Sunhee's Days: Chasing the Clouds Away
An Asian immigrant opened a restaurant in Troy. Now take all of the stereotypes and assumptions that just floated up out of your subconscious and pop them.
“Food is a bridge,” Jinah Kim, the founder of Sunhee’s Farm and Kitchen in Troy. “I see myself, and Sunhee’s, as existing between cultures, and becoming a way for people from different places to come together and learn from each other.”
Kim came to the United States from South Korea with her parents and older brother when she was three years old. She and her family went on to tick off several boxes on the usual high-achieving recent immigrant list: Her parents opened a successful jewelry store in Albany after learning the trade from relatives in Massachusetts; she studied hard and in 2012 graduated from Boston College with a degree in international relations; she worked as a case manager for the Refugee Resettlement Office of Catholic Charities Community Services in New York City for a few years, but she missed the Capital Region and decided to return when she was given an opportunity at the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants in Albany.
But then Kim decided to flip the script.
“Growing up, my parents were working so hard, and they were so busy that we couldn’t spend as much time together as we wanted,” Kim recalls on a recent, rare quiet moment over Ginger Tea in Sunhee’s. “So when I was in New York City, coming home and spending time with my family became really special. Food has always been important to all of us, and a way we could come together after long days at work and school and communicate without saying a word.”
In 2012, her parents purchased a 41-acre farm in Cambridge. Her father began keeping laying hens and meat chickens, and growing produce like scallions, hot peppers, perilla leaves and Korean cucumbers. On more and more frequent visits to her parent’s house, seeing the flavors of her childhood—the kimchi, bibimbap, radish pickles, soy-sesame chicken bowls—transformed and intensified via a seasonal, farm-fresh lens intensified her pleasure in not just food but Korean food specifically.
Meanwhile, her work with refugee groups captured her heart.
“I still remember what it was like being a recent immigrant,” Kim recalls. “Overall, I have had a wonderful experience in America, but you never forget what it’s like to learn English when everyone around is fluent, and eating foods you love in the school cafeteria that seem weird or smelly to other kids. I wanted to help new Americans who are struggling know that it’s OK, and that it will get better.”
Kim dreamed of a way to combine her parents’ entrepreneurial zeal with her passion for helping “outsiders,” while also paying tribute to their shared history.
“I came across this amazing space for rent and I just instantly had a vision of what it could be,” Kim recalls of the space that she and her parents turned into Sunhee’s. A former Irish pub, it sat vacant for two years, and the rent, when she inquired, was reasonable. Her parents— who opened two successful jewelry stores, ran a ministry for a time at Korean Community Church and purchased and built up a farm—are consummate entrepreneurs and embraced the notion of launching with their daughter a business rooted in traditional commerce that grows branches of kindness, charity and love reaching up to the sky.
“I wanted it to be a restaurant and community center,” Kim says. “I wanted to show how beautiful and delicious authentic Korean food is, and I wanted to provide for refugees in particular because of the additional hurdles they face when coming to the country and the greater resilience they develop as a result with employment. I also wanted it to be a place they could come to take English classes, network with each other and learn skills that would elevate their careers.”
So she opened a food business, you know, the thing stereotypical high-achieving recent immigrants are supposed to avoid. They officially opened in early 2016 after months of a father-daughter build-out. Kim runs the front of house, which includes lunch, dinner and bar service (that began in December of 2016 when they received their liquor license). Officially, the restaurant is fast-casual, with orders placed at the counter, but it feels more like speedy-mom, with a menu that includes room for flexibility within reason and service that feels personal. (And there’s no side-eye cast at tables that linger over tea and kimchi.)
Mom Chun Hee Kim runs back of house, along with Sun Hwa Choi, a lifelong friend of the family Kim refers to as “Aunt.” Her father, Amos Kim, runs the farm, which supplies all of their eggs, most of their chicken and almost all of their produce in the summer. They supplement the rest of their menu with local farms, Kim says.
“Sourcing locally is an absolute priority and part of our vision of community,” she explains.
Opening a food operation is one thing, but making it a secret social-empowerment project on the side is quite another. Tall order doesn’t quite capture the magnitude of attempting to execute her all-encompassing vision, but incredibly, she’s pulled it off, and then some, without hitting folks who are just looking for some aged soybean soup over the head with it.
In fact, the first few times I dined at Sunhee’s, I had no clue it was a mission-based “safe space” for cultural learning. I was just entranced with the food, which is authentic, but approachable.
