On the one hand, there's always a line out front. On the other hand, I had heard from two friends that this place wasn't very good. I figured it was still worth a go, and when a friend of mine suggested it, we went.

It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't good either. Other reviewers describe it as 'Westernized' but it struck me as the same sort of Chinese-ified Vietnamese that's all over HK. I suppose it doesn't matter why it isn't good.First up was the soft-shell crab roll. I wanted some Sriracha for it, and when I asked for Sriracha, the server looked at me like I was crazy. "Chili sauce" eventually did the trick, but I had to ask for more chili sauce twice during the meal. Can't I have a bottle on my table?

Anyway, the soft shell crab roll was fine. No complaints. A-I'm torn about the pho. First, pho is really four things: noodles, broth, meat, and flavor enhancers. I haven't known anywhere in Hong Kong to do it right on all four (or even on all the first three). I liked the noodles at Nha Trang, because they weren't the ones that get mushy 5 seconds after the broth is poured on them. But the broth was absolutely flavorless; it tasted pretty much like hot water. The meat was unexceptional, maybe a little overcooked. I was satisfied with the flavor enhancers: lime, chilis, and basil. You might be miffed that they don't have bean sprouts, if that's your thing. Overall, B. We got this beef salad. I have very little to say about it. The beef was a little overcooked, but not much. It was a little flavorful, but not much. I don't recommend it but I don't recommend against it, if it floats your boat. C+I do, however, recommend against the banh mi. The baguette itself was a horrible, flaccid piece of tasteless white bread with no crispness and no flavor. There was no mayo and no chili sauce. Just some vietnamese sausage on white bread. Like a balogne sandwich almost (but with no mayo). D

The food is surprisingly inexpensive (though not that surprising, given the quality). This restaurant is really close to some other cheap, delicious things (like Mak's) that have smaller lines out front. Why would you go here? C+

I was the first to arrive in our party of three. The host said I could not sit at a table by myself if my party was incomplete. So instead she offered me the center island table, which seated about 10 people. In typical HK fashion, lots of people shared this long table. No big problem if you aren't looking for personal space. Very cozy.

We ordered basically one thing from each flap of the menu. Including their spring rolls, paper rolls (shrimp and some other sort of fish), pho, Com Tam Suon Bi Cha, and chao tom.

The presentation was very well done. All the food was pretty. The portions were more than enough.

Now for the taste. The food is so westernized that it's to the point where it's almost considered fusion food. No authentic flavors at all and also don't even bother ordering in Vietnamese, most of the waitresses will just ignore you.

The only picture I have is of the shrimp paper rolls. It's the first choice on their paper rolls menu. They included peanuts inside the rolls which gave it an odd crunch texture. Normally paper rolls come with a peanut sauce. They only provided nuoc mam. Also I really like to eat pickled carrots and daikon, theirs was soggy and not sour enough. I forgot to take pictures of everything else we ate because we dug in right away, but overall if you're looking for a more modernized and western take of Vietnamese food, I'd recommend this place, but if you're after the more authentic flavors, I'd say pass.

There's almost always a line in front of this restaurant, so it's rather crowded at all hours of the day, but the line moves reasonably fast because it's not a slow food sort of place. The decor inside the restaurant is very bright and pretty—oil/acrylic paintings of scenes in Vietnam, and light colored tables and chairs. The seats and tables are rather closely spaced together, so that sometimes you get a feeling you're sitting in a stranger's lap and if you're sitting close to the window, you may get hungry stares from the patrons waiting in line outside, which may be slightly uncomfortable. Still, the place is great for casual dining—it's noisy enough so that you can have a rather loud boisterous conversation and not worry about being overhead. Definitely not a romantic date sort of place, but very good for group gatherings.

The food's pretty good in all branche of Nha Trang in HK. We had spicy beef noodle soup and deep-fried soft shell crab and a couple of young coconuts this time. The coconuts were not particularly young, I think, so that although the juice is sweet and tasty, the meat of the coconuts were a little tough and hard to scrape off and eat; but juice quality v. meat tenderness I think has always been the Scylla and Charybdis of eating young coconuts, and I think these coconuts do a pretty good balancing act.

