Vang Coffee Bar — Restaurant in Quincy

I was sooooo excited all day to try their bánh mì chảo after seeing all the videos on Instagram as well as the reel that the owner posted about how she relearned entrepreneurship!! However, the experience couldn’t have gone any worse!

We ordered 2 different types of banh mi chao, their signature dishes:

The red pan of Saigon The black pepper pan

grilled pork for my kids and an egg coffee. We placed a separate order for the sticky rice as a to go order. Now let me walk through the things that went wrong.

1. Instead of having my sticky rice to go, they served to our table. Since nothing else came out any way, it was fine. We started munching on it!

2. They forgot to make the red pan of Saigon and the black pepper pan was the only one that came out! Now I recalled the number on the receipt didn’t add up and I went asked the staff if they charged for the red pan of Saigon. She said no worries - it was on the receipt. I went back to my seat for 2 minutes and she came to me said she forgot to charge! At this point, I still had a lot of patience and told her it was fine! Charge us and go make it! I wanted another black pepper pan, not the red pan initially because my family was all hungry so I had them eat mine first.

3. I thought that was the extend of the inconvenience. However, we waited for another 30 mins and nothing came out! There were only 3 tables at the restaurants so there should be no excuse!! When I saw they tried to bring what seemed to be my dish to another table, I lost my patience and I told the staff I was still waiting for my dish and it had been a long time. At this point, she brought me exactly the dish that the other table refused! Since it had the distinct tomato sauce taste, I knew they brought me the wrong order! But whatever, I was done! I was so pissed that I forgot to take pics of their signature dishes!

4. They ran out of bread at the end and offered me a refund of the bread later

In term of the taste, I agree with the other review that food is 7/10. Even the way they heated up the bread could be better! It was hot outside and cold inside the bread! My kids did not like the grilled pork. The only thing we all really liked was the sticky rice!

The only other good thing was the decoration and the staff seemed to be nice! I would have given 1 star with this experience, but since they are still in their soft opening period, I understand things could go wrong (in the...

I'm literally still eating my first-ever meal on our first-ever visit today but needed to write this review RIGHT NOW.

I found Vang Coffee Bar on Google this morning. The food looked delicious, the vibes seemed perfect, so we made our way over and holy moly are we absolutely ecstatic that we did.

Atmosphere: The vibes are absolutely amazing. The area in the front is bustling and casual with Vietnamese music playing. The room in the rear is more laid back with soft lighting and jazz.

It doesn't matter what kind of atmosphere you're looking for - they have it here. Both spaces are very well laid out and decorated, the furniture is comfortable, there's wifi.

Staff: The staff are so friendly. They're fast, happy to answer questions, and attentive. One person doubled back to a table to make sure both people had gotten their drinks. Customer service is always hit or miss, but good places run by good people tend to have staff that care more, and that's definitely what it feels like here.

Food: I ordered a ca phe trung, my partner got a Thai xanh kem trung, and we both chose banh mi chao jambon. The drinks are really well made - all the flavors are well balanced, it's not too sweet nor too strong. They're the kinds of drinks where you end up torn between wanting to order another or wanting to try all the other ones because they're so good.

The banh mi chao jambon came unassembled, which was great because I tend to inhale my food and this approach forced me to slow down and appreciate all the flavors. Speaking of, the flavors were amazing. Just as with the drinks, everything was so well thought out and executed. The flavors worked perfectly together and nothing overpowered anything else.

Overall: It's become increasingly hard to find lovally owned restaurants and cafes. What I love about small businesses is the tangible love and care you can sense in everything from its decor to its food and atmosphere. Even so, Vang Coffee House is a gem. Everything feels intentional, from the books on the shelves to the design of the drink glasses to the table service. It's welcoming, it's cozy, and it's a place you'll think of visiting for a pick-me-up when you have a bad day.

Thank you for opening and we look forward to coming back (probably...

I will preface this review by saying that the staff was very nice. But the food was not. They missed the mark on execution.

Coffee was nice and strong, the salted cream was good.

This plate though…confuses me. I think this was the pepper steak plate.

I don’t know if I missed it, but I didn’t really see any cooking happening on an actual stove. And if they did cook it on a stove, I would be shocked. I did see the girl put the plate into an oven thing then taking it out. The surface of my sunny side up egg was cooked into sort of a chewy layer. So, I don’t know if they had stuff premade, then assembled and put into an oven to heat up. And by stuff I really mean the steak. Because obviously cold cut, pâté and laughing cow cheese are premade. The eggs could have very well cooked in the oven anyways.

To me it seems that the cast iron plate was heated in the oven or very briefly/inadequately on a stovetop. Then everything was assembled onto it and stuck back into the oven to continue heating. I expected a sizzling plate of food… achievable if they had heated the plate correctly on the stove and cooked the food.

When she brought the plate to me she said “be careful it’s hot” and I literally touched it and it was barely hot. Lots of sauce or juice…steak slices were swimming in sauce and the pâté kind of got dissolved in it.

I was the ONLY customer in the store at the time. A pair of customers showed up after I received and started on my food. So they had ample time to give me hot food. However, my food was warm at best. The baguette was cold in the middle. It was semi warm on the outside but the inside was definitely cold.

The taste was just ok…I think everything was overwhelmed by the sauce situation. It was peppery, savory and sweet but there was just so much of it. This is also one of those dishes that really doesn’t require a lot of skills. It’s all in the assembly. Focus here should have been making sure the steak is properly cooked (it was a little uneven) and maybe the pâté (but half of it was dissolving in the sauce).

Lots of opportunities for improvements. The reviews were promising, but the experience was...