Interview with Daisy Chuskul, June 6, 2022

|00:00:04| Brody This is Betsy Brody. Today is June 6, 2022. I am interviewing for the first time as Daisy Chuskul. This interview is taking place in my home office in Richardson, Texas. This interview is possible thanks to the support of a Mellon/ACLS Community College Faculty Fellowship and is part of the project entitled "Digging In: How Food, Culture, and Class Shape the Story of Asian Dallas." Hi, Daisy. Thank you for joining me today.

|00:00:30| Chuskul Hi. Thanks for having me.

|00:00:32| Brody To start out with, why don't you tell me where and when you were born?

|00:00:37| Chuskul So I was born in Greenville, Texas, but my parents lived in Dallas at the time. I was born November 17th, 1989. And the reason I was born in 00:01:00Greenville was because there's a Thai doctor who births a lot of the Asian or the Thai families in the area. So we all, I guess, trek over there to have him deliver our babies. So, yes, but I'm a Dallas native.

|00:01:13| Brody So your parents were Thai?

|00:01:16| Chuskul Mm hmm.

|00:01:17| Brody Tell me about what brought them to Texas.

|00:01:19| Chuskul So my mom was studying nursing for the Red Cross, and they brought nurses over to the U.S. and that's how she came in. My dad's history is like a little fuzzy. I think he just, you know, wanted to come to America to work. And so he made his way here and was working as a cab driver in Baltimore, Maryland. And that's where both of my parents met in Baltimore.

|00:01:51| Brody Great. And what brought them to Texas?

|00:01:55| Chuskul I think they had friends here and they probably were more used to the climate in Texas compared to Baltimore. So I think, yeah, the weather and maybe some opportunities and friends.

|00:02:09| Brody You mentioned the doctor and the friends. Was there a large Thai community to your knowledge at that time when they came?

|00:02:19| Chuskul I'm not, I'm not really sure, but I know that the doctor is one of my parents' first friends, and they have been good friends for, you know, all these years and...

|00:02:32| Brody When, do you know what year they came to Texas?

|00:02:36| Chuskul So we opened our restaurant in 1982 and I think they came to the U.S. maybe around 76 or 77 and got married, I think, in 78 and had my 00:03:00sister. She was born in 1980 and she was born in Maryland. So I think shortly after she was born, they came to Texas.

|00:03:03| Brody Tell me about the restaurant.

|00:03:06| Chuskul Yeah. So we're a family run restaurant in East Dallas called Bangkok Inn. We've been open for- this is our 40th year. And my parents ran the restaurant all that time until about 2012. That's when I graduated from the University of North Texas, and I studied hospitality management there. And so I already had the idea that I would come after I graduated and start taking over with my older brother and sister. So we started running the restaurant back in 2012.

|00:03:46| Brody Had your parents ever done anything like a restaurant before, 00:04:00any food related businesses?

|00:03:54| Chuskul No, I don't, I don't think so. And I haven't personally heard this story, so I'm not, I'm a little bit skeptical of it, but this is the narrative that my brother tells. And what he remembers is that my parents met at a mutual friend's wedding in Baltimore, and my mom had made lots of food and kind of catered that wedding. So he ate the food and was like, "Who made this? I have to meet her." And that's when the suiting began. So.

|00:04:24| Brody Wow, that's a great story.

|00:04:25| Chuskul I know. I was like and it's a great story. I don't know if I believe it, but that's what we're sticking with.

|00:04:33| Brody So still, though, what possessed them to open a restaurant?

|00:04:37| Chuskul I think that's just what a lot of Thai people that came here, it was just something that there wasn't any Thai restaurants here at that time. I think we might be the oldest or one of the oldest still running from that time 00:05:00period. And so I think they just saw that there is an opportunity, a lack in the market and something that they could do.

|00:05:06| Brody Do you know much about sort of the nuts and bolts of of how they got the restaurant off the ground?

|00:05:12| Chuskul No, I'm very surprised. So there's quite an age gap between me and my parents. So they had me when they were 45. And so I'm always so curious about like what their twenties and thirties even looked like and how they navigated even opening the restaurant. Like running it now, there's all these like technical permits and stuff and things I have to figure out and I'm like from here. So it's difficult for me. So it must be, must have been like a community effort of friends and helping each other out.

|00:05:52| Brody Did they buy the property or the building or...

|00:05:56| Chuskul I think they were renting it for a while, but the owners were ready to sell at some point and sold it to my parents. So we owned, we own that space and property. We don't own the whole little shopping center corner, but we just own that little pocket.

|00:06:17| Brody Where is the restaurant?

|00:06:19| Chuskul So it's, the address is 6033 Oram Street, Dallas, Texas 75206. So it's in the East Dallas Lakewood area. It's very close to, it's kind of like adjacent to Lower Greenville or Lowest Greenville.

|00:06:42| Brody Do you remember, or in your family are there stories of sort of the as the restaurant was getting off its feet and the growth or you know, who 00:07:00the customers were and what that felt like?

|00:06:54| Chuskul Yeah. So we have a lot of customers that have been eating at our restaurant for, you know, decades. And it used to be only a portion. Our restaurant was only a portion of what we have now. And I've heard stories of people...I think we only had maybe six or seven tables. So we would have people line, line up in the parking lot, waiting to eat and would like bring coolers and stuff and kind of like tailgate our parking lot, wanting to try a probably my mom's Pad Thai. And I know there was like an early article in the, I think it was a Dallas Chronicle, and they did a profile on my mom and that was probably like really what kept things buzzing at that time, I think.

|00:07:53| Brody Do you remember what the article featured?

|00:07:57| Chuskul I think it was just showcasing like South Asian, Southeast Asian cuisine in Dallas. And so they had a picture and a little blurb of her. And I think we have it somewhere. So if I can find it, I'll send it to you.

|00:08:14| Brody Thank you. So how did your mom learn to cook? Was she...

