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Grab a table at Thai Recipes. The owners Wannee and Dr. Tep Saicheur have a story to tell. While on most days they tell this story with their home style, traditional Thai food, I was lucky enough to sit down with Wannee and Tep and hear the story behind the food, which begins more than 10 years ago, when the Saicheurs came to Davis as graduate students.
When Tep and Wannee arrived in Davis, they had no intention of starting a restaurant; they came to pursue graduate degrees. Tep eventually earned a doctorate in veterinary medicine and Wannee finished a masters degree in child development. But during their time here, they fell in love with Davis and did not want to leave after graduating. So they opened Thai Recipes, one of the only Thai restaurants in Davis at the time.
While the Saicheurs had no official restaurant experience or training, Wannee had been cooking her whole life and had studied home economics as an undergrad. Tep quickly learned the business side of the restaurant, and they fully embraced the challenge of cooking strictly traditional Thai food here in Northern California. It took them about two years to source all the products they needed to complete the authentic menu. To this day, they go shopping themselves at small specialty stores once a week for products they can't order. And if they can't buy it or order it, the Saicheurs will grow certain hard-to-find ingredients (like kaffir lime leaves) themselves.
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