Sophina Uong
Sophina Uong doesn’t do a lot that’s anticipated in a kitchen. The manager chef and co-owner of Mister Mao in New Orleans is thought for her “inauthentic” takes on world dishes. However she says that, even with that perspective, when the house owners of Skinny Dennis approached her and requested, “Are you able to make Asian meals in our honky-tonk?” she had one thought: “Are you insane?’”
Fortuitously, neither Uong nor Zephaniah O’Hora or Salvatore Fristensky, the house owners of Skinny Dennis, are scared off by “insane” concepts. So on March 10, Uong will open Little Miss Mao in East Nashville from a kitchen within the new honky-tonk, which opens March 1.
Uong, who immigrated as a baby to the U.S. from Cambodia, is a James Beard 2024 Greatest Chef South semifinalist who has labored in most of the nation’s favourite kitchens.
As you may guess from her background and the restaurant locale, the concept behind Little Miss Mao just isn’t your common bar meals. Uong was nonetheless finalizing the menu when she spoke to the Scene earlier than the opening, however she promised just a few issues, together with: garlic noodles utilizing Mr. Aaron’s chitarra; Prahok Ktiss, a Okhmer curried pork + fermented seafood dip; grilled Alabama oysters; and Pani Puri potato masala. The menu will likely be obtainable to these having fun with reside music and a beer at Skinny Dennis and, ultimately, anybody who needs a late-night meal that’s one thing completely different from the everyday midnight taco or burger. Little Miss Mao will likely be open from 5 p.m. to 1 a.m. day by day, plus weekend brunch. Uong needs hospitality employees to have the ability to come get some tasty dishes after they get off their shifts elsewhere, whether or not they want a full meal or just a bit snack.
Clients will order from their telephones or from the small window at Skinny Dennis, and meals will likely be delivered to them when prepared.
Little Miss Mao joins Nashville’s explosion of Asian and Asian-inspired eateries lately (see additionally: Kisser, Kase, Noko, Current Tense and 888, simply to call just a few). Uong guarantees so as to add to these choices, together with her private imaginative and prescient, counting on her Cambodian roots and affinity for spicier dishes.
“We’re enjoyable, seasonal native purveyors — we make adventurous snacks, and don’t take ourselves too critically,” she says of the Mister Mao/Little Miss Mao vibe.
Skinny Dennis additionally hopes to supply one thing not available in Nashville, O’Hora says. With a capability of 200 to 300 individuals, it’s larger than The Bowery Vault and smaller than The Basement East. It’s designed for expertise for each musicians and audiences. For instance, there’s a inexperienced room with a restroom, so musicians don’t have to face in line ready to make use of the lavatory throughout a quick break of their units. There’s a dance ground, sales space seating and a few elbow room. Plus, the area at 2635 Gallatin Pike was bigger than initially anticipated, with a totally enclosed patio, permitting for extra experimentation than initially anticipated.
It wasn’t the imaginative and prescient, initially, to have a full meals menu at Skinny Dennis, O’Hora provides. “However as soon as I began residing right here, I may see how meals is a fairly key piece of the scene right here. Not like New York, [many] individuals need to drive dwelling, and so they don’t seem to be simply consuming.”
“There are such a lot of good burger locations and a lot good pizza,” O’Hora says. “Little Miss Mao is ideal for an sudden curveball.”
