Bernard and Phuong Hoang took a "leap of faith" when they opened their first restaurant in Los Angeles. Now, they're expanding to San Pedro.
Fernando Haro, Patch Staff
|Updated Tue, May 20, 2025 at 9:57 am PT
SAN PEDRO, CA — Growing up as first-generation Vietnamese-Americans in Southern California, Bernand and Phuong Hoang felt there weren't many restaurants around the South Bay that represented their experience, food or culture.
So when the opportunity presented itself for them to open up their own restaurant, they wanted to create a place rooted in the Vietnamese-American experience, the San Pedro couple said.
"We also saw a lot of ethnicities and backgrounds dabbling in pho restaurants, but we didn't have any Vietnamese restaurants to tell our story through food," Phuong told Patch. "That's what inspired us."
In 2016, Bernard and Phuong, along with her brother, Nhien Tran, and sister An Tran, opened up their own Pho Saigon Pearl on Fairfax Avenue in Los Angeles, which they believe was the Vietnamese restaurant in the area at the time. Although learning how to operate a restaurant was "brutal" the first few years, according to Bernard, Pho Saigon Pearl has been successful, and even made an appearance on the Los Angeles Times' "11 must-try spots in L.A. for a comforting bowl of pho" earlier this year.
"We just took a leap of faith," Phuong said.
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Despite Pho Saigon Pearl's success, the last year has been one of their most difficult, Phuong said. It's been one marked by lasting impacts of the Los Angeles wildfires, rising costs, and the daily struggles of keeping a family-run restaurant afloat, Phuong said.
Still, that same grit, determination and love for community that helped make Pho Saigon Pearl a success is what's driving them to open up Saigon Oi Cafe — a casual coffee and street-food focused outpost in San Pedro, Phuong said.
The name of the restaurant is inspired by the chorus of the song Saigon Dep Lam, a piece celebrating the beauty of what was once the capital of South Vietnam, Phuong said.
The couple said they chose San Pedro as the city to open Saigon Oi Cafe because they wanted to create a space that offered the community high-quality meals while adding to the melting pot of Asian foods in the area.
"There are a lot of people who have never had pho before," Bernard said. "We want to fill that void and bridge that gap between two cultures."
Bernard said he's always had a passion for cooking, which started when he first saw the Food Network as a child. Although he wanted to attend culinary school, his parents thought it'd be best for him to go to college instead, he said.
After college, he worked in the gaming industry but was laid off in 2014. Phuong, meanwhile, worked in the fashion industry, doing e-commerce and marketing.
One day, Phuong's brother, Nhien Tran, approached Bernard and told him that he should use his passion for cooking to partner with him in opening up a Vietnamese restaurant. Bernard took the opportunity to make his childhood dream come true and has since been working with Phuong, along with her brother and sister, to provide an eating experience unlike any other, according to the couple.
"Our pho isn't just authentic, it's elevated," Phuong said. "We source high-quality meats. That sets us apart from others. We don't cut corners."
On the menu is a pho with a bone broth that Bernard cooks for over 20 hours, filet mignon cuts of meat, a "fall-of-the-bone" oxtail and a couple of fusion dishes, including a Vietnamese twist on the popular Peruvian dish lomo saltado.
The new San Pedro cafe, which the couple hopes to open by mid to late June, will also have Vietnamese coffee, made through the traditional brewing method called cà phê phin. Cà phê phin involves using a metal drip filter developed during the French colonial era and has since become unique to Vietnamese culture, Phuong said.
"We just want to bring flavor to San Pedro," Phuong said. "We want to build this new Saigon Oi Cafe for people like us — people who didn't grow up seeing their culture on restaurant menus but knew the magic of a hot steaming bowl at home."
Saigon Oi Cafe San Pedro will be located at 407 Sixth Street in the city's historic downtown area.
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