The deep-fried soft shell crab was succulent and tender on the inside and lightly breaded and crispy on the outside, served piping hot—a 9 out of 10. The spicy beef noodle soup had just enough lime and pepper in it to give a slight kick to the beef slices (full of tendons, the way I like it) and some pork pieces (slightly chalky, but edible)—7 out of 10.

The service was quick, friendly and efficient. Your food is almost always at your table within 10 minutes of ordering, and check gets to your table in 1 minute flat when you ask for you. Admirably, even though there are almost always people lining up outside, the restaurant staff never gives you the impression that they're anxious for you to leave--empty dishes are cleared away very discreetly and quietly, and you're welcome to linger as long as you like, although the noise inside the restaurant sometimes may make you wish finishing up the meal with a quiet cup of coffee somewhere else.

The Significant Other & I went to this restaurant last night for dinner. We had dined there once before, some time last year. We were not blown away by the food the last time but thought perhaps we had orderd the wrong dishes, and having seen all the people lining for it each time we were on the escalator going to Soho, we thought we would try it out again. The food is still nothing to shout about. We had the pho, cold pork belly, prawn salad rice paper roll, fish cakes and beef in pandan leaf. The fish cakes and beef in pandan leaf were good but not outstanding. The cold pork belly did not resemble the picture in the menu. The pho and prawn salad rice paper roll were just so-so. We did not finish the fish cakes and pork belly, so, I thought I should pack them for take-away but was told that I had to pay $2 for the box, which is an ordinary paper one which I could not re-use thereafter. It comes with a paper bag, which I declined since I had a bag with me, and the waitress did not offer to waive the charge. While $2 is not a lot of money, I feel that the restaurant should see it from a different perspective when diners want to take away leftovers: it means that they had over-ordered but because the food is so good, they would like to pack and take it away. While at the restaurant, we also witnessed some rude service rendered to a group of four at the next table. They had given feedback to the acting manager that the rice paper for the roll was cold and hard. Instead of trying to find out what really happened, the acting manager was defensive and confrontational and kept insisting that that could not be the case. Any feedback from diners is feedback to be taken positively for improvement. The restaurant must not forget that the diners are paying customers. While the restaurant has every right to be proud of their food, they must balance that with discernment and tact when handling diners' feedback. The lack of humility could be the reason why the quality of food is going downhill as seen in recent reviews about this restaurant on this website. Yes, it is a reasonably-priced restaurant, but I would rather pay more for really quality rather than mediocre food. At the end of the evening, The Significant Other & I knew we will not be returning diners for this restaurant.There are far better and more authentic Vietnamese eateries in this wonderful city.

Gwailoguru Rating: 4/10 (Vietnamese)

*In One Simple Sentence:*
Once perfect Viet Place, going downhill since last year, some food still good

*Insider Tip:*
The Pandan Leaf wrapped Beef and the Tomato Pho

Visiting Details:
Cuisine: Vietnamese
Food rating: 6/10
Service: 3/10
Ambiance: 5/10
Price: HK$150 pax
Serving Tab Water/Tea: Yes-No
English Menu: Yes

What we really liked:
As usual the Pandan Leaf wrapped Beef, the softshell crab spring rolls and the Phos are very good

And what not:
The service personnel was amazingly rude today, the overall quality of the food has decreased since our first visit 4 years ago

Summary:

Service
Holy!! If we wouldn't have had half our orders served already, the 6 of us would have walked back out straight away. It all went fine until one of our orders was wrong, no big deal usually, we've learned in the last 5 years that the language barrier especially with the personnel sometimes can lead to misunderstandings, but usually those are clarified quick and in a normal manner. So what happened?

We ordered our all time favourite "Pandan Beef", and the waiter understood "Pepper Beef", no biggy, when he came with the wrong dish we clarified and thought all good, however, 2 seconds later he simply places the dish on our table, tells us we ordered it, he is not wrong, and left. We all sat at out table like this O___O.
So we asked him to please take the dish next time he passed, but he started accusing us of ordering wrong and pretty much started an argument in the middle of Nha Trang, scolding us for our mistake, he was very persistent on the fact that it was OUR mistake and he was right. By then the whole restaurant was looking to our table because he was talking so loud, we were stunned as we never gotten approached by a waiter in such a manner, we just wanted to enjoy the evening as usual (we are regulars at Nha Trang since 4 years), so to just get it over with we complied, but he still continued to talk loud as us, on how to proper order, walking away (finally) still swearing at us.

