady. She's a legend here.

She's the one who ran the Chinese/Vietnamese restaurant. Just like Seinfeld's Soup Nazi, you better know your order right away. If you don't, she screams at you. Don't stutter either. That's no excuse. If you stutter, have your buddy order for you.

She's so scary that sometimes you mess up your order, even though you practiced in advance. She has a way of doing that to people. She makes you nervous. She senses weakness and exploits it. And if you screw up, she screams at you. That's the price you had to pay if you wanted Pho in Santa Barbara.

But not anymore. Ha ha. Sygyzy discovered a new restaurant in the next town down (actually up - Goleta). It not only serves Pho, it's better than Scary Chinese Lady's place.

It's also clean. See, that's one thing that a lot of Asian restaurants don't understand. Americans like clean. A lot of Americans don't care if the food is authentic or not. We'd rather eat in a place that's clean than a place that's authentic. That's why when you walk into Sammy Wo's in San Francisco, you rarely see non-Asians. Excellent Chinese food, but it looks like a Third World country in there.

So goodbye Scary Chinese Lady. I'm never going to buy pho from you again, for thanks to Sygyzy, you're no longer the pho monopoly. Ha ha. The joke's on you now, Scary Chinese Lady.