When Chanita Chayaluk decided to open her restaurant and wine bar Taan in Chicago, she harbored a clear and ambitious vision: she wanted to showcase Thai food in a different light. Explaining the culinary landscape of her adopted city, she notes that the first major wave of Thai immigration to Chicago occurred in the 1970s, and a significant portion of the Thai food available locally still feels firmly rooted in that era. When Taan opened its doors in September, its menu was designed to challenge those outdated perceptions, featuring bold, traditional preparations such as miang—a Northern Thai dish made with fermented tea leaves—and a whole, deep-fried fish smothered in a rich fish-sauce caramel.
Yet, operating a modern independent restaurant in Chicago comes with unexpected hurdles, chief among them being the pervasive ethos of the local dining culture. According to Chayaluk, the city remains defined by its signature "Midwest nice" attitude, where hospitality workers are culturally conditioned to overaccommodate and bend over backward to appease the masses. In the early days of Taan’s service, this manifested as a relentless wave of guest requests for custom modifications, ingredient omissions, and substitutions driven by personal preferences and dietary restrictions.
For a small kitchen team operating with limited staff, trying to honor every single customization request severely bogged down kitchen operations. Chayaluk points out that these constant slowdowns did not just affect the back-of-house workflow; they ultimately degraded the overall guest experience. It reached a point where the boutique restaurant began to feel less like an intimate culinary destination and more like a fast-casual assembly line. The breaking point arrived when a customer placed an order for green curry mussels—specifically requesting them "without the mussels."
That surreal interaction prompted Chayaluk to draw a firm line in the sand. She implemented a strict limited substitution policy at Taan, taking to Instagram to explain to the public that foundational ingredients like fish sauce and shrimp paste are the very fabric that defines authentic Thai cuisine, and therefore could not be removed from dishes built around them.
Taan is far from alone in facing this friction. A decade or so ago, the culture of asking for extensive menu modifications was generally frowned upon by culinary professionals and derided by food writers as bad manners. Recently, however, restaurants across the country report that substitution culture is bubbling back up, and this time it is arriving in full force.
A complex swirl of cultural and economic factors has steered the restaurant industry to this precarious juncture. The rise of fast-casual lunch "slop bowl" spots has profoundly primed contemporary consumers to expect an extraordinarily high, highly detailed level of customization with every single order they place. Meanwhile, the massive cultural footprint of books like Unreasonable Hospitality has reinforced an intensified version of the old "customer is always right" mentality, creating an environment where pushback from a restaurant is often viewed as a personal slight.
Compounding this pressure is the modern ecosystem of social media influencers entering the food-review space. Today, the choice by a restaurant not to honor certain dietary preferences or customization whims is ripe for an immediate, viral online takedown. Couple all of that cultural entitlement with the harsh economic reality that it is extraordinarily difficult to keep an independent restaurant afloat in the current financial climate, and the result is unsurprising. Numerous operators have simply given in, either acquiescing to endless specific demands or altering their menus altogether, a phenomenon reflected in the broader culinary trend of the great de-spicification of dishes across urban centers.
At the same time, a resilient contingent of independent restaurants is choosing a different path. Venues like Taan and New York’s Ha’s Snack Bar—which proudly announces right in its Instagram bio that everything on its menu contains fish sauce—are standing their ground, choosing culinary integrity over universal accommodation.
A similar battle lines have been drawn in Phoenix, Arizona, at Lom Wong, where substitution and modification requests spiked dramatically after the establishment received a wave of national attention. Last year, chef Yotaka "Sunny" Martin was recognized by the James Beard Awards, and in August, the restaurant was honored with a Michelin Bib Gourmand designation.
According to chef and co-owner Alex Martin, the influx of new diners brought a noticeable shift in customer behavior. Following the accolades, the restaurant welcomed more guests than it was typically accustomed to, many of whom began picking dishes apart. Diners frequently asked to modify traditional plates or expressed confusion regarding the restaurant’s service style, struggling to understand why Lom Wong did not course its meal in a traditional European fashion.
Alex Martin points to a pervasive European distinction of what an elite, award-winning restaurant is supposed to look like. Many patrons mistakenly equated culinary recognition with the formal atmosphere and malleable service of a white-tablecloth establishment. The owners’ response, however, was unequivocal. They reminded themselves and their patrons that this was never who they had been, nor what their restaurant would ever become.
Much like Taan, Lom Wong turned directly to social media to reset diner expectations. Their public posts clarified that the restaurant would not make substitutions simply to make a dish more familiar to Western palates, and warned that certain elements—such as beef containing gristle or fish being served whole—were intentional choices rooted in culinary tradition rather than kitchen oversight.
Alex Martin describes his co-chef and partner as the guiding light of cultural context for the establishment. When evaluating customer requests, Sunny Martin constantly considers whether altering a specific element would fundamentally compromise the integrity of the dish. For instance, while the kitchen is willing to accommodate a customer by placing shrimp on the side of a mango salad, they will steadfastly refuse to strip beef or shrimp paste out of preparations that inherently require them.
Chayaluk has adopted a nearly identical philosophy at Taan. To accommodate diners with genuine dietary restrictions without altering the soul of her core recipes, she ensures there is always a dedicated vegan and gluten-free option on the menu—currently a fried rice dish—that serves as a reliable catchall. She takes great care to ensure that this designated accommodation is exceptionally well-prepared and substantial, emphasizing that it is designed to be a complete meal rather than an afterthought or a sidelined appetizer.
Behind these policies is a concerted effort to protect front-of-house and back-of-house workers. Both Chayaluk and Alex Martin emphasize that establishing these firm boundaries is just as crucial for preserving their staff’s daily peace of mind as it is for maintaining strict quality control for the diners.
While taking this uncompromising stance has occasionally generated minor pushback from entitled diners, the proactive step of setting clear expectations before the meal begins—bolstered by upfront social media announcements—has largely been met with understanding and respect. The key, according to Alex Martin, lies entirely in the delivery. When addressing customer inquiries, the staff’s approach is rooted in kindness, politely acknowledging that while the restaurant respects individual preferences, those preferences ultimately belong to the guest alone. From there, servers gently steer diners toward items on the menu that already naturally align with their tastes.