The Place
Nha Trang is a long established Vietnamese Restaurant in the heart of Central between LKF and Soho, it draws big crowds and you have to be prepared to wait up to 30mins, they wont let you to your table until your whole group is present, means you cant chop a table and hold it until everyone arrives.
The interior is bright and we like the big windows to the street. However eating at the long tables (not the regular ones) can be disturbing as they cramp as many people on it as possible, personal space = 0.The Food
The Food is Vietnamese but with a European twist, making it easier for the many Caucasians (including me) to order, A lot of fried dishes and very meat centered. The drinks are not Vietnamese at all (even if it says so). The coffee used to be good but I got it served tasting burned twice in a row now.Phos
We usually order at least two Phos when we eat in here, because their broth is usually very flavourful and tasty. Same this time. If you go with the Beef and the Tomato Pho you cant go wrong much. Just share with your party of friends.Soft Shell Roll
Good, another item we always order, comes fresh and with great flavours.Papaya Salad with Pork Neck
Used to be one of our favourites, but this time the salad itself wasn't really crisp any more, the pork neck was ok quality, although not the best one either, will probably pass this dish the next timeStuffed Squid and Fried Spring Roll
Both ok, but average, however decently priced you cant do much wrong here.

I hadn't been to Nha Trang for quite a while, so I thought I should revisit! I saw somewhere on the web that their cabbage salad was really good. After waiting for about 10 minutes, my family and I could finally sit down. Normally I order a vermicelli rice noodle thing and meat (called 'mong' in Chinese) but today I decided to order the chicken cabbage salad (first on the list of salads on the menu). It was so delicious!! It was $56 and I think that's considered quite cheap with the inflation going on in Hk and with such a generous portion!

At the bottom of the dish lied the vinegar sauce, it was quite sweet so it complimented the dish very well.
Also, topped over the whole salad were crushed peanuts, also very yummy!

Will definitely come again

Nha Trang is probably one of the busiest restaurants in central!! seriously the line is always long, people start queing up before they open!!
i was one of them that day, but only started queing at 11:50am and once it hit 12pm, doors opened and people flocked in.
i had the classic pho, it was good! we also shared some rolls and salads which were not bad.
i can see why this restaurant is so busy. the prices are very reasonable with decent food and it is located in the middle of central..
however the queue is ridiculous and it's not worth queing up!! food is decent though and i'll be back when it's not too packed

So there is only one dish to get at this restaurant and that's the deep fried soft shell crab roll.

The green papaya salad looks super wonderful but it is rather flavorless aside from the pork neck. There is no acid, sweet, and spicy normally associated with this classic dish anywhere to be tasted. It was as if it was neutered for the western palate-- if you're into that, by all means, this is the restaurant for you.

We also got the pho and the beef on top was cooked til it was a dull brown when I specifically requested extra rare. Again, playing to the western palate. The broth was cloyingly sweet and I ended up not finishing most of it.

Our server made many strange noises our way and almost lost her mind when I poured our sauce into the "improper" vessel for dipping. She moaned like I had just shot her puppy or something equally heinous.

All in all, I was very pleased that the restaurant was so clean and well designed. I really enjoyed my limeade soda--- however, the flavors here are not so authentic.

Had a 'Raw Beef Pho' and Lime Soda

The broth of the pho does not taste of beef at all, it is salty and with MSG added as I got very thirsty after drinking a spoon of the broth.
There were only 5-6 thin slices of beef and they were mostly overcooked
The rice noodles were too thick, too hard, and do not hold broth on them.
The only strength is that it came in a big portion.

The lime soda tasted like sparkling water, it was only very lightly sweetened, no taste of lime at all.
Although the price is rather low in Central area, I will not come back for such quality!

I was very disappointed with this restaurant. I just returned to Hong Kong and this used to be my favourite restaurant. Now it has gone downhill in all areas. I was eating on my own and they led me to a huge table in which the seating arrangements were horrible (a little too cozy even for HK standards). I was also right next to a drawer, which the waiters were constantly opening and slamming shut. Then the food was so bad. The guy sitting across from me took one taste of his pho and walked out. I also used to love love the coffee here but I was so very disappointed again. What happened? I will definitely never return!