Chef Seng was born in Laos and fled the country during the Vietnam War. During her stay at a Thailand refugee camp of Nakhon Phanom, she learned how to cook from her camp neighbors and elders. At the age of twelve, she was the eldest of five and took on the role of caretaker of her four younger siblings in order to support her working mother. In 2009, at the age of 40 she decided to go after her greatest passion, cooking. She took over Padaek (previously Bangkok Golden) in 2010 and in 2014, she opened Thip Khao.

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Bobby Pradachith grew up in Northern Virginia in a Lao household. He felt lost within his family’s culture due to separate upbringings outside of home. As he sought to understand more about his family, he discovered food could help guide his learning journey. The opportunity to study in culinary school and to work under his chef-mother and the tutelages of other Chefs in several restaurants in DC and New York helped guide him, to continue to operate his family’s two restaurants. His sole ambitions are to preserve the integrity of the culture through food and to encourage the Lao-American communities to follow the journey of Lao story telling. He finds old historical contents, recipes, and art to be the inspirations within the menu.

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