|00:08:21| Chuskul Yeah. So this is...She was the oldest of maybe nine siblings. I'm like, I don't have all the accuracies, but she used to tell me all the time how she'd have to wake up at the crack of dawn and travel to the market and get ingredients to help cook all of her siblings like little probably, like sort of similar to like a bento box, like lunches for the day. And she just did that 00:09:00every day. And I think Pad Thai was her mom's favorite. And so she would go to the night market and kind of watch how they were making Pad Thai. And she knew the most popular one was the one to look for. And so she would spy at like their trash and see which trash had the most eggshells because like at the night market, they would crack an egg for each order. And so the one that had the most eggshells like was, had the best Pad Thai. So she just would watch and study.

|00:09:34| Brody That's really clever and was this in Bangkok?

|00:09:39| Chuskul So she was from a small town called Rat Buri. I think that's right, yeah.

|00:09:51| Brody What was your what would tell me your mom and dad's names again?

|00:09:53| Chuskul Oh, yeah. So my mom is named Patcharee. She would go by Pat or Noi, and my dad is named Threechok and he would go by June like the month.

|00:10:07| Brody Great. So describe the Pad Thai that your mom would cook.

|00:10:13| Chuskul Yeah. So our Pad Thai just is...The sauce is based on like a tamarind reduction. And so we would like either use a tamarind mash or like, now what I do is, like, fresh tamarinds, and we soak until the meat breaks down of that fruit and and reduce that into a sauce. And so that's like a brown color, right? And so our Pad Thai is always a lot lighter than what I've seen at other restaurants that add a red coloring, either like through paprika or even maybe 00:11:00like a food coloring. But it's funny that that's what people think of Pad Thai and versus the Pad Thai I grew up with. So I know it's very good. There's a mixture of the tamarind sauce and fish sauce and some vinegar for acidity. It has the egg and some red and green onion, bean sprout, and crushed peanut.

|00:11:20| Brody It sounds wonderful. So you mentioned that you have customers that have been coming for about forty years and how it used to be with people lining up. How did your parents, other than, you know, when they were featured in that article, how did they reach their clientele?

|00:11:40| Chuskul Yeah, I think a lot of it was just word of mouth. And so I think that's what sustained us for so many years, because even now I'm just 00:12:00starting to, everything has changed with like social media, but we didn't have that base before. So I think we were just really like a neighborhood restaurant. We're in Lakewood and I think the community there is really open to trying like new foods. And it was something affordable and quick and different that they couldn't cook at home. And so it was just like an easy weeknight pick up for them. But it's been really fun to see generally, generationally our clientele who have watched me grow up and have and I've watched their families grow up and now their kids eat here and they bring their kids. And so I see multiple generations coming through the restaurant. And I think probably one of the biggest draws also was just my mom. She was just so hospitable and everyone called her "Mom" and just wanted to be around her and spend time with her. And I 00:13:00think that's why they enjoyed coming to the restaurant.

|00:12:56| Brody Yeah, a lot of people that I have been talking to for this project talk about their philosophy of hospitality. What would you say your mom's and dad's philosophy of hospitality was in those days of setting up and starting the restaurant? And then for you, what does hospitality mean?

|00:13:16| Chuskul Yeah, I think. Hospitality and and food are like...That's just immediately what we are ingrained to think about. And. I was watching. Sometimes I follow some Thai language instructors on Instagram, and one tip that they gave was, one teacher gave was, if you want to sound like a native, you 00:14:00have to learn this phrase. And it's "kin khao reu yang" like, "have you eaten?" And that's how people greet each other. And it's just like making sure that, you know, just entered someone's heart, through their stomach and make sure they're fed and that warmth and care that's taken through food. So, I think with the restaurant is, we wanted to create an atmosphere that's like, come into our home and we're going to feed you.

|00:14:24| Brody That's really nice. I'm sure your customers appreciated that and that's why they lined up and kept coming back. Speaking of your customers, is there a typical profile of your Bangkok Inn customers or how would you describe them?

|00:14:45| Chuskul Yeah. I think a lot are families and some older customers 00:15:00that still enjoy coming. So yeah, I feel like we have kind of more of an older clientele and just like that neighborhood family spot. And then I guess there are younger people wholive in that area and work and that come too. I was like, I don't know if this is...They're mostly white. So we live in, I guess in that area it's not as ethnically diverse. And we've talked about because we live in Richardson and there's a lot of different cultures around here, but I think closer to where the restaurant is more of a white clientele.

|00:15:51| Brody Well, that makes me think based on who your customers are, do 00:16:00you approach the menu in a different way or...

|00:16:02| Chuskul Right. Yeah. So I think that the menu that we've had for many years, it's pretty accessible and I was having a conversation with someone earlier talking about how a lot of the Asian cuisine seems more centered on Cantonese or doing the basic stir fry stuff when there's so many other kind of more interesting and fun dishes. And it made me think about, "Oh, is our menu not authentic? Or, what does that mean?" And I think yes and no. So obviously, my parents were one of the first restaurants, Thai restaurants in the area, so I 00:17:00think they did want to create something that was going to be like palatable for people trying Thai food for the first time. And but then when I think about the stir fries and, the base and sauce that we use for that, that was just such a staple for them in my home. That's just a very home cooking, we're going to do some veggies and meat or whatever and have this kind of standard sauce. So it feels very authentic in that way because it's like, well, this is literally what my parents were eating when, you know, they were at home or off work.

|00:17:34| Brody Yeah, I mean, the concept of authenticity is a little bit tricky. It's a slippery concept, right? What does what does that mean when we're talking about food from other cultures?

|00:17:47| Chuskul Yeah. Yeah. Because I think everyone's wanting to try some of 00:18:00the more like street foods or some things that might have been more time consuming. But what I've observed, you know, from my family and family friends, it's going to...what they have at their table is pretty basic. You know, they're not makingelaborate things all the time. Who has the time? So it's been interesting thought to...How do I want? What direction do I want to go in expanding and exploring those those kinds of dishes that people can't find? You know, but then. What's going to be profitable or make sense for me with how I organize my kitchen and how time consuming certain dishes are that people are wanting to explore.

