Phocific Standard Time: the cocktail bar hiding above Pho Bac

Yes, this is a rooftop blog, and no, Phocific Standard Time is not a rooftop. It’s one flight up, which I’ve decided counts, because some rooms are too good to lose on a technicality.

PST hides in plain sight. The address takes you to Pho Bac downtown: white subway tile, steam off the broth pots, Vietnamese music videos on the TV. The bar is up the black steel staircase next to the counter, with the name painted on the wall on the way up, in case you’re worried you’re climbing into a storage loft.

The Pham family has been making pho in this city since 1982; PST is what happened when the next generation got a floor to themselves.

The room

Upstairs is one room, and the room is mostly bar: a glowing U of counter with the bartenders in the middle and a couple dozen seats wrapped around it. Palm murals, a paper lantern, and lighting dim enough that your drink becomes the brightest object you own.

Everyone faces the center, so the whole night plays like dinner theater where the show is the pour. I didn’t see a bad seat.

The drinks

The list raids the Vietnamese pantry: pandan, longan, pho spice. It’s playful without being a gimmick. The one in the photo is my friend’s. It arrived over a hand-carved block of ice wearing a disc of caramelized sugar with cookie crumble embedded in it, like a little stained-glass window you’re encouraged to eat, and I photographed it for a solid minute before they were allowed to drink it.

And the kicker: this is a rooftop bar blog, not a pho blog, so I’m in no position to rank what’s in the bowls downstairs. What I can tell you is that it’s the best pho in front of you, and that counts for a lot in my book. Dinner plans itself.

The move

This is the part I actually need you to hear. PST is a great date spot: intimate, dark, conversation-sized. But it’s a small room and they don’t take reservations. What they have is a tablet where you sign up for a table.

So get there about ten minutes before your date, put your name in, and by the time they walk up the stairs you look like someone who planned the whole thing.

Ask me how I know the math works.

Best time to go: a weeknight, ten minutes before your date. Drinks upstairs, pho downstairs after.