Restaurant Review: Diane’s Place and Vinai in Minneapolis Celebrate Hmong Cuisines

Food|Two Restaurants Are Making Minneapolis the American Capital of Hmong Food

The pork belly and shoulder had broken almost all the way down to their wispy, elemental threads, held in a sweet emulsification of rendered fat and broth that clung to the rice on my spoon.

I’d never seen this dish of long-braised pork with ginger on a menu until I saw it at Diane’s Place in Minneapolis, where it arrived heaped with scallions and pickled bamboo. That’s because it’s not exactly a restaurant dish.

The chef, Diane Moua, knew this pulled pork as something her elders would have made from scrappier cuts — snouts, ears, trotters — when the weather was cold and meat was scarce in the mountains of Laos. Now it was the leftovers that Hmong parents might pack for their grown children to take home, because for a generation who lived through war and hunger, it didn’t matter how much time had passed. They would always worry: Are you getting enough to eat?

Ms. Moua was raised in Wisconsin, and her menu exalts the Hmong home cooking of her family gatherings with technical precision and a sense of cascading abundance — the pan-fried bean thread noodles her aunties and grandmas used to cook, the sheer-skinned steamed pork rolls just flickering with pepper.