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New Oakland Cambodian Restaurant Makes Bon Appetit's Top 10 List

OAKLAND (KPIX) - An Oakland restaurant made it onto the list of America's '10 Best New Restaurants.'

"Not so many people know too much about Cambodia or its history and I think that's why I wanted to introduce them to Cambodian food," says Nite Yun, chef and owner of Nyum Bai Restaurant. "The food I grew up eating, the food I grew up with, the food I fell in love with and still fall in love with."

Yun is proud of her culture and loves sharing her Cambodian cuisine with her customers in Oakland's Fruitvale.

"Once you eat it there's a handful of people who say it's unlike anything I've ever had. They can't pinpoint what it is and maybe it's the fermented fish paste that we use to make it stand apart," she says.

Yun and her family's story is one of survival. Now they are living the American dream.

"My parents escaped the genocide in Cambodia and we settled in a refugee camp for about seven years until we able to call Stockton home," she said.

Yun opened up her Cambodian restaurant Nyum Bai just a few months ago. It's already getting a lot of attention.

It just made Bon Appetit's 2018 Hot List for the best new restaurants in the country, coming in at #5 on the list.

Bon Appetit editor Julia Kramer was on the CBS This Morning, talking about Yun's restaurant.

"And then when she was in her 20s went back to Cambodia where her parents had fled the genocide and 70s and tasted of the food there and said oh this is what I grew up eating and I need to cook this food in the restaurant then came back and opened her spot and now it's on our list best restaurants in America," said Kramer.

"When I heard the news from my friends and family about making into the top 10 I'm just overwhelmed, filled with gratitude and joy and love and feeling the support from the community," said Yun.

Self-proclaimed 'foodie' RG Rosero has his own foodie Instagram page RGSMunchies. He's trying the food here for the first time.

"I would say I'm a foodie a self-proclaimed foodie not like I got a doctorate on food!" he said. "I thought the food was pretty on point. I was told to check this place out on Instagram since I was coming to Oakland today."

Customer Quennie Lau agrees.

"The food is amazing and it's great that it's a woman-owned business," she said.

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