Akkapong “Earl” Ninsom

Coming Up

The work reads as a sequence of controlled adjustments: how Thai food can travel, how it can stay legible while still changing shape, and how a restaurant can be exacting without becoming closed off. Ninsom’s restaurants tend to sit in that middle ground. The dishes speak plainly, but not bluntly; the flavors stay rooted in place while leaving room for diners to come in.

Where They Are Now

Hat Yai is built around fried chicken and Southern Thai flavors, with the kind of attention Ninsom describes in his own words. Even in a format that can be read quickly, the food is treated as something that carries memory and specificity. The Southern Thai base gives the restaurant its frame, while the approach keeps it accessible without flattening what makes it distinct. Langbaan shifts that same discipline into a tasting menu format, where the pacing is more deliberate and the experience more concentrated. Yaowarat arrived in 2023 as a Portland restaurant inspired by Bangkok’s Chinatown. Across the three, the common thread is clear: regional Thai cuisine, dishes chosen for both interest and appeal, and Southern Thai food adjusted with care for Portland diners. Each restaurant holds a different register, but the choices behind them come from the same working logic.

Signature

Akkapong's signature dishes include Langbaan, Hat Yai, Yaowarat, and EEM. Taken together, those names map the range of his work: the elegance of a tasting menu, the direct satisfaction of fried chicken, the Chinatown-influenced perspective of Yaowarat, and the distinctive reach of EEM. Each carries a different texture, yet all feel connected by the same instinct to make Thai flavors resonate in more than one register.

In Their Words “People aren't as familiar with Southern Thai food, so we have to be careful. We try to choose dishes that are interesting but still appealing.” That line gets to the balance in Ninsom’s cooking: keeping faith with a regional cuisine while also accounting for the diner in front of it. The work asks for precision, but it also asks for judgment about what will land. “I realized we could actually use her knowledge and skill to do real Thai food.” The point here is not spectacle; it is the use of expertise. Ninsom frames collaboration as a way to reach something more grounded and more exact, with knowledge and skill shaping the food rather than decorating it.

Honors

Akkapong's honors include James Beard Award, Outstanding Restaurant for Langbaan (2024), James Beard Award finalist, Best Restaurateur (2022), Portland Monthly Restaurateur of the Year (2019), The Oregonian Restaurant of the Year for EEM (2019), USA Today Top 10 Best New Restaurants for Hat Yai (2016), and Portland Monthly Restaurant of the Year for Langbaan (2014).