You have to be cut from a different cloth to work in the competitive-yet-lucrative world of investment banking. So much so that landing a job alone qualifies as win.
Likewise for chefs and the modern ecosystem of hospitality with its hefty demands and razor-thin profit margins: opening a successful restaurant alone is a lofty ambition – never mind multiple award-winning venues.
Clearly, there isn’t a fabric that can adequately define Peter Cường Franklin.
From his teenaged years as a refugee of the Vietnam War; to graduating from Yale University and carving out a career in Morgan Stanley’s investment banking division… these perilous roads led to him fulfilling his ultimate destiny of becoming a chef.
Cường Franklin enrolled in the prestigious Le Cordon Bleu culinary school, trained in kitchens in America and Thailand, opened his first restaurant in Hong Kong, and eventually returned to Vietnam when he opened the doors of Anan Saigon (read my review here).
Tucked away in a narrow building hidden in a wet market on Tôn Thất Đạm Street, Ho Chi Minh City, it didn’t take long for the chef’s contemporary take on traditional Vietnamese cuisine to attract international attention.
Anan Saigon earned a spot on the list of Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants, before being awarded a Michelin star in 2023 – the first year Michelin unveiled a guide for Vietnam.
“Cooking is in my blood,” explained Chef Peter.
“When it’s in your DNA, it defines you whether you express it or not. But because I grew up in an environment where my mother was always cooking, it was very close to me.”
His mother ran a noodle restaurant when he was a child, and while he doesn’t credit her solely for his interest in food, she played a significant role. Another important trait ingrained from an early age was that of resilience, which he learned to survive as the only Vietnamese kid in his Irish Catholic high school.
“People say, ‘What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.’ But it does kill some people.”
“I used my stress as a source of energy to become stronger. I still have many scars inside me, but I survived and now those scars are important to who I am,” said Cường Franklin.
“It’s easier said than done, but I look at forced change as an opportunity for improvement and I remember no matter how bad a situation is, if I do the right things I can always come out even better than I was before.”
After finishing school, Peter Cường Franklin was accepted into Yale University, where an Arts degree was never on the cards for him.
“Like most Asian kids, there was an expectation that I would become a doctor, lawyer, or work in finance, and I went into investment banking with Morgan Stanley,” he recounted.
“I worked on and off with the firm for about 15 years in London, New York, and Hong Kong, but even though investment banking is a very lucrative career, it’s also very unstable and I was fired twice.”
“When I was fired a second time, I decided to take a year off and go to culinary school. At that point, I spent some time thinking about who I was, what I wanted to do now, and what I was good at.”
Cường Franklin checked into the Bangkok outpost of Le Cordon Bleu culinary school and set about reinventing himself as a chef. The love of cooking was already there, as were his work ethic and adaptability, though leaving the world of high finance for a chef’s bench was still a gamble.
He added: “It’s not easy to start from the bottom again in something totally new, but I believed it was an opportunity for a second life. I was older than everyone else, but I was willing to suffer more.”
After finishing at Le Cordon Bleu, the man honed his craft in respected kitchens like Alinea in Chicago and Bangkok’s Nahmfor, before returning to Hong Kong. Having already spent years in Hong Kong as a banker, he had a well-established network in the city and after running private kitchens with friends, opened his first restaurant: the ten-seater Chôm Chôm.
Chôm Chôm was successful. His desire to return to Vietnam, however, never faded. And in 2017, he opened the doors to Anan Saigon. Despite the challenges of the pandemic and Ho Chi Minh’s competitive, ever-evolving hospitality scene, Anan Saigon hasn’t simply survived – it’s become a dining destination for gourmands everywhere.
“Sometimes restaurant owners forget the basic fact that they need to make good food that people enjoy. They get distracted by the venue or the concept, but we have a ‘no bullshit’ rule in our kitchen. If the food is good, we’re good.”
Cường Franklin has long known the particular challenge with Vietnamese food. Unlike French, Italian, or Japanese cuisine, most people’s experience of Vietnamese food involves street food, meaning the balancing act between maintaining expectations and elevating each dish was a challenge he needed to master.
“The main mission of Alan Saigon is to elevate Vietnamese food beyond street food. I want people to rethink what’s possible with Vietnamese food, so we try to present food that’s both different and familiar,” he said.
“It’s about resetting expectations. People are willing to pay thousands of dollars to travel to Vietnam but they are only willing to spend $2 on a meal. We’re trying to change their perceptions of Vietnamese food so they’re willing to come to our restaurant and spend $100.”
“We want people to ask themselves, ‘What is Vietnamese food and what is it worth?’”
This recalibration of expectations was particularly challenging in the early years of Anan Saigon when tourists didn’t understand what he was trying to do with his menu, believed it was overpriced, and were put off by its wet market location.
“When we got into Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants for the first time in 2021 it was a major change. We started to get a more global clientele because people had the context to understand what we were doing,” said Chef Peter.
“Then in 2023, we were the first restaurant in Saigon to get a Michelin Star, which brought another kind of clientele looking for fine dining. We are anything but a traditional Michelin Star restaurant because we are very casual, but we put everything into our food.”
Today, the restaurant caters for at least 100 bookings for the set menu every night, which Cường Franklin estimates is likely three times more than any other restaurant in the country (as well as another 100 to 150 a la carte orders). The waitlist for a table is now measured in months, not weeks.
The Michelin Guide returned to Vietnam in 2024 and Anan Saigon retained its star, as one of just seven restaurants in the country to be awarded. The second year of recognition certainly matters for the growth of Cường Franklin’s restaurant, but it doesn’t radically change anything happening in the kitchen.
“Our main focus at the moment is to improve our consistency and our quality.”
“There is always pressure with Michelin to maintain what you’re doing, but that’s a good thing. This year we opened an upstairs section of the restaurant with a team that’s dedicated to phở,” he explained.
“It’s a very traditional dish, but we want to push phở to another level by bringing some science into how it’s made. We also want to get the ingredients to the highest possible level, such as using Australian Black Angus beef, and try to produce the best bowl of phở anywhere in the world.”
It’s an exciting position for the head chef and his team to be in. With Vietnam growing economically and as a tourist destination, the possibilities are expanding around what can be done. Now more than ever, his inherited enthusiasm for gambling and innovation are the defining factors in his success.
“We’ve had some success with this thing we’re calling modern Vietnamese food, and the clientele have accepted it. We have also helped to open the door for other chefs to explore Vietnamese cuisine in a way that’s not just pandering to tourists,” said Peter Cường Franklin.
“You have to be brave, you have to take some risks, but that’s what we love to do.”