|00:18:50| Brody Right. Yeah. That sounds like for a lot of people who own 00:19:00restaurants, it's a balance of trying to put things on the menu that are, as you said, accessible, that people will order, because after all, it is a business. But on the other hand, education piece of it, a lot of people have said in putting different things on the menu, so people have a chance to try them.

|00:19:17| Chuskul Yeah. Yeah. And it's also tough with, you know, we've been running for forty, we have forty years of clientele that are used to and still love what we do and not trying to change things too much and like, "Okay, I'm going to rebrand into this like really modern fusiony thing" is like, "No, I don't want that." So yeah, trying to straddle that line because I think I'm interested to explore, especially now that my parents have passed. And so it's 00:20:00kind of been a mission for me to dive even deeper into the cuisine and kind of unearth these recipes that maybe that I've never...I didn't get a chance to learn. I only had maybe once in my childhood or like at a party that, you know, my family friends are holding or something of that nature. And I even have resistance from my siblings because they're like, "Well, let's not change. Everyone's used to this, let's not change this too much." But I don't think...I think now that we're getting older and having more autonomy, it's like we can do whatever we want. But, yeah, let's be smart about it.

|00:20:35| Brody Right. Especially because, you know, as you said, you've got the existing customer base that that keeps coming back for what they're coming back for.

|00:20:43| Chuskul Right. Yeah.

|00:20:46| Brody I'm just wondering, do you know if your parents or or yourself 00:21:00experienced any any discrimination or racism in the course of running the restaurant?

|00:20:58| Chuskul Yeah, I think it was especially hard for my parents at that time. I don't know any...I mean, I'm sure I've heard specific stories from when I was younger. But overall, I just felt there was a lot of distrust, especially on my dad's end. He was always like, don't trust anybody. Do everything on your own. And as I've grown older to think about it, I'm wondering if I mean, that must have come from somewhere, right? And so he he must have had to experience discrimination and and getting, I don't know. Just like having hate, you know, 00:22:00towards him. I remember growing up younger and one time he had an argument with someone in the parking lot. And I don't know, I think especially at that time, people weren't as open to other cultures in general. So, yeah, I think he felt a definite mistrust of a lot of people.

|00:22:23| Brody Since the time that your parents came to Dallas and started the restaurant, the Thai community certainly and the Asian community in general have grown dramatically as there started to be more and more Asians in Dallas. And also, as you know, people started to explore eating food from other countries. Did you, do you recall anything about competition, other restaurants, Thai restaurants starting and discussions of that within your family?

|00:22:56| Chuskul I think it was just kind of understood. I think everybody was, all the probably first families that were coming into the area, that was what they were doing. So I think that competition was just... I mean, I don't know, if it was ingrained, but it was just...They were used to it. So it wasn't. It didn't feel very competitive. It was just like, okay, this family has this restaurant, this family has this, everybody has a restaurant.

|00:23:26| Brody Did those families all become sort of a community in and of themselves, the restaurant families?

|00:23:32| Chuskul You know, maybe that's where one of, most of the competition came from because, yeah, there wasn't that much of a interconnected "let's help each other out." It's like, okay, we're all doing the same thing. But it was pretty isolated.

|00:23:50| Brody Was it hard to get food, the you know, the raw materials for 00:24:00the restaurant?

|00:23:57| Chuskul I mean, for me, now it's not. Gosh, yeah. That's such a good question. I wonder how they managed that. At the very beginning. But for me and the time I've grown up, we've always been in very close proximity to Hong Kong Market. So we always run. Are there just, wow, this is opening up all these memories of going to all these small, you know, little Thai grocers and some of them are...don't exist anymore. But yeah, that's very interesting. I guess at the same time, and I know that part of your project, you're interviewing Asian grocers as well, but yeah, there were a bunch of smaller shops that just only 00:25:00did mainly Thai that my parents went to. But, you know, in the later years, now we have like bigger Asian supermarkets. So now I do more of my inventory at like Hong Kong Market and like we do have one small vendor. His place is called Thai Oriental and he's right off of Lower Greenville, off Sears and Greenville. And he's kind of one of the last independent, like groces that we still use, now that I think about it.

|00:25:38| Brody Because they're the larger supermarkets?

|00:25:40| Chuskul So yeah yeah. So we go... I'll just to go ahead and tell y'all all my places, right? So I'll go to Hong Kong Market and Restaurant Depot 00:26:00and then we'll get a shipment from Southern Star, which is like a bigger Asian food distributor. And then I'll also still get stuff from Thai Oriental. And it's funny because I don't even know if that's the most economical choice. I mean, I think it's fine. I don't think I'm really losing money or having to pay so much more. Still being in business with I think his name is Roy. His Thai name or I forgot his Thai name. But yeah, he's just been in business with my family for so long that it never occurred to me not to buy from him, even if it's kind of a small order. And he really appreciates it and he still has his connections with like a lot of Thai restaurants around in the areas and all 00:27:00over, but. Does that answer your question? What was the question, now?

|00:26:58| Brody Those relationships are important and, you know, being able to get what you need. That's really interesting. Do you know of any challenges that your family faced in in running the restaurant over the years?

|00:27:15| Chuskul Let's see. Well, we did have two locations and we had a bigger, much bigger location more north on Greenville, closer to Park Lane. And that was a fun restaurant. I remember being a kid and playing around. We had a walk in cooler and my brother and I would play in there. And yeah, it was. It was huge. I wonder, I don't even know what the max capacity was, but at some 00:28:00point I think the rent got so high that we lost that restaurant. But before that happened, my dad, and I was very young when all of this happened. My dad decided to do a different concept. And he changed the restaurant into an Italian concept because he really loved Italian food. And he had an old friend in Baltimore who just cooked a lot of Italian cuisine, an Italian chef, I guess. And he brought him over and they opened the rest...or they changed the restaurant into Italian concept. And that was not well-received. I think a lot of people could see like, why are these Asian people now serving, you know, spaghetti and stuff? And so that didn't go well. And I know my parents had to file for bankruptcy, but I 00:29:00also was so young that I don't know how all that went. Gosh, I wonder what year that was. But probably somewhere in the mid-nineties. And so now we just still only have our original first location.

