Tacoma restaurateurs Yu Nanakornphanom and Buoy Ngov are stripping their menu down to one dish. After years of running two separate Stadium District restaurants, the pair is opening The Holy Birdy at 6820 6th Ave., a cafe built almost entirely around khao man gai, the Thai take on poached chicken and rice, with Thai-inspired pastries sold alongside it by day.
The new spot takes over the space long occupied by Fuzion Cafe, which closed after 12 years in business, according to The News Tribune. Nanakornphanom and Ngov took over Fuzion's day-to-day operations in February 2026 and announced the cafe's last day in late July, weeks before the renovation-and-rebrand push toward The Holy Birdy became public. Fuzion had previously operated under Indochine on Pearl, with Hong Ngov running it back in 2014 and Sean Yean later managing it, per the same account.
The move follows the sale of the couple's other two restaurants. In June 2025, Nanakornphanom and Ngov finalized the sale of Indo Asian Street Eatery and Moshi Ramen Bar, their Stadium District sister establishments, to new owner Kevin Merrell, according to WhatNow. Nanakornphanom had run Indo since 2015 and Moshi since 2018, and offloading both apparently freed up the operational bandwidth to build something narrower and, they hope, sharper.
A Single Dish, Years in the Making
Khao man gai has quietly become the couple's obsession. Nanakornphanom told The News Tribune that The Holy Birdy will concentrate only on this concept, and that the restaurant has spent recent years testing recipes before committing to the idea. The rice itself is inseparable from the chicken in the cooking process, the pair said, which is why shortcuts are not really an option if the dish is going to taste right.
Nanakornphanom, who was born and raised in Bangkok and learned to cook working at his family's food stalls before moving to Tacoma, was featured years ago in the City of Tacoma's Inspired Palates series highlighting local culinary creators. That street-food grounding shows up directly in the dish he is now betting a whole restaurant on. He described khao man gai to The News Tribune as comfort food, the kind of thing enjoyed at parties, birthdays and celebrations back home.
What's Actually in the Bowl
Khao man gai traces back to Hainanese chicken rice, brought to Thailand by southern Chinese immigrants from Hainan before spreading further to Singapore, and the dish features poached chicken served over jasmine rice cooked in chicken broth and rendered fat, according to the MICHELIN Guide. Where the Singaporean version leans on ginger-scallion and chili sauces, the Thai rendition is defined by taucheo, a pungent dipping sauce built from fermented soybeans, garlic, ginger, chilies, vinegar and soy sauce, per Hot Thai Kitchen. The News Tribune reports that the taucheo at The Holy Birdy will contain vinegar, soy, green chile and ginger, and the cafe plans to round it out with additional dipping sauces and condiments. Fried chicken will also be on offer alongside the traditional poached version.
The menu will likely extend beyond the core dish to include kanom jeen nam ya, a southern Thai specialty of fermented rice noodles in a fish-based curry, per the same report. Still, the overall approach is intentionally slim rather than sprawling, with the goal of doing a small number of dishes exceptionally well instead of chasing a broad menu.
Pastries, Tea and a Fall Target
By day, The Holy Birdy will double as a bakery and cafe, serving Thai-inspired pastries featuring pandan and lemongrass alongside fresh Thai teas, matcha and coffee. Nanakornphanom has spent recent years honing his baking skills, and the initial pastry lineup will start small, including a puffed pastry filled with mango sticky rice. If the concept catches on, the pastry side could expand further, the owners indicated.
The cafe still needs updates and permitting before it can open, and the owners are targeting a fall 2026 launch. Nanakornphanom and Ngov signaled the timeline themselves, writing that something new is in the oven, coming fall 2026. Those with questions in the meantime can reach The Holy Birdy at 253-267-1566.
Part of a Broader Tacoma Shift
The Holy Birdy will land inside Tacoma's 6th Avenue Business District, a stretch between Sprague and Proctor streets that already holds Central Tacoma's densest cluster of independent restaurants, bars and shops, according to Move to Tacoma. It is not the only recent example of a hyper-focused regional Thai concept setting down roots in the city. In March, Nana Thai expanded from Freighthouse Square stall to storefront in the Lincoln District, building its sit-down menu around regional specialties like khao soi.
The single-dish approach also has a well-established precedent farther up Interstate 5. Portland's Nong's Khao Man Gai grew from a food cart launched in 2009 into a brand with two brick-and-mortar locations, an eight-item menu, and options ranging from peanut sauce and soup-form servings to a vegetarian version and a double portion, according to the Oregon Historical Society. Nanakornphanom's Tacoma roots run deeper than this single project, too: the Ngov family, whose parents migrated from Cambodia, helped build the South Sound's Indochine restaurant brand, which expanded across the city through several family members. Nanakornphanom has also weathered rougher chapters running a Tacoma storefront — in 2022, Mayor Victoria Woodards proposed $300,000 in federal pandemic recovery funds to help business owners, including Nanakornphanom, replace windows after repeated vandalism, according to KIRO 7 News Seattle, with Nanakornphanom noting at the time that every window at his Stadium District venue had been hit.
