By Đằng-Giao/Người Việt
WESTMINSTER, Calif.(NV) – Every day, Bich Phuong Nguyen opens Coffee Factory at 15582 Brookhurst St., then gets her morning caffeine fix by brewing herself a cup of coffee — a special house-blend: light roast Bella Terra.
That’s how the co-owner of the 18-year-old Coffee Factory starts her day, before the 150 to 200 daily customers walk through the door.
Cafe Mocha. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
On the weekdays, the place buzzes with chatter inside and outside. It’s even louder on the weekends.
“We double that number for each day of the weekend easily,” said Anh Nguyen, Phuong’s sister and co-owner of the joint. And she couldn’t hide a proud smile. “To drink coffee here is to come back for more,” she said.
What’s the secret of this crowd-pleasing coffee?
“We have a Dietrich coffee roaster in-house, so our coffee is always super fresh,” Phuong said. “I roast, then blend them daily. No other coffee store can claim this. No way.”
“We selected three main types for blending: Ethiopia for light roast, Columbia for medium and Sumatra for dark. And we also have single origin, such as Costa Rica and Ethiopia Yirgacheffe.”
The in-house roaster. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
Coffee Factory opened its doors as a cafe with snacks for the local crowd. Today, it has grown into a full-fledged cafe-restaurant with two menus — one for coffee, drinks and food, the other for tea.
Unlike other Vietnamese coffee stores, this place is not exclusively for men. It’s suitable for both genders and all ages. There’s also a mixture of local, out-of-state and foreign customers.
And the customers all have a list of their favorites at the cafe.
Francis Terry McNamara, former ambassador to Vietnam has his favorite drink: “Cafe Sua Da. I only drink it when I’m there. Nothing else.”
“Summertime, I drink ‘Sua Da double shot,” said Huan Tran of Garden Grove, pointing at his dark, cream-colored coffee: “See? It’s double strength house-blend coffee mixed with condensed milk. And when the weather gets colder, I switch to Americano, a hot black blend here. It’s real nice.”
The signature drink Cafe Sua Da. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
Huan continued: “Food? Seven years going here, I always order one thing – shredded chicken (in baguette). It’s kinda salty for my taste, but a little extra cucumber fixes it easily.”
The well-known violinist Luan Vu has his own addiction: “I have come here for a cup of Sua Da triple shot large and a bowl of Soup Filet mignon every day for 15 years. I may change the food but the coffee stays the same. Fifteen years.”
For those who can’t afford the luxury of fine coffee every day, they do so as often as they can.
Mindy Ha, who was vacationing from Toronto, put her chopsticks down to talk about the place.
“Last year, my friend Kim (of nearby Fountain Valley) brought me here, but she’s out of town now so I came with my friend Cathy, also from Toronto. I said to Cathy, ‘the Bún Riêu here is to die for.’”
Bún Riêu. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
Cathy Geisler agreed: “To be honest, I thought she (Mindy) was exaggerating; so I went along just to be nice. Wow, little did I know, the soup blew my mind. It was… uh, yeah .., to die for. I love Vietnamese food, but this was something else.”
She added: “We both liked the Rose buds organic tea. Really refreshing.”
Phuong commented: “That’s right. We have all kinds of tea here. Tea to boost your energy up, tea to calm you down. Say, if you’re too nervous, we have Moroccan Mint Elixir; it will relax you.”
She took a sip of a colorful, flowery tea: “What I’m drinking is a blend of Oolong, organic rose buds and Goji berry; it has antioxidant effect that helps cleanse our body.”
All about tea. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
“If you’re into tea and like a big variety of it, just come here. We have it all,” Phuong said.
Connie Garcia, from Tucson, Ariz., talked between sips: “I’m a sales rep for a prescription glasses and contact lenses company so I get to go to Orange County quite often. Every time I’m here in the O.C., I’m here, at Coffee Factory, sitting outside.
“It’s nice out here, sort of reminds me of a sidewalk cafe in Europe – not the scenery, of course; but the coffee makes it up for me.”
She pointed at her finished plate: “My favorite dish, it’s the goat curry. It’s daring. Daring in a sense that it still has a hint of goat. Other places, they completely get rid of the aroma, the flavor of the meat.” She quibbled and laughed: “That’s chicken!”
Phuong served up her philosophy of cooking: “I believe in fusion. This is the United States of America, a country of fusion, a melting pot. I try to blend things together as long as I don’t lose each ingredient’s characteristic.”
Amid a vibrant atmosphere that exudes a French vibe, Phuong nodded her head: “Yes, you can say my recipes are mainly influenced by Vietnamese and French cuisines.”
“To be good at anything, you have to enjoy doing it…, be passionate about it,” Phuong said. “I love cooking, I love trying out new recipes; I love it when people like my food.”
“The same with blending coffee. Each type of coffee reacts differently to different timings and different temperatures. I love the fact that I have to be meticulous.”
Coffee Factory has a bit of everything for everyone. Weekdays, adults crowd the place from open to close.
“On the weekend or holiday, a lot of parents bring their children in, mostly inside, so the cafe has a different liveliness,” Phuong said.
“The kids tend to be predictable; they usually order dishes with eggs, like Opla Lap xuong (sunny side up eggs with Chinese sausage), steak and egg, French toast, phở and bò kho (Vietnamese style beef stew).”
Her sister Anh shared: “A lot of kids, they liked our food so much, so when they grew up, they come back with their boyfriends or girlfriends. Some of them even bring their own kids.”
“I asked what made they come back; they said they liked the food and they liked they way we treated them, that we made them feel like they belonged,” Anh explained.
Filet mignon and rice. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
“That’s so true because we treat everybody as though they’re house guests.”
Pleasing customers’ taste buds then capturing their hearts; no wonder they keep coming back for more.
Every night, Phuong closes her day by brewing herself a cup of Dong Ding Oolong tea. “It helps me unwind and sleep soundly. I need a good night’s sleep to regain my energy.”
Tea heaven. (Photo: Ngoc Lan/Nguoi Viet)
“Running a cafe-restaurant is fun but no picnic,” she smiled.
“But I enjoy being a barrister so much we are opening two other stores – ‘Creamery Pop’ at 15556 Brookhurst Street and ‘Cafe N Te’ at 9430 Warner’ soon. You can read more about our stores online at ‘cafente.com’.”
