by TM Petaccia

After 36 years, Charlotte’s first Thai restaurant will be getting a facelift and a gradual refocus. Chiengthong Kongkham, who launched the business in 1988, has begun the process of stepping back from day-to-day operations with her son, Roger, stepping in to continue the family legacy.

“I knew my mother wanted me to come back here, but there’s still a lot of things that I still wanted yet to explore, especially with the the bar scene,” he says. For the past few years, Roger Kongkham has been one of the top-tier mixologists at The Bar at Supperland. He also owned and operated his own place, Hibiscus, until it closed in 2021. He was recently profiled in UP’s Behind the Stick, and is the winner of several local and regional cocktail competitions.

“Now I’m going to be a lot more hands-on with Thai Taste as my mother wants to be a little bit more hands-off,” Kongkham says.

With the transition will come some notable changes, inside and out. Plans call for the addition of a 16 to 20 seat patio along with the expansion of the bar. Since the restaurant is located in one of Charlotte’s designated historic communities, the changes had to be approved by the Historic District Commission. Approval was granted last month. The plans are now awaiting City approval to get the proper permits to begin construction.

If all goes as planned, the first construction phase will begin sometime in July.

Two parking spaces at the front corner of the building will be replaced by an enclosed patio. Inside, the bar will be extended ten feet with seating for six. William Lee Robinson is the architect for the project.

As far as the rest of the interior, Kongkham wants to take it slow. “I want to start small, rearranging some things in the interior,” he says. “Something as simple as lighting, maybe painting some of the accent walls, I just want to open up the space a little.”

Structural changes aren’t the only ones planned. “I want to trim down the menu a little,” Kongkham says. “Charlotte’s palates are not the same as they were back in the early ’90s, so it’d be nice to see some changes. Currently, we have about 46 items on our menu. I’d like to get that to under 30, and rotate the others in and out as specials, plus maybe some new items. We’ve been tracking which dishes are selling more than others and seeing what we could trim.”

Kongkham also envisions a late-night menu, serving until 11 p.m. or midnight. But again, implementation will be methodical. “We’re going take everything very slow,” he says.

With his background, it’s a given the bar program will overhauled. “I’m thinking it’d be really fun to have a low-key, but amazing bar program,” Kongkham says. “A lot of the bar inspiration is going to come from from what we were doing at a Hibiscus. I also have someone who is going to come along, and we’ll work in tandem on the bar program. Right now, I’m thinking about offering pre-batched cocktails, like two rotating milk punches and several different high balls. I also want to bring in more Asian spirits: sake, soju, shochu, and others.”

In the meantime, Kongkham will still be pulling shifts at The Bar at Supperland, gradually spending more time at Thai Taste. His plans are to fully be ensconced at Thai Taste this August.

“It’s exciting. This is a place I spent much of my entire childhood, and now I’m able to have this kind of input to change things here and there and put my own imprint on it,” he says. “My mom spent the better part of the past 40 years here. I’m sure she’ll always have a hand in it, but she says she’s ready to retire.”

“She’s earned it.”