The Collegian

Issue date: 4/3/08 Section: Focus

"Better not eat that pepper you just found," said James Holleman, music department chairman, to a customer sitting near him at the Coffee Cup Diner.

"Have you made that mistake?"

"Not in a long time," said Assistant Professor of Music Omri Shimron, sitting between Holleman and the customer.

Holleman and Shimron, who call themselves, respectively, a "regular" and a "semi-regular," said they look forward to Thursdays and Fridays at the diner, when owner Prapai Ringenberg cooks up a different Thai meal every week.

"It's the best-kept secret in town," Shimron said.

"I guess it is, because I didn't even know about it," said Sheila Bronson, a clerk at Broad St. Market, which sits next door to the diner.

Bronson said she eats breakfast there occasionally, but she goes for the American dishes.
"Of course I have regular customers who like meat and potatoes," Ringenberg said. "I'm never gonna get away from that."

"I come here because I like their burgers," John Solis, a frequent customer, said while holding out his fingers to illustrate his burger's thickness.

He said he knows about the Thai lunches but sticks to the American food.

Ringenberg said she grew up in Thailand, but started cooking in American restaurants about 50 years ago, when she moved here at the age of 17.

Her Thursday and Friday lunches unite Thai and American cultures: The food of Ringenber's native country served in her American restaurant.

She said the tradition started in late 2005. A Thai girl who lived in Somerset, Mich. came in and asked Ringenberg for a job, but the girl only knew how to cook Thai food.

Ringenberg hired and taught her how to cook American food. She also agreed to add a Thai meal to the lunch menu for two days each week, to see if the customers liked it.

The employee moved away two years ago after her husband found a job in a different city, but Ringenberg continues offering Thai food every week.

Since she can't buy the necessary ingredients in Hillsdale, she said she makes a weekly trip to Oriental food stores in Ann Arbor and Lansing.

She focuses on traditional Thai dishes, she said, like Pad Thai, Thai red pork, chicken curry, beef noodle soup.

Ringenberg learned how to cook Thai food while growing up in Bangkok, but never worked in a restaurant until she came to America, she said.

"Then I got stuck in the restaurant business for a long time," she said, laughing.

She worked in a handful of restaurants in southern Michigan - mostly Detroit - before buying the Coffee Cup nine years ago.

She said that as the owner, she can't call in sick or take vacations whenever she wants.
"Customers depend on you," she said.

Head Basketball Coach John Tharpe said Ringenberg's personality accounts for much of the restaurant's appeal.

"Prapai is really a great person," he said. "[And] I think it's the best food in town."

Still, she said she gained a new kind of freedom when she became the owner - now she can choose the menu, for instance, like she does with the Thai lunches.

"You have a choice of doing your own thing," she said of restaurant ownership.

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