Quan Ca Can
In Little Saigon, a restaurant devoted to My Tho-style noodles and egg-filled steamed buns
Recommended to us by a friend who noted that their spouse sought this place out for authentic Vietnamese dry noodles, Quan Ca Can in Westminster has a tiny menu and a very narrow focus: steamed Banh Bao dumplings and noodle bowls in the style of the southern Vietnam city Mỹ Tho. If you look solely at the two sides of the single-page menu, you’ll see only these choices and beverages – seven buns, mostly featuring quail eggs and/or salted eggs, plus seven noodle dishes, including the two Mỹ Tho versions (special and regular) shown in our photos, plus wonton, seafood, meat ball and chicken versions. Each can be served with soup in the bowl or “dry,” which is to say soup on the side with noodles, proteins, and vegetables in the bowl.
The two Mỹ Tho soups are identical except for the $4 addition of a single pork spare rib in the “special” version. You can choose either rice (hu tieu), egg (mi) noodles, or a mix; we tried each. Ordered dry, they each arrived with a bowl of lightly oiled broth that tasted like a mix of chicken and pork with scallions – tasty enough to enjoy on its own, but available to pour into the dry noodle bowl in desired quantities and times. If they’d been on the menu, rather than just on a sign at the cashier’s area, we would also have ordered har gow shrimp dumplings and/or shumai to go along with our noodles.
Apart from the addition of a little sniffle-inducing MSG, the noodle bowls were very similar to Hu Tieu De Nhat’s versions in flavors and ingredients. The biggest differences were chunks of dried pork fat – think mini chicharrones, not particularly desirable from our standpoint – and the special version’s spare rib, which was unspectacular on its own but brightened with soy, vinegar, and chili sauces on the table. We found the addition of those sauces (and other items such as garlic and peppers) to be necessary to make the noodle bowls comparable to how they arrive straight from the kitchen at Hu Tieu De Nhat; they were otherwise flat in flavor.
Quan Ca Can isn’t a huge standout for us, but it’s a fine place to get noodles and buns, particularly if you’re looking for an early morning or evening meal – it’s open from 6am to 8pm, both earlier and later than Hu Tieu De Nhat, as well as some other local places serving dry noodles. We’d consider returning to sample their off-menu dumplings.
Stats
Price: $$
Service: Table
Open Since: 2023
Addresses
8433 Westminster Blvd.
Westminster, CA 92683
774.888.8200