Japanese, Vietnamese restaurant ready to serve diversity in the RGV

The Rio Grande Valley is mostly known for their Mexican food, however many new cafés and restaurants are serving more diverse cultural flavors for the public to try. 

In Brownsville, a Vietnamese café and a Japanese ramen restaurant are bringing in more diversity with their culture and aspiration in having citizens try something new and different. 

Dino Tea & Coffee is a Vietnamese café owned by Emily Vo and her husband, who were born and raised in Vietnam and later moved to Brownsville. 

“I always loved Boba tea and my husband loved coffee and I always wanted something with the flavor we had in Vietnam,” Vo said. 

The inspiration to create a business surrounding her culture featuring her favorite drinks came from a nostalgic feeling.

 She said she always thought about a place for her and her family to hangout and snack.

Vo added Vietnamese culture has “really good” spicy food, and the coffee they have is popularly known for being tasteful and strong. Her goal was to bring that tastefulness of coffee to Brownsville. 

“It’s hard for me to find a name I liked, and I looked at my son who’s name is Dino and I thought it was cute and my daughter also liked dinosaurs. So, that’s how the theme and title of the place came to be,” she said when asked the meaning behind her business’ name.

Vo said she wants her customers to feel comfortable and happy when they bring their kids here and enjoy their time together. She added she wants them to try their coffee and taste something different then they are used to. 

The Dino Tea & Cafe is open from 9 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Monday to Saturday and from 10 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on Sunday at 500 E Morrison Rd Suite H in Brownsville.

Kuyashii Ramen

Another owner who was inspired to share their passion for diverse cuisines is Robert Escobedo, owner of the Japanese restaurant named Kuyashii Ramen.   

“We went on a trip to try ramen because we never had it available in the area and we came back with this idea to bring something to Brownsville that we haven’t experienced,” Escobedo said.

He added  he went on a trip to Austin where he noticed that these bigger cities have different options of cuisines and smaller cities, such as Brownsville did not have that.

“We do use a lot of Japanese products to cook and prepare our food, from what I learned from their culture is that the way tacos are to us, is the way ramen is their favorite cultural dish to them,” he said. 

Sesame oil, mushrooms, sesame paste, mirin seasoning, cooked bamboo and Kombu, which is a type of seaweed to season the broth are some of the Japanese ingredients the restaurant uses. 

“We do a fusion of ramen because we try to cater to our demographic,” he said. “So, we have birria ramen, which is catered to the demographic in our area.” 

When asked the reasoning behind his business’ name, Escobedo said ‘Kuyashii’ is a Japanese word for when no one believes in you and you work very hard.

“We decided to name the restaurant that because we never had the support,” he said.

Escobedo said he wants to transport his people from a regular traditional restaurant in Brownsville to have a different experience.

“We always try to provide an experience for every guest, our menu is a bit intimidating to read at first because some of it is in Japanese, so there’ll be a small learning curve, but the experience is always fun,” he said. 

Kuyashii Ramen restaurant is open from 5 to 10 p.m. Tuesday to Sunday at 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., and from 5 to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday at 1212 E Washington St. in Brownsville.