So You've Taken Over Your Family's Restaurant
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Restaurants are delicate things — especially mom-and-pop operations. Among the smallest of small businesses, the most successful attract customers with a combination of low costs, intense deliciousness, do-it-yourself charm and pure gumption. The hawker stands of Southeast Asia are famous examples of this. Diners forgive rough service, put up with long queues and forego white tablecloths — if not tables — for a chance to enjoy a secret sauce, that special spark, the elemental spirit passed down generation to generation.
Scaling up these tiny treasures might maximize profits, but the risk is losing the magic. A line of cooks organized along Auguste Escoffier's kitchen brigade system may help churn out dishes and feed a lot more people efficiently, but certain recipes require exacting experience and a discriminating je ne sais quoi. They may not survive the transition. Customers who are used to lower prices will also grouse at the increased costs that come with more staff and expanded real estate. A purist or two will complain that you've sold out.
I've been worrying about this because friends of mine are in the process of scaling up a mom-and-pop operation that had a legendary cult following here in London. People used to take 45-minute train rides from the middle of the city east to less-than-posh Leytonstone on a chance that a table — even if you had to share it — might open up at the Thai restaurant Singburi. That's because 'mom' — who took bookings only over the phone — said there was no availability unless diners didn't show up. 'Pop' started the restaurant in 1999, but Singburi's reputation got going after Sirichai Kularbwong joined him in the kitchen toward the end of the last decade. Over that period, his parents toyed with the idea of retirement and finally decided to do it at the end of 2024. By then, the hole-in-the-wall underdog had become the 73rd best restaurant in the UK.
Will Singburi 2.0 — in a brightly modern, much bigger space in trendy Shoreditch — be able to replicate its former charms? Some favorites from its old chalkboard menu aren't on offer, and that will disappoint some followers. I'm a friend and fan of Kularbwong and his partners, and so, while I've tasted (and thoroughly enjoyed) a preview, I have to await popular acclaim — or the opposite — along with them after the restaurant officially opens this week. I'm rooting for them and sharing in the anxiety, almost like family.
I take some comfort from the recent remaking of another family-run Thai restaurant. In Copenhagen last month, at Noma chef Rene Redzepi's MAD symposium on the future of food, Justin Pichetrungsi — who'd been working for Walt Disney Co. as an animator — gave a speech describing how he had to change careers in 2019 when his chef father suffered a stroke. He took over Anajak, a four-decade-old traditional Thai restaurant. He proceeded to innovate (think Thai Taco Tuesdays), turning it into one of the most sought-after reservations in Los Angeles. He instituted his changes, including a huge list of natural wines, while in close consultation with his father and the kinfolk who'd always helped run the place. Pichetrungsi won the 2023 James Beard Award for best chef in California. His mother, who remains in charge of making Anajak's mango sticky rice, wore the medal when he returned to LA with the prize, and proudly got fruit stains on it.
Sometimes family may just be what a restaurant in jeopardy needs. In February 2003 — despondent over an unexpected demotion in the unforgiving world of French haute cuisine — Bernard Loiseau, the celebrated chef of Cote d'Or, a three-Michelin star restaurant in Burgundy, walked up to the upstairs bedroom where he usually took a nap after lunch service. He then shot himself in the head. There was heated debate in the media over what part of the system was to blame for the tragedy.(1) Then the world moved on.
But not Loiseau's family. The chef was the relentless genius at the center of not just Cote d'Or, but also the eponymous company he built around it. Indeed, Bernard Loiseau SA was traded on the Paris stock exchange. How could such a personality-driven enterprise exist without him? His culinary reputation was also the only real thing his grieving family could claim ownership of. So his widow Dominique decided to press on. With most of her late husband's staff, she persevered, keeping Cote d'Or going. Eventually, two of their three children — daughters Bérangère and Blanche — would become part of the operations. Bérangère took over the front of the house and the management of the finances; and Blanche would join the kitchen.
It hasn't been easy. In a poignant speech at MAD, Bérangère talked about channeling her father through his writings and documents to figure out how to move forward with the restaurant and the company. Nevertheless, in the 22 years since his death, Cote d'Or hasn't only expanded to include the small hotel Relais Bernard Loiseau and several other properties, it's also kept its Michelin stars. In 2003, Dominique told French television soon after his suicide, 'All these exceptional beings who give you the impression of so much assurance, they are all very fragile. They all have such strong moments of doubt.' But she and her daughters came to the rescue. And because of them, Bernard Loiseau has a living legacy in the world.
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(1) In 2003, Loiseau was demoralized by his demotion by the Gault Millau restaurant guide and feared Michelin would follow suit. It did not. Cote d'Or would retain its three Michelin stars.
This column reflects the personal views of the author and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Howard Chua-Eoan is a columnist for Bloomberg Opinion covering culture and business. He previously served as Bloomberg Opinion's international editor and is a former news director at Time magazine.
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