Bourdain's legendary street food favorite started from a kiosk and became an established spot. Story of Lunch Lady and its pho.
The place
Fifteen years ago, Anthony Bourdain, the chef and storyteller who made cooking a cultural journey, discovered a little corner of gastronomic paradise in the heart of Ho Chi Minh City. What struck him was an anonymous dining banquet, run by a chef with a magic touch: Nguyen Thi Thanh. That simple visit changed the course of his life and his restaurant, transforming it into a symbol that today has found new life in Vancouver, Canada, with the name Bourdain himself gave it: “Lunch Lady.”
With roots deeply rooted in Vietnamese culinary tradition, Chef Thanh opened his banquet in Saigon many years ago, offering different soups for each day of the week (the Michelin Guide itself recounts) a custom that did not take long to win the hearts of customers. Bourdain, during his trip, described his experience in words that captured the magic of Thanh's dishes: “Every bite is like exploring a new neighborhood”. It was he who encouraged her to name her eatery and propelled her to a success that now crosses oceans.
Thanh's meeting with Vancouver came about thanks to Michael Tran, a Canadian city resident with Vietnamese roots, who became enchanted by the banquet flavors during a trip to Vietnam. With Thanh's blessing, Tran transformed his mother's old restaurant into a new home for the “Lunch Lady,” turning over the kitchen reins to Benedict Lim, a chef determined to keep those flavors authentic. Today, the Vancouver restaurant keeps true to tradition, offering dishes such as pho, made in a process that takes 20 hours, and the famous luc lac steak. The latter is the most sought-after dish, a sophisticated take on a Vietnamese classic that combines French sous-vide technique with the quality of Canadian beef, enriched with luc lac butter and a light crust given by the wok and blowtorch.
“It is important that Vietnamese roots remain at the heart of our cuisine,” explains Chef Lim, who also relies on local Vancouver ingredients, such as fresh seafood from Granville Island, but incorporates spices and herbs imported from Vietnam to ensure authenticity. The atmosphere of this spot is designed to recreate the feel of a bustling Saigon street, with an open kitchen and steel details that evoke traditional Vietnamese carts. Prominent among the cocktails on offer is a reinterpretation of Negroni, Bourdain's favorite, filtered through a Vietnamese phin to add a touch of the local coffee. "Vietnamese cuisine has been taken to a new level of excellence, ” comments Thanh herself, who appreciates how the Vancouver restaurant has been able to offer a complete dining experience without betraying the essence of its recipes.
In a world that lost Anthony Bourdain too soon, the success of “Lunch Lady” in Vancouver seems to fulfill one of his wishes: to see Thanh's flavors shared with the world. It is a story of culture, passion and flavors that crosses continents, proving that cooking, in addition to nourishing the body, can build bridges between people. “Canada is a beautiful country with a rich culture and welcoming people,” Thanh says. A tribute not only to his culinary prowess, but also to the ability of cuisine to tell stories that go far beyond the boundaries of a dish.