|00:29:17| Brody When did this second location come into being?

|00:29:21| Chuskul Yeah. I don't know. I wonder if it was. Maybe. I don't know. That's a good question because I was like, it could have been just a couple of years after they opened the first one.

|00:29:36| Brody And that was that location that he tried, the Italian?

|00:29:40| Chuskul The bigger, the bigger, the bigger restaurant. Yeah. So that's what we would call it. When it was Ran Hiy and Ran Lek and so Ran Hiy is..."Hiy" is big in Thai. So the big restaurant or Ran Lek, like the little restaurant.

|00:29:57| Brody In either location. Did you have neighbors, other restaurants or other stores that you had relationships with?

|00:30:06| Chuskul Ran Lek, the little original spot, the one I run, there was a laundromat on at the other end of the block. So where the restaurant sits is in like a little, I almost don't want to call it a shopping center because it's so small, but it's kind of, you know, like it has a shared parking lot with a few other businesses. So on the corner there's a garden shop or a dentist that's been there, I guess, for as long as I remember. I wonder if they pre-date us even. And then there was a laundromat and in between the so the business in the 00:31:00space between our restaurant and the laundromat has changed over the years. I think it was a hair salon when I was young and then a yoga studio or an art consignment place and a yoga studio. And now it's like a DIY craft studio. But yeah, it was...But the laundromat in particular was the one that I had the most connection to. And there was this black woman who managed it named Peaches, and she adored me and I adored her. And I guess would kind of babysit me while my mom was working and I remember sitting, she would have a chair outside and I would sit like on her lap and she would like sing hymns to me. And I was like, "Aunt Peaches," like.

|00:31:46| Brody That's a great story.

|00:31:46| Chuskul And that laundromat in particular, I think, was just like a 00:32:00staple for the neighborhood. When they closed down, it was quite a loss because a lot of people were doing their laundry there and there's a lot of smaller apartments and older apartments and duplexes that I guess didn't have that and, you know, washer and dryer included. So I think that really tied in to like kind of our community neighborhood vibe of like, "Oh, this is where I'm going to do my laundry and then I'll eat or pick up food from the Thai restaurant." And it's just part of their everyday regular lifestyle.

|00:32:35| Brody Right. It sounds like the restaurant was just woven into the fabric of that neighborhood.

|00:32:42| Chuskul Right. Yeah.

|00:32:44| Brody That's that's really nice. So...

|00:32:48| Chuskul And then for the bigger restaurant, it was kind of in a 00:33:00little bit of a funky little business shopping center. And there's like a a quite a steep hill that you go down and the main businesses that I knew that were there was our restaurant and then across it was a hamburger place called Joe Willy's. And I would...Me and my brother would always go across the street and I think they had a couple of arcade games. So we would play games and get some money from my parents. You know, a couple of dollars to play games. I think my brother was tricking me and using my money and I was only operating the computer one. But so then whenever he would die, he's like, "You died, put in your quarters." But I was too young to recognize I wasn't actually controlling 00:34:00the other character.

|00:33:55| Brody Very tricky of your brother. Your brother and sister and you are now together running the restaurant.

|00:34:02| Chuskul Yeah. So right now at current it's just me and my sister, but, yeah, my brother just stepped away about a year or two ago. But yeah, so it's me and my sister and we have one cook, so we run a very tight and small ship.

|00:34:23| Brody Are you using the same recipes and basically the same menu as your parents used?

|00:34:29| Chuskul Yeah. Yeah.

|00:34:30| Brody Yeah. What are the biggest sellers?

|00:34:34| Chuskul Yeah, I think our Pad Thai is really popular. I think there's definitely a cult following behind our peanut chicken. So the peanut sauce that my parents or mom created tastes very unique and different from peanut sauces 00:35:00I've had anywhere else. And yeah, there's a big following.

|00:35:04| Brody That's great. Earlier you talked about that one article that featured your mom kind of early on. Over the years, I'm sure there have been other reviews and things like that. What are your thoughts about the, you know, professional restaurant reviewers and sort of the impact on your restaurant when when you get reviewed?

|00:35:28| Chuskul Yeah. So, I mean, we've been a couple of times awarded through The Dallas Observer when they did, do their big food and entertainment "best of" of the year. And. Yeah. We'll get things here and there. But I think right now some of the more innovative, buzzy or on trend are getting a lot of 00:36:00the attention as opposed to, you know, some of the hole in the wall. I mean, I think the, what am I thinking of? Just the whole scene has changed now. And so for these smaller, "mom and pop," they're kind of that's become standard. Like they're used to it now and they're wanting to expand further from that. And so I think from the start of the restaurant, when there was only like three. My parents, we're running one of three Thai restaurants, you know, in Dallas, and now there's countless restaurants. And who's doing something to actually stand 00:37:00out and be above the crowd. And when I tell people that I run a Thai restaurant, the most frequent answer I hear is "Thai is my favorite food." When, you know, when my parents opened, people didn't know about Thai food. So yeah, I don't know. It's interesting to see going forward how I'm going to kind of pivot things in a way that will have us stand out. But I'm really thankful for the community and support that we have had for all these decades.

|00:37:33| Brody Yeah, for sure. And, that's an interesting point that you're making about, you know, as there are more and more Thai restaurants or, you know, Asian restaurants in general, the ways that people try to differentiate themselves and you, you know, used the phrase "hole in the wall" and "mom and 00:38:00pop." What do you see as the sort of distinguishing characteristic of a "mom and pop" restaurant? You know what, what does a "mom and pop" restaurant need to do or have to do to be successful?

