Benchawan Jabthong Painter is the mastermind behind Houston’s beloved restaurant Road to Kitchen.
Editor’s notice: Benchawan Jabthong Painter is a 2024 Houstonian of the 12 months finalist. Learn in regards to the winner and the opposite runners-up right here.
When Benchawan Jabthong Painter was a younger woman, she beloved hanging out in her grandma’s restaurant in her house nation of Thailand. She obtained to style all of the meals whereas studying find out how to prepare dinner it alongside the way in which. Her grandma made it enjoyable—it by no means felt like work or an obligation.
“She knew find out how to make me really feel like I wish to do that,” Jabthong Painter says. “I grew up with it, and I like to eat a lot. However each time I see somebody have a smile on their face after they attempt my meals, it touches my happiness.”
Raised within the restaurant business, she naturally adopted in her grandma’s footsteps, a journey that may sooner or later land her on the prime of her sport: the chef and co-owner of a extremely acclaimed and award-winning Thai restaurant stateside, Road to Kitchen. Jabthong Painter, who’s now recognized across the kitchen as Chef G, beloved being concerned with the household enterprise and labored at varied eating places and pastry outlets in Bangkok, the place she finally met her husband, Graham Painter. In 2015, they made their technique to Houston.
When she moved right here, she continued to work within the restaurant business at spots just like the now-closed SaltAir Seafood Kitchen. Her culinary world actually expanded beneath the route of chef Justin Yu at Theodore Rex, the place she discovered about approach and the small print that go into every step of the cooking course of, which she says was a sport changer. She additionally visited loads of native Thai eating places, however she observed that none of them had been as genuine as she would really like—and she or he missed her house nation’s cooking.
“American Thai meals is completely different from the place I got here from,” Jabthong Painter says. “The elements aren’t the identical as a result of they regulate to cater to the individuals within the space.”
At some point, she turned to her husband with an concept. If she opened her personal restaurant, she might make genuine meals, and possibly assist Thai people who find themselves additionally homesick. Nevertheless, there was one more reason: She needed others to have an actual understanding of Thai meals and the nation’s distinct areas—North, Northeastern, Central, Southern—which every have a novel tradition and converse completely different languages. Within the outdated days, Thailand’s royal kingdoms influenced the meals their individuals had been consuming, creating one other sort of delicacies that’s grow to be well-liked, Royal Thai.
Jabthong Painter started to pursue pop-ups at farmers markets round city, taking no matter elements had been seasonal and contemporary and turning them into Thai dishes. In August 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, she and her husband took a leap of religion and opened a brick-and-mortar within the East Finish.
The primary iteration of Road to Kitchen was in a former Popeye’s, in a tiny fuel station strip middle, on a nook of Harrisburg Boulevard nearly hidden by an overpass. Take-out solely at first, it had simply 10 tables and was BYOB. However the restaurant was a direct hit. Jabthong Painter says individuals had been driving from The Woodlands and Sugar Land to eat there.
The restricted seating made it laborious to accommodate everybody. Jabthong Painter knew it was only a matter of time till she must look for a bigger area. They started looking out in 2022—which turned out to be excellent timing as a result of the subsequent 12 months, she received a James Beard Award for Finest Chef: Texas. A longtime buyer of Road to Kitchen had spoken to her in regards to the empty area he had within the Plant in Second Ward after Café Louie closed, which was 3 times greater. They made the transfer in November 2023, and their buyer was promoted to landlord.
With the expanded area, Road to Kitchen was capable of make a number of modifications, together with including a full-service bar, which is curated by Graham Painter (additionally a co-owner). The purpose is to make friends really feel like they’re leaving Houston and getting into a restaurant within the couple’s favourite a part of Bangkok: Thong Lor, an space of city frequented by a hip, artistic crowd. This “journey” is executed by means of Thai decorations, vibrant colours, music, and an aroma that can make your mouth water.
The star of the present—the meals—offers diners a glimpse into Jabthong Painter’s life in North Central Thailand, a border area with a melding of North and Central culinary traditions plus a number of of its personal, with dishes like purple curry corn fritters, Grandma Pluentha’s eggplant fish curry, and betel leaf crab curry. Should you had been a fan of the restaurant on the former location, you most likely keep in mind that Jabthong Painter would shock diners on weekends with particular menu objects. Now, Road to Kitchen affords specials each evening, like a gaeng ran juang stew made with A5 Wagyu Black, a grass-fed Crying Tiger rib eye served with Lao-style som tum, and even coconut shallot caviar ice cream.
Honest warning: Road to Kitchen has earned a fame for being very spicy, even by Texas requirements. That is by design, as Jabthong Painter strives to serve meals that’s genuine to Thailand, not a watered-down model. She additionally encourages diners to share their meals, to take pleasure in all of the completely different taste profiles the dishes supply.
“That is the meals I actually wish to share with my buddies, my household, and all my prospects,” she says. “Road to Kitchen is rarely going to be excellent, however I don’t consider in excellent.”
And, properly, life isn’t excellent, both. Opening her restaurant in the midst of the pandemic wasn’t simple, and 2024 introduced on different important challenges. Road to Kitchen was hit laborious by the derecho in Could, shedding energy for 5 enterprise days. Then got here Hurricane Beryl in July. The restaurant’s outage solely lasted two days, a comparatively brief time in comparison with others, however Road to Kitchen nonetheless misplaced a number of enterprise, as many individuals both assumed eating places weren’t open or had been too caught up with their very own restoration to dine out. And between the Could and July storms, the restaurant misplaced energy randomly 4 extra instances—thanks, CenterPoint.
This didn’t cease Jabthong Painter from serving to others throughout that point. Road to Kitchen distributed to-go meals on a pay-what-you-can foundation. A wine dinner in early August to have a good time its four-year anniversary contributed simply shy of $2,000 to the Southern Smoke Basis.
When Road to Kitchen was one of many fortunate locations with energy in the course of the horrid 2021 freeze in Texas, Jabthong Painter did what she might to convey some heat again into individuals’s lives, donating over 1,000 meals to individuals locally.
An important manner Jabthong Painter likes to provide again is thru second probabilities. She offers alternatives to be taught culinary expertise to individuals who’ve come out of jail. So long as they’re disciplined and able to work, that’s all that issues, she says.
Jabthong Painter nonetheless has loads extra up her sleeve. Road to Kitchen simply received a Bib Gourmand from Michelin, for one. The couple can also be increasing the restaurant after they acquired the enterprise subsequent door when it closed in December 2023. The purpose is to have a tasting room the place diners can bask in unique dishes. When wanted, it’ll additionally function an additional eating room to accommodate overflow of consumers.
The chef has many different concepts she’d wish to finally convey to fruition, together with 4 to 5 new ideas, and even a restaurant again in her house nation that can create a fusion of Texas and Thai elements. One thing individuals don’t know, she says: In Thailand, they love barbecue, too.
