To passersby, the Mekong Vietnamese restaurant in downtown Richmond, Virginia isn't notable. It sits in a strip mall on Broad Street, not far from Interstate 64 and just up the street from an AmeriPawn and the Colonial Shooting Academy. Inside, it looks like every nearly every other casual Vietnamese restaurant in the country: yellow lighting, wooden tables, pictures of friends and family hung from the walls. According to the regulars, little about the restaurant has changed in the last 20 years. But this single restaurant is responsible for Richmond's conversion from "Richmond: One of America's Murder Capitals" to "Richmond, One of America's Best Beer Cities," and rising contender for Coolest Place to Live.