|00:38:08| Chuskul Like now in this day and age? Yeah, I think a lot of it is about visibility and social media, and that's something I'm very new to approaching even, you know, being 32. Like I'm still young and I grew up with all of that stuff. But I feel like I'm a little bit of a late adopter. I didn't get a smartphone until, I think, 2017, which I'm glad I did, because I could tell it was impeding me into operating normal business and just getting around in the world without a smartphone. But yeah, a lot of my friends were surprised. 00:39:00I was kind of known to be the friend that was still using a flip phone or a dumb phone. So, yeah, I think social media is, is huge now and we talked a little bit before the interview about the Facebook group, the D- GrubHub, DFW, Asian, Asian Grub-DFDub, something like that. And it's a huge group. And I feel like that's really if you can make it on that Facebook group, you'll do well because people are traveling all over just to try these recommendations. And I even, you know, got a pretty big buzz from just doing one post for my mom's 75th birthday. We 00:40:00just had a little I just told them about the restaurant and my mom and that she was turning 75 and if you come by and wish her happy birthday, you could get a little discount or something. Birthday discount. And yeah, that got shared I think 700, 800 times or had that much interaction.

|00:40:20| Brody Did that translate into lots of people coming?

|00:40:22| Chuskul Oh, yeah. It was definitely a busy week.

|00:40:26| Brody That's great. So that makes me think about not the professional reviewers, but sort of the social media side of restaurant critique.

|00:40:35| Chuskul Yeah, the branding and all that stuff. I even see now when I post on our Instagram, the ones that I post myself get a lot more engagement 00:41:00than just a picture of my food. So people want to, they want to eat stories. They want to, you know, have a full experience and know the story behind the food.

|00:41:07| Brody Sure. And what about like Yelp and those types of review sites? Do those impact you and your operations?

|00:41:17| Chuskul Yeah, sure. And I think luckily for us, just being so longstanding, we have quite a bit reviews on Google and Yelp and those kind of platforms. And I think that just comes from our huge client base and just been operating for so long. So I'm thankful for that because I don't know how if I was starting fresh today, how I'd have to build all those reviews and get that kind of good rank and standing.

|00:41:55| Brody That's a, I mean, an entirely different enterprise than just making delicious food and serving it.

|00:42:01| Chuskul Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of people, I mean, it's become a full time job. People will hire companies. We even did for a little bit. I think there's Main Street Hub. They will manage all of the reviews and all of those different platforms and create content for you. And so that was fun. And honestly, a lot of customers enjoyed it. But I think times were tough at that particular time, and that was an expense that we ended up cutting. And it was fun content, but it was also kind of, I don't know, it wasn't coming from me. And so some of it felt like very disingenuous. I mean, I remember one time they 00:43:00posted some kind of graphic or meme or whatever about like "an egg roll a day will.." something, you know, whatever, something cheesy like that. And it seemed kind of generic, you know. But I mean, any kind of engagement, if you're catching someone's eye, that's fine, you know? So I think it was effective inand some way, but.

|00:43:22| Brody I think a lot of what you're saying, it seems like it keeps coming back to that sort of feeling of authenticity. Right? You know, you mentioned that the the look of your mom's Pad Thai is, you know, is different than what a lot of other restaurants are serving because of the way that it's made. You mentioned that when you post something yourself, you know that that gets a lot more engagement.

|00:43:45| Chuskul Yeah. Like people like seeing a selfie over a whole room, 00:44:00just, you know, a lonely plate of food.

|00:43:54| Brody So how do you, as a restaurant owner, how are you going to, going forward, sort of try to strike that balance of maintaining the authenticity of the restaurant that you're, that you're carrying on the legacy of and also kind of moving into the future.

|00:44:15| Chuskul Yeah, I mean, that's a big and very new challenge for me, and I think I was feeling kind of held back with my parents and even some of my siblings' attitudes towards the restaurant. And I think my brother was also wanting to like expand, but we weren't always on the same page about how to do that and, with my parents both passed now and my mom recently passed this past 00:45:00December and for the last about eight years I had been a caregiver and caring for her. She had Alzheimer's, and that was another full time job I was doing with running the restaurant. So I think for a lot of those years, I was just kind of like, let's just keep things going, status quo. But now that I've been relieved of my caregiving duties, I'm starting to think about how to creatively expand. And I think in 2020, my friends and I held a Thai brunch that was quite successful. And we did a buffet style brunch. We're a BYOB restaurant, so everybody could bring their own champagne or beverage of choice. But I made...I 00:46:00brought some, like, orange juice, and I made some tamarind juice so people could do tamarind mimosas. And the buffet consisted of some menu items, but then a couple of dishes that I came up with myself. I did a laab omelet. So laab is like that Thai salad that has the fish sauce and citrus and rice powder. And I saw a video that, like, you could make laab with a egg omelet, like you do a solid omelet scramble and cut it into squares, and then you can toss it in the laab dressing and sauce and do fresh herbs, mint and basil and cilantro. And it 00:47:00really brightens up that. And so I wanted to take a, do a take of that with egg and potato because I thought a fried potato kind of goes well with the fish sauce and vinegar where the citrus acidity. It was quite good. That's probably one of the best things I've come up with in a while. But, yeah, that was fun to showcase. And then I did these...And this one's a fun story there. I forget the...I never knew what the name was. I looked it up and I guess it's translated into like "son in law eggs." But they're these fried, hard boiled eggs that have a tamarind based sauce over them, and they're great. And that was one of my 00:48:00favorite things that, my parents would rarely make when I was young and it wasn't on the menu or anything. So I had to kind of reverse engineer it in my memory. And I was like, "What do I remember how she made that?" And I think I also used the knowledge of how they just make the food at the restaurant, too. Like my dad would always say, "You want your food to have three-a balance of three components, sweet, salty and savory. And so using that mindset, I was like, "Okay, I think I know what's in the sauce."

|00:48:41| Brody Figured it out.

|00:48:41| Chuskul And figured it out. Yeah. So that was a fun thing to eat. And I've been thinking about doing that one maybe on a special or regular because a 00:49:00lot of my friends are fans of those eggs.

