Photo by Erin Nelson.
Pho Pho Asian Cuisine manager Andy Cao pours hot water over coffee grounds using an aero press to make a batch of Vietnamese coffee. Pho Pho Asian Cuisine opened in 1,800 square feet of the former Organic Harvest spot in the Hoover Village shopping center at 1580 Montgomery Highway, with a soft opening Aug. 31 and grand opening Sept. 30.
There’s a new option for Asian food on U.S. 31 in Hoover.
Young Shin closed his Pho Pho Vietnamese & Sushi Bar in Five Points South in 2019 and opened a new location in the Pizitz Food Hall in downtown Birmingham in April of the same year, but now he has brought his craft to Hoover, with a little twist.
He opened Pho Pho Asian Cuisine in 1,800 square feet of the former Organic Harvest spot in the Hoover Village shopping center at 1580 Montgomery Highway, with a soft opening Aug. 31 and grand opening Sept. 30.
Pho Pho Asian Cuisine is similar to his restaurant in the Pizitz Food Hall, but Shin has added Thai food to the other offerings of Korean, Vietnamese and Japanese food.
One of the new offerings is pad thai, which is a stir-fry dish made with rice noodles, peanuts, scrambled egg and bean sprouts, scallions and the customer’s choice of chicken, shrimp or tofu.
Pho Pho has a lot of health-conscious customers and offers vegan, vegetarian and gluten-free options in addition to meats, said Kookie Kim, Shin’s wife, who works at the University of Alabama at Birmingham but helps out in the restaurants as needed.
Shin, who lives in the Rocky Ridge portion of Vestavia Hills, said he wanted to open a location in Hoover because he had a lot of customers from Hoover and Vestavia Hills at his Birmingham locations. While his restaurant isn’t famous, a lot of people from the Hooverarea know about it, and he thinks Hoover is a good market for Asian cuisine. It’s a big and diverse city, he said.
Realtor Lyndsy Yim of Retail Specialists helped him find the spot on U.S. 31, which is a well-traveled corridor.
Shin said he also doesn’t see much competition in the part of town he selected.
The restaurant offers casual dining with main dishes ranging in price from $9 to $14. The restaurant, decorated with bright lime green and orange colors, seats about 25 people, but most customers in the first month opted for takeout, Shin said.
He originally planned to open the Hoover location in May but was delayed due to COVID-19.
Shin, 40, is originally from Korea. His family immigrated to the Birmingham area in 1996 when he was 16. They lived in north Shelby County along U.S. 280. He got a part-time job working at the Kobe Japanese Steakhouse on U.S. 280 and worked his way up from busing tables and washing dishes to hibachi chef in the mid-1990s.
In 1998, he went into business for himself and opened Wings and Teriyaki near Birmingham-Southern College and Wings and Stuff in Fairfield. He sold those restaurants in 2010 and 2012 and opened Pho Pho Vietnamese & Sushi Bar in Five Points South.
Shin said he feels like he has had some success in the restaurant business, but “I’m not there yet.”
In addition to the two Pho Pho locations, he also owns The Standard restaurant in the Pizitz Food Hall, which sells hamburgers, hot dogs and french fries.
Shin said he has been approached about opening a Pho Pho location in another part of Hoover, as well as one in Tuscaloosa, but for now, he’s focusing on getting the first Hoover location up and running well.
