My brother and sis-in-law are coming into town today for a friend’s wedding so I thought I’d take this grand opportunity to share about their bomb dot com restaurant in downtown Los Angeles called Starry Kitchen!
{Didn’t have a photo of them at SK but here they are at Newport Seafood}
They have a neat story about how their restaurant came about that I shall summarize in the following bullets
- My sis-in-law, Thi, loses her job in 2009
- Thi doesn’t know what to do after losing job and didn’t like her old job so she begins to cook
- My brother, Nguyen, takes pictures of all her delicious creations like curry crab legs or korean wings w/a sweet ginger glaze
- People see photos and say they’ll pay to eat all of Thi’s delicious creations
- Nguyen and Thi have an “Aha!” moment and begin an underground restaurant out of their own apartment
- Starry Kitchen (SK) is semi-born!
- Jon and I fly out there to help out and eat the yummy food and are convinced they’ll be successful!
- SK begins to build a Yelp following, a really good Yelp following
- SK gets closed down by FDA
- SK goes fully underground
- SK gets approached by people who are willing to invest in them and give them a brick and mortar location in downtown LA
- Nguyen and Thi and both their families do a happy dance!!!
- March 2010 SK is fully born and opens its doors to a foodie city that embraces them warmly!
There it is friends. The better version can be heard straight from the horse’s mouth, Nguyen and Thi, but that’s my abridged version for ya. Pretty stellar huh? And like their 267 reviews on Yelp predominately tell you, their food is just as great as their story (4 stars y’all!)!
{clearly we give SK two thumbs up (minus my dorky brother with his thumbs down) }
Anyhow, I’m really excited to have them in town for a few days and take them to some good Dallas eateries while they’re here. Thanks for letting me share about their restaurant and a little bit of our California trip just seven months later! If you’re in the Los Angeles/SoCal area, you should definitely stop by Starry Kitchen and tell Nguyen and Thi you found them via my blog (okay, I admit that I just think that’d be really cool if you discovered SK through my blog and told them…now I feel guilty for asking)!
{all photos by The Eclectic Author & Jon}
21 comments
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March 10, 2011 at 6:27 am
Stephanie
Wow! That’s quite an amazing story! I will definitely visit if I’m in LA! I’ll also mention I found it via your blog. Underground restaurant- so funny! Welcome to the Dallas Bloggers Network! 🙂
March 10, 2011 at 8:14 am
Leslie *Fresh Out of Lemons*
Oooohh, those pictures make me hungry! Congrats to your brother and sister-in-law! If they decide to open any new locations, tell them to think Georgia. 🙂
March 10, 2011 at 8:22 am
theEclecticLife
Hahaha. Done and done!
March 10, 2011 at 10:10 am
Lillian (Unstitched.)
It looks like so much yummy food! I’ll have to try it out – make a special trip to LA for it! 🙂
March 10, 2011 at 10:24 am
theEclecticLife
Hey Lillian, what part of SoCal do you live?
March 10, 2011 at 10:17 am
Laura *You Stir Me*
I love your summary of how it all started! Congrats to all their success! It’s wonderful to see such young business owners doing so well at what they love:)
March 10, 2011 at 10:33 am
Maddy
Wow! What a fascinating story! I’m so happy that they finally got their restaurant off the ground! And since they’ve had such an amazing underground following, I’m sure it will be do great! The food looks incredible! If I didn’t live on the other side of the states, this would totally be my kind of spot 🙂
March 10, 2011 at 10:44 am
Tang
Mmmmm looks yummy! I might be going there to visit family this summer!
March 10, 2011 at 10:55 am
Justine @ Urban Scarlet
that’s so great! so glad i don’t live too far from LA… definitely gonna be on my foodie list for sure! 🙂
March 10, 2011 at 2:50 pm
Suzie @ cupcake monkey
What a wonderfully inspiring story! I will also be placing on this my list of spots to visit the next time I am in LA! Everything looks fantastic!
Hey…thanks for stopping by cupcake monkey! a few weeks back. I meant to pop by here sooner and things got hectic!…off to explore!…loving what I have seen so far! 🙂
March 10, 2011 at 4:06 pm
Gloria
love this story – what a happy ending (well, actually, beginning)! the food looks AMAZING – so bummed i’m across the country!
March 10, 2011 at 11:03 pm
Brandi {not your average ordinary}
Vivien, this is so awesome! I will make sure to visit on one of my next trips to LA and write all about them on my food blog! And what a wonderful story of how they began — it so inspires me to see what happens with my cooking and baking…
March 11, 2011 at 1:59 am
Elizabeth@themustardceiling
Great story. Their food looks absolutely delicious. If I am ever in LA I will definitely stop by….it has my mouth watering as I type.
March 11, 2011 at 2:04 am
jennifer young
oh my goodness how amazing is this!? i will definitely have to pay a visit! thank you for sharing!!!
j.
March 11, 2011 at 3:17 pm
claire
What a great story! To continued success! 🙂
March 12, 2011 at 12:35 pm
Starry Kitchen
WOW, thanks for writing about us sis. NICE!
And thank you to all the commenters and your nice notes. We’re crossing our fingers to grow this (’cause it’s HAAAAARD).
Let’s see what the future holds for us, and hopefully we can give you some more to blog about too! 😉
Thanks,
TEAM SK
March 17, 2011 at 12:57 pm
AlphabetCityStudio
How about I tell you I heard about your blog from your brother. ;D
SK is awesome!!!..and yes, the food is as yummy as it looks! The staff is always friendly and helpful – I always ask for their recommendations since they always keep things fresh with new items on the menu because they’re always experimenting with different recipes.
Congrats to SK and best wishes for continued success!
~Carrie
March 21, 2011 at 8:56 pm
Mary
Hooray to SK!! Looks amazing!!! Love the summary, too! And Viv, you look adorable in that picture!
April 15, 2011 at 4:32 am
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