-Honestly, I never thought
that I would marry a foreigner. -The heat in Texas is no joke. Luckily, we do this
in the morning. -It's kind of like going to
a night market, except it's right down the road. -So I got a half chicken
and a mango. -Normally, you would see a lot
of curry, noodles, and all of that, but this is more
like country-style. No pad thai, no, like... -No fried rice.
-...green curry, no fried rice. Yeah.
-No fried rice. I'm Justin Trubiana, and...
-I'm Lakana Trubiana. -And we run Dee Dee,
the Northern Thai street food truck
here in Austin, Texas. Two pad, spiced down, two mu
ping, and a mango sticky rice. We opened in 2016.
-We serve Isaan food. It's very country-style. We have pad krapow. We have laab moo. We have moo ping. We have om gai, som tom, and som
tom isaan, mango sticky rice, gai yang grilled chicken,
and tofu stir-fry. -So I need one pad,
two mangoes to go. -Pad krapow,
"pad" meaning you sauté. "Krapow" is the name
of the basil. This style is like my mom
would do it at home, like, very simple, just basil and meat
and homemade chili paste. You grab some sliced cucumber,
add some fried basil that I fry it, and that's it. That's our most popular one,
pad krapow. The flavor base is, like,
very different on each dish. The sauce is fish sauce
and Thai soy sauces. And the spices are like chili,
Thai chili. -And those are
all homemade, obviously. -Yeah, I made all of the chili
paste and chili powder. -Do I have a tofu low yet
and a tofu medium with an egg? -Tofu low is ready. My food is very labor-intensive. If you don't care about it,
it's not going to come out good, so I do everything myself by
hand, and it takes a long time. I want to serve how me,
my family eat in Thailand, so to be able to do that, you just you have
to follow those step. Otherwise, it doesn't come out
the same, you know? And this one is ready. That's the laab moo. I am from Riad. It's northeast of Thailand. Isaan is where all the farmer,
all the rice, you know, that go through
the country from. I learn to cook
from my great-grandmother. When I was growing up, you have
to make fire to cook rice. You have to make fire
to make food. We didn't really have
refrigerator at first, so if you want to eat,
you know, you have to wake up
early in the morning, starts to cook sticky rice
because it take a while. My great-grandmother,
she would be really tough on me. She would wake me up at 4:00
in the morning, you know, to start fire
and cook rice so she can take some rice
to the temple. [ Man speaking Thai ] It was tough,
but it's in a good way. You know, I learn
a lot from that. You know, now I can do
all the hard work. This is for
the rotisserie chicken. It has lemongrass
and palm sugar and fish sauce. We met at a bus station. You know, I was just traveling
to see my friend. And then we just exchanged,
what was that, MSN? -Mm-hmm.
-Yeah. -Thailand was so warm and
welcoming to me as a tourist, and I just remember thinking,
"I want to stay here, and I would like to do something
to show my appreciation." So that little 3-month vacation turned into 9 months
volunteering. During that time is when we met. And then when we met, that 9 months turned into
living in Thailand for... -5 years.
-...5-plus years... -Yeah.
-...and then moving back to get married. We moved to America in 2013
when we got married. -Yeah. I was never, like,
outside of Thailand, so I wanted to come here to see,
like, how everything here is, and it was, like, a shock. I saw a purple tree. It was so different
because in Thailand, it's just green or dry brown. You know, it's just hot. What time is it -- 8:00? -What time is it right now?
-Yeah. -It is 8:02, so we're
making good time. -I was very homesick at first.
-You were homesick. You were missing your food, and
she was cooking every meal... -Every meal.
-...every day for everyone, so, like, all my friends
and all my family. They absolutely loved it, and that's kind of
what gave us the idea. As we looked at it, it's like,
well, Austin has this booming,
blossoming food scene. I put a website together. We were, like,
brainstorming menu ideas and coming up with all of these
different dishes and concepts that we wanted to do,
and, um... I can't -- [Voice breaking]
I can never talk about this without breaking up.
