The new Turtle Tower is a reborn shrine to chicken pho

Eat Here Now is a first look at some of the newest, hottest restaurants around – the ones we think are worth visiting. We dine once, serve forth our thoughts, and let you take it from there.

The new Turtle Tower has two things that anyone with a beating heart should love: a great comeback story and legendary bowls of noodle soup. A few weeks ago, the hallowed Vietnamese restaurant, which closed its original Tenderloin location in 2023, victoriously reopened in the Financial District. From Day One, the reopening has caused a fervor.

While I wait to be seated one day in March, a desperate table-seeker tries to connive her way into getting a future reservation despite the fact that the restaurant does not take them. By 11:30 a.m., only 30 minutes after the doors open, every seat is full with a Richard Scarry “Busytown” customer mix — tow truck drivers, cops, MUNI operators, downtown office workers, and politicians like former Supervisor Jane Kim and current City Administrator Carmen Chu. The other day, the restaurant even hosted a couple of famed comedians, Ali Wong and Bill Hader.

New Turtle Tower partners Arash Ghanadan and Hilwim Wonga, who played a big role in helping founder Steven Thang Pham rebirth his restaurant, couldn’t have asked for a better reception. Though the food alone is very good, it’s infused with a lot of nostalgia, something that makes everything taste better. A place like Turtle Tower is about memories, family, and food — and, properly, the three are inseparable.

Situated next door to Perbacco and Tadich Grill, the new location isn’t exactly swanky. But in comparison to the original, which debuted in 1999 on the corner of Larkin and Willow Streets, it is positively tony. In the old locale, where I enjoyed more than one bowl of pho ga over the years, the interior was pragmatic, with basic tile floors, pale-yellow walls, and proletarian chairs. It was also a different time — the same year Anthony Bourdain took viewers along on a first trip to Vietnam and when, outside of native speakers, only food nerds knew to pronounce pho with an “uh” instead of an “oh.”

By the time the original Turtle Tower closed, the neighborhood had declined to the point that even customers getting pick-up were scared away. “The Tenderloin was an amazing place before the pandemic. But then it became the city’s dump,” recalls Kathy Pham, Steven’s eldest daughter, who worked as general manager as Turtle Tower expanded to four SF locations over the years, and then, by the end of the pandemic, down to zero. 

The new space, which formerly housed Barbacco, is narrow, with a diner-length counter and plenty of seating. Menu prices are higher than they used to be, but surely so is the rent — so is everything. There are basket pendant lights, orange-tinted uplighting, palms, and exposed brick walls. A full liquor license is coming soon, and on the menu will be cocktails like Dragon Lord (tequila, passion fruit, dragon fruit, and sour lime) and 18 Kings (coconut-fat wash, whiskey, Thai tea, and cardamom). 

The food menu is largely the same: There are 10 variations on pho, both beef and chicken, made in the purist style of Hanoi, where Steven Pham hails from. Unlike Southern Vietnamese pho, the broth isn’t made with star anise, which gives it a sweet profile. It also isn’t served with an accompanying plate of bean sprouts and herbs like Thai basil. And don’t even mention the words “hoisin sauce” to Kathy. It’s triggering. “People are like, ‘Why no hoisin sauce?’” she says. “Because it’s a flavor that is alternating instead of enhancing.”

Servers gingerly stream out of the kitchen, clearly still getting their footing, looking slightly terrified as they walk the long space, balancing trays holding massive, heavy, scalding bowls of the brothy soup — mostly pho ga ($19.50), which the restaurant is famous for. It is made with chicken delivered daily from a poultry shop in Chinatown. “It’s a fresh, free-range brown chicken,” Kathy says. “It doesn’t yield a lot of meat, but it’s much sweeter in flavor.” Afloat with almost disintegratingly tender, fresh rice noodles (most pho joints use dried), it tastes nourishing and honest, like someone is taking care of you. 

On the other hand, there are huge chicken wings ($18) that seem to have come from the biggest chicken ever; they’re simply fried without any coating or batter and served with a sweet-sticky chile sauce on the side. They’re solid, but the competition for wings in this town is fierce — and I’m partial to more down-and-dirty, finger-licking wings like the ones at San Tung. For fried items, the imperial rolls ($19) filled with crab, shrimp, and pork would be my choice, because wrapping something crispy and hot with cold, crunchy lettuce and herbs is one of Vietnam’s greatest culinary ideations.

With dinner service now available, other entrees will soon be added. I can’t wait for the cha ca, made with turmeric-stained fish marinated in shrimp paste and galangal and served with copious amounts of dill, all served with rice noodles. I remember being introduced to the classic Hanoi dish for the first time in the first Turtle Tower location.

And before you chug all your broth, I’d recommend you save room for dessert — an addition to the menu courtesy of Kathy, who’s very good at the hard sell. When the made-to-order mochi waffles ($12), vanilla-fragrant with pandan and served with a salty whipped cream, arrive, they are impossible to stop eating. Chewy-salty-sweet is its own kind of holy trinity. Despite being full, my friend and I leave nothing but a tiny waffle square — a gift to the gods.

The day I have lunch, Steven Pham, now 67, stands behind the counter, his beard tied in a ponytail, quietly compiling fresh spring rolls, instructing a fledgling prep cook on how to make the green papaya salad, and nodding to the endless regulars who come by to genuflect and give their thanks for his return. Kathy says that when they were forced to close, the family figured it was the universe saying it was time to retire. “I guess we were not accurate about that fact,” she laughs. The universe, as we all know, can be fickle.