The northeast Minneapolis-based Vinai restaurant is a newly nationally recognized hub for Hmong food with the restaurant’s interior being a “love letter” to the owner’s parents.
Chef Yia Vang opened Vinai in July 2024 in the Sheridan neighborhood after owning Union Hmong Kitchen on Lake Street for several years.
The restaurant opens at 5 p.m. from Tuesday to Saturday. Reservations are encouraged, as the restaurant frequently fills up within thirty minutes of opening.
The restaurant got its name from the Ban Vinai refugee camp in Thailand where Vang’s parents met and he was born. Vang said the name still hits home for many refugees in Minnesota.
“When you say the name Vinai, there’s still a lot of refugees that remember their first time coming from there and then there’s still a lot of parents and grandparents who are around and that’s where they came from,” Vang said.
Vang said he worked with an architect when designing the restaurant to tie elements of his family into Vinai’s interior.
A few examples of these design choices include the cinder blocks in the center of the restaurant relating to his dad teaching him how to grill, the textured wall resembling the old refugee homes in Vinai, a shelf containing family photos from the camp and plants representing his mom’s green thumb, Vang said.
“(My parents) harvest their garden and it all comes to the restaurant,” Vang said. “They didn’t ask for a dime.”
Vinai said the food created at Vinai is meant to mimic what parents would serve their children if they had the technology back then.
“It is one generation builds a platform so that another generation can fortify it and build (it), making it stronger,” Vang said.
Customers Chai Khang-Lee and Rory Lee said the food served here is traditional Hmong food but with a more elegant presentation.
“This is something our parents would pack for us when we were younger, just different,” Khang-Lee said.
Khang-Lee added that while Hmong food is typically difficult to plate in a pretty fashion, Vinai nails the presentation.
Bartender Autumn Reid, who has worked at Vinai for around two weeks, said she has never experienced anything like this restaurant.
“Sharing is caring and that is exactly what we’re trying to inspire,” Reid said. “You can actually feel and taste the love in the food,”
The food is priced above average, with the highest-priced item being a Double Cut Pork Chop at $58.
The New York Times listed Vinai as one of their “50 Favorite Places in America 2024.”
Vang said his goal is to tell the Hmong story through food by balancing the differences in Hmong food all over the country.
While Vinai will continue to serve food, Vang said he also wants the restaurant to be a place of restoration and community.
“We’re using food as a vehicle to help develop and build community, just like the refugee camp was 50 years ago, where all these people were displaced, lost, without a home,” Vang said. “They came together and families were formed, communities were formed.”
