Jan Parker’s Filipino restaurant has found a home. We sat down with her to find out more

Chef Jan Parker, a mainstay of Tacoma’s market circuit and a two-time Food Network show contestant, has found a home for her first brick-and-mortar restaurant after more than a year of searching.

Reyna Filipina Kitchen aims to open at 1122 S. 11th St. next year, one of two commercial tenants on the ground floor of a new Tacoma Housing Authority development in Hilltop.

Menu details are taking shape, but teasers abound most Saturdays at the Proctor Farmers Market, where Parker helps lead the equity committee, and other festivals, including Lincoln Food Walk, Tacoma Sunday Market and Hilltop Street Fair, throughout the year.

Reyna, which Parker envisions as a “community hub” with a focus on Filipino culture, will serve casual, counter-service lunch and brunch plus sit-down dinner. Dishes such as her signature chicken adobo and a vegan iteration featuring local Adam’s Mushrooms might grace the menu, but her beloved chili-garlic noodles will be near-impossible to omit.

“I feel like people will rage if we don’t have the noods,” she joked in an October interview over coffee at her soon-to-be neighbor, Red Elm Cafe.

“You know, we’ve been working from a canopy. We’re limited in what we can produce,” continued Parker, who has become a magnetic force in Tacoma and the South Sound since launching her pop-up business, Jan Parker Cookery, in 2018. “It’s going to push us to create more than the noods. People need to experience more Filipino food.”

Fresh off an unexpectedly packed 2023 — in which she competed on an episode of “Chopped” and spent several weeks in Puglia, Italy, filming the second season of “Ciao House” co-hosted by Alex Guarnaschelli — the chef has way more in mind.

“Hilltop has been a vibrant and culturally significant Black neighborhood, and we are honored to be part of its rich legacy,” Parker said. “Our intent is to not only reconnect with the community and continue the relationships we’ve established in the past but also to build new connections.”

While she has fried up the occasional ube-glazed beignet, her food hinges on local, seasonal ingredients, which will play a key role at the restaurant. In addition to using produce from friends at Share the Wealth Organics, Adam’s Mushrooms and De La Mesa Farms, she hopes to offer cooking classes and other events.

“I really want to re-shape and re-encourage people to eat vegetables,” said Parker, adding that, like her pop-up menus, Reyna won’t be “focused on lumpia, but lightening Filipino food, away from the homey plates that sometimes feels like it’s the only thing that people know of the cuisine.”

Filipino flavors will also play a key role in drinks, whether that’s banana milk in coffee or pandan in a cocktail, and the space will feature Filipino art and other artists of color.

“We’re selling the food but also representing the culture,” Parker said. “You want to do right by the culture and the community.”

HOUSING HILLTOP STOREFRONT

Parker will join Bridget Demerson and her children’s store Lavonne’s Room in the Housing Hilltop South building, THA announced Sept. 25. Tacoma Urban Performing Arts Center is expected to move into the 10,000-square-foot, ground-floor unit across the street.

The two buildings, marked by vibrant colors of orange and blue for one and purple and green on the other, are part of a $120 million affordable-housing development with various funding sources. It began in 2016 and is anticipated to be completed by the end of this year, The News Tribune previously reported.

The funding model, which included contributions from Pierce County, the City of Tacoma, Chase Bank and the Amazon Housing Equity Fund, offered tenant-improvement support and other grant money that “made this attractive,” said Parker, who publicly chronicled her brick-and-mortar journey in a spreadsheet noting every walk-through and no-call-back.

Her Kickstarter campaign, which ran last summer, garnered nearly $80,000 in donations from around 800 supporters, but that’s still tight for an independently operated restaurant. Reyna walked away from its initial anticipated home — a food hall, Oxford Market, in Tacoma Tower at 1119 Pacific Ave. — as the project stalled.

“Something didn’t feel right about it,” Parker recalled. “Last year I was really in a place of uncertainty … It’s a huge deal to have this restaurant. I feel really good moving forward.”

THA spent months engaging with businesses, both established and nascent, to encourage proposals for one of the three available spaces, according to the news release. Staff, with members of city government and the Hilltop Action Coalition, developed a rubric to “grade applicants in categories ranging from business vision to community support,” as well as the owner’s connection to the neighborhood.

Lavonne’s Room was previously in the Key Bank building that was demolished to make way for Housing Hilltop. Owner Demerson said that “coming back to the same exact location is quite amazing, kind of like it’s meant to be.”

Reyna was noted for being a minority- and woman-owned business “with broad community support, years of established practice, comprehensive financials, and a clear vision for the business.”

In her proposal, which she shared with The News Tribune, Parker emphasized her food business as one that has strived to nurture young people, including full-time students, while shifting the idea of how a kitchen must function.

Now that the space has been solidified, she and her team — in between R&D — are turning toward selecting an architect who will transform the bare-bones room into a kitchen and dining room. There is also a built-in patio.

“Everybody washes dishes. Everybody picks herbs. It’s just more sustainable,” she said. She hopes to bring that mentality to Reyna. “The restaurant industry can be a toxic industry. I’ve strived to move away from that, show that it doesn’t have to be that way … and give people opportunity, too. I want to ask them, ‘What is the ultimate goal and how can I help you get there?’”

REYNA FILIPINA KITCHEN

▪ 1122 S. 11th St., Tacoma, instagram.com/reynafilipinatacoma

▪ Details: brick-and-mortar restaurant opening at Housing Hilltop, target mid-2025

▪ Meanwhile, find Jan Parker Cookery at Proctor Farmers Market most Saturdays and other events throughout the year; follow instagram.com/janparkercookery for updates

This story was originally published October 15, 2024 at 5:15 AM.