Quan Thanh, West End

Two Fridays ago, I had dinner at Quan Thanh.  Quan Thanh is a Vietnamese/Chinese/Malaysian restaurant in West End.  It is interesting in that the restaurant is separated into two dining areas:  one for Vietnamese cuisine, and another for Chinese/Malaysian fare.  The two areas are divided by a bottle store.  However, if you are seated in the Vietnamese area, you can order from the Chinese/Malaysian menu, and vice-versa.  Anyway, all that day I was in the mood for a large, rich meal.  However, by the time I got to the restaurant, my appetite was not as strong, so I ordered the comparatively light chicken laksa.  Ordering a laksa is usually a safe bet, and this time was no exception.  One laksa is much the same as the other, however, this laksa had a couple of unique nuances.  The first was that there was some sort of flavour that I could not identify, and have never associated with laksas in the past.  This was by no means bad, just different.  There was also two different kinds of noodles in the laksa.  I liked this touch.  After you've had your fill of the soup and meat in a laksa it can get kind of boring finishing off the noodles.  So the fact that there were two different kinds of noodles was welcome.  Another plus was the vegetables.  I am notoriously fussy when it comes to vegetables, and often omit them from my dining experiences.  On this occasion, most of the vegetables were some sort of Asian greens; vegetables I will happily eat.  There were also some beans, which is also good.  However, there was some eggplant, which I avoided, but thankfully, there was maybe only three or so pieces of eggplant, so it wasn't a major issue.  I am rarely able to finish a laksa due to the shear volume of soup and noodles that they usually contain.  True to form, I couldn't finish this laksa, but I did polish of the chicken and vegetables, which was enough for me.