|00:48:57| Brody Sounds great. And that really reminds me some of the people that I've interviewed, again, you know, started talking about creating a menu, have talked about, you know, and I mentioned this earlier, that balance of trying to push people's palates forward and introduce new things while also keeping the familiar and the accessible...

|00:49:18| Chuskul Mm hmm.

|00:49:18| Brody On the menu. And it sounds like some of these recipes that you're reverse engineering from your childhood are an attempt to do just that. If you were thinking about how to, you know, describe Thai food and sort of the essence or the spirit of Thai food as as you serve it at your restaurant, what would you what would you say to people?

|00:49:47| Chuskul Yeah. I mean, I feel like what I said earlier, that's kind of 00:50:00the philosophy, the balance of the the sweet and salty and savory. And so there's going to be a sweet, like just even just sugar or tamarind. And then...wait, no! I'm misquoting this and I was like, I knew the third one sounded off and it's sweet, salty and sour. I was like, "Okay, sorry about that, everybody. And sorry about that, dad." Okay. So sweet, salty and sour. So there's always that tamarind or the sugar and then the fish sauce and then either vinegar or lime juice or lemon juice. And so it's kind of a vibrant and bright palette, just trying to have all of those, you know, working together. And that's Thai food, I guess.

|00:50:52| Brody And your vision of your own restaurant and sort of the spirit of what you're trying to to provide for your customers. What do you think about that?

|00:51:03| Chuskul Yeah, I feel like because. You know, I'm first generation Asian-American and, eating out, I'm just a big lover of food and all kinds of food. And so what's authentic to me is different. It's kind of going to be a little bit of a hodgepodge. And I know, people's stance on...I don't...I'm not really sure what people's stance on fusion these days are, but that's kind of who I am. You know, I'm a fusion because I'm a Thai woman, first generation in 00:52:00America, so I have both of these cultures that have influenced me throughout the years and, trying to be creative or modernize, what I've gotten really into now is like watching a lot of YouTube content or chef food creators on YouTube. And it kind of came from a boredom from my food actually, because I, I work all the time and I wouldn't really want to eat what was on the menu, especially if I was making it myself. Like there was some kind of trick when my friend would order it and they're like, "Do you want to have some?" And when I, whenever I was sharing the food with them, it tasted good, you know? But then when I was just making it for myself or having to choose, it was kind of boring. So I started 00:53:00watching all these YouTube videos of different Thai foods, and I got really into making Korean food. I was like, "How do I make...How do I use the great ingredients we have at the restaurant and just make something that tastes kind of fresh or different to me?" And maybe I have to buy, like one extra ingredient, but nothing too elaborate. Like I want to try to work with mostly what we have. And so that's what kind of a new, my new menu or new vision is building off of these ideas that I had just because I got bored, you know, eating our food.

|00:53:36| Brody Well, necessity is the mother of invention, right?

|00:53:39| Chuskul Right.

|00:53:41| Brody So you mentioned earlier that the restaurant is BYOB. Is that a conscious choice and or, you know, just sort of because it always was?

|00:53:53| Chuskul Right, yeah. So it's a little bit. So we've been, I don't know if you've gathered we've been a little bit stuck in our ways for a while now. And I know just from school that beverage sales will make up at least sixty percent of your profits because it just has a higher, oh, man, I feel like a bad student now. I can't remember the word, but like higher profitability, the cost to buy and the markup on beverage is really what makes a lot of restaurants money. And I've always kind of disregarded that idea because I liked the idea of us being BYOB. I like the keeping that homey neighborhood spot, like when you 00:55:00bring a bottle and have a good time and and sit and you know have the family I trust make my food. Right? So it's something I, in my heart, I want to keep, but in my brain, I'm not really sure if it's, like, the most smart decision financially. So I haven't...I've had a lot of resistance to explore what that...because friends ask me, like, "Why don't you serve beer and wine?" And I was like, "Oh, you know, you have to pay the liquor license or beer and wine license. And no, that's always so much." And kind of just disregarded it without actually like looking at the numbers and seeing, okay, what would be more sustainable for us? So yeah, I don't know. We'll see where that goes, but I do have, like, an emotional connection to being BYOB, for sure.

|00:55:53| Brody Yeah, I've heard that from several people that sort of the the decision or choice to stay BYOB is as important to the customer experience and sort of the energy in the restaurant itself. And that's super interesting. You mentioned school. So you studied at UNT. Tell me about that and how that studying hospitality has impacted your running of the restaurant.

|00:56:24| Chuskul Yeah, so I think I enjoyed my degree and I liked that a lot of what I was learning was very tangible and I was actually going to use, practical for what I was doing, but at the same time it felt like I could 00:57:00probably learn this on the job, you know, working at other places. But I got to have like a college experience, so I don't know. It was great. And, you know, at the end of the day, what was funny was, you know, I graduated 2012 and I haveall this, you know, textbook knowledge of how to run a restaurant and how to do a cash flow statement and balance sheet and all these ways to...Depreciating your equipment and all this stuff. And so I'm ready to, you know, take over. And I asked my dad, like, "Okay, you know, show me your books." And he just hands me this binder of just our daily sales. And he was like, "All right, there you go." And I was like, "Well, how do you track expenses or do any of that?" And he's 00:58:00just like, "I don't know. It's just ingrained and intuitive to me." To him, he wasn't actually making spreadsheets or balancing out or tracking all that stuff. And even at that time he was paying for a lot of the food on a credit card. So that really offsets the cash flow when you're just not when you're buying your inventory on a credit card, but only paying a set amount every month. But it really undercuts what you're actually making. So it felt like a big mess, coming into the restaurant.

|00:58:32| Brody Did you make changes then at that time or kind of wait until you took over?

