By 7 p.m. Saturday — one of its final nights of service — Kothai Republic had the energy owner Sung Park has been trying to will into existence since opening in 2023.
The room in the Inner Sunset was packed. Candlelit tables overflowed with beautiful food. And Park was all smiles. A native San Franciscan with 30 years of experience in hospitality, he acted as both chef and server — running dishes, checking on tables, making sure guests felt taken care of.
When he learned my friend was vegetarian, Park threw together a salad of lacy chrysanthemum leaves, sunflower shoots, crunchy pickled fennel, and a briny seaweed dressing (about which my friend is still raving). When the two women next to us kept ogling it, he gifted them one too. This kind of generosity is second nature to him.
Kothai will close for good Feb. 15. When we were there, even though it was a goodbye, everything felt celebratory. The ending didn’t seem inevitable. The difference between staying open and shuttering felt contingent on whether the support had come sooner — and consistently.
“For the next two weeks, we’re going to be the busiest restaurant in town,” Park said, happy yet rueful. “When I look at the numbers, we only needed about eight more people a night, and we’d still be here.”
At the adjacent table, two neighborhood locals polished off lamb with Sichuan peppercorn sauce and flaky roti. First-time diners, they felt crushed when they realized what they’d been missing. I asked Park if it was a gut punch to see reservations spike only after people learned the restaurant was shutting down. He leaned in and whispered conspiratorially: “So many people have said, ‘We’re so sad you’re closing — Kothai has been on our list to try.’ And I want to tell them, ‘But we’ve been open for three years!’”
Chef-owner Sung Park of Kothai Republic is the consummate host. | Source: Andria Lo for The Standard
This is not to say that Park isn’t aware of Kothai’s flaws. The dining room is spare and pragmatic. The Asian-inflected menu is hard to sum up and doesn’t fully telegraph the sophistication of the food — food that surely requires high costs of goods and lots of labor. In an expensive, competitive city, there is little room for error. (And even seasoned, successful restaurateurs struggle.) Putting your heart and soul into something, as Park has done, isn’t always enough.
Kothai represents the majority of restaurants in San Francisco. Most never make the media’s “hot lists.” They survive on a base of regulars, people from the neighborhood who return again and again. And yet, as a diner, I understand how overwhelming it can feel to be told it’s your responsibility to save a restaurant you love. Eating out is shockingly expensive and insists that you step away from the vortex of your couch. How can we be surprised when a restaurant closes if we rarely — or never — ate there?
Once, while wincing between bites of suped-up chicken wings on “Hot Ones,” chef David Chang offered a simple suggestion (opens in new tab): “To help the restaurants we love survive, we should choose three to five places and get to know them.”
I love this idea, though I think one restaurant — ideally in your own neighborhood — is a great start. Try going at least monthly, on off-days, not busy weekends. And attempt to dine later at night. An 8 p.m. reservation can make a real difference. (You post-pandemic early-to-bedders, mainline an afternoon espresso, if that helps.) “When you look into a restaurant around 7, it looks busy,” Park told me. “But for a restaurant to be successful, it needs to turn the tables twice in a night.”
On Friday night, the restaurant was full. | Source: Sara Deseran
Park gestured toward a table occupied by a woman who was pregnant when she began coming to Kothai Republic and whose daughter, now a toddler, has grown up eating at the restaurant. “No exaggeration, we have had a handful of guests who have come here over 100 consecutive weeks,” he said, grateful. “Being lucky enough to have regular guests is not a right, however. It’s a blessing and a privilege.” Beyond the economic impact, it keeps a chef like Park emotionally bolstered.
And if, amid the churn of exciting openings, returning to the same restaurant feels like a bland civic duty, think of it as an opportunity to access something beyond a good dinner: familiarity, comfort, and the chance to watch the business evolve — one that you’ve played a part in. And yes, there are perks. The better a chef knows you, the more likely you are to get thrown a bone. Or, if you’re lucky, a fantastic salad.