New RiNo Addition Mecha Noodle Bar Offers Piping Hot Bowls of Pho and Ramen

When Tony Pham and his lifelong friend, Rich Reyes, founded Mecha Noodle Bar over a decade ago in Connecticut, they had one non-negotiable: "The company has to be transformational. It can't be transactional," Pham says.

Today the Southeast Asian-inspired noodle bar has ten locations nationwide. Its latest, and first in Colorado, opened at  2801 Walnut Street in RiNo in August. From kimchi to bao and spareribs to sushi, the menu includes a colorful collection of small plates as well as its double headliners: pho and ramen.

"We're really just trying to provide people with a hug in a bowl," says district manager and beverage coordinator Jason Snopkoski.

Despite the brand's growth, the Mecha team is more committed than ever to retaining its core values. The word "mecha," Pham explains, translates to "mom and pop" in Vietnamese. Both Pham and Reyes are the sons of immigrant parents — the Phams are from Vietnam and the Reyeses are from the Dominican Republic. Growing up in small-town Connecticut, they both know what it was like be treated differently.

The pair first crossed paths at a childhood birthday party for one of Pham's cousins, where he couldn't help but take notice of the one kid brave enough to march right past the egg rolls and fried rice to chow down on some fried quail, "bones and all," Reyes recalls.
It was a pivotal moment of mutual recognition — two like-minded humans with a like-minded love for food and a shared desire to honor the hard work of their parents and immigrant families everywhere. "How do we say thank you to our parents, that we always call the sacrificial generation? They sacrificed everything so that me and Tony could choose what we wanted to do," Reyes notes.

The pair opened the first Mecha as a ramen shop. It wasn't until Pham's mother brought in a batch of home-cooked pho for the kitchen staff that the concept of serving both popular soups was born. "I knew pho — I grew up cooking pho and eating it, so I knew it like the back of my hand," Pham notes.

"The ability to share the flavors of both pho and ramen under one roof makes us unique," adds Reyes.

Two years into Mecha's run, Pham and Reyes turned their focus to how the food service industry they had come to love could serve as the perfect vehicle for supporting disadvantaged communities and paying forward the relentless efforts of their parents.

"If you can create a transformational company within an industry that is staffed by immigrants, you're going to transform the lives of immigrants time and time again," Reyes explains. "So for me, it wasn't even a question. It was just a matter of how and what — and that, over the course of time, was this idea of Eat Justice," a campaign in which Mecha Noodle Bar funnels $0.50 of every bowl of ramen sold company-wide to a monthly selected organization or nonprofit. Its October Eat Justice campaign raised an impressive $24,300 for Food Bank of the Rockies.
The menu includes the simple but satisfying with its classic Pho Sizzle and the eye-catching Pho Bo, which includes a marrow bone sourced from the Local Butcher around the corner at Denver Central Market. The most recent addition to the ramen lineup, Tonkotsu 3.0, features a 24-hour simmered Hakata-style pork broth.

Beyond piping-hot bowls of soup, Mecha's menu includes tempting choices such as mushroom dumplings simmered in sweet brown butter miso and red oil dumplings showered in tangy Sichuan vinegar.

On November 6, Mecha debuted a flurry of new menu items, including a deconstructed crab rangoon, made with fried wonton chips served alongside bright crab kani and topped with nori dust and glistening salmon roe, and an Asian-inspired poutine of crinkle-cut fries topped with thick Japanese curry, nori dust and green onions.

The cocktail list has been curated with just as much love as the food menu and includes playfully named drinks that incorporate Asian-inspired spirits, some hard-hitting mezcal sips and Mecha's signature boozy boba. The sake list is equally lush and is half-off during the Cheap Thrills happy hour, which is available from 3 to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday.

"My dad had a saying, you know: 'Do whatever you want during the day, but come home for dinner,'" notes Pham. As Mecha approaches its millionth dollar raised through Eat Justice, the team has no intention of outgrowing its origins as a true "mecha" — a place to come home to.

"Let us become your neighborhood noodle bar," Snopkoski adds. Whether it's for a quick bowl to reset on your lunch break, or an outing with friends to enjoy the happy hour, Mecha hopes to become known as a comfortable and friendly place to linger.

Mecha Noodle Bar is located at 2801 Walnut Street and is open from 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday. For more information, visit mechanoodlebar.com.