Arnold Myint runs a five-star Nashville restaurant. He’s also a five-star drag queen
This Tennessee native and restaurant owner is living out his drag (and cooking) dreams.
Mark
“I’m at home in Nashville now,” said queer chef Arnold Myint, speaking to GayCities on a recent video call. “I just got back from Atlanta last night. I leave for New York tomorrow. Then in a couple of days, it’s Seattle.”
Over the past months, Myint (pronounced “mint”) has been on a frenetic promotional tour more befitting a Wicked Witch than a debut cookbook author. But boosted by the chef’s indefatigable enthusiasm, his Family Thai: Bringing the Flavors of Thailand Home is positioned to be a popular culinary hit.
Loaded with mouthwatering photography and detailed, easy-to-follow recipes, the book also captures its Tennessee-born author’s exuberant, optimistic spirit.
Nashville may seem an unlikely setting for the origin story of a gay Asian-American chef (not to mention a former figure skater and occasional drag queen). But Myint says that growing up around International Market — the restaurant/food shop his parents first opened half a century ago, and that he and his sister Anna reconceived and reopened across the street in 2021 — instilled in him a welcoming, open-minded ethos.
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Growing confidence
“There’s a pretty familiar Asian-American story where the parents run a mom-and-pop restaurant, and the kids are behind the cash register or doing their homework off in a corner,” said Myint.
“In the stereotypical story, the parents want their kids to follow a particular path toward success: Maybe you play the violin as a kid, you get your degrees, and become a doctor or some other profession.
“I was lucky to have parents who were super hip. My dad, who was Burmese, came to the U.S. in his early 20s to study. He was a scholar and later a Buddhist lecturer.
“My mother, who was Thai and who ran the restaurant kitchen, was also very open-minded. They planted themselves in a neighborhood that was cheap and seedy in the 1970s, but is now super bougie.
“My parents kept company with academics and other people who were really worldly and dialed-in. The restaurant was also near Music Row. All these music executives who were used to travelling internationally were happy to find food that was different from what you’d generally find in Tennessee back then.
“So there was an inclusive mindset within the walls of the International Market. I was allowed to flourish within those walls.
“I never felt ‘less than’ or looked down upon because of my ethnicity. And I was also allowed to embrace who I was as a young gay boy discovering his natural flamboyant self. I didn’t have any stigma planted in my head.
“I remember hanging out in the alley down the street from the restaurant, racing my buddies on our skateboards. And I’d have a Barbie doll in my hand. I really loved watching her hair flow in the wind. My dad bought me the board and the Barbie. He was saying, ‘If that’s what my kid’s into, that’s what he’s into.’
“I know this isn’t the usual story you hear. But luckily, it’s my story.”
Gay blades
Myint says that the road-warrior lifestyle of his book tour harkens back to his high school days, when he pursued elite figure skating and traveled extensively for competitions.
“I didn’t really know about skating having a gay reputation at the time. At that point, I was training as hard as the football players at my high school. Looking back, I guess all of the gays in Nashville were probably eyeing my butt, but I was so focused on the athletics, though. I wasn’t even really thinking about my sexuality yet.
That changed post-graduation, when Myint joined the cast of a traveling arena ice show. He joined other gay cast members to go clubbing and carousing after their shows. He also had his first romantic relationship on the road.
“We met in a bar one night,” he recalls. “I was in the ice show, and he was a dancer in the musical Fosse. “The two tours were on similar itineraries, so we would try to hook up whenever we were in the same town.”
Homecomings
Stepping away from figure skating, Myint realized that he wanted to return to the culinary world he grew up in. After attending the Institute of Culinary Education in New York, he apprenticed in kitchens on both coasts before returning to Nashville, where he established two restaurants — and one drag persona—of his own.
Myint went all-out to embody the eponymous mascot of his first eatery, Suzy Wong’s House of Yum.
“I was the character for the restaurant,” he recalls. “Basically like Ronald McDonald for McDonald’s, but a little bit more glamorous.”
Over the next decade, both Arnold and Suzy saw their public profiles blow up: Arnold competed on Top Chef and guested on a handful of other culinary television programs; Suzy’s boom included performing not just at her namesake restaurant but at queer community events in Nashville and beyond, culminating in being crowned Miss Gay America 2017.
While the epidemic shuttered Myint’s initial Nashville businesses, he continued to build his presence and personal brand through online cooking videos and additional television appearances.
And in the wake of his parents’ passing, Myint and his sister, Anna, hatched a plan to revive the restaurant where they grew up.
By day, their new International Market serves homestyle Thai dishes based on the Myints’ mother’s recipes. At dinner time, Arnold’s chefier, a more elaborate style, takes over; it’s inspired by Royal Thai cuisine but incorporates local Nashville ingredients like smoked meats, cornmeal, and okra, which is native to both Thailand and Tennessee. Myint includes recipes for both old-fashioned and newfangled dishes in Family Thai. The restaurant has been honored by the James Beard Foundation and Thai Select, the Bangkok-based Thai equivalent of the Michelin Guide.
Cherishing memories of growing up around his parents’ restaurant, Myint is now introducing a new generation to the family kitchen. His daughter, Henley, was born in 2023.
“I’m building a new house right down the street from the restaurant,” says Myint. “I really do feel like Nashville is home.”
Arnold Myint’s queer Nashville notables
Chef’s kisses abound when Arnold Myint starts rattling off suggestions for queer visitors to Nashville. “We have a beautiful community,” he says.
Beyond treating yourself to a superb contemporary Thai dinner at International Market, Myint recommends checking out the following spots:
D’Andrews Bakery & Café represents another queer Nashville homecoming. After training in high-end New York restaurants and bakeries, local native David Andrews returned home to tempt Music City with an array of stunning pastries, breakfasts, and light lunches.
Lipstick Lounge, aka “The Lip,” is lesbian-owned, but proprietors Christa Suppan and Jonda Valentine point out that their popular hangout is “a bar for humans.” And if you’re a human who sings, all the better: Arnold Myint says the karaoke here is hard to beat. “You’re in Nashville, after all,” he says, “Everyone is so freaking good.” Chapstick, next door, is the owners’ lively sports bar, opened in 2024.
Margot Café and its queer owner, Margot McCormack, have been Nashville icons since the turn of the century, when they kicked off the city’s contemporary restaurant boom with satisfyingly unfussy French cuisine. Get in your last licks before this legend closes its doors in June 2026.
Play Dance Bar is the sort of bustling catch-all queer bar complex that thrives in smaller Southern cities, with drag shows, dance floors, bottle service areas, a video bar, and more under one roof—a friendly favorite since 2005.
Suzy Wong’s Drag’n Brunch, a long-running offshoot of Chef Myint’s former restaurant, is a Friday-to-Sunday only affair with appetizers, entrées, and a three-performer show for a low all-inclusive price. Myint, no longer involved with the business, recommends ordering a flight of rainbow mimosas and cautions visitors to expect “a whole bunch of woo-hoo girls in white cowboy boots celebrating bachelorette parties.”
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