Review: Four Sisters’ Feng Shui

Four Sisters’ Feng Shui

South Main Street’s newest family-owned Vietnamese eatery hits home.

By ANDREW MARTON

“Perfect,” said my server Nadia to each of my menu selections after I settled in at the four-month-old Four Sisters –– A Taste of Vietnam.

The Vietnamese Shaken Beef was beyond reproach, with its DIY dipping sauce of salt, pepper, and limejuice.

Photo by Crystal Wise

I wonder if any of the “four sisters” of head chef and principal owner Tuan Pham would quibble with the high bar set by my professional server. Nadia was close to spot-on in her bold prediction.

The combination of Four Sisters’ solicitous service, an interior exuding soothing feng shui, and, most importantly, the vibrancy and authenticity of its Vietnamese dishes allowed the restaurant to attain often –– not always –– that elusive goal of “perfection.”

Four Sisters’ greatest intangible was an interior anchored by minimalist touches of oak-wood panels and soft-glow track lighting illuminating taupe-colored walls and tables. It all created a sense of pristine serenity, only occasionally interrupted by a dramatic flame flaring from a kitchen wok.

And then there’s the food. Chef Pham owes a huge debt to his mother, who passed along a legacy of family-tested recipes. As a result, close to three-quarters of Four Sisters' offerings are inspired by Mom's handiwork.

The sauce accompanying the beef wraps married two unlikely but delicious ingredients: anchovies and pineapple.

Photo by Crystal Wise

With the South Main Street eatery embracing the Asian tradition of family-style dining, close to half of its offerings were The sauce shared plates. These accompanying extended from elaborate the beef wraps dishes, such as steamed married two rice rolls featuring unlikely but tough-to-execute rice delicious sheet noodles, to such ingredients: street-food standards as anchovies and wraps, baos (buns), and pineapple. all manner of egg and summer rolls.

From the sophisticated to the simplest, all of Four Sisters’ dishes produced a pinballing of tastes, from smoky to sweet, fiery to funky umami, and all in a highly defined menu of just 20 items.

Four Sisters: A Taste of Vietnam

Photo by Crystal Wise

As Southeast Asian cuisine is often rooted in street food, it felt right to start with that quintessential on-thego nosh, the bao, or steamed bun. Its spongy-textured dough was filled with equally tender confit of duck breast that had emerged from a sinful wallow in a duck-fat bath and then swabbed in a honey-hoisin glaze thankfully free of any cloyingly sweet aftertaste.

Utter the word “wrap,” and I’m there. But I never expected Four Sisters’ attractively presented beef wraps, sheathed in a razor-thin layer of betel leaf, to have their overall taste so amped up by a terrific dipping sauce. Yes, these nicely grilled batons of ground beef, speckled with roasted peanuts, were perfect foils for a sauce marrying two unlikely, though vivid, ingredients –– pineapple and anchovy. The result was a taste apex of sweet and savory.

All the kitchen needed do was omit the Chinese sausage from its fried rice dish and the result would have been a plate that could satisfy even the most persnickety vegetarian. Of course, that vegetarian would have to forgo those nubbins of sausage and their interplay with a garden of baby corn, broccoli spears, peas, and shredded carrots, all sprouting from a bed of rice where each grain seemed so individualized, it was probably counted in the most recent census.

While the shaken beef tenderloin was generally beyond reproach, its most “shook-up” aspect was its dipping sauce. Instructed first to blend salt, pepper, and a heavy dose of limejuice in a shallow dish, I then gleefully sank shards of beef, along with their accompanying red onion and scallions, into the mix.

The beef pho, which our critic deemed “the city’s premier version” of the classic soup, is a dish for all ages.

Photo by Crystal Wise

For all of that DIY sauce-making, the shaken beef dish couldn’t compete with what I now declare as one of the city’s premier versions of a Vietnamese classic: beef pho. This ultimate-in-earthy soup is akin to your grandmother’s chicken soup –– packing all of her care, love, and healthfulness while throbbing with a worldbeat of Asian flavors.

That’s what 16 hours of laboring over a beef broth will do. Well before I sank my silver spoon into the cauldron-sized bowl, beef and brisket bones had simmered away until they were a distant memory, producing an elixir-like broth flavored with cinnamon, star anise, coriander, and ginger.

Four Sisters offers a full bar and a boutique coffee/tea menu, which includes the Vyvy, an amalgam of Cachaça, jackfruit puree, strawberry liqueur, and egg white foam, topped with grated cinnamon and star anise.

Photo by Crystal Wise

Bobbing on the broth’s surface like meat buoys were beef balls, the Vietnamese answer to Jewish matzo dumplings. They tangled in a net of rice noodles, bean sprouts, cilantro, basil shards, and green and red onions.

Then the real fun began as I added a slice or two of jalapeño, a spritz of lime, plus any of the restaurant’s three table-side condiments –– smoky-spicy

Sriracha, sweet hoisin, and a vinegary chile-spiked sambal. Suddenly, a once prim-tasting pho was transformed into the Lenny Bruce of soups, an in-ya-face, drop-the-mic, spicy delight.

Amid Four Sisters’ feng shui calm and its polished service, patrons are likely to revisit because they crave that comforting Vietnamese dish that, through some sleight of culinary hand, reminds them of their own favorite Fort Worth family meal.

Four Sisters

A Taste of Vietnam

Where

1001 S Main St, Ste 151, FW.

682-385-9353

Entree Prices

$6-$17.50. All major credit cards accepted.

Don’t-Miss Dishes

Duck confit bao, beef pho, and shaken beef tenderloin

Vibe

Minimalist, serene, and modern

When

10pm Fri-Sat 11am-9pm Tue-Thu, 11am

Zest817.com