Pho Ha Noi (Chain)

When businesses expand from one region to another, trademark law limits their ability to create confusion in the new place by using a name that was already locally established by someone else. That’s why Baldwin Park-based restaurant Vaca Brunch rebranded to Pradera Brunch only months after opening its second location in Costa Mesa, the long-time home of Amar Santana’s tapas restaurant Vaca. A new naming conflict ripened in January 2026, when a 10-year-old San Jose-based Vietnamese restaurant chain opened its first Orange County location in Fountain Valley, roughly 15 minutes away from a 19-year-old Irvine restaurant with the same name – Pho Ha Noi. Will lawyers get involved? Stay tuned.

Pho Ha Noi’s name isn’t the only part that will seem familiar to OC residents, as it follows the same conceptual template as several other semi-upscale local Vietnamese restaurants. With seating for perhaps 100 people – roughly as large as Garden Grove’s Brodard Chateau, and similarly decorated with 1990’s finishes – it was previously a Coco’s and a “new American” restaurant named The Recess Room before its latest remodeling. Rather than offering one cavernous dining room like the flagship Brodard, semi-private walls divide Pho Ha Noi’s space into narrow corridors and rooms with a moderately sized and somewhat modestly stocked bar in the center. On our visit, this segmentation created some service challenges: servers don’t appear to be assigned to individual tables or zones, leading to pileups of dirty plates, multiple servers repeating the same questions, and unfamiliar people (one without a restaurant’s uniform) showing up at the table to offer unordered items and drinks.

Ordering was fairly straightforward, though. Pho Ha Noi’s primary menu is an oversized soft plastic sheet folded in half to create two pages with four total sides worth of options, starting with a handful of appetizers ($7.50 to $10.50), continuing with chicken pho soups ($9 for broth, $14.50 to $17.50 with meat), then moving to the main attractions – beef pho soups ($8.50/kids to $17.95) and house specialty entrees ($15 to $22.50) – before finishing with drinks, which spill over onto a second single-page laminated menu. Two desserts, che and “special healthy drink,” are also available for $6.50 each, though servers will hand out a 1/4-sized pandan waffle to each guest as a free dessert at a seemingly random point in your meal.

In parts of the United States without serious pho competition, Pho Ha Noi’s Northern Vietnamese-style beef broth – “slow-cooked for 24 hours using all-natural beef bones and marrow” – and USDA choice angus beef might stand out as particularly impressive. But thanks to Orange County’s Little Saigon, there are countless strong pho options here, starting with nationally famed Pho 79, continuing with Northern/Southern-style pho specialist Pho Flavor, excellent beef broths at PhoHolic and Pho Lovers, and even more premium wagyu beef at places including Pho Akaushi. So by local standards, Pho Ha Noi’s pho ingredients are solid rather than standouts, and in the same price range as numerous premium pho rivals.

The $17.50 house special beef pho we ordered, pho bo dac biet, was mostly noteworthy for delivering on a promised and substantial 10 ounces of meat spanning beef flap, well done beef, brisket, shank trimmings, tendon, sliced meat balls, and short rib meat. This collection of slices and chunks completely covered the rice noodles, which we initially ordered “regular” style – here, that apparently means “thin,” from a package – and enjoyed. Pho Ha Noi’s broth doesn’t lack for strong, beefy flavor and isn’t terribly fatty or oily, but also doesn’t really stand out from established local favorites in any way. You can customize the soup with a side plate of sauces, lime, and somewhat wilted vegetables, if you want.