Nguyen Tran of Starry Kitchen hanging with Jet Tila at LAFW last Friday and totally keeping secrets like a boss
The internet has been abuzz with news of the return of Nyugen and Thi Tran’s pop-up restaurant Starry Kitchen. Just as they were getting settled in delivering their scratch-and-sniff curry and other delights through Uber Eats, plans were already in the making to set up the food for upcoming arcade-bar (or barcade) Button Mash.
According to the LA Times, Button Mash is slated to open as early as late September in a strip mall in Echo Park. “The restaurant will feature a sit-down area, an arcade game area and a bar and pinball area.”
EaterLA has announced that Button Mash is supposed to have “50 classic games from the owners’ personal collection of over 100 machines, plus a selection from local legend Jim Belsito’s pinball machine collection.” Centipede and Ms. Pacman are a sure bet, but we just hope they have Bubble Bobble. Although it was far more popular on home gaming systems than in arcades, Bubble Bobble kicks serious ass.
Games aside, we are just happy to have Starry Kitchen back, and we didn’t even have to contribute real money to their Kickstarter campaign (Although I fully expect Nguyen to honor his promise of getting a unicorn tattoo with me riding it). The LA Beat spoke with Nguyen about the new menu. “I think half of the menu will be new dishes here. Some of the stuff we did at Grand Star won’t be here, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be back in other iterations or concepts.” Let’s hope someday, somehow, Singapore Crab will come back to us. For now we are just ecstatic that Starry Kitchen is coming back! And there will be beer!
As Nguyen Tran told the LA Beat, “it’s good to have our balls back in the game.”
