Lotus

Awesome little place in the middle of mainly Mexican restaurants. Excellent Phở, The best tasting Bahn Mi puts Lee Sandwich to shame. Bahn Mi is a must try. Within walking distance of the Mission.

Sometimes you just have that craving for some good Phở which my husband and I both ordered the Chicken Phở. It was good but I thought the chicken was a little tough but the flavors made up for it! It was a great size and we both had a hard time finishing it. I read other reviews and decided to order the spicy green beans. They took awhile for them to bring them out which made me think they may have forgotten about them. They were pipping hot but I was not the biggest fan of them to be honest. I wanted to come with a good sauce or something to help bring out more of the flavor. Other then that, everything else was good. I will probably come back for more Phở because it’s a great location and it was very quite inside!

The owner reached out to me too try and make things right. I will be changing my review and give them another chance in the near future. This is a new restaurant in SJC. I wish them well.

So happy there’s now a Vietnamese place in downtown San Juan Cap. Very authentic flavored with fresh ingredients.
Titan Phở on the other side of the fwy beats them on the grilled pork vermicelli and more varied menu, but Lotus wins on the wonton soup. Some think that they’re all the same, but they’re not. Lotus’ wontons are plumply-​filled with ground pork & shrimp unlike some Chinese places where it’s all wrapper and no meat. The flavorful broth is close to the best I’ve had and they add fresh veggies to it.
The phở is also very tasty as are the egg rolls and spring rolls. The beef appetizer wrapped around veggies is not normally on Vietnamese menus but is really tasty. They have a limited menu compared to Little Saigon places, but they have the major stuff covered.
Nice, clean environment and friendly. Remember, this isn’t an American chain restaurant, so adjust your expectations to an authentically-​run mom & pop and you’ll be happy.

Literally just finished my meal. I guess they still have some growing pains to go through. My husband, son and I ordered fry onions, shrimp and pork egg roll, two beef phở, and grilled pork with egg and rice.
The beef phở is legit. The broth is very flavorful on its own. They only have one size and one kind of beef phở unlike other phở places where you have different options. They do have a chicken phở and wonton soup. On the board they also have an oxtail phở.
The grilled pork with rice was not very flavorful. I had to ask for their egg roll sauce to give it some flavor.
I was so looking forward to the egg roll and my husband to the fry onions but sadly they did not come. I had to get up and ask for it. After about 5 mins the server asked if we still want my spring rolls and fry onions. I said I did not order spring rolls I ordered egg rolls. She asked again if I still want the spring rolls so I said again I ordered egg rolls and no she can cancel it but we still want the fry onions. She asked again if we wanted the appetizers I said no to the egg roll and yes to fry onions to which she replied it will take 20 mins to make, its really busy right now. This is really surprising as the place was not that busy when we walked in. I have a feeling she forgot to put in our appetizer order.
They did apologize when they brought the bill and the left over soup.
I will try them again. Hopefully the service will be better next time.

My Mom and I got here about ten minutes before they opened so we sat in the car and waited in the parking lot for a bit. It took some time to find this place. My Mom had been here before, but the place is so tucked away it’s still hard to find. Once it was 11am my Mom and I got out of the car and walked into the little plaza. The courtyard we walked through was nice and small with a pretty water fountain in the center. There was a couple of people waiting right by the door, they weren’t sure if the place was open since it looked pretty dead inside. We opened the door and to our relief it was unlocked. The place was quiet and we didn’t see anyone at first. Then a woman came out to clean the tables and she saw us and let us choose a seat. She was the only server. She was a little quiet and hard to understand, so she had to repeat herself for us quite a few times throughout our meal.
The utensils were a little dirty, I had to clean them off with my napkin. The chopsticks looked pretty old and worn, it’s not the prettiest or cleanest place. We were going to start with appetizers, but our waitress said that the chef wasn’t in yet and we could only order phở for the time being. She said the chef won’t be here for another half hour and if we wanted to we could wait until then for appetizers. So we ended up ordering one oxtail phở to share. By this time I was kinda upset and disappointed in this place. I didn’t understand why my Mom liked this place.
When the phở came to our table I finally understood why my Mom liked this place so much. The phở was the best I’ve ever had. The beef was fall off the bone tender and the broth was flavorful, yet light. It barely needed any additives, just a little chili paste and that’s all it needed. The noodles are normally my favorite in phở, but in this particular soup the meat was the absolute star, all I wanted was more of that beef. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. We both ate every last drop of that soup. My Mom and I normally split, but we said that next time we are each getting our own bowl, because it’s just so good.
We did eventually end up ordering an appetizer. We got one order of shrimp and pork spring rolls. They were ok, not the best I’ve had. They had a weird fishy off flavor that I didn’t really like, so I only had one piece. My Mom said they would of been better to start with rather than to end with.
I love their phở here and if you tried it, you would probably love it too. That bowl of soup made me forget about all the little mistakes and just made me happy. Makes me want a bowl right now.

