Kyle Nabilcy
The kao piak khao at Sern Sapp.
The kao piak khao, or congee, is terrific.
Southeast Asian food has been a part of Williamson Street for a long time, and almost from the jump, the Inthachith family has been there. They were, until recently, running two locations of the venerable Lao Laan-Xang. But the Willy Street location closed in 2022 with the retirement of matriarch Bounyong Inthachith, as staffing two kitchens became too unwieldy.
After three years, the unlikely gravitational pull of that little storefront at 1146 Williamson has proven too strong for the family to resist, and Ounprason Inthachith — the son of Bounyong, who coincidentally goes by “Son” — has, with his wife, opened Sern Sapp.
Lest you think this is another interchangeable location of the same old LLX, I’m going to rip the Band-Aid off quickly: there’s no crab rangoon, no drunken noodles, no squash curry. Sern Sapp is its own thing, at once both a little homier and a little more hawker stall. You will see phrases like “street favorite,” “comforting,” and “very much like home” on this menu, and the operation stays true to those guiding lights.
Sern Sapp’s early hours (currently 10 a.m.- 2:30 p.m.) intrigued me, especially with the presence of khao piak khao on the menu. More commonly known as congee, it absolutely lived up to my anticipation, all savory broth and creamy rice porridge, topped with crispy onion, green onion, and cilantro. “Soy-splashed hard boiled egg” might not replace “cherry on top” in the lingo, but it certainly made this breakfast dish complete.
Arriving early will also help you get your hands on one of the more fascinating dishes on the menu. It’s called nam khoa, not to be confused with nam khao (a popular crispy rice salad), this savory crepe wrap most closely resembles Vietnamese bánh cuốn. In a conversation with the Capital Times, Inthachith expressed surprise that it wasn’t more widely available in Madison, but it took an email directly to him for me to feel like I really got the proper understanding of this hard-to-google Luangprabang favorite.
Kyle Nabilcy
The nam khoa at Sern Sapp.
Nam khoa is a slippery little bundle.
It’s a slippery little bundle, literally and figuratively, filled with thinly sliced mushrooms and topped with a variety of meats and egg. Though the name means “white roll,” its mix of egg, meat, and veggies should appeal to any Denver omelet fan. I have seen it sell out before the end of Sern Sapp’s already brief daily window of operation.
Noodles (noodle soups) make up a lot of the Sern Sapp output, and this was true even before the early September shift to a “Strictly Noodles Saturday” menu. Perhaps frustratingly to those who can’t conveniently get there for a weekday breakfast, only a half dozen or so noodle dishes are offered on Saturdays — no congee, no slippery little crepes, no spring rolls.
Still, the khao piek sen is a fine bowl of what is fundamentally Lao chicken noodle soup. The intense khao soi soup comes in the same northern Lao style you’ll find at Ahan, with less coconut and more tomato in the mix. Take care when dosing your noodle soups from the little dish of finely chopped chili; it is markedly hotter than the thicker, smokier chili oil offered alongside the congee and other dishes.
On those Strictly Noodle Saturdays, you’ll find the mee ped, a roast duck dish unique to the Saturday menu. Though the roughly hewn duck is visually arresting, the broth is the star of this show, deeply savory and satisfying. I’d love to see the duck skin a little crispier — don’t I always — and for that matter, also available as an option elsewhere on the menu, like in the khua fer (stir fried wide egg noodles). It’s absolutely fine with chicken, but holy moly, with a little crispy duck, it’d be mind-blowing.
It’s hard for me to not be prescriptive with Sern Sapp, because I just want a little more from it. The hours are obviously limited, and the menu is already small before tightening up even more on the one day a week the majority of diners can visit.
Before the current Central Asian dining boom, before poke, ramen, or even most sushi spots, Madison had southeast Asian restaurants. Diners have become more savvy to the differentiations between Lao and Thai and Hmong and Korean over the years; thank god, the old days of embarrassingly monolithic cultural awareness are (mostly?) behind us. I look forward to seeing what else Sern Sapp can do once it settles into its groove, because what it’s doing now has real promise.
Sern Sapp
1146 Williamson St.
608-284-7310; sernsapp.com
10 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Mon.-Sat.
$6-$18
