Viet House - Taupo

I went to many different vietnamese restaurants in nz south korea n USA this is by far the worst quailty and expensive place with bad service and low quality food. I was surprised to see they put pork smelly meat balls in the Pho soup. My hubby ordered hanoi style pork but the sauce was not the Vietnamese sauce and my mate says the chicken was not edible quality. We complained to the cashier and the chef never came out to see what was wrong. They were giving excuses like many returning customers coming and their food is Kiwi style. Honestly I think they are taking advantage of locals n kiwis who have no idea of what Vietnamese should be like We will never go to that place again

Cold need to put air curtain by door and heating in. Salads are all cold

Service was poor. Unacceptably poor. First of all, the front house staff impolitely greeted us upon arrival and requested us to wait outside in the blistering cold (this visit was during winter) while our table was being made. There were plenty of space at the waiting area, also, we were not a big group and made sure to leave plenty of walking space for other people to move about. Secondly, we were unapologetically told we will make your orders now when we asked about our order progress after observing 2 tables, all seated after us, were provided with their orders before us (we placed our orders at approximately 7:15 pm, our entree and drinks were the only things served when we questioned a staff member at 9pm). We were at a loss and felt extremely disappointed; we did not expect service from a 4.8 star restaurant to be this poor and unprofessional. At this point, we no longer felt comfortable dining here and exited the restaurant after paying for what was already served. We are a reasonable bunch and do empathise that it was a busy night, but we cannot find any reason why tables seated after us were provided with their food first when we had ordered much earlier than they did. No adequate explanation was given and manner of the waiting staffs were also very poor. I would make sure to steer clear away from this restaurant in our future visits to Taupo, so would my friends and family.

Excellent food, friendly service and conversational Vietnamese NOT a requirement, thank goodness!

A fairly new addition to the Taupo dining scene, I had an early encounter with the food as a takeaway the week they opened and found it ghastly. However recent word was that the initial kinks had been ironed out, new chefs were on board, and the cuisine was being rated highly in town. With friends in tow, I was persuaded to find out for myself with a dine-in dining experience.I can’t say I feel the restaurant has much ambience; more of a box with some afterthought furniture. Everything feels like it is at an angle and the fluorescent color-changing “VIET HOUSE” sign indoors doesn’t help. Service was friendly, but slow off the mark, with many tables already dining and only one waitress it was a reasonable delay after seating before we were even offered a drink.For a starter, I had the salt fish. This delivered more of what I had expected, crispy, crunchy, piquant bits of fresh fish with the salt and spice I was looking for. Very tasty however also very dry; the plate was crying out for a sauce of some kind to dip the fish in. Calamari was devoured with relish by my dining companions.To follow, I ordered the Spicy Beef Noodles while my neighbor ordered the standard beef noodle (Pho) and I am 95% sure our orders were delivered switched. Similar in profile, the broth and noodles were aromatic, savoury and spicy, but his bowl came with an accompaniment of fresh chilis that really kicked up the heat. I had some kind of dried chilli paste to add to my bowl which added a mild warmth. Nonetheless, meals were tasty and across the table a duck salad was served with perfectly crisp duck skin and crunchy fresh vegetables which was a delicious hit.Sweet-tooth lovers will have to look elsewhere in Taupo if they want to go further; Viet House currently has no dessert menu. Overall while it is welcome that the small town now has options for takeout other than Thai or Indian, Viet House does feel like a weaker attempt at bringing the full flavor of a memorable Vietnamese dining experience to life.