So you’ve taken over your family restaurant

RESTAURANTS are delicate things — especially mom-and-pop operations. Among the smallest of small businesses, the most successful attract customers with a combination of low costs, intense deliciousness, do-it-yourself charm and pure gumption. The hawker stands of Southeast Asia are famous examples of this. Diners forgive rough service, put up with long queues and forego white tablecloths — if not tables — for a chance to enjoy a secret sauce, that special spark, the elemental spirit passed down generation to generation.

Scaling up these tiny treasures might maximise profits, but the risk is losing the magic. A line of cooks organised along Auguste Escoffier’s kitchen brigade system may help churn out dishes and feed a lot more people efficiently, but certain recipes require exacting experience and a discriminating je ne sais quoi. They may not survive the transition. Customers who are used to lower prices will also grouse at the increased costs that come with more staff and expanded real estate. A purist or two will complain that you’ve sold out.

I’ve been worrying about this because friends of mine are in the process of scaling up a mom-and-pop operation that had a legendary cult following here in London. People used to take 45-minute train rides from the middle of the city east to less-than-posh Leytonstone on a chance that a table — even if you had to share it — might open up at the Thai restaurant Singburi. That’s because “mom” — who took bookings only over the phone — said there was no availability unless diners didn’t show up. “Pop” started the restaurant in 1999, but Singburi’s reputation got going after Sirichai Kularbwong joined him in the kitchen toward the end of the last decade. Over that period, his parents toyed with the idea of retirement and finally decided to do it at the end of 2024. By then, the hole-in-the-wall underdog had become the 73rd best restaurant in the UK.