Peter Cho and Sun Young Park, the duo behind Portland restaurants Han Oak and Toki, are taking over the former Renata space for a new concept, Cho and Park confirmed in a phone interview Wednesday.
The new restaurant, which does not yet have a name, will focus on whole animal, wood-fired Korean barbecue, Cho and Park said. The restaurant was first announced on the Instagram page of Portland food obsessive Gary Okazaki.
“I’ve been wanting to do wood-fired Korean barbecue since I was in New York,” said Cho, the former right hand man to celebrated New York chef April Bloomfield. “Early on at Han Oak, we would smoke meat in a makeshift cinder block grill, we just never had the money to change the kitchen around and put in a hearth.”
Cho and Park are aiming for a spring opening for the restaurant, which will break down whole slabs of beef, pork and lamb in-house. Unlike a traditional steakhouse (or Korean BBQ for that matter) when a specific cut of meat is sold out, it will no longer be available, a model pioneered at Renee Erickson’s Seattle steakhouse Bateau. Meat butchered at the new restaurant will also help fuel the menus at Han Oak and Toki.
Seafood cooked in Renata’s old wood-fired hearth and oven will play a major role as well, Park said.
Depending on what direction the menu takes, the new restaurant could join Cote in New York City and San Ho Won in San Francisco as modern restaurants seeking to elevate Korean BBQ from all-you-can-eat palaces to something closer to an upscale steakhouse.
Though the new restaurant is just beginning to build its team, they do have one hire in place: Nick Arnerich, Renata’s co-founder, is now on board as director of operations for all three restaurants. Arnerich, who spent time at high end San Francisco area restaurants including The French Laundry, adds a seasoned hand to a restaurant group that has historically operated primarily on instinct.
Renata, which opened in 2015 and was The Oregonian’s Restaurant of the Year that year, continues on as a line of frozen pizzas produced in the same building and sold at local markets.
“This is all happening really fast,” said Cho, noting that the duo hope to eventually buy the Renata building. “We’ve been doing this casual mom-and-pop, DIY, not-too-serious thing for a long time. We’ve become known for it. But to have a real restaurant space, you can’t mess around. As much fun as that is. It’s a real restaurant and we need a concept that’s strong enough to fit the space.”
Cho, who was raised in Springfield, moved back to Oregon with Park in 2014, eventually opening Han Oak inside a Northeast Portland courtyard space attached to the small apartment where they lived and raised two young boys. It was The Oregonian’s Restaurant of the Year in 2017. The couple opened a second restaurant, Toki, in downtown’s former Tasty N Alder space in 2021, then converted Han Oak into a reservation-only hot pot restaurant last year.
According to Park, the new restaurant is aiming for a May opening, just long enough for some light renovations designed to make the space — once one of Portland’s most dramatic dining rooms — feel a little more approachable. She also wants to further utilized Renata’s pleasant patio and parking lot for outdoor seating come summer.
“It’s a proper restaurant,” Park said. “I want it to feel as welcoming and unassuming as our other restaurants, but I also want the quality and standards of the food to be high.”
What else should people know?
“We’re hiring,” said Park. “All positions.”
The new, untitled wood-fired Korean BBQ restaurant from the Han Oak team is aiming for a May opening at 626 S.E. Main St.
— Michael Russell; mrussell@oregonian.com
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