|00:58:39| Chuskul Yeah. So we had some financial...We made some kind of intense financial decisions at that time, which I'm not really sure if they were the 00:59:00best or what, but we took a reverse mortgage on our house to kind of clear out all the debt because I was like, "Let's just start from, you know, zero, because I was like, this is this is too funky for me." And at that time, we were needing like some major repairs on the roof at the restaurant. So we had a new roof, but ended up doing a full remodel but kind of on the cheaper end. I'm not really sure if that was the best decision now looking back, but...yeah, it's been a little bit tough trying to figure out how to keep up with the books and do create my own system. I still have trouble with it. And that whole managerial 01:00:00side without having someone who taught me how to do that. And I just think it's so funny how my dad just he, I think did it so, for so long was just very intuitive about it. Sometimes he would go to behind the counter and we still write... We don't even have, like, a POS system, that's how old school we are. So we're still writing our orders by hand. And so just from the stack of the little ticket or ticket bills or whatever, he would be like, "Okay, I think we made X amount of money." I was like, "Dad, that doesn't mean anything. Like one ticket could be $100. One ticket can be like $5." Like the weight of it is not supposed to tell you anything, but he would be pretty accurate. And I mean, he 01:01:00was there at the restaurant seeing, you know, what tables are coming through or whatever, but he would just kind of do that math intuitively, which is not teachable.

|01:01:08| Brody That's really funny that he was pretty accurate.

|01:01:12| Chuskul I know. Yeah. My brother and I would tease each other about that all the time.

|01:01:17| Brody So when you were in school, were there many other students in your classes that had as much sort of on the ground experience as you had growing up in a restaurant?

|01:01:28| Chuskul No, not particularly. But I think what I enjoyed about my peers were they were already working. So I think that was fun to have peers learning together and also working in the same industry already. And I think that was quite unique to the hospitality major because usually it's like, oh, 01:02:00you study the degree and then you look for your job later. But it was just like at the same time, we were doing both and they're the ones that were working students. And so I think what a big contrast of a lot of...Because UNT is a big art school, so a lot of my friends were in the art programs or RTVF and they were, had no money. But then when I would go out with my hospitality friends, they're like, "Oh, I'll buy a round for everyone."

|01:02:33| Brody Big contrast.

|01:02:34| Chuskul Yeah. But yeah, it was fun to have that real world and book knowledge and being able to share in each other's journeys. I don't think that a lot of my peers ended up pursuing hospitality long term like some of them are 01:03:00realtors. Some of them are maybe teaching. Yeah. I don't know. Or have just found other jobs, so I don't know. I feel like mine's a little more unique in that I actually stayed because it's a hard industry and I get it, you know. And you aren't going...It's not guaranteed that you're going to be making these high six figure income. So yeah, it's definitely grunty, scroungy work for not a lot of payoff, but I love it, so.

|01:03:40| Brody That's...And you're carrying on a legacy as well.

|01:03:42| Chuskul Yeah yeah. It's feels very close to me in a lot of ways.

|01:03:48| Brody So if you were giving advice to someone who, like you, you 01:04:00know, grew up with a family business, a restaurant or, you know, even grocery store, food related. And that period of transitioning that you're describing- those conversations with your dad who, you know, kind of it was in his bones to know how things were going. What advice would you give someone who like you is being handed the baton on the family business?

|01:04:24| Chuskul Gosh, I feel like I'm still learning to even be giving that much advice, so I'll just speak for what I'm working on within myself. I think getting your numbers down very clear is really important and I think finances is just hard for anyone, right? It's like, okay, I just check my bank account and 01:05:00see if I have money. And if I do, good. If I don't, oh, no. Right? So getting that down and, you know, getting- asking for help and asking for assistance or maybe getting someone that, you know, that's their skill set to help you. And I think that's a big shift in how I'm trying to run the restaurant now because like I said, it was very isolating. Like all these other families have Thai restaurants, but I didn't grow up with them in a like connected way. I wasn't, I didn't, I wasn't friends with them and everybody was just doing their own thing. 01:06:00And that's kind of the culture of my family structure is just like everyone to do their own thing. But I am reaching a time that if I'm going to keep doing this, I need help, I need community. I need to be able to ask for help in all kinds of ways, like, oh, I need the sink broke. Like, who do I call and how do I fix all these things and collaborating with people? So that's my big growing moment right now is asking for help.

|01:06:27| Brody It's good advice. So we talked about earlier that the Asian community in Dallas has grown a lot since the time that your family started the restaurant. How would you characterize that community today?

|01:06:43| Chuskul The Thai community?

|01:06:44| Brody The Thai community and the larger Asian community in general.

|01:06:49| Chuskul Oh, man. Well, I was like, I'm not sure if I know how to 01:07:00answer this. I just think I mean, for me, I feel like the evolution of technology and Internet and information accessibility has really made things more dynamic and has really changed the atmosphere of culture. And so we havethis huge database system of connecting to, you know, friends and relatives and through social media or just looking up anything on Google. And I think that's what's really been expansive for people's minds and probably has 01:08:00influenced, where people decide to move because it's just, it feels less scary if you can do the research or if you already know people that are there and you can easily talk to them, you know, through like any kind of app like Line. Recently, my relatives from Thailand, after my parents, after my mom passed, were wanting a way to communicate with me and I had never communicated them, with them before and they probably had to ask through weird channels. Probably going back to the the doctor that birthed me who's like, "What's Daisy's phone number?" And reached out to me and like, "Hey, will you download Line so I can talk to you through this app?" And so I don't know if that was the best answer, but that's my answer.

|01:08:51| Brody Sounds like a lot of building connections and maintaining those 01:09:00connections, and it's much more possible, as you said, with the different technologies that we have to do that. So in Dallas, we've had a lot of not just COVID obviously has an impact on, has had an impact on everybody around the world. But we had the tornado a few years ago and then the big ice storm a couple of years ago. So were you impacted or the restaurant impacted in in any way by those incidents?

