Saigon Babylon

Cambridge doesn't deserve Vinh Le. We're here giving five stars to Waypoint and Alden and Harlow, we need to get our culinary issues sorted before we get gifted quality like Cicada and Saigon Babylon.Holy moly is this place good. I'm not talking "date night good" or "rooftop bar good". I'm talking some of the best food I've eaten in this city good. And it's good for a date. And it's a rooftop come on people how are you not already eating here?!Atmosphere is cute, a bit busy and crowded on the inside, but step outside and it's a totally different scene. Chill little tables and an unobstructed view so nice it'll make you a NIMBY. Cambridge is totally unaffordable and STILL we get awesome restaurants like this one.The dishes are what you might expect if you've been to Cicada, carefully crafted modern takes on Vietnamese dishes. If you come here and don't get the Bac Ninh you have wasted your trip. This dish is probably one of the best things I've had in Boston generally. The duck is perfectly salty and greasy, the noodles are fresh and whatever magic they do with the sauce should be outlawed. Or given a medal. Something should happen to it.The Nom Chay (I think) was really interesting - it had a metric ton of mint on there but somehow that worked with the other ingredients, making this mix of texture and flavor that didn't have the wow of the Bac Ninh but was new and different.The way the dishes are presented is also just gorgeous, each part of it is layered for a complete bite. It's like Le knows we Cambridge people are too stupid to figure it out ourselves. (we are)

I'm of Vietnamese descent and I was really excited about eating at Saigon Babylon. I loved the eclectic decor - Asian inspired and real candle sticks burning. I'd give 5 stars for the ambiance.I tried the Good Dealer (pho cocktail), Cicada Breeze (bird eye chili pepper), and Honey Mousse (espresso) cocktails, which were all delicious.I really enjoyed the dishes that I tried: the Lemongrass Beef Carpaccio, the Bác Ninh, and the Oxtail. They were all very flavorful - if you are a fish sauce lover, these dishes are for you. The noodles were delightfully soft.My only gripe is that the hostess and waitresses were incredibly rude and short. From seating us to answering questions about the dishes. This really left a bitter taste, especially when I was so excited to dine here.I'd probably come again, for the rooftop and cocktails, since it was raining the night I went. If the service improves, I'll consider paying more for the dishes. There are multiple reviews about rude service, so I think it's important that management takes note.

Aesthetics: 5 stars Drinks: 3 starsWhat made my experience at this place awful was the rude service. Made reservations for trying this place for the first time for a group of 3. Didn't realize this place had limited menu for food, so we decided to just order drinks and something small to snack on before finding another place. Our waiter looked at us strangely because we didn't want to order any of their 3 choices of entrees and opted for the drinks&snacks only. Quickly after being served our drinks, another woman came and asked us to move to the roof top setting area since we were not eating a real meal. We quickly said yeah no problem. What threw us all off was her comment after asking us to move our seats was, "because you can't just sit here and order a plate of corn". LOL we were all baffled. Here is a photo of our $75 experience .

I'm always excited to try out new Vietnamese restaurant, especially the ones that are doing modern Vietnamese food since we don't have much here in MA. But unfortunately this place turned out to be a huge dissappointment. My friends and I made a reservation at this place for our girls night, thinking we could have dinner in the dining room first then move out to their roof top for more drinks after. But that did not happened as we left hungry, mad, and everything in between after our dinner. Let go over the food first, I have to say they have some great ideas on some of the dishes but could not delivered the quality and quantity of food to match with their prices. Everything was extremely salty. Most of the dishes all we could taste was the salt or the saltiness from fish sauce and nothing else. You can get most of the dishes from here at any other casual Vietnamese place that will taste 100 better for 1/10 of the price, and you won't be hungry after. Things we ordered: Drinks:Pandan Long Island - tasted like a normal Long Island, nothing special as we could not taste any pandan flavor.Stormy Saigon with rum added as suggested - the description sounded good but it tasted and smell like Chinese medicine (very strong herbal taste). Food: Viet Festival Salad ($16) - this is just a typical Vietnamese shrimp salad, nothing special. Portion is extremely small for its price of a simple salad that contains 3 shrimps. Lemongrass Beef - Raw beef thinly sliced, served cold with yuzu crackers. It would be a great dish if it wasn't salty. Bac Ninh - stir fry Pho noodles top with grilled duck, this was the worst dish. The pho noodles were good with the right texture but the duck was inedible. The duck tasted extremely gamely, irony (?), salty and chewy. It was like they used some very old frozen duck. Corn - stir fry glutinous corn with dry shrimp. It's a simple Viet street food that simply hard to mess up and since it's a simple dish to begin with we werent expecting anything crazy. The moment we saw it we laughed out loud, it was a complete joke lol. Tiny tiny portion for its price and again it was salty. Oxtail - a modern twist on a Vietnamese beef stew but with oxtails. Great idea but flavors was not there. The broth was too watery, "tomatoey", and bland. Turmeric fish with dill (forgot the actual name of it) - This was the most salty dish of them all, I could not taste anything but saltiness. This dish has so much potential if they learn how to season it correctly. Service:Not sure why our server Catherine or Katherine was serving and checking up on every other tables except for ours. The one time she "checked up" on us, she managed to gave us the dirtiest look as soon as she walked away? We still don't know why she did that as we were very polite to her up until that point. We had to flag down other people/servers whenever time we needed something or even our check to pay. The only person seem to care was either the manager or the owner I'm not sure which one. She provided amazing service when we brought up the inedible duck dish, she comped the dish and also gave us the turmeric fish to try out. The only positive thing I can say about this place is the atmosphere. I would not come back nor recommend this place to anyone. Save your money, time, and frustration from rude servers.