“We know that traditional Korean food can be really spicy for the American palate, but we did not want to dumb it down,” Kim acknowledges. “So we compromise by dialing back the spice a little in some dishes, but not resorting to the added sweetness and salt found in a lot of Asian food in the States. And anyone who wants it super spicy can ask for it that way.”
It wasn’t until I started stalking their Instagram to visually feast on their beautiful dumplings, kimbap rolls, Korean butter cookies and green tea ice cream that I noticed their feed was peppered with pictures of immigrants and refugees, accompanied by upbeat inclusive hashtags (#weareimmigrants, #americandream #withrefugees, etc.).
Like the Underground Railroad, which was successful in part because of the codes slaves and “conductors” used to communicate with each other (“bundles of wood” translated to fugitives that were expected, a “load of potatoes” meant escaping slaves hidden under farm produce in a wagon), at Sunhee’s you have to know what you’re looking for to see it. But once you do, it’s clear as day.
“Word spreads among the network of refugees in the area,” Kim explains. “We get about 400 refugees a year in the Albany-Troy area. Many of them are fleeing war, conflict and political or religious persecution. Few speak English. They all need jobs.”
Looking around Sunhee’s, which she and her father transformed by hand from a dank and dark former Irish pub into a stunning, light-filled oasis that looks like it was beamed in from Anthropologie home (seasonal flowers in jelly jars, reclaimed wood tables and floors, a gorgeous polished wood bar in one room, delicate steam-punk light fixtures, whimsical and delicate dried flower wreaths adorning the walls, the windows…), in addition to the food, the drinks and the mini-mart of handmade and Korea-sourced kimchis and candies, there is a bulletin board advertising English classes and other resources for immigrants and refugees.
The non-food part of Sunhee’s mission has taken on a life of its own. A fellow Boston College grad and fellow first-generation South Korean–American, Grace Lee, approached Kim last year about coming in as a managing partner and assisting her with the refugees, and Kim was delighted to take her on. She also assists with social media and outreach.
“That section of the business currently being developed as a nonprofit, which will make it simpler when we get official approval,” Kim explains.
“We do beginner and advanced English classes four times a week and advanced classes once a week. It’s amazing to see how these people come together from countries South Sudan, Afghanistan, Turkey and Burma and all over the world really, and become friends and bond in this class,” Lee enthuses. “We are also really excited about our pilot computer education laptop program.”
This first year, Kim and Lee hope to pair laptops with refugees and, perhaps more importantly, teach the recipients computer skills that they can then utilize in better-paying jobs. They raised $5,000 in funds initially the old-fashioned way: by signing up for a marathon and begging their friends and acquaintances to sponsor their run for laptops. They have absorbed all upfront costs for the laptops. Officially, they will fund 50% of the laptop’s cost, with the remaining 50% balance to be repaid by the recipient over time, without interest. So far this year, they have paired four participants with laptops, with additional applicants pending.
With 15 refugees, immigrants and Americans who need jobs on their payroll, a community of immigrants and refugees benefiting from their classes and guidance, plus scores of foodies who wandered in for Mama Kim’s Secret Menu (just ask: you won’t regret it) and left with a lesson in global politics, it seems like “mission accomplished,” right?
Not so fast. Next up is Kim’s Kimchi factory. She purchased two buildings in downtown Troy (171 and 173 Fourth Street) within a Mason jar’s throw of Sunhee’s for $200,000 in January. One will be used for industrial-style production of their wildly popular farm-to-bottle kimchi (a family recipe, Kim says), and another will be used to further expand their educational and outreach programs.
Plus, there’s the new River Street Market in Troy they’ve signed on for. (They will be one of several food-makers in a market styled on the classic food halls of Florence, Italy, refashioned for the 21st century.) They will serve a handful of their customer favorites, including purple rice and bibimbap. Between the two new projects, Kim projects they will have to hire at least 10 people eventually.
A portion of Sunhee’s Kimchi when it does land on shelves, hopefully by 2019, will be used to fund their community-outreach programs. (They have been using company profits and fundraising to pay for all programming to date, including English class materials and staffing.)
Mama Kim’s magical spicy cabbage brimming with probiotics and extra altruism on the side, hold the stereotypes? I’ll take a dozen.
Sunhee’s Farm and Kitchen | @sunhees95ferry
River Street Market
