ST. LOUIS, MO – September 18, 2026 (StLouisRestaurantReview) Chao Baan, the Prapaisilp family’s regional Thai restaurant in The Grove, will permanently close after dinner service Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026, bringing an end to a seven-year run that introduced many St. Louis diners to Thai cooking extending well beyond familiar pad thai and curry dishes.

The closing represents the end of a distinctive chapter for one of St. Louis’ most established locally owned restaurant families. But based on owner Shayn Prapaisilp’s explanation, this is not a story of a family abandoning the local food business.

Instead, it appears to be a business transition.

Prapaisilp said his attention has increasingly shifted toward his family’s international grocery operations, Global Foods Market in Kirkwood and United Provisions in the Delmar Loop, as well as changing responsibilities at home. The family’s other restaurants — King & I in Richmond Heights, Oishi Sushi in Creve Coeur and Oishi Sushi & Steakhouse in Chesterfield — will remain open.

That distinction matters.

No verified evidence currently shows that Chao Baan’s closing resulted from financial failure. Rather than speculate about the restaurant’s finances, the facts point toward the Prapaisilp family consolidating Shayn’s time and attention around other parts of a St. Louis food business that has evolved for decades.

Chao Baan brought regional Thai cuisine to St. Louis

Chao Baan opened in June 2019 at 4087 Chouteau Ave. on the ground floor of the Chroma development in The Grove.

The restaurant was deliberately different from many American Thai restaurants.

Chao Baan means “of the people” in Thai, and its menu combined dishes and cooking traditions from two regions closely connected to the Prapaisilp family.

Shayn’s mother, Sue, is from Loei province in northeastern Thailand, while his father, Suchin, grew up in Yala province in southern Thailand. Chao Baan therefore concentrated on the cuisines of northeastern Thailand, known as Esaan, and southern Thailand, or Pak Tai.

The restaurant’s official description explains that many Thai restaurants in the United States emphