FEAST UPON A UNIQUE CAMBODIAN TASTING MENU

One of America’s only Cambodian tasting menus is served in Chicago thanks to Khmai Fine Dining in Rogers Park. Chef and owner Mona Sang launched the endeavor in January with the intent of rotating menus monthly to focus on a particular Cambodian province.

Diners can experience a unique seven-course meal with non-alcoholic or alcoholic beverage pairings. March’s menu focuses on Kampot, a province known for its peppercorns, durian, and crab dishes. For many diners, Khmai’s gateway to Cambodian food is the egg roll, something they’re eaten at Chinese and Vietnamese restaurants. Egg rolls aren’t on Khmai’s tasting menu. Sang is determined to set Cambodian food apart from other Asian cuisines.

“We want to have our own shadow; we don’t want to be behind anyone else,” she says.

Sang has since reconsidered, deciding to switch menus every two months — it’s too much stress on the staff. As one of two Chicago’s Cambodian restaurants, Sang has taken her role as a cultural ambassador seriously since the original iteration of the restaurant opened in 2022, earning a place on Eater’s Best New Restaurants in America list. The restaurant moved toward Loyola University’s Rogers Park campus last year and split the space into a casual side (called Kaun Khmai) and a more fine dining space, anchored by a colorful mural of an Aspara dancer. One of the restaurant’s signatures is a staff which can explain the stories and histories of dishes to customers, sharing Sang’s passion and experiences as a refugee. Customers will also often see Sang’s 84-year-old mother in the kitchen.

The overarching goal is to present traditional Cambodian flavors playfully and elegantly, proving to fine dining fans that her culture belongs on the same pedestal as other cuisines. Sang also wants to show diners how wars with the French and Chinese influenced cooking in Cambodia, bringing diners back to how food tasted in the country before those conflicts. Sang resisted calls to adapt Khmai’s food to local tastes, as she isn’t in any mood to mute the funk.

“Not everyone is going to like this, but the people that do like it will come,” Sang says. “I don’t expect my food to be for everyone — but I can’t water it down. It’s like hiding my identity and I’ve done that enough.”

The tasting menu attempts to thread a needle between appeasing Cambodians longing for traditional cooking and fine dining aficionados who demand fancy platings for an elevated experience. An example of this effort comes from Khmai’s presentation of num banh chok. Khmai’s version includes a tableside presentation so diners can see the vermicelli noodles before the fish broth is poured on top.

Cambodian fine dining is rare in America. New York has a few standouts and is expecting a few new entries this year, and Philadelphia has a large Cambodian population, as does Long Beach, California. Sophon in Seattle has earned several awards and has further blurred the line to what constitutes a tasting menu. Some of its courses are served family style, a philosophy shared at Hermosa, Chicago’s other prominent Cambodian restaurant. The family-style aspect is important to traditional Cambodian cuisine, where communal dining plays an important role. There’s room for different approaches in the fine dining area, and Chicago has two unique options.

Khmai Fine Dining, 6580 N. Sheridan Road, tasting menu reservations available via OpenTable

Correction: March 17, 2025, 3:30 p.m. This article was corrected to recognize and include tasting menu formats from other Cambodian restaurants, including Chicago’s own Hermosa, which has served a 16-course meal with family-style courses. This means Khmai Fine Dining isn’t alone in offering a tasting menu featuring Cambodian food. The headline has been adjusted to reflect that.

2025-03-08T00:28:18Z