Phin Smith Express

Coffee, acai bowl, and sandwich shop each morning, burger and brew joint at lunch and dinner

Since 2018, Garden Grove’s Phin Smith has firmly established itself as one of Orange County’s best coffee shops – obsessive over quality to the point where they’ll gladly remake any unsatisfactory beverage, a guarantee we’ve never needed to test over numerous visits. In 2025, the business expanded into a second and surprisingly nearby space by opening two conceptually separate establishments: Phin Smith Express and DZO Brewing Company. Despite their similar names, Phin Smith and Phin Smith Express offer decidedly different experiences during breakfast and lunch hours, while DZO Brewing is a lunch and dinner restaurant with a very heavy emphasis on beers. We’ve covered DZO’s drink and food options in a separate article.

While Phin Smith pitches Express as a way to skip the original shop’s long lines for a more streamlined grab-and-go experience – and that’s true – their menus only lightly overlap. On each of our visits, Express offered a total of three coffee drinks (Ca Phe Sua Da, Tres Leches, and Espresso Tonic), three tea drinks (Lychee Breeze, Taiwanese Jasmine, and Summer Peach), banh mi sandwiches, pastries ranging from pate chaud to croissants, and a separate counter serving a range of bottled fruit juices and made-to-order acai bowls. With fairly short lines, the total time from arrival to having drinks and/or foods in hand is roughly five minutes per counter.

Unsurprisingly given Phin Smith’s reputation, the drinks were all delicious – the multi-cream Tres Leches coffee great enough to return for, and the Lychee Breeze and Summer Peach both refreshingly fruity. A fresh chocolate almond croissant was just one of multiple items which look to have been freed from the original location’s tiny pastry display. While we didn’t get a chance to sample the banh mi, chicken and pate versions were pre-made and ready to go along with a turkey havarti sandwich.

Acai bowls are available in two sizes – 12 ($9) or 16 ($12) ounces – with typical bases ranging from acai and pitaya to matcha, coconut, and chia pudding, two types of nut butter, three fruits, and 10 toppings. Instead of holding up ordering or production lines with long orders, each bowl is assembled based on a written form you fill out with a pencil and confirm at the register. The bowl we ordered was loaded with toppings and our two chosen bases (frozen acai and matcha), thoroughly delicious from first to last spoonfuls. We’ve visited Phin Smith Express three times, and based on the consistently very good options, certainly plan to return again.

Stats

Price: $-$$
Service: Counter / Table
Open Since: 2025

Addresses

12865 Main St.
Garden Grove, CA 92840

Instagram: @phinsmithcoffee