The Heart of a Sandwich

During lunch at , Lucas Yovanovich, a senior, searches for a . He often satisfies his appetite at , a small Vietnamese sandwich shop at 1309 Solano Ave.

Vietnamese sandwiches are a combination of French and Vietnamese cuisine. When France colonized Vietnam, French colonials imported the baguette. The Vietnamese added pickled carrots, daikon radishes and Asian-flavored meats to the baguette, creating the Vietnamese sandwich.

Kim’s Vietnamese sandwiches, said Yovanovich, are a great bargain.

"A lot of students at Albany High don’t have all the money in the world, so the prices are pretty nice compared to other shops around," said Yovanovich, of Kim's $3.50 to $5 sandwiches. "So that’s pretty inviting because you get a filling meal for a good price."

I sat down with Cathy Tra, the owner of , to discuss why she decided to open her Solano Avenue sandwich shop despite the struggling economy.

A 1,000 MILE JOURNEY

Tra, now 49 years old, grew up in Vietnam. When the communist North Vietnam captured South Vietnam in 1975, Tra’s father, a South Vietnamese soldier, decided to evacuate his family.

Tra was 17 years old when her parents and seven siblings crammed into a small boat in 1978. Their 1,000 mile voyage to a Philippine refugee camp was supposed to take seven days, but a storm diverted them to Malaysia and then Indonesia. On day 23, Tra’s family reached its destination.

Tra said she was blissfully ignorant during her family’s escape. Her parents did not tell her about the journey's possible dangers.

Tens of thousands of Vietnamese refugees, known as "boat people," perished on the high seas. Many were victims of pirate attacks, stormy weather or starvation.

"My parents thought it was a dangerous trip," said Tra. "But we (the children) thought it was a fun trip. We had no idea what could happen."

PUTTING DOWN ROOTS

Tra’s family stayed in the Philippines for one year. They received their visas to the United States in 1980.

Tra first lived in Berkeley, working in customer service for an electrical company for 18 years, and then at a petroleum company for six years.  

Tra’s dream, however, was to open her own restaurant. She enjoyed cooking for her husband and two children, Jessica and Jaimie. Tra wanted to turn her hobby into employment.

But opening a restaurant, thought Tra, was too risky.

"I was scared when I thought about opening a restaurant because I had a stable job," recalled Tra. "When you have a stable job, you don’t want to move."

After more than 10 years of internal debate, Tra opened in November 2010.

FROM COFFEE TO SANDWICHES

Tra’s original plan was to open a Vietnamese coffee shop. French colonials had trouble obtaining fresh milk in Vietnam, so they poured sweetened condensed milk into their coffee instead. This improvisation created Vietnamese coffee.

But Tra was unsure if a Vietnamese coffee shop would fit in Albany, where she and her family have lived since 1998. In Vietnam people like to smoke when they drink coffee, said Tra, adding that this could have been incompatible with Albany’s atmosphere.

Jessica, Tra’s older daughter, saw her mom’s indecision and offered a suggestion.

"Well, mom, on Solano, they are missing Vietnamese sandwiches," Jessica, now a 23-year-old architecture student in Brooklyn, told Tra. "Why don’t you open a Vietnamese sandwich shop?"

THE HEART OF THE SANDWICH

Tra followed her daughter’s advice. The first step to making a good Vietnamese sandwich, said Tra, was finding the right bread.

"The bread is the heart of the sandwich," said Tra. "If you have good bread, everything will come out really good."

Tra tested breads from four local bakers and picked baguettes made by Semifreddi’s. Many Vietnamese sandwiches use the French roll, but Tra said she prefers baguettes.

"She made Vietnamese sandwiches for me when I was little and she used the baguette," said Jessica. "I said, 'Why don’t you make your sandwiches on that? Since that is what you did for me.'"

Many customers said the baguette is a big draw.

"Fricking bread is delicious, it’s very good quality. That’s what I like about this place," said Teo Maldonado, an Albany High senior, of Tra's sandwiches. 

KEEPING IT FRESH

Tra said she is a stickler for homemade quality ingredients that are healthy and made fresh.

Each day, she cooks a new batch of sandwich meats: BBQ pork, black pepper pork, curry chicken, lemongrass chicken and BBQ chicken. She refuses to freeze her food. Freezing and reheating, said Tra, subtract from the meat’s flavor and texture.

Tra also doesn’t cook with oil. Oil makes sandwiches too greasy, said Tra, so she substitutes oil with the meats’ own fat.

"I had Vietnamese sandwiches before and the other sandwiches seem almost dry (compared to Kim’s)," said Yovanovich, whose favorite sandwich at Kim’s is the juicy and tender BBQ pork.

Besides Vietnamese sandwiches, Tra also makes soups, salads, spring rolls and rice plates.

THE LITTLE THINGS

Tra said she attends to the smallest details of her sandwiches. When the restaurant first opened, some customers didn't like the seeds in her jalapeno peppers.

"When I take the seeds out, it takes me three times longer," said Tra. "But little things make your business a success or not."

In addition to removing jalapeno seeds, Tra also changed the amount of cilantro leaves in her sandwiches, the time to pickle the carrots and daikon, and the mixture of her sauces. Her sandwiches, said Tra, are more than the sum of each improvement.

"I don’t know if people remember or not, but the food right now is way better than the food before," said Tra. "I changed the ingredients around, and see how people like it."

MAINTAINING ENERGY

Besides fresh ingredients and attention to detail, cooking great food, said Tra, also requires positive energy.

"When people have their own business, they have a lot of stress and they overwhelm themselves," said Tra. "But when you don’t have energy, your food will never taste good."

Tra said stress dulls the taste buds. A cook with dampened tastes can’t sense the right proportions.

To maintain positive energy, Tra said she never works past 10 o’clock. She would rather go to sleep early and wake up at 5 a.m. than work late into the night.

Kim’s Café is also enlivened by Tra’s youngest daughter, Jaimie, who is a third grader at . Jaimie sometimes works the counter and brings food to customers.

"I think it’s very cool that it’s a family place," said Thalia Tom, an Albany High sophomore who works at toy store a few blocks away. "They have a daughter and she takes my order. I think that is very cute."

WHO IS KIM?

Kim’s Café was originally called . Tra changed the name in mid-2011 because she felt the name sounded too generic.

But the identity of Kim, said Tra, is going to remain her secret.

FOR THE FUTURE

Her children's future, said Tra, is what pushed her, in the end, to start her own business.  

"My kids, I think I should create something for them, something for them to hold onto," said Tra. "They might go their path but, later on, they can come back."

It was a struggle to leave the stability of working within a company, but Tra said ultimately she decided the risk was worth it.

"(I debated) back and forth, back and forth before I decided to do it," recalled Tra. "But if you don’t try, then you'll never know if you’re going to succeed." 

If there's something in this article you think , or if something else is amiss, call editor Emilie Raguso at 510-459-8325 or email at albany@patch.com.