Thanh Son Tofu - San Diego

**** Thanh Son Tofu moved, then closed

We'd been trying to get to Thanh Son Tofu on El Cajon Boulevard for a while. First off, they are located a bit off the street with one of those psycho-free-for-all parking lots where people seem to define their own parking stalls and rules. In addition Thanh Son seems to close rather early, so I've missed the boat a few times, before we finally made it at about 1pm on a recent weekend afternoon.

We entered the large almost empty shop, and no one was around, and not much food either. There were many, many signs though!

Wow, so Thanh Son does Banh Mi? But I really didn't understand much else.

In the meantime, the Missus had struck up a conversation with a nice young man, who told us that they were out of tofu. In fact, they usually run out of fresh tofu before noon. Bummer. Meanwhile the Missus's short attention span had gotten ahold of Her and She had moved on, and was checking this stuff out.

A large variety of Che, otherwise known as "sweet soup", those very refreshing dessert drinks of which there must be hundreds of variations. These were $2.50 a piece which I thought was on the high side until I noticed a sign over the cash register.

Basically buy 2 get one free! Baaargain city..... So, the Missus hit the jackpot and selected Her Che. I'm not a dessert person, but the one She enjoyed the most had taro and slices of ginger in coconut milk, which I thought was pretty good. Unfortunately, there's no photo since it never made it home. Here are photos of the other two cups of Che the Missus had.

Come to think of it, these were 12oz cups...and were pretty large.

We also got some of the fried tofu we saw(10 pieces for $1.25):

After the Missus talked the young man into giving Her some samples(She is very useful sometimes...) we got the version on the left, it had onion, bean thread, and black fungus in it. Crunchy exterior, nice flavor, with just a touch of salt. The version on the right was a lemongrass tofu which we didn't think had as much flavor, nor the great texture. We were still a bit disappointed that we missed out on the tofu....

At this point, getting some tofu from Thanh Son had become a mission. My mantra became, "I'm going to get me some tofu...or die trying!" I got up at 630am on a recent Sunday, and made my way to Thanh Son. If there is one benefit to arriving at 7am, it's that I had my choice of parking spaces without having to worry about being blocked in. I walked into the shop and noticed three people hard at work making spring rolls and other items. Luckily the same young man who served us the other day was there; the other two people only spoke Vietnamese. I ordered two block of tofu($1.25/ea), and also an order of the noodles that looked really good.

The large container of the noodles cost $3.50, and was okay, just a bit under flavored for us.

Oh yes, and finally the tofu! Now due to communication problems, I'm not sure if Thanh Son sells a variety of Tofu. I was given two large blocks of firm tofu.

The tofu was quite dense, but short on the strong "soy bean" flavor I was expecting. The tofu is well suited for deep frying or various stir fries. I'll probably be back to see if other tofu products are sold. Till then, if you're in the mood for some fresh tofu, you know where you can get it.

Thanh Son Tofu
4616 El Cajon Blvd Ste 15
San Diego, CA 92115

Comments

[Passionate Eater]

YEA! I love buy-one (or two)-get-one-free deals! And look at the Missus workin' her magic!

[Kathy]

Hey Kirk!
What is it with all these Vietnamese places doing buy 2 get 1? I was at Banh Mi Che Cali on Valley the other day and they had buy 2 get 1 che. Then I went across the street to the new Lee's Sandwiches and they had the same deal going on! It drives me crazy, when I buy 3, I have to eat them all at once...good on the wallet, but not top friendly to the waistline! :)
still, so cheap though!

[Wandering Chopsticks]

I wonder if they're the same as the Thanh Son Tofu in OC? If so, I'm surprised they ran out of tofu at noon.

I go to Dong Phuong Tofu myself and they always have all the tofu products all the time. But then, they do make 20,000 blocks of tofu a day. :)

[habereno]

I'm also a fan of Dong Phuong Tofu in the OC. I highly recommend picking up some tofu pudding from Thanh Son (if you get there early enough!) or Dong Phuong -- it's one of my favorite desserts (mostly because it's almost entirely guilt-free)! It usually comes in a big cylindrical tub and comes in a plain or pandan flavor. The plain pudding usually comes with ginger sugar syrup to spoon over the top of the tofu and the pandan flavor comes with coconut milk. Mmm!

[kingkong5]

I'm a fan of the pandan flavor too, only because I prefer the coconut milk/sugar to the gingery kind. Plus the coconut milk has tapioca in it, so you get to eat those little eyeballs!

Kirk, what did you end up doing with the tofu blocks? We usually end up slicing them thin and frying them, and dipping in a mixture of soy sauce (or Maggi seasoning), smashing one red chili pepper in it. It's very good!

[Juan]

Hey Kirk, I love everything at Thanh Son Tofu. You can't get any of these specialty items anywhere else. From what I heard, Thanh Son Tofu has been around for almost 20 years. Dong Phuong's customer service isn't all that great. They're not as friendly and I don't think their products are all that great. There's more variety at Thanh Son. I really like them! And from what I understand, they also have several other chains in San Jose, Seattle, Sacramento, and Falls Church, Virginia. I would recommend them to everyone. I love eating healthy!

[Chubbypanda]

Fresh tofu? Mmmmmmmmmmmm... There used to be a little shop in San Jose's Japantown that sort artisan tofu made the old way. I bought tofu there all the time. It closed several years ago and I've been sad ever since.

[Kirk]

Hi PE - Yes, the Missus works in mysterious ways.....

Hi Kathy - Ah yes, volume discounts taken to a new (waistline widening) level.

Hi WC - Well, if you're ever down here, you can find out....they speak mostly Vietnamese.

Hi Habareno - That sounds really good...I'll make sure the Missus knows for the next time we're there.

Hi KK5 - Some in a stir fry, the rest in a nice soup with mustard greens.....

Hi Juan - Thanks for the recommendation. I haven't been to Dong Phuong so I wouldn't know. As for me, I just love eating....

Hi CP - People who haven't tasted really good, fresh tofu, really haven't experienced how good tofu can be.

[Annie]

hi kirk, sorry, i haven't been good about blogging! i'll need to catch up on all of your past posts! yum!

this post looks really awesome! thanks for the heads up! now i know where i can get fresh tofu! (i haven't tried really fresh tofu before! except at a korean restaurant!)

[Kirk]

Hi Annie - So nice to have you posting again, we missed you!

[Zarine]

If you like the asian desserts called "che", you've gotta try this new place called Elan Desserts in the east San Diego area. It has all the Viet desserts like pandan tapioca and sweet rice. It just opened recently (used to be a boba shop) and it sells asian desserts like they do in Orange County.

[lia]

i have a vietnamese friend and i've got to ask him to give me a taste on that tofu dessert on pandan and coco milk!

[Sean]

Did y'all know that Thanh Son was the one who invented the Pandan Pudding! It's a fact! I was there when they first came out like 15 years ago! Couldn't get it anywhere else, because it didn't exist elsewhere! Thanh Son Rules!!!

[Lan]

I ended up checking out the San Diego location just to get the Pandan Pudding and was disappointed that they didn't have it! I had to settle going to a regular market and get the Soy Life brand, but they just have the ginger syrup. The coco milk ruled! I guess I have to head to an OC Asian Market to get my fix.