Experience taught restaurateur to offer varied menu to draw customers

Gen Lam drew on a wide range of experiences when he opened Noodles Asian Bistro, back in 2010.

He’d already opened a successful Memphis restaurant.

He’d studied a wide range of Asian cuisines.

And he’d practically grown up in the business, thanks to his father, Kwok Lam, who’d launched several local Chinese restaurants.

What Gen Lam learned is this: Memphians like Asian cuisine, but they also like variety.

That’s why Noodles offers a wide range of menu items, with dishes representative of Vietnamese, Korean, Thai, Japanese, Chinese and Singaporean cuisine.

Gen Lam said his father, who eventually owned and operated three Nam King restaurants here — now under different ownership — is a smart businessman who did “pretty well.”

The keys to his father’s success, Gen Lam said, were hard work, treating customers well, keeping restaurants clean, and offering good food and service.

But he also made a point of tracking trends in Asian restaurants elsewhere, visiting popular eateries in major food cities like New York, Atlanta, Los Angeles and St. Louis. He studied the menus and entrées, adopting some of the best for Noodles.

Besides offering cuisine from multiple nations, Noodles also has an open kitchen and a sophisticated décor.

Noodles’ most popular dishes include Chinese Lo Mein,  General Tso’s, Pad Thai and Thai Mango, a dish made with fresh mango that’s wok-tossed with sweet peppers, snap peas, cilantro, roasted cashew nuts in a Thai brown sauce.

A favorite drink of customers is the Bubble Tea Smoothie, which, Lam said, is a sweet nonalcoholic drink made with  tapioca pearls.

Tony Maneclang, a regular patron, said he appreciates the food, prices and relaxing atmosphere.

Gen Lam said his mission for Noodles is to offer an express lunch, a relaxing dinner, good food and good service.

He started Noodles after the 2008 economic collapse. Business has been good, but could be better, he said.

He would like to open more Noodles restaurants.

When some customers walk into his Germantown restaurant, they look at the décor and ask him if it is a chain.

“Pretty soon,” he replies.

Noodles Asian Bistro

Address:  7850 Poplar, Suite 12

Telephone: (901) 755-1117

Online: noodlesasianbistro.com