If you want a zen experience on a rooftop setting, perfect for fall sunsets, with delicious & clean Vietnamese food...this is your place. I love the vibe, which is Asian inspired with bamboo and stone sculptures. No reservations available for the roof seating, as it is first come first served. Wonderful cocktails which are also Asian inspired. I highly recommend coming here when looking to chill from the busy city vibe.

We came here when they just opened, and a line was waiting. Since the weather was nice, we sat outside. Don't expect lots of service since you will get ignored after you place your order. I ordered the pandan long island, which wasn't too strong of alcohol and had little pandan taste. For the starter, we ordered lemongrass beef carpaccio and bap xao tep (corn) was well seasoned. The lemongrass beef carpaccio was a little salty if you don't mix it well, and the beef was so tender. I wish they could give you more crackers for the dish. The corn was not the regular corn that we usually eat; they used waxy corn, which was less sweet, but they added coconut and a little XO seasoning (I think) on the tiny shrimp, adding a great flavor. The main dish, bac ninh, must ordered; the duck was soft, and the rice noodles just had the right texture. I'm not fond of ginger, but you can't taste it. Overall, the portion of the dishes from the start to the main dish was small.

I was worried this spot would be super hard to get into but I didn't have too hard of a time getting a reservation on a Sunday when I booked a few days in advance. Also, their outdoor patio is first-come-first-serve (no reservations) so keep that in mind if you feel like spontaneously stopping by! It seemed like there were more tables on the patio than inside the actual restaurant.I tried their stormy sai gon ($13) mocktail. It has pandan, tea, and coconut milk, so I was expecting something to taste kind of like milk tea. The mocktail ended up having a much more savory flavor to it (and was more tart than I expected), but not in a bad way at all! Two of us split the lemongrass beef ($18), banana flower ($16), and bac ninh ($30).The lemongrass beef was my favorite. This would be a good dish for anybody who likes beef tartare/carpaccio/yukhoe! The beef was so tender and the passion fruit sauce added such a refreshing, tangy sweetness. I really liked how the textures from the rice cracker, beef, and vegetables complemented each other.The banana leaf had really succulent pieces of shrimp but otherwise mostly reminded me of a papaya salad. As someone who likes papaya salad I enjoyed this dish a lot, but I probably would have rather picked another dish on the menu that I haven't had before.The bac ninh was a great portion size for two to share! It came with a decent portion of duck and the noodles themselves soaked up a lot of the savory sauce. The noodles had a great texture-- they were really bouncy and fun to eat. They give you a garlicky ginger sauce on the side which I didn't really care for as a dipping sauce but we ended up mixing it into the noodles and I really liked how the flavors all blended together. The fresh ginger flavor added a lot of brightness to the dish that would have otherwise been on the heavier side from the oil.I would love to try more of their drinks. I thought the food was tasty and nicely presented but I wouldn't say there was a stand-out dish.

I have mixed feelings about this place. I had a reservation for dinner on a Friday night a week into opening. We weren't able to find any menus online so we took a chance. The menu is limited, there aren't many options if you're a vegetarian but they can make things veggie for you. Our server was very nice and accommodating. We started with a couple drinks. They were ok. We were told that plates are to share but we got a plate of our own. I got a salmon with rice dish and my friend who is vegetarian got a vegan pho stir fry. Both portions were definitely not for sharing. They were on the smaller end (as can see from the photos). The decor and the ambience of the place is great, however the food and drinks unfortunately do not live to the hype. I would definitely pass on food, maybe enjoy the rooftop with a drink or two. There are many places in the area with phenomenal food.

A really beautiful location and space for a light meal. The two of us were seated inside at the long table in the middle, but despite others being sat next to us later on, it didn't feel cramped.The menu isn't extensive, but it has some inventive options. I got the Stormy Sai Gon, which was a little smaller than I hoped it'd be. To share, we ordered the Bac Ninh and the Watercress Salad with Scallop. The portions aren't huge, so we decided to order less and have a second meal elsewhere. The food was good, but not good enough that I'd come back for a full meal (but perhaps for a drink on the roof).

if you are looking for a unique, special experience where everything was hand crafted from inspiration, from food, decor, and drinks, this is the place for you! Come for food, leave with an experience of the senses.