Cuc departs Sing

Talented chef suddenly departs blossoming Asian restaurant in The Heights

Jerry Lasco (left) has parted ways with Cuc Lam (right), the co-founder who has left Sing.

Courtesy photo

A promising new Heights restaurant has parted ways with its chef and co-founder. Cuc Lam announced she has departed from Sing, the fast-casual Singaporean restaurant she recently opened in The Heights.

Jerry Lasco, Lam's business partner in the restaurant, confirmed her departure in a statement provided to CultureMap. Despite Lam's departure, the restaurant already has a new chef and will continue on.

"Cuc is a talented and wonderful lady. We all wish her the very best in her future endeavors," Lasco said. "At Sing, we are focused on continuing the mission of delivering a unique experience with a Singaporean-inspired menu and the highest quality food. We are excited to announce that chef Eileen Lopez, who has been training with our team and comes to us with over a decade of Asian cooking experience, is leading the kitchen."

While the news that the restaurant will continue is good for its fans, the timing of Lam's departure comes as a surprise. After a somewhat rocky start (early Yelp reviews were a mixed bag), Sing had hit its stride with critics. Houston Food Finder included the fast casual spot on its list of 2018's best new restaurants, and Chronicle critic Alison Cook awarded it one star ("a good restaurant that we recommend") last week. Everything seemed to be going well for Lam, who made the leap from food writer to chef and restaurateur by opening Sing.

Lam declined to comment on the circumstances surrounding her departure, but perhaps her social media post, specifically the part about being "due for a few weeks worth of R&R," offers a clue that the demands of running a restaurant may have been overwhelming. In addition, the official Sing Instagram account posted an apology for slow service in the wake of the crowds that descended on the restaurant in the wake of the venerable critic's review.

Here's hoping that Lam pop-ups again with a new project. Having gone through the year-long process of opening Sing, it would be a shame if she gave up operating restaurants for good after only four months.

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Dinner with Friends

New app connects Houstonians for friendly dinners at any restaurant

Photo by Negley Stockman on Unsplash

OpenToBites hopes to be used by travelers and locals alike.

A new app in Houston is connecting foodies and social butterflies for shared meals. OpenToBites launched on Android on June 18 and iOS on June 22, and is available to use for free now.

Founded and operated in Houston by a local developer Kelvin John, OpenToBites allows users to join each other for meals by finding empty seats at tables in 16 cosmopolitan cities. That includes Austin and Houston in Texas, plus other American cities like Denver and New York, and even international cities including Paris, Tokyo, and Sydney.

The app is built on a simple concept, and a press release emphasizes that it's for anyone who wants "friendly company."

“We built OpenToBites in response to several trends, including the rise of solo travel and the demand for social experiences that don’t feel like dating, networking, or large organized events,” said a spokesperson in the release. “We are not a dating app. We are offering shared food and conversation for people who want simple, in-person meal company in a public setting.”

When signing up, users set their first name, an optional profile photo, and a short bio. They'll mark themselves as a traveler, a local, or both, and they can also select an age range or opt out.

Once a profile is created, the user can search for or create meals that are happening within the next 72 hours — keeping things relatively spontaneous. To find an existing meal, they'll select the city and date and apply some filters that determine how many seats are open, what type of cuisine to try, and whether people want to share food with the table or order their own.

Someone has to get the party started, so users may need to take the initiative and start a meal. That means they'll get to choose the date, time, and restaurant — anything is on the menu, as long as they can link to the restaurant on Google Maps or its own website.

This divides users into "host" and "guest." Guests have to request to join a table, and the host can decide to accept it or not. Guests won't be able to see the exact restaurant until their request is accepted, so hosts have a "helpful note" field to fill out with more information about the restaurant.

John says in an email exchange that the goal right now is to grow each city's user base before adding new locations.

A similar app called Timeleft launched in Austin in 2024. Timeleft acts as a friendship matchmaker for small groups of strangers who answer personality questions, meet at a restaurant for dinner, and decide if they wanted to stay in touch. Timeleft chooses the restaurant for each group and charges a "ticket" price before the cost of dinner, making it a more externally organized process and a slightly larger commitment.

Though OpenToBites has a similar concept, it seems to work more like Couchsurfing, an app that connects travelers on their own terms. It also emphasizes the immediate over the long-term — the meal itself is the social goal.

OpenToBites is available for free on the App Store and Play Store. The app is still brand new, so users should expect to host or have limited choices for now.

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