Kuya Brings Authentic Filipino Soul to the Bluff City
Manila meets Memphis at Kuya, a new Filipino snack bar that brings flavor and flair to South Main Street, offering seasonally rotating family-style small plates and street-food-inspired cocktails.
Kuya, which translates to “bro” or other form of casual endearment, is a labor of love created by Shayne Diaz. Her family immigrated from the Philippines to West Memphis when she was just nine years old. During this time, Shayne’s mother, Irene, worked 100-hour weeks in back-to-back nursing shifts, Her father, Christopher, stayed home and learned how to cook staple Filipino dishes like Sinigang, a tamarind soup with daikon, shrimp, potatoes, and okra; or whip up the perfect Laing, a thick dip with coconut milk, dried taro leaves, and pork belly; and grandma’s Pinakbet, a vegetable stew with squash, bitter melon, and shrimp.
When Shayne was in college, her father tragically passed away, leading her to drop out of college to support the family, taking care of her two younger siblings and picking up front-of-housework, and later restaurant management, at a nearby Japanese restaurant. “I had to figure out how to help my mom pay her debts and feed my siblings,” she recalls.
However, what started as a job to help make ends meet quickly turned into a passion. “You get to know the customers and their stories. Hearing what they might be going through helped me deal with the grief of my father’s passing.”
That gave birth to the idea of Kuya, a colorful and cozy Filipino establishment featuring fan favorites from pop-up events like Lumpia and Sisig Baboy, and a colorful mural painted by local artist Bird Cap with cultural depictions of animals and other fun elements. After the kitchen closes on Fridays and Saturdays, Kuya turns up the volume, turning the place into a dance house with local artists spinning tunes until 2 a.m. With modest indoor seating and a patio to open this summer, Shayne hopes people feel at home without the overwhelm of an overly complicated menu.
“I want to showcase and educate people about Filipino food in a modernized way so everyone can taste the same flavors of
my childhood,” she says, like the mango-tamarind house cocktail that brings Shayne back to life in Manila, when she would run home from school on hot days to sit on the porch with grandma and dip ripe mangos into salt and shrimp paste.
Opened last month as the only Filipino restaurant within city limits, Kuya brings cultural representation to Memphis’s culinary scene, home to an estimated 5,000 Filipino community members (FILAMemphis, Inc.). “I’m most excited to see people enjoy Filipino food.”
Check them out on IG: @kuya.mem
By Shlomit Ovadia
Photo by Josh Clark
