Bite Me!

After Les Bouquinistes, we went for something quite different for supper. 

Restaurant Shunda came recommended by a friend, and turned out to be a cheap and not particularly cheerful little Vietnamese place.  Apparently there are huge queues outside at lunchtimes, but since we turned up at 10 o'clock on a rainy Monday night it was pretty much empty.  I imagine the ambience is better during the day.

The food, on the other hand, was nice, although the portions were MAHOOSIVE.  I could have fitted my entire head into my bowl of soup.  This seems to be a peculiarity of Vietnamese restaurants and I should expect it by now, but it always takes me by surprise. 

My pho (soup) was, as I said before, nice; there was nothing wrong with it, but again, I always expect something a bit more exciting-tasting.  This came with the usual array of bits to dunk - beansprouts etc - and I got stuck into the chilli sauce to pep it up a bit.  The real treat was the prawn dumplings (or "ravioli", as the menu described them) that came with it - they were large and meaty and there were at least ten of them, which seemed like good value for €8. I failed to finish them, which was a bit sad but not surprising when you consider that we had the same dumplings, fried, as a starter.  Prawn overkill.  (They were actually slightly nicer fried, in case you're wondering).

Foodrambler had beef noodles, which were apparently very good and were the reason that Shunda was recommended to us in the first place.  To be honest, I probably wouldn't rush to come back here - there wasn't anything wrong with it, but I'm sure Paris has more exciting places to offer.

Having said that, I didn't have the noodles, so what do I know?

Restaurant Shunda, 12 Rue Volta, 75003 Paris