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Pho coffee is now a thing, and you can find it at a Vietnamese-fusion coffee pop-up in Sunnyvale.
Robu Coffee aims to introduce Asian flavors into the craft coffee scene, and it doesn’t stop at pho: Find offerings like cherry blossom lattes, coconut ube coffees and vegan traditional Vietnamese coffee. And for those who want a snack, the cafe also offers a selection of modernized Vietnamese sandwiches.
Robu Coffee got its start in March with corporate pop-ups and events, and since April 12, the cafe has operated Tuesday through Sunday as a pop-up at KTea Cafe in Sunnyvale. Owners Tammy Huynh and Katie Voong intend to operate as a pop-up for no longer than six months before transitioning to their own nearby brick and mortar.
“I want to make the cafe like an actual high end bar, but this is going to be more of a coffee bar instead of an actual bar that serves liquor,” Huynh said. “Imagine walking into one of those craft breweries, we’ll have multiple taps in house with different flavor profiles when it comes to nitro coffee.”
Huynh, who grew up in Vietnam, has had a longtime passion for coffee. She said most of her childhood memories with her father were at coffee shops.
“We bonded over the coffee scene, him drinking coffee while I watched him interact in his business meetings in the coffee shops,” she said. “We pretty much explored every coffee shop you could go to in Vietnam.”
She even loved her first sip of coffee at 9 years old, she said. At age 11, Huynh moved to San Jose, eventually going to De Anza College before transferring to San Jose State University and spending a lot of time in Sunnyvale. In 2014, she created her own cosmetic brand, Luxie Beauty, before realizing her true passion lay in coffee four years later.
“The spark really happened when I went back to Vietnam in 2018 to go visit my dad,” she said. “I fell in love with the coffee scene again, toured a bunch of different family-owned farms in Vietnam that my dad has connections with and really learned the actual cultivation of coffee beans and how it comes about.”
Huynh noticed that higher acidity arabica beans were much more common in the United States than higher caffeinated robusta beans typically used in Vietnamese coffee. So she partnered with family farms in Dalat, Vietnam, to source both arabica and robusta beans that she roasts and blends herself.
“The reason why our coffee tastes very different and unique is the blend of both beans, so it’s the best of both worlds,” she said. “We roast our arabica and robusta beans very differently because of different acidity levels.”
With her custom blend of beans, she began experimenting with different flavors. For example, she created pho coffee by infusing the coffee with star anise, whole cloves, cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods, ginger and coriander seed and brewing it in the traditional Vietnamese phin ($6.95), and coconut ube coffee by adding coconut cream and ube foam to Vietnamese phin-dripped milk coffee ($6.95). And it’s not only coffee on the drinks menu, find fruit fizzes in flavors like yuzu, mojito mint and passion fruit peach.
“Coffee is my playground, to be honest,” Huynh said. “I have so many different flavor profiles I want to introduce that no one has ever tasted before.”
Huynh looks forward to introducing new menu items, like truffle macchiatos infused with truffle oil with shaved dark chocolate on top.
“Robu was really born based on my passion for coffee and my love for Asian flavors,” she said. “I want to create something that is more than just a coffee shop; it’s an experience. The whole mission for us is really crafting joyful moments one sip at a time.”
Robu Coffee, 139 S Murphy Ave, #A, Sunnyvale; 408-800-5037, Instagram: @robu.coffee. Open Tuesday through Sunday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
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