The service was pretty bad. They brought my husbands meal out 10 minutes before mine. Kind of strange. Small menu. Just overall underwhelmed. Food was meh.

I give this place credit for being a obvious mom and pop run restaurant. And its cleanliness is better then most phở places. But that is the only reason I give this place 2 stars. I had the beef phở as it is described on the menu and the fried calamari. The calamari that was supposed to be a appetizer came out last and tasted like salt water… giving me the idea that this came out of a bag from ralphs frozen food aisle.
The phở broth was hot which was a good thing But, it again tastes salty like the pre made condensed style you can buy off the shelves. The meat which is supposed to be served almost raw and cooked inside the broth was pre-​cooked and you could tell cause it tasted like it had been grilled then reheated. Not saying it was bad food, just not what good phở is supposed to taste like.
If this it truly a 2 person run restaurant and the short cuts they are doing is for efficiency I understand. I just hope soon then can get more help in the kitchen to make this food taste the way it was meant to, before it drives away future business.

My wife and. Love vietnamese food and welcome good dinning in our awesome little cowboy/​mission town of San Juan Capistrano —
Lotus was super clean well light. Great courtyard and street view of San Juan.
We both ordered phở and it was great! Stew with big chunks of meat and veggies the broth was delicious. My wife’s chicken phở was equally great, light perfectly balanced broth.
Spring rolls were light and tasty like they should but no peanut sauce but I guess that’s really a Thai dipping sauce.
Can’t wait to go back. Service was ok. Growing pains I am sure. Hope it makes it.

Very happy a new phở place opened near me. Even more happy that the phở is excellent. We ordered the Vietnamese egg rolls, chicken phở, and beef phở.
Portions were perfect.
I’m not a phở expert but I’ve been over to Vietnam and I eat phở regularly when possible. With that said:
Ratings,
1. Beef phở and chicken Phở (Grade A+ for both). The broth is very good, much better than I expected for south OC place. Rear Beef was good. But the brisket was top notch. Highly recommended.
2. Egg eggs. (Grade B-​). I like them better at other places and will probably try other appetizers next time.
Overall:
Great ambiance.
Owner is the cook. I like that. Keeps quality.
Will try the deserts next time.

The best authentic restaurant is always ran by that ethnicity. Panda Express is never quite good enough for me. Lotus is fusion, not quite Vietnamese, so we could not expect very authentic Vietnamese.
Being said, we could find such gourmet Asian food in San Juan, we are lucky.
Egg roll is good, but Vermicelli is hot. Typical Vermicelli is served cold with hot meat on the top. Oh, they also forgot the vinegary fish sauce which I have to ask and wait. That is not cool. My wife likes the beef phở!
Service is friendly, bathroom is clean, parking is easy. Walking distance to Mission, not bad for a family combo activity.
PS: Critical but not judgmental, I hope.

I’ve tried a couple of Vietnamese restaurants and this has to be my favorite! The food was amazing! I ate way too much because I just couldn’t help myself LOL. Would recommend beef phở, but everything we tried was AMAZING.

Ok so my wife and I always go to little Saigon for Vietnamese food. We live here in town and come over for dinner. The owner and staff are amazing the place is crazy clean and the food was off the charts. I recommended the beef Phở, vermicelli, and banh mi sandwich. Yes we ate it all and cannot wait to come back. Thank you for coming to San Juan Capistrano and bringing the great treat of Vietnamese. Cuisine. See this weekend for another round.

Walked in on a whim. Happened to have initially opened 10 days prior.
Fair prices and great food. Had the beef phở.
Staff is very friendly and wants to know your opinions so they can make your experience more enjoyable.
Check it out. You won’t be disappointed

I happened to find this gem on a local business trip. Probably the best phở that I’ve had in the south oc area. Broth was tasty and clean. Meat and noodles were on point.
Service was great and the staff was super friendly. The restaurant is tucked in cute shopping center behind a Chase Bank. I’ll definitely be back when I’m in the area.

South OC doesn’t have many choices when it comes to Vietnamese cuisine. It’s great to finally have something down here that is on par with the food up in Little Saigon in Westminster. I got to sample many items from the menu, from spring rolls, egg rolls, chicken soup with noodles, chicken curry (comes with bread), bun with eggrolls and grilled beef, chicken wings, and seafood roll. The soups are tasty and light. It doesn’t taste like it’s laden with msg. The owner said they make the soup themselves everyday!
It’s located in the same plaza as Chase bank, but in the courtyard behind the consignment shop. Great new place to eat in San Juan!

Really good phở! There are no really good Vietnamese restaurants in south orange county. It is a new business only open 2 months ago.. Pork and shrimp spring rolls were very tasty. I wish I took pictures I usually do, but it was so good I went all in.
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