Wichita’s new seafood restaurant was overwhelmed on opening day, took time to regroup

Putting on the occasional pop-up crawfish boil is one thing.

But as Nith and Darryl Huynh learned on Saturday, opening a brick-and-mortar restaurant - especially one everyone is talking about — is quite another.

When the two opened the doors of their new Mama Nith’s Crawfish, a Cajun seafood restaurant at 604 S. Topeka., they quickly found out they weren’t prepared for the demand.

Lines were long on Saturday, and they had to turn people away when they ran out of food. (They issued coupons to those people for a future visit.)

They ended up closing down between lunch and dinner on Saturday to regroup, and then they decided not to open on Sunday because they didn’t have enough inventory — and they wanted to work with their staff more.

“It was quite an experience for us,” Nith Huynh said on Sunday “Our food was great, but our service time was not. We need to improve on that, which we plan to work on and train our staff tomorrow.”

The restaurant, which the couple always intended to close on Mondays, will reopen on Tuesday with a break between lunch and dinner. Hours for the rest of the week ill be 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 5 to 9 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday, though it will be closed on Thanksgiving Day and will open for dinner only on Friday.

“I hope people give us another chance,” Nith said. “We are new to the restaurant business but will definitely get there.”

People have been buzzing about the restaurant, which offers a menu of “Viet-Cajun”-style dishes, from crawfish pho to lobster, crab, shrimp and clams served with unique sauces. The menu also offers Cajun dishes like gumbo and etouffee.

The Huynhs got their start doing pop-up crawfish boils at restaurants and events around town and decided to open their own restaurant to do it full time.

For more information, call 316-260-3843.

This story was originally published November 19, 2018 at 4:59 AM.