Linda and Ben Phan open Viet Next Door alongside their family’s restaurant Vietnam
The next generation of the family behind Vietnam restaurant have opened their own contemporary eatery and bar alongside the original.
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Each night after service had finished at their family’s wonderful eatery Vietnam, Benand Linda Phanpicked up all the broken eggshells left in the kitchen and sat down to
clean them.
It took more than a month of painstaking work before the brother and sister had enough.
Fragments of those shells are inlaid in the tops of the two main dining tables of their new Asian bar and eatery, Viet Next Door – both a tribute to the traditional Vietnamese art of eggshell mosaic and a tangible connection to their parents and the restaurant in which they grew up.
Links like these are all-important to Ben and Linda, who on Friday will open VND, as the name suggests, alongside the perpetually busy Vietnam on Addison Rd.
Taking over a former dental practice, they have created a smart, contemporary space that has already won an award for designer Ryan Genesin.
Plush booths curve around the eggshell tables. A long bar of mottled grey stone runs down one side of the room. The wallpaper is based on a traditional weaving method.
The cooking, to be overseen by Ben and his fiancee Mimi Tran, aims for a similar balance of old and new.
“We have kept true to signature dishes but put a modern take on it,” Linda says. “We have also incorporated influences from other countries.”
Hence the signature dish, a traditional spicy Vietnamese beef stew “bo kho”, based on a recipe from their mum, Suong Ho, served as a kind of ragu with Italian gnocchi rather than noodles or a baguette. “Mum has tried different dishes and helped us with the flavours,” Linda says. “But we are also respecting the Italian cuisine by trying to perfect the gnocchi and staying true to that.”
The drinks selection includes bottles from favourite local wineries (Rockford, Ashton Hills) and a range of bespoke cocktails.
VND is a project that has been bubbling away in the background since Ben completed a design and architecture degree and came back to the family business.
“It would have opened a while ago but Dad (Dinh Phan) has not been well and we have had to focus on Vietnam restaurant and for Dad to get fitter and stronger,” Linda says. “Dad has taught us so many things as a person and in the industry. We wanted him to be there and see it happen and be proud of it.”
Viet Next Door, 73a Addison Rd, Pennington, 8447 7799, vietnextdoor.com.
Open for dinner Fri, lunch and dinner Sat and Sun
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