-[ Breathes deeply, chuckles ] -My grandfather --
We went to go visit him. He sat us down, and he told us that he was giving his
grandchildren his life savings. Like, a week or two after
that meeting, he passed away. That's what gave us the
opportunity to begin Dee Dee, and I think the reason we've had
such good luck and fortune with what we've done
is because he's kind of, like, there with us, watching over to make sure everything's
kind of gone smoothly, so... -That was good.
-Yeah. Yeah. -I'm all -- [ Chuckles ]
-[ Chuckling ] Sorry. Yeah. -When we first started, we really had no idea
what we were doing because we had never done
anything like this. I mean, I know how to cook,
but I didn't know to, like, run a restaurant,
a business like this. So, I mean, we would, like,
you know, stay up until, like, 2:00
to 4:00 a.m. in the morning, you know,
trying to get everything ready. -Are we going to go do
the chickens now? -Yeah, I'm about to right now. -Alright.
Yeah, I got the fire going. We were two people.
-Yeah. -And we were only two people
for a good solid year. -Yeah. -And we were very busy, like,
right out the gates. Generally, it's 14
to 16 hours a day. -We do that, like, 6
to 7 days a week. Traditional, real traditional,
they use a bamboo grill stick that they kind of like do two, and then they just spread them
out, and they flip it by hand. I think I am the boss.
-Oh, yeah. 100%. 100%. She looks sweet and innocent, but she is a tough cookie
in that kitchen. -Grilled chicken, we disagree
at first because American way,
they like it juicy, but Thai way, you know -- -A little bit drier.
-It's not dry. It's just slow cook, you know. If you do it right,
it will be moist and tender. Slow-cook it. It's not ready yet. Do not serve raw chicken. No. -Kitchen life is not easy life,
so there's heated moments. -It's so stressful.
-It's stressful. But at the end of the day, I would much rather
be working with her and spending my time with her than in an office
somewhere else. -I rub them because I want
to keep them nice, moist. -I can't keep up
with her work ethic. It's actually insane. I don't know where
she gets the energy. She's cooking all day,
every day. I work the window. I'm exhausted
working the window, and she's in there, like,
you know, stirring, mashing,
and then prepping on top of it. And then when she's not
in the kitchen, and she does have free time, she's in her garden,
like, digging holes and planting herbs
and vegetables. I -- It's insane.
-I just wish that I could grow everything
and then, you know, like, pick out
from my garden and organic and, you know, serve my,
yeah, customer, you know? This is mint. It's going to in one of my dish. Yeah, I love the garden because
you can't just get basil from, like,
Thailand, like, from the market. The sweet basil and the holy
basil, this one is more pungent. It's stronger.
It's spicy. This is kaffir lime tree. This is lemon basil. It reminds me of my mom,
you know, my grandma. We would eat that a lot. Chili -- this is not as spicy
as I like, but, I mean, it's good. And this is some grapefruit. Apple, and that's orange. This is lemon and some banana. And that's it.
[ Laughs ] To be able to grow herbs
that actually from my hometown and put in food, just the smell,
just the taste of it, it just, like, you know,
bring back, like, memories, you know, being with family. -I think ticket time
probably 20 minutes. Just got a lot we're trying
to get out right now. One pad, two mangoes to go. I knew she had a gift
when I was in Thailand because I was eating Thai food
every day for five years, and the best food was always
what she cooked at home. And then when I saw
that she would cook for Thais in Thailand
and they would come and they would rave
about her food, that was when
I was like really like, "Okay, so this is, like,
the real deal." They're filming us for Vice,
and I was telling them how you take the som tom
back to your wife. -Oh, yeah.
I bring home papaya salad, which is her favorite
thing here. And it comes with
a lot of sauce, so I bring two
TSA food containers and kind of siphon the sauces
in there so I can fly with it, and when I get home,
she just digs in. -I've got a hot chicken set
and a mango sticky rice to go. The future of Dee Dee,
our goal is brick and mortar. -I would love a restaurant. I think, you know, I don't mind
working in the heat, but I just want to be able
to do more just what we sell right now. We try to keep it very, like,
real to where I come from, and we will always be that way. ♪♪ ♪♪