|01:09:31| Chuskul Yeah, I mean, of course. Right? And so I think in terms of the pandemic, we were an easy fit. And so we had...Because we had such a take out base, we didn't have to pivot our food or restaurant or style or anything to 01:10:00cater to those communities. So I think at the beginning of the pandemic, when everybody was like "support local" and "order takeout," it was, we were doing quite well. But then after a while that slowed down and we still have a big takeout base, but our dine in hasn't built to the level that it was before. And with my brother stepping out from the restaurant, we had, you know, we were down one more person. So the workload was, you know, quite heavy for me and my sister on top of caring for my mom. So we reduced our hours to just 3:00 to 10:00. And so now we don't really have lunch service. And for me, our lunch was so cheap 01:11:00that I was like, I don't even think we're making any money from it anyways. So that was kind of an easy thing to get rid of, but it's been a better work life balance for me if I'm going to be working every day or six days a week to just like kind of focus on when we're making most of our money. So those are some changes we've had. I think with the ice storm, it was kind of fun. Our restaurant, I think, is on the same great grid as the fire station. So we had power at the restaurant, but we didn't have power at home. And I was caring for my mom at the time too, and I was concerned about having her at the house without any heat. And so I just carefully made the trek to the restaurant and 01:12:00people were always so grateful that we were open and serving food and were walking over, carefully driving over. I also did some deliveries because I'm wild like that, I guess. But I just really care, you know? And I really want to serve the community if I can. And so we did that. Unfortunately, we had an accident where I was being very careful having my mom, walking my mom into the restaurant. And so when we got inside, I kind of let her go and turned around and started, you know, doing my own thing. But I forgot that her feet were going to be slippery from the ice, so she had a fall and ended up fracturing her hip. So that was a very unfortunate thing from the storm.

|01:12:55| Brody I'm really sorry to hear that. And sorry also for the loss of your mom.

|01:12:59| Chuskul Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, she was a wonderful lady and really hung in there for a long time. So I'm very grateful for all the times that we've had together.

|01:13:10| Brody Yeah. And you- and you're carrying on her legacy with that recipe.

|01:13:14| Chuskul Yeah, I'm a little mini mom now. I am her.

|01:13:21| Brody A lot of people that that I've talked to who have had restaurants here in Dallas for a long time, have stories of celebrities and in Dallas Cowboys and things like that. Do you have any stories like that?

|01:13:35| Chuskul Gosh, someone was just asking me about this. But I think one of our- I don't know their names, which I guess is fine, but I think that the head like medical doctor for the Dallas Mavericks, he's a regular and I think 01:14:00there is that also an ex-Mavericks player from a long time ago. He's quite tall, almost too tall for our restaurant, that has come over the years too. But yeah, aside from that, I don't know if there's been that big of a celebrity spotting at the Bangkok Inn.

|01:14:17| Brody You might be...sometimes you don't know.

|01:14:18| Chuskul Sometimes I don't know. Maybe I didn't catch them.

|01:14:22| Brody So we've talked a lot about, you know, food and sort of people's feelings around food and the role of food. What is your thinking about the ability of food to transmit culture or to communicate about culture?

|01:14:44| Chuskul Um, gosh, I mean, maybe in so- there's so many ways, you 01:15:00know, even from the ingredients that are used and techniques and styles or just like the sauces. But what it really comes down to for me is family. What your mom was cooking you. You know, your favorite dishes that you had as a child at home? I feel like that's really the big tie for me culturally. So, you know, back to what I was saying, it's like, was it authentic or not? It just was home. It was our culture. And I've been eating at one of my- we're not actually blood 01:16:00related, but she is my cousin. And I've been watching what her mom makes for them. She works full time, but she still cooks for the family every day. And it's always some vegetable. The dish like prepared as simply as just like blanched or fresh or, you know, a stir fry and then a meat protein stir fry. And then there's always like a soup, and the soup is called chuet, which means bland. So it's very, not a strong, you know, bland flavor soup that you eat all of these things with rice together. And that's kind of a very typical like home 01:17:00meal. And then sometimes there's something I feel is more fun, like a sauce. There's one sauce that she makes and we call it fish salsa, but it's kind of like ground or like pulsed fish and some, gosh, I don't know the recipe yet. I'm going to try to figure it out. But yeah, sometimes you'll have the fish salsa on the table. Or I think a big staple that my parents also made was I think it's called "Nam Prik Kapi" and it's the sauce I'm still like working on reverse engineering this one. But the sauce, I think primarily has shrimp paste, fermented shrimp paste that's very salty, very strong in flavor and odor. So it's a very smelly sauce. I think that's why it's not served in a lot of 01:18:00restaurants because they're like, "I don't want to scare off the customers" and it'll leave you with a funky smelling mouth. But I love that sauce. And we would eat it with the Thai omelet and and rice and it goes with everything. And then my dad did a Thai chili and fish sauce. And I would call it "Dad sauce." He would eat it with everything. And I've reverse engineered that sauce and have been having a lot of fun building upon that and making dishes based on that flavor profile. It's just basically a fish sauce and a chili and garlic and lemon juice and sugar. Or the palm sugar. And it's been, yeah, it's been fun to 01:19:00kind of explore. I feel like, did I answer that question? I don't know.

|01:19:09| Brody Sounds wonderful. So finally, what are some lessons or reflections that you have on your life in the restaurant?

|01:19:22| Chuskul Oh. Okay. Hmm. Well, I think as far as working goes, it's made me like kind of a, I guess a hard worker without asking for much. You know, 01:20:00I don't have a big expectation. Sometimes I hear about of what I'm going to receive. So sometimes I hear about my friends who are like, "Oh, that's, you know, above my pay grade" or like "I'm not if I'm not getting paid for that, I'm not going to do it." But my mentality is like, "Oh, you do everything, whatever needs to be done, you do it." And you don't think about, "Oh, is this going to reward me later?" And just like helping each other out and and working and getting things done.

|01:20:34| Brody That's great. Well, thank you for that. And is there anything that I didn't ask you today that you'd like to add to this interview?

|01:20:42| Chuskul I think we covered a lot. So I'm feeling pretty good about it.

|01:20:47| Brody Thank you. I really appreciate you sharing your family's story and your own experiences for this project. Thank you so much.

|01:20:55| Chuskul Thank you.