"Northeast Minneapolis Thai restaurant Sen Yai Sen Lek and sister sandwich restaurant Dipped & Debris have closed after a combined 14-year run. Current and former staff and a small army of regulars gathered Saturday to say goodbye to the restaurants, longtime anchors of Central Avenue’s diverse food corridor that — even amid two of the most socially isolated years in recent memory — have remained vibrant, essential spaces for people to gather and eat. Owners Holly and Joe Hatch-Surisook met working at a St. Louis Applebee’s. After resettling in Minneapolis, they opened Sen Yai Sen Lek in a brick storefront on Central Avenue in 2008. At the time, they say, there were fewer Thai restaurants in Northeast. Joe, who emigrated from Bangkok at age 5, spent hours revising recipes with his mother’s guidance, attempting to capture the flavors and textures of his childhood Saturday afternoons, like ba mee haeng, an egg noodle dish made with barbecue pork, fried garlic oil, and peanuts. In the years since, Sen Yai Sen Lek has become beloved for its Thai menu: creamy, fragrant bowls of khao soi, spicy pad kee mao, and Isaan dishes like som tum (green papaya salad) served with fried pork and a mound of hot sticky rice. But even stronger than its identity as a Thai restaurant, say Holly and Joe, is its identity as a community restaurant — a place with the windows thrown open on sunny days, where neighbors gather weekly to eat." - Justine Jones
