Vietnamese food fans take note: Santa Clara County now has the highest share of Vietnamese restaurants in the nation, edging out Orange County, according to a new study on Asian cuisine in America by the Pew Research Center.
The study tabulated the number of open Asian restaurants in the U.S. in March 2023. Vietnamese restaurants made up 6 percent of all restaurants in Santa Clara County vs. 5 percent in Orange County. Santa Clara County has the second highest population of Vietnamese outside of Vietnam (120,000) behind Orange County (180,000).
Little Saigon in San Jose has long been a must for delicious, authentic Vietnamese food, but popular, tasty outlets are growing in surrounding areas such as Santa Clara and Sunnyvale.
The study also found what many Bay Area foodies have long known: the region dominates the country in Asian restaurant offerings.
Of the eight counties in the U.S. where at least a quarter of all restaurants serve Asian food, four are in the Bay Area. In Santa Clara County, a whopping 30 percent of all restaurants serve some type of Asian cuisine from Chinese to Pakistani to Filipino.
And Santa Clara County has the second highest percentage of Indian restaurants in the country (4 percent) after Middlesex County, New Jersey (7 percent). Asians make up 40 percent of the population in Santa Clara County, according to recent Census numbers.
