Memorial service for Tanya Tandoc celebrates her life, passions (VIDEO)

Tanya Tandoc’s memorial service on Thursday night was filled with all the things she loved.

Belly dancing. Pictures of pugs. A cello suite. Performances by her local music friends. And lots and lots of talk about goat cheese and seared beef tenderloin and fresh herbs.

The public service for Tandoc, the popular local celebrity chef and owner of restaurant Tanya’s Soup Kitchen who was killed last week, drew a crowd of 1,200 that packed downtown’s Orpheum Theatre to capacity. It included people from her inner circle of friends as well as Wichita artists, musicians and restaurant owners. Tandoc’s housemate, Curtis Mitchell, has been charged with first-degree murder in her death.

Tandoc’s parents, Valentin and Bonnie Tandoc, were there, as was her brother, local coffee shop owner Warren Tandoc.

The evening was intended as a celebration of Tanya Tandoc’s life, said Mark Anderson, a local actor and director and a 20-year friend of Tandoc’s. And he tried to keep it light, emceeing the event as though it were a stage show and cracking jokes that would have been Tanya-approved. At one point, he asked the audience to vote by applause whether Tandoc’s tomato bisque or chicken curry soup was best. (It was bisque, by a narrow margin.)

Throughout the service, a slide show was projected onto a screen behind the stage, displaying a constant loop of moments from Tandoc’s 45 years of life: A photo of her as a toddler picnicking outside with her parents. A photo of her from high school, complete with 1990s-era big bangs. There were photos of her dancing. Pictures of bowls of soup she’d prepared at the restaurant. Of her pet pugs, of her clowning with other local chefs, of her smiling on a hill overlooking San Francisco during her days at the California Culinary Academy.

The service began with belly dancing by women from Tandoc’s dance group. In recent years, she had become active in the local belly dancing scene and taught dance classes. The bells on the dancers’ attire jingled as they shimmied their middles just as Tandoc had. Pictures of Tandoc in similar attire – with flowers in her hair, a bindi on her forehead and a smile on her face – flashed behind them.

Afterward, several people spoke, sharing stories about Tanya that kept even the most emotionally overcome people in the crowd laughing.

The first to speak was Evan Gottstine, whose father, local musician Wayne Gottstine, was married to Tandoc from 2001 until earlier this year and who also was in the crowd. Now in his early 20s, Evan Gottstine said Tandoc had been in his life since he was 5.

“She taught me about unconditional love and patience,” he said, noting that he was overwhelmed by how many people had shown up to pay tribute to her.

“Hold your family close. Hold your friends close,” he said. “That’s what Tanya would have wanted.”

Tandoc’s two top managers from her restaurant – Sarah Osborn-Bennett and Kelly Rae Leffel – spoke, too, comparing Tandoc to a mother who had hundreds of restaurant-industry “children.” To illustrate their point, they asked everyone in the crowd who had ever worked with or for Tandoc to stand up. Dozens did.

“We didn’t do business like everyone else did,” Osborn-Bennett said. “We did it Tanya’s way.”

After two songs performed by Tandoc’s music friends Nikki Moddelmog, Mark Foley and Shane Marler, two of her colleagues from KMUW, where Tandoc provided frequent restaurant reviews, spoke. They shared stories about how Tandoc would breeze in for her tapings, take her time kissing and saying hello to everyone in the studio, and make a salty-asparagus double entendre on the air.

Tandoc’s first Wichita restaurant employer, former Larkspur owner Pam Bjork, also spoke about when she first hired the 22-year-old chef, who came recommended by Old Mill Tasty Shop’s Mary Wright. Bjork said she loved Tandoc’s tattoos and decided to take a chance on her. It paid off in a menu filled with beautiful, progressive food: tarts and tenderloins and strawberry balsamic panna cotta.

“Once you met her, you never forgot her,” Bjork said. “Tanya’s essence was love.”

As the service came to an end, Tandoc’s friend and fellow cellist Jakub Jerzy Omsky came onstage to perform. He wanted to play Tandoc’s favorite piece – the one she always wanted him to play: Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 Prelude in G Major.

“I’ve learned that this piece is hard to perform when being hugged from behind,” he said, referring to Tandoc. “I feel her spirit hugging me right now.”

This story was originally published June 11, 2015 at 9:17 PM with the headline "Memorial service for Tanya Tandoc celebrates her life, passions (VIDEO)."