Mr Red Cafe

update:
We came back for their traditional banh mi and it was just as good as I remembered.
The same can’t be said about their phở though…
The soup base is excellent but their phở noodles were waaaay too soft/​over cooked.
It almost had a chicken noodle like texture. — short soft noodles.
If they upped their phở game, I’d probably be here more often.
4* for their sandwich, 2.5* for their phở

Ambiance & Service 2.5÷5. A loud and cramped restaurant. Some cute décor but service was slow. Waited over 30 minutes for our food.
Food ⁵⁄₅ perhaps worth the wait! Great food with amazing earthy flavours to their broths. Would go back again!
Location ⁴⁄₅ Meter parking and close to Nanaimo stop on a couple of bus routes including 135. Free parking in residential areas without permit signage and 1 hour parking across the street on side streets.
Price 3.5÷5. A bit more expensive for their specialty noodle soups but BBH and phở where cheaper than average phở joint.
Would definitely go back for more now that it’s cold and chilly out :)

This place is not the authentic run-​down ghetto-​looking Phở places but a tiny fusion red room. Their menu has limited choices-​9 $ for a bowl of rare beef and beef ball noodle soup is a bit too much for me. You can’t even choose the size you want. Portion was fair and quality is just like any other Phở places. Something different than the other Phở places is they have pickled garlic and chilli peppers as condiments. I had to ask for the Hoi Seen sauce which is usually paired up with the hot sauce on the tables. Service was good considering how small the place was so it can’t be that busy for them. Street parking available.

I just came back from Vietnam and the food there is amazing. So when my wife discovered this restaurant we knew we had to try it out. It had all the authentic dishes we tried in hoi an and Hanoi.
To our disappointment this food was less then mediocre.
–We ordered the chicken banh mi.
This was tasteless and very lacking in ingredients.
–Papaya salad was okay but they skimped out on the jerky
–the sticky rice. In Vietnam we loved this. Here it was shit for a lack or better words. So tasteless.
–beef spring roll was utter garbage. No taste and I literally saw maybe two small slices of beef. Please refer to pics.
–thit bo la lot. Which is the beef in betel leaves. This was probably the best thing but it wasn’t cheap.
Overall…I wouldn’t come again. I don’t recommend this to anyone. It was total waste of time and I wish I could’ve gotten my 48 bucks back and the time it took me to drive there.
Don’t go.

My friend had scoped out this restaurant to try. We ordered the beef rice roll, vermicelli rice noodle dish with a mix of proteins and a phở dish. I loved how authentic this restaurant was. They had some things I’ve never tried before like this garlic vinegar sauce that you can add to your noodle soup dishes. I also really liked their tea! We asked about it and found out it’s pandan leaf tea. They sell it in bags for $ 3.50 which is a deal! That bag will last you quite a while!

Stopped by here after a recommendation from a friend who said it was «different than any other Viet place I’ve tried»
And different it was. We ordered a couple dishes that I’ve never had before, like grilled meat wrapped in betel leaves, sticky rice (yes it’s Viet), and Bánh bt lc. All the food was very very tasty and I enjoyed my time.
That said, inside here is quite warm, I mean like it felt like Vietnam in there!

Growing up in NorCal and being surrounded by delicious Vietnamese food really made me picky about the Viet food that I get here in Vancouver. I can honestly say that the food here is authentic Vietnamese and really hits all my Southeast Asian taste buds.
Pandan tea was phenomenal and I’ve actually never had some in restaurants anywhere. Very nice, floral flavours and tastes exactly like home.
I shared the sticky rice with chicken and pâté and that was very nice! Their pâté had a nice umami blend and the fried shallots really tipped it off! It was quite filling as well.
I tried my friend’s spicy banh mi and oh gosh, a bit unconventional but so delicious. It was 4 long strips of a baguette with nice crispy outsides but soft, fluffy insides. The pâté was BOMB! The fried shallots on top really added a nice addition to the tastes.
My dish was the mixed plate with shrimp paste sauce, herbs, fried tofu (really well fried), and sliced pork. The waitress was kind and offered to give more sauce if I ever ran out. She instructed to eat it by mixing all of it together with the sauce. Authentic tastes and that being said, it’s definitely not everyone’s cup of tea. It was a bit strong on the shrimp side, but I personally enjoy that.
Highly recommend. Will be back quite often.

