Khmericano in Pineville: One Khmer, One American, One Cup
By Karen LeBlanc, host of LA64, a Louisiana Travel Show on PBS
This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission from purchased products at no additional cost to you.
I have spent a good chunk of my career arguing that Louisiana food is a conversation, not a recipe. Somebody’s grandmother brings a technique across an ocean, somebody else’s grandmother has different peppers, and four generations later you have a dish nobody could have invented on purpose.
What I did not expect was to find that argument being made fresh, right now, in a coffee shop on Highway 28 East in Pineville.
Khmericano is a small, family-run place in Rapides Parish where the espresso is serious, the syrups are made in-house, and once a week the kitchen turns out a Southeast Asian dish in a quantity that sells out before most people know it existed. It is run by Bibi Leang, who grew up on the Cambodian side of the Thai border, and Kristen Leang, who grew up in Ohio and met him in Cambodia. Neither of them planned to end up in Central Louisiana. Neither of them planned to serve food at all.
I sat down with both of them while Bibi cut beef for a pot of khao soi. Let’s go.
Table of Contents
- A Border Childhood, Measured in Broth
- Coffee First: Cambodia to a Truck to a Storefront
- What “Khmericano” Actually Means
- The Food Was Never the Plan
- Khao Soi, and the Woman From Church Who Changed It
- What This Says About Pineville
- Know Before You Go
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Suggested Reading
A Border Childhood, Measured in Broth
Bibi grew up in a province right on the Cambodian side of the Thai border, in a neighborhood that was not one community but several stacked against each other. Vietnamese families. Thai families. Chinese families. Muslim families. Cambodian families. Different languages carrying over different fences, and one very lucky kid moving between all of them.
“We all grew up over there together,” he told me. “As a child, I got to taste all kinds of food.”
He is describing, without using the word, a foodways laboratory. And what he noticed as a boy is exactly what a cultural anthropologist would tell you to look for: not the dishes themselves, but the divergences. Everybody made broth. Nobody made it the same way. Everybody used chicken and beef. Everybody prepped differently, seasoned differently, thought about curry differently, grew different things in the yard out back.
“Everyone different when it come to flavor, broth, when it come to the curry,” Bibi said. “Chinese preparation different than Thai, than Cambodian.”
That is the whole intellectual project of Khmericano’s food menu, formed decades before there was a menu. He is not cooking one national cuisine. He is cooking a childhood block.
Coffee First: Cambodia to a Truck to a Storefront
Here is the part that surprises people: the food came last. Coffee came first, and coffee is the reason any of this exists.
Both of them worked for a coffee roasting company in Cambodia. That is also where they met. Coffee is, as Kristen puts it plainly, Bibi’s passion, and when the two of them left Cambodia, they left with a business idea rather than a job offer.
“We started out as a coffee truck, actually,” Kristen said. “Because when we lived in Cambodia, we worked for a coffee roasting company, and his passion is coffee.”
The truck ran for about three years before the opportunity opened for a brick-and-mortar, which is where the food finally got room to happen. The espresso program stayed exactly as fussy as it had always been: homemade sauces, homemade syrups, and a stated intent to be a better alternative to whatever you have been settling for.
Why Pineville, of All Places
This is my favorite part of the story, and it is entirely accidental.
Kristen is from Ohio. After years in Cambodia, she had lost whatever tolerance for cold she once had.
“I’m from Ohio,” she said. “And after moving from Cambodia, I couldn’t take the cold anymore. So we decided that we were going to travel until we could find a place to settle down and run the coffee truck all year round.”
The plan was to keep moving until somewhere felt right. Pineville was the first stop. The first stop.
She is a nurse, so she took a travel contract in Alexandria, the standard three months. Then they started going to a church, and the thing happened that happens to people in Central Louisiana all the time and almost never gets credited as a tourism asset.
“We fell in love with the people,” Kristen said. “We really weren’t ready to say goodbye.”
So she extended the contract. They brought the truck down. And after that second term, they stopped pretending they were still traveling.
I want to be precise about what happened there, because it is easy to sentimentalize. A couple with a mobile business and no geographic obligation ran a cost-benefit analysis on the entire United States, and Rapides Parish won on the first try. That is not luck. That is a community doing something right and not bothering to put it on a billboard.
What “Khmericano” Actually Means
The name is a piece of arithmetic, and Kristen walked me through it like a proof.
Khmer is the nationality and the language of Cambodia. She is American. And everybody already knows the espresso drink.
“One Khmer plus one American plus espresso equals one Khmericano,” she said. “That’s where our name came from.”
The logo carries more freight than most logos manage. It is built from a Khmer letter — the one you would use to begin spelling the name in Khmer script — stylized until it reads as a coffee cup. And the latte art swirling inside that cup is a fish, for their Christian faith.
“Our love for coffee, our love for Jesus, our love for Cambodia,” Kristen said.
Three things, one mark. I have interviewed brand consultants who bill six figures and do not get that much done.
The Food Was Never the Plan
If you look at the original branding, there is no food under the Khmericano name. There was not supposed to be. The plan was a good cup of coffee, made properly, with syrups they made themselves.
Then they started feeding friends.
One of their pastors kept asking what they were eating. So they cooked for him. Kristen’s instinct was immediate and correct: you should sell this.
Bibi, being Bibi, took the compliment as a compliment and nothing more.
“He said, ‘We never have anything like this. This is so delicious,'” Bibi told me. “And I take it as, you know, it’s just compliments. And we enjoyed this thing so much, that’s why we make this for you.”
The pastor was not being polite. He told them that if they ever sold it, he would buy it.
Thirty Bowls, One Day a Week
Here is where Bibi’s honesty about the whole venture comes through, and it is the line that stayed with me longest.
