Shawnessy Vietnamese

So, the restaurant's name is "Shawnessy Vietnamese" which in itself seemed oddly pan-ethnic to me. (But it turns out to have to do with the name of the neighborhood in Calgary. Yep. For details click here. So, Shawnessy Vietnamese is not, alas, Irish Vietnamese.) Anyway, there it was, in a sort of mall somewhere in Calgary. Who knows where. Inside, a beautiful huge salt water aquarium with iridescent yellow fish and beautiful blue fish -- huge along a wall. And the menu had pictures of spring rolls. So, we ordered spring rolls with shrimp, spring rolls with shredded pork, and an order of lemon grass chicken which came with steamed (white) rice. And, of course some beer: Saigon beer. Was the food good? Yes indeedy. The chicken came with loads of crisp vegetables and a mild but tasty sauce. All of which was wonderful, augmented by the extremely hot sauce and the soy on the table. The service gets criticized on other sites, but seemed ok to me, though we did have to ask for plates to use to share.

The cuisine of Vietnam, of course, includes much much more than lemongrass chicken. But that is what I keep ordering ever time I enter a Vietnamese restaurant. Hmmm. Maybe it is time to move on -- to the subs that were on the menu (and appeared, for example, in a favorite cookbook of mine, Hot Sour Salty Sweet) or even the lovely vietnamese pork dish I regularly produce from Madhur Jaffrey's Curries and Kebabs which traces the diaspora/globalization of curry. Maybe I need to explore -- and cook more Vietnamese -- using recipes from here or here. Hmmm. 2008 -- a new year!

Where is Shawnessy Vietnamese? 16061 MacLeod Trail SE, Calgary, T2Y3S5
How do I call the restaurant? 403-201-3888
Has it been reviewed elsewhere? Yes, try clicking here and looking for the entry on Vietnamese lunch. Or check out Urban Spoon.