La Dong – wagyu pho poured tableside off Union Square

Just off Union Square, on East 17th Street, La Dong serves modern Vietnamese cooking inside a room staged as what its owners call an Asian colonial house. It opened in mid-September 2024, the work of Jaruwijit Jaruthiphayakhantha and Hathaichanog Setasethien, the duo already known in the city for the Thai restaurants Pranakhon and Thai Villa. Within roughly a year the kitchen had done something rarer than winning an Instagram following: it earned a MICHELIN Bib Gourmand, the Guide's distinction for good quality, good value cooking. The room leans on wooden arches, private booths and lotus-shaped lamp fixtures to set a Colonial-era stage, and the dish every table seems to order is a pho finished with paper-thin Miyazaki A5 wagyu, its broth poured from a metal pot once the bowl reaches the table. The menu itself is ambitious in scope, running from Hanoi classics to dishes that trace the Mekong River south, built for groups willing to order past the familiar.

01The room and the setting

La Dong's dining room is a deliberate piece of theatre. Forbes described a charming, colourful space with the look of a colonial-style house, floating bamboo lotus ceiling lamps, carved wood accents, coloured glass windows and a mural of a Vietnamese woman painted onto the brick wall at the entrance. Time Out's reviewer found the same effect from a different angle: an array of lanterns, lotus-shaped lampshades, floral wallpaper and a mural of a lady in a conical straw hat, with even the floor tiles tastefully chosen.

The MICHELIN Guide itself frames the room in simpler terms: wooden arches, private booths and lotus-shaped lamp fixtures making for a colorful, Colonial-era stage to match the kitchen's cooking. On the restaurant's own site, the concept is personified as a welcome from "Ms. Đồng," whose house, diners are told, runs on hospitality rather than currency.

02The chef and owners

La Dong is not a solo chef's project but a house restaurant from an established New York hospitality team. Jaruwijit Jaruthiphayakhantha and Hathaichanog Setasethien opened the restaurant in mid-September 2024, and crowds have filled its retro dining room most nights since. The pair are already known locally for the Thai restaurants Pranakhon and Thai Villa, and La Dong carries the same instinct for a lively, design-forward room translated into Vietnamese territory, just a block from Union Square.

Insider tip

Walk-ins welcome; parties are seated together only once everyone has arrived.

Forbes identified the restaurant's driving force as Jaru Jaruthiphayakhantha — Thai himself — who has pushed La Dong's identity beyond the kitchen into its bar programme, most recently with an extensive "Liquor Luck" cocktail menu built on Southeast Asian ingredients and Vietnamese-made spirits.

03The cooking

The kitchen's ambition is geographic: a menu built to move, as the restaurant's own site puts it, from north to south along the route the food travelled down the Mekong River. In practice that means a card said to run to roughly 45 dishes, split between Vietnamese classics — pho, bánh mì, summer rolls — and a chef's specials list built for sharing, including a turmeric-marinated catfish, Chả Cá Lã Vọng, fried tableside with dill, scallion and fermented shrimp paste.

Northern technique shows up in the pho itself, which MICHELIN's inspectors singled out as a fragrant, superb bowl brightened by thin slivers of Miyazaki A5 wagyu. Beyond the broth, the kitchen works confidently with fire and glaze — a whole fried branzino, Cá Chiên Nước Mắm, arrives over a sweet, sticky fish-sauce glaze substantial enough for two.

04What to order

Start with the Gỏi Bưởi Tôm, a pomelo salad built around lightly grilled shrimp, Cara Cara orange, lemongrass, kaffir lime and toasted coconut in a spicy tamarind dressing, or the Nem Nướng, a grilled meatball wrapped in lettuce with scallion oil, sweet radish and nuoc cham. The turmeric crepe, Bánh Xèo, is a clever, well-reviewed riff filled with shrimp and pork sausage and served with a basket of fresh herbs; little steamed rice cakes garnished with shallot and garlic make a good companion dish.

For the main event, the Wagyu Pho is served with the Northern Vietnamese garnishes of pickled garlic and fresh chilli, its rice noodles tender against thin, melting slices of Miyazaki A5 wagyu. Pâté & Bone — chicken liver mousse with bone marrow and a toasted baguette — is the chef's-special appetizer most diners mention, and the classic bánh mì comes, unusually, with a side of house truffle soup.

05Wine and drinks

La Dong brews its own Bia Hoi draft beer and runs a cocktail list, "Liquor Luck," built on Southeast Asian ingredients and spirits made in Vietnam. Non-alcoholic drinkers are looked after too, with Coconut Salt Coffee, a lotus jasmine iced tea and inventive mocktails such as a salted-plum Mậngarita alongside the more familiar Vietnamese iced coffee.

06The neighbourhood and booking

The address sits a few minutes' walk from the 14 St–Union Square subway station, serviced by the 4, 5, 6, L and N, Q, R, W lines, putting La Dong within reach of Union Square's greenmarket and the shops of the Flatiron District. According to the restaurant's own site, walk-ins are welcome, but parties are seated only once everyone has arrived, with tables held for 1 hour 30 minutes for groups of one to four, 1 hour 45 minutes for five to seven, and 2 hours for parties of eight or more; groups of eight or above, or anyone planning an event, are asked to email ahead.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.