One of my favourite local Vietnamese restaurant. I love much a variety of different Vietnamese cuisine you get here. We ordered lots to try out everything: Green papaya salad, collection of the traditional Vietnamese dumplings, traditional banh mi, xoi khuc vung lac (sticky rice with mung bean dumpling with peanut and sesame), and slice beef noodle in soup. Loved all the food we ordered. We also got their good Vietnamese coffee. It was alright but the mug wasn’t even fully filled. It looked like they drank half and gave us the cup. They didn’t even have the Vietnamese coffee drip for us to mix it. It was premixed which I’m not a big fan of.

From the reviews I read, most were positive and since I was in the area I was really excited to try Mr Red Café with family today.
What a huge disappointment. This place is really overrated. Food is okay nothing special nothing great. The only thing that stands out is the northern style Vietnamese food and they serve sticky rice, dumplings, and their own beef salad rolls.
I ordered the deep fried crab rolls with vermicelli and I can honestly say I could’ve made this dish at home an with better herbs and would’ve tasted better than this crap.
Their rice rolls suck major balls and portions are small, same goes for their banh mi. A tiny couple of uneven slices of Viet ham and hot sauce.
Never coming back. overpriced overrated and food sucks.

My girlfriend and I went here a couple of weeks ago, I wanted to try a local Northern Vietnamese restaurant as when I visited Hanoi one of my highlights was the amazing food. I’m use to eating Southern Vietnamese food that it was nice to try something different. «Same-​same» but different:)
I had the Papaya Beef Jerky Salad and the Phở Rolls. I think it’s one of the view places in Vancouver that sells Phở Rolls. I’m not a huge Phở soup fan, unless it’s homemade:) I like to eat rolls: salad rolls, spring rolls, sushi rolls, just rolls of everything!
The Papaya salad was fresh and tasty, loaded with tons of vegetables and I love beef jerky, maybe a bit more jerky would have been nice.
The Phở Rolls was alright, I think the rice paper was a bit too thick and not as soft, as it could be. Also, I find that the Northern style fish sauce is a tad too sweet for my liking. I like more of a lemony garlic fish sauce taste. Also, there was this overpowering mint flavour, which just overwhelmed the taste profile of the roll. Sometimes less is more.
Service as OK, our water wasn’t filled as often and no one really ask us how our food was. It might be a culture trend, as I find this with a lot of Asian own restaurants really off exceptional service. I don’t really take offense to it, but I believe great customer service can go along way and it can really set a restaurant from being OK to EXCEPTIONAL, even to compensate for maybe other things, such as food quality.

After all the hype and talk… I have to say that Mr. Red Café is really meh.
Due to the fact that it is really hard to find a decent Northern Viet restaurant, my husband and I were looking forward to sampling the food from this place. I’ll be short and sweet though: the portions were small, the prices were high, and everything was just salty.
Sticky Rice: well made, but tiny, tiny portion. I mean I wasn’t expecting a heaping mountain for the amount it costed but the amount they gave you was like a small bowl’s worth, deceptively arranged on a flatter surface so you would think that there was more.
Phở Ha Noi: $ 9 Phở (that’s $ 10 after tax and tip…)?! Wow, the singularly most expensive bowl of noodles I have ever ordered from any Vietnamese restaurant. Naturally my expectations were high but this howl of noodles was again, meh. The broth was super salty, but the meat was very good. Unfortunately the salt and MSG overpowered much of the natural flavours of the beef and soup. Again, portions were smaller.
Sautéed beef wraps: decent. Probably the best dish there, I would order again.
Maybe we ordered the wrong things but overall our experience at mr red café was mediocre.

Just went back for lunch yesterday – try the deep fried crab meat rolls!!! So yummy!

I came VERY close to giving a ONE star rating tonight!
This was the 2^nd attempt at trying to find here. The first try we were disappointed that arriving by 6:30pm on a Sunday to find that they close at 5pm???
This time we were successful and had a great meal … until my last bite … literally my last scoop of noodle … had … a … white … hair … gag!!! and I didn’t see it … Yeeeup it was in my mouth … barf!
I brought it to the attention of the waiter and they redeemed themselves by apologizing profusely and taking 10% off the entire tab not just the Bun noodle dish I ordered. That act in itself earned the five star rating.
The food did taste great and was well presented though

Excellent Phở & Vietnamese coffee here! I had the chicken phở — the broth, chicken and noodles are a great combo teeming with flavor.

We enjoyed a lovely lunch here. The food is amazing and tasty. I found the phở portion to be on the smaller side. Broth was very flavourful. It would be even better if there were some extra noodles. The restaurant was busy so be prepared for line ups. Cash and debit only!
My only issue was the burning incense. The smoke and scent was irritating my eyes for the duration of the meal. Please keep that in mind if you are sensitive to smoky environments or strong scents.

At first when I noticed this restaurant I thought it was bad planning to be called Mr Red on the same block as the very popular Red Wagon restaurant. However this place is clearly making a name for itself. Be prepared to wait for a table as its a busy restaurant.
Pricing is reasonable. Service is great. Food is amazing.
I’ve been back a couple times now to try the different items on the menu. Everything is delicious, with the exception to the sticky rice. I found the rice to be dry and tasteless. However I’m not exaggerating when I say every thing else is delicious.

Mr. Red Café doesn’t sound like your typical Asian restaurant but don’t let that fool you. They specialize in Northern Vietnamese dishes, which I haven’t come across before unless you count my time traveling in Vietnam itself. Lucky for me, I found out about this place through some research and cyber friends.
Everything is prepared fresh and prices are very, very reasonable. We went on a Saturday for lunch and we were seated right away, but by the time we left, the place was packed. It’s small and compact inside but doesn’t feel crowded. Love how the glass completely steams up once they start cooking in the kitchen. Make sure you try the condiments on the table, especially the pickled raw garlic slices with hot peppers. Those were insanely delicious — spicy, tangy, I could use a jar like this at home.
— Prawn salad roll (#1) ($ 5.00) — these salad rolls were stuffed to the point of breaking, just look how plump they are. Two prawns, lettuce, vermicelli noodles and some herbs. The peanut dipping sauce it came with was tasty. Simple but executed well. It’s nothing you haven’t had before but it was a good way to share and start our meal off.
— Steamed pork and shrimp tapioca dumplings (#5) ($ 7.00) — six pieces of tapioca dumplings wrapped in banana leaf. I think this was the first time that I’ve tried tapioca dumplings. They were very sticky and glutinous — I think that’s the perfect way to describe them. Not sure if I would order these again but it was worth a try.
— Banh mi pâté (#20) ($ 4.50) — traditional style — they have a couple of banh mi options to choose from but we went with the original/​traditional style. The traditional is made up of ham, meat floss, cucumbers, shredded carrots and cilantro. Totally worth the price tag and stomach space. One of the best banh mi’s I’ve had in awhile — crunchy, flavourful and well balanced. It even had a nice kick to it.
— Special sticky rice with pâté and chicken (#23) ($ 7.00) — another new dish that I’ve never had before. Special sticky rice served with a side of daikon and pickled carrots. The presentation is stunning, although it is a tad on the small size, portion-​wise. Worth trying and sharing though. The fried shallots really gave this dish a dose of flavour. The rice had a nice consistency to it — soft, chewy and sticky and mixed with all the other elements placed on top, it was gooood.
— Deep fried crab meat rolls (#19) ($ 11.50) — deep fried crab meat rolls served with vermicelli, mixed herbs and a sweet and sour fish sauce. We weren’t sure how to eat this at first but we figured it out eventually. The rolls were interesting — the taste of crab wasn’t too prominent but it was fried to that point where it wasn’t greasy at all. Beauty. The rest of the dish you just mix together and eat — I’d definitely add a few of the pickled raw garlic and peppers to give it some kick.
— 2x Phở ga (#9) ($ 8.00) — the typical basket of phở side goodies but look how fresh the basil leaves, bean sprouts and limes are! It’s all in the details. Chicken with flat noodles in soup. We ordered two chicken phở’s — my parents shared one and I had one all for myself. How is this only $ 8.00!?! Unreal.
Broth was delicious with a lot of depth and flavour. The noodles were perfect. Even the chicken pieces were tender (every time I’ve ordered chicken phở, the chicken is dry and bland, but not in Mr. Red Café’s one). I’ve read some other reviews complaining about the bowl size but I thought it was the perfect amount. Although that might have been because we ordered so many order things to try so take that with a grain of salt.
If you’re looking for something different and unique, Mr. Red Café is one of a kind Northern Vietnamese goodness. The food is fantastic, freshly made and the quality is top notch. Just reminiscing is making me want to go back and visit Vancouver. I’ll have to soon so that I can try the rest of their menu!

A definite stand out amongst the many Vietnamese noodle shops in Vancouver. Everything is lighter and less salty, yet the flavours are bold. Starting with the pandan tea, which has a light sweet scent, I knew this would be a good meal.
The place has simple décor, with large windows overlooking the bustling Hastings Street. The menu has pictures of almost everything on the menu, which really helps when deciding what to order.
After some contemplation, we decided to get:
#3 Papaya salad,
#5 Bánh Bt Lc Lá Chui: Pork dumpling & shrimp tapioca dumplings wrapped in banana leaves
#13 Rare beef and beef balls with noodles in soup.
#23. Special sticky rice with pâté and chicken
The papaya salad is a great starter, the blend of the sweet and sour was just right, and I always love the textures in a papaya salad. Dumplings wrapped in the banana leaves were unique; they remind me of a Taiwanese dumpling. These ones, made with tapioca, gave them a unique chew, and the flavours of the pork and shrimp went well with the jar of vinegar infused garlic and chili.
Even the phở noodle soup was different here. The frangrant broth had complex flavours, not like the usual MSG infused soup. My favourite dish is the special sticky rice. The pâté and rice combination is something new to me, and it works really well with the flavourful sticky rice. The addition of the fried shallots not only adds texture, but also melds everything together well.
Service is great, and always accommodated to our requests. This will definitely be one of my go to places.

Another great Vietnamese place along Hastings.
Parking is available on Hastings after 1800, as well as the side streets.
As the name suggests, the walls are red. Quaint little place. The interior is definitely on the stuffy side — even the windows are fogged up. Larger groups can fit here, but 4 people would probably the maximum I would recommend. Staff are friendly — looks like a husband and wife team.
The table condiments here are a bit different. There’s an interesting jar of vinegar (filled with garlic and chilis) besides the typical rooster sauce and chili oil. The chili oil here is pretty good here. Special mention.
Flipping through the menu — one item jumped out at me. #10 — special Mr. Red Café chicken, pork meatballs and drive mushroom with vermicelli noodle in soup. Sold. This one really is something different. The soup is nice and light. Nice large shitake mushroom
Interesting enough, this place doesn’t have spring rolls. Only salad rolls.
I also tried the #20 traditional Vietnamese sandwich. Strangely enough, this didn’t taste too much like anything I had in Vietnam. Not saying it’s bad. Just questioning the authenticity. I could taste the «laughing cow» cheese in it though — a bit of it is smeared in there somewhere.
Definitely will be back to try more items. Recommended.

Mr. Red Café is a recently opened Vietnamese restaurant on Hastings (Sunrise neighborhood). Unlike many phở restaurants in Vancouver, Mr Red Café offers traditional Northern Vietnamese cuisine. Owner Rose tells us that they value authentic traditional flavors. Their broth is MSG free and flavors are built by heat and bones. They make three different stocks daily from scratch everyday. Instead of the atypical hoisin sauce, they steep their own rice vinegar with tons of chili and garlic. We soon noticed the subtle differences as we began with some Pandan jasmine tea.
Banh Bot Loc La Chuoi 6.00: Vietnamese steamed pork and shrimp tapioca dumplings wrapped in banana leaf. The steamed dumplings were fragrant from the banana leaves. Light tasting and some bite from the pork and shrimp filling. Dash some chili garlic rice vinegar to taste.
Bun Bo Hue 8.00: Hue style combination of well done beef, sliced pork, beef balls, pork blood, pork feet with spicy soup. Light clear broth that is spicy but not over-​powering. It is very fragrant. I think aside from Phở Tam in Surrey. This could very well be my second best bun bo hue in Vancouver.
Bun Nem Cua Be 10.50: Deep fried crab meat spring rolls. The best crab meat spring rolls with vermicelli, mixed herbs, and sweet and sour fish sauce on the side. You have to taste it for yourself.
There are so many more things we really wanted to order. There is not enough time and never enough room in our stomach. We love chatting with Rose and her listen to her stories about her husband Hong. Mr Red Café makes everything in house — ie. spicy pâté used for Spicy Pâté Sandwich.
See you next week Rose. I have a feeling we will see you lots!