'Rit' Bangklum, Local Thai Chef

By Marge Wilson of The Clarion Journal

Ever since he was a small child growing up ijn Saraburi, Thailand - about 150 miles from Bangkok - Rittrong 'Rit' Bangklum has enjoyed cooking and looked forward to someday being a head chef.

Rit's mother and father were both chefs and owned a restaurant. Rit became a teenage chef and - becoming a capitan in the Thai Army- cooked for fellow soldiers. When he retired from the army he and his wife traveled to America to visit their two daughters here and their grandchildren.

The opportunity to be a chef came four years ago when some Thai accquaintances in Seattle asked Rit to come help them with their popular group of Thai restaurants mushrooming in the northwestern city. He learned about the finance end of the restaurant business there, became head chef and was doing well. But he and his wife, Somcheay, missed their grandchildren in this part of the country.

When their oldest daughter, Patcharin "Toi" Danco and her husband, Joe Danco, decided they wanted to open a Thai restaurant, this one in Columbia, the Bangklums agreed to join them, with Rit acting as head chef for his children rather than his Seattle friends. The Columbia restaurant opened in April at 109 S. Main Street.

Since Rit, Toi and Joe have been running the Thai House, not far from Columbia City Hall, they've gotten customers from all over - Belleville (their former home), Waterloo, Millstadt, Red Bud and as far away as Nashville, IL; Florisant, MO; and Scott Air Force Base.

"These guys from Scott have travelled a lot so they enjoy different styles of food," Joe Danco said. Another reason for customers from many locations is that the location in Columbia allows for lower prices than in, say, Seattle, but the ingredients are always the highest quality, Toi said.