Rise and Shine is Mai Tran's unassuming bakery with treats like cakes and fresh taro buns. The banh mi features house-made bread and perhaps the most tender grilled pork in the area. But the best reason to make the trip to Shoreline is for the weekend special, which might be pho ga one week, beef stew the next, mi quang after that. You just need to time it right to be seated at one of the two small tables.

For Seattle’s (and Bellevue’s) original upscale Vietnamese experience, diners need look no further than Eric and Sophie Banh’s Monsoon, sibling to Ba Bar. Using finer ingredients sourced locally when possible, Monsoon blends traditional Vietnamese cuisine with Pacific Northwest innovation for food with fine-dining flair. Drunken chicken, catfish clay pot, and banana cake for dessert are among the popular dishes; there are sometimes special feasting opportunities to enjoy Dungeness crab, too.

With multiple locations throughout the city, this is the place to fork over a few extra dollars for the finest bowl of pho in town, but the menu goes well beyond beef noodle soup. There’s Vietnamese coffee with pastries in the morning (this was the home of one of Seattle’s first “cronuts,” after all), along with rotisserie meats and rice vermicelli or broken rice in the evening. Ba Bar’s got a casual-cool street-food feel all day long, extending to 2 a.m. nightly and 4 a.m. on weekends at its original Capitol Hill spot.

The barbecue pork sandwich here is pretty solid, but perhaps the top reason to come is the “lunch box” of two entrees and a ton of rice for just a few bucks more. Beef stew, stuffed bitter melon, and coconut chicken are among the top picks. As with the other nearby delis, diners can also buy trays of fresh spring rolls, banh cuon (rice crepes), and other Vietnamese bites, including neon-colored sweets.

Vietnam House shares the same parking lot as Tamarind Tree, though it attracts more of a Vietnamese clientele. This is a reliable spot for broken rice dishes, including one with a grilled pork chop, shrimp on sugar cane, deep-fried bean curd, and a fried egg. With more than 100 items, the menu may be a bit overwhelming. Note, though, that nearly every table orders bun mang vit (duck and bamboo vermicelli noodle soup). It's available one hour after opening, and typically sells out before the end of the day.

Pho Bac Sup Shop shares a Little Saigon parking lot with venerable sibling restaurant Pho Bac (they’re both owned by the same family), but there’s a lot more on the menu than soup noodles. The pho tron ("dry pho") is outstanding, and there are many tasty bites like prawn ceviche, Viet sliders, and chicken wings with tamarind sauce. The service currently leaves a lot to be desired, but hopefully it will eventually catch up to the quality of the food.

In a city full of pho, Pho So 1 puts the word right in its name and succeeds in making the beef noodle soup shine. Eater recommends No. 20 on the menu for the widest variety of meat (rare beef, well-done flank, fatty flank, tendon, and tripe), with the option of adding meatballs for an extra dollar. The bun bo hue is also worth a try.

At this 12th and Jackson strip mall gem, customers at Hue Ky Mi Gia gravitate toward the fried butter chicken wings; crusted with garlic, green onion, chili, and salt, they’re fantastic as is, or dipped in the tangy, sweet chile sauce that’s served on the side. The wings are the perfect appetizer ahead of one of the many noodle dishes on the menu, including egg or rice noodle soups (braised duck is especially popular), chow mein and chow fun options, and stir-fried vermicelli plates.

This is the place to go for some of the best tofu in town. Here you’ll find large blocks of firm tofu, containers of plain or sweet soy milk, and tofu pudding with ginger syrup. There’s a self-serve buffet bar with various flavors of fried tofu, including lemongrass-chili. And for those who can’t wait to eat, there are a variety of banh mi sandwiches — including, of course, tofu.

This Columbia City pool hall with a sports bar feel is a popular hangout for some in the Vietnamese community, and the quality of its kitchen justifies a visit — either for takeout or for a fun dine-in experience. Noteworthy items include banh mi, bun (dry noodle bowls), and soups like bun bo hue, bun rieu (crabmeat with tofu and rice noodles), and bo kho (beef stew with noodles or bread). Bun mang vit (duck noodle soup with bamboo shoots) is especially popular here.

One of many good Vietnamese restaurants near Othello Station, this place offers prepared products, entrée-and-rice boxes, and more. Tony’s even bakes its own bread for banh mi. While the dac biet (house special) banh mi is popular, insiders order banh mi ca xa ot, with battered and fried basa fish (a type of catfish) and a smear of garlic-chive aioli. (Across the parking lot, Q Bakery also prepares delicious banh mi; its homemade bread is more crackly with a denser crumb.)

At the south end of the Vietnamese “strip” along MLK, at the Othello Station light-rail stop, this humble hole-in-the-wall has a small number of tables waiting, a television typically blaring, and an owner likely whistling or singing. The sign outside says Bun Bo Hue, which is easily mistaken as the name of the restaurant — rather, it’s the signature dish and the one to order, with its gelatinous pork knuckle and earthy pork blood cakes.

This White Center restaurant features Da Lat-style special noodle soups, including various versions of nam vang noodle soup and a Da Lat version of bun bo hue that contains beef brisket. Best might be the mi quang, a hearty bowl with turmeric noodles, pork spare ribs, prawns, quail eggs, and a sesame rice cracker. The banh xeo is unique: Diners put pieces of the Vietnamese pancake, herbs, and greens (including, in season, a mustard leaf called cai be xanh) inside rice paper to eat more neatly.