“I wondered if folks were going to eat my Asian dishes,” he said.
Sit with that for a second. A man who has fed people his entire life, in a new state, genuinely did not know whether anybody would show up for what he cooks.
So they ran a trial. Thirty bowls. One day a week.
Sold out.
So they kept going. A Cambodian dish. Then a Thai dish the following week. Then Vietnamese. Rotating through what Bibi describes as the best of Southeast Asia, which is a marketing line for everyone else and a literal description of his childhood for him.
“It reminds me of my childhood growing up,” he said. “I have Vietnamese community, I have Thai community, I have Chinese community, I have Cambodian community and myself. And I want to enjoy all those flavors.”
Because the dish rotates and sells out, this is not a restaurant you drop in on casually and expect to find a specific bowl. Watch their social feed. That is the whole system.
Khao Soi, and the Woman From Church Who Changed It
The day I visited, Bibi was making Khao Soi — a northern Thai dish he associates with Chiang Mai — and prepping beef for it.
Which is not how it usually goes. Khao Soi is generally a chicken dish, and that is how Bibi had always known it.
Then a Thai woman started attending their church.
Their daughters had become friends first, the way kids do, and the parents got curious about each other the way parents do. Bibi asked her whether she knew how to make Khao Soi, because it was one of the dishes his family loved most. She said yes.
So the arrangement became: she makes a pot, they come eat, everybody wins.
And she made it with beef.
“We never thought the beef would do that good,” Bibi told me. “And we love it.”
I want to flag what just happened, because it is the entire thesis of everything I do for a living. A Cambodian man and a Thai woman met at a Baptist church in Central Louisiana because their daughters wanted to play together, and the result is a northern Thai dish, altered, now being served to Rapides Parish out of a coffee shop.
That is not fusion. Fusion is a chef’s decision. This is transmission — the same mechanism that gave Louisiana gumbo, and it is still running.
What This Says About Pineville
I asked Bibi why he thinks it worked here, and his answer reframed the town for me.
“I think Pineville, Louisiana is diverse when it comes to food,” he said. “They will give you a chance to try it out.”
The food I ate that day did not taste like Louisiana. It tasted like a specific block near the Thai border, filtered through a Baptist church potluck and a beef supplier in Rapides Parish. Which, if you have been paying attention to how this state actually assembles itself, means it tasted exactly like Louisiana.
Know Before You Go
- Where: Khmericano, 3919 Highway 28 East, Suite A, Pineville, Louisiana, in Rapides Parish. Across the Red River from Alexandria.
- Check before you drive. Hours have changed more than once and the food rotates. Their Facebook page is the most current source for what is cooking and when the doors are open.
- It is a morning-weighted operation. This is a coffee shop first. Plan around breakfast and lunch rather than dinner.
- The food sells out. Thirty bowls became the model for a reason. If a dish is announced and you want it, go early or ask about ordering ahead.
- Order the coffee properly. The syrups and sauces are made in-house, which is the entire reason this place started. Skip the thing you always order and ask what they are proudest of.
- Bring your patience on a busy morning. It is a small family operation, not a chain with a drive-through built for volume. That is a feature.
- Pair it with the rest of Rapides Parish. Downtown Alexandria is minutes away, and Kisatchie National Forest is an easy drive.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Khmericano in Pineville, Louisiana?
Khmericano is a family-owned coffee shop and kitchen at 3919 Highway 28 East in Pineville, Rapides Parish, run by Bibi and Kristen Leang. It serves craft espresso drinks made with homemade syrups and sauces, plus rotating Cambodian, Thai and Vietnamese dishes.
What does the name Khmericano mean?
It combines Khmer, the nationality and language of Cambodia, with American and the espresso drink Americano. The owners describe it as one Khmer plus one American plus espresso. The logo is a Khmer letter stylized into a coffee cup, with latte art in the shape of a fish representing their Christian faith.
Can you get Cambodian food in Central Louisiana?
Yes. Khmericano in Pineville rotates through Southeast Asian dishes, including Cambodian, Thai and Vietnamese. Because the dish changes and quantities are limited, check their social media before you go rather than assuming a specific item will be available.
What is Khao Soi?
Khao Soi is a northern Thai coconut curry noodle soup associated with the Chiang Mai region. It is most commonly made with chicken. Khmericano serves a beef version, a preparation the owners learned from a Thai friend they met through their church in Central Louisiana.
How did the owners end up in Pineville?
Bibi and Kristen Leang met in Cambodia, where both worked for a coffee roasting company. They moved to the United States and traveled looking for somewhere warm enough to run a coffee truck year-round. Pineville was their first stop. Kristen took a three-month travel nursing contract at Cabrini in Alexandria, they found a church community, extended the contract, and stayed.
Is Khmericano just a coffee shop or a restaurant?
It started as a coffee truck and remains a coffee business at its core. Food was added after the move to a permanent location, initially as a limited weekly offering that sold out. Think of it as a coffee shop with a serious rotating kitchen rather than a full-service restaurant.
Suggested Reading
- Stepping Into History at Hotel Bentley: Eisenhower, Patton, and the Louisiana Maneuvers
- Guide to Kisatchie National Forest Adventures & Conservation Efforts
- Best Louisiana Road Trips: Three Scenic Drives Into a Louisiana You Didn’t Expect
- The Best General Stores in Louisiana Still Worth a Stop
- Living Legacy: Your Guide to the Keepers of Cajun and Creole Culture
- More Louisiana food stories from LA64
Khmericano is located at 3919 Highway 28 East, Suite A, in Pineville, Louisiana. For current hours and the week’s dish, check their Facebook page or their listing with Explore Alexandria Pineville.
Watch more of the Louisiana you won’t read about in tour guides on LA64, airing statewide on PBS.
