Pho Tacos? Brisket Fries? Bánh Beo? Only at Cơm Nhà Kitchen & Bar

My home neighborhood, Harvey Park, is a wonderful place to live and a quiet, almost suburban environment where pedestrians and cyclists are common and dog-walking competes with yard-sale shopping as the unofficial sport. But it’s not exactly a hotbed of culinary activity. Even looking west and south toward busy Bear Valley and Sheridan Boulevard, the dining options are few and far between, and it’s a rare occasion when something new opens.

That’s why I was thrilled to see a Vietnamese eatery called Cơm Nhà Kitchen & Bar open in December at 2133 South Sheridan Boulevard, offering a deep dive into both traditional and inventive dishes meant for sharing over rounds of drinks, in what had been home to Rosemary Cafe for more than 20 years. The spot was once emblematic of all-day Denver diners serving a combo of American, Greek, and Mexican grub (sometimes all on the same plate), but it closed after the owner, Gerasimos Apergis (who was also the co-owner of the similarly fated Breakfast King), passed away in 2021.

For a few brief months in 2024, the building hosted Harvey Park Grille, but the neighborhood didn’t embrace the modernization of the bar and the menu the way restaurateur Josh Epps, who also founded Jelly Cafe, hoped it would. The new tenant, however, feels like a good fit in southwest Denver, where Vietnamese families have long been opening businesses, making an impact on the economy, and sending their kids to school.

One of those kids was Lucy Nguyen, who grew up in Harvey Park, ate her share of pho and other Vietnamese dishes in the area, and as an adult began looking at other cities for culinary inspiration. “If we want the best Vietnamese food, my family and I go to Los Angeles or Houston,” Nguyen says. “There are just so many more Vietnamese people there.”

While traveling, Nguyen found restaurants that served more than pho, and places that emphasized the bar program and food to go along with it. That’s the goal at Cơm Nhà, which means home-cooked in Vietnamese. “I wanted to offer something fun,” the owner says. “We want to bring Vietnam to Denver.”

Variety and global exploration are part of that fun; Nguyen points to the pho tacos and the egg-topped brisket fries as two non-traditional dishes that make for great starters while you pore over the rest of the menu.

If you’d rather skip straight to Vietnam, try the bánh tráng nướng, grilled rice paper pockets filled with quail egg, sausage, shrimp, and herbs, or the build-your-own bánh beo, an array of rice-batter disks steamed in their own saucers and served with savory topping like crispy shallots and garlic, dried shrimp, mung bean paste, fried pork lardons, and pungent sauces. Any (or all, if you bring a group) of these match well with Asian themed cocktails (think sriracha bloody marys or lychee martinis), party bowls, and shot flights.

For entrées, Nguyen recommends any of the seafood dishes (scallops, mussels, clams, and whole grilled squid, to name a few) and a sizzling platter called bò né, which comes with garlic steak, a roasted marrow bone, fried eggs, meatballs, and a baguette. Of course, Cơm Nhà also offers pho, noodle and rice platters with grilled proteins, bún bò Huế (pho’s bolder sibling with thick noodles and spicy broth), and other standards. Nguyen also points out that her restaurant is one of the few in the neighborhood that stays open until midnight on Fridays and Saturdays.

Remnants of the building’s former tenants remain—the midcentury modern bar and light fixtures from the Harvey Park Grille, the well-worn tile floors in the dining room from Rosemary Cafe—giving a sense of history and continuity to the space. But the new decor, the drinks, the menu, and the overall vibe feel fresh and new, mixing a little youthful energy into Harvey Park’s otherwise quiet scene.

Cơm Nhà Kitchen & Bar is located at 2133 South Sheridan Boulevard, Denver (Harvey Park). Their hours are 11 a.m.–10 p.m. Monday–Thursday and 11 a.m.–midnight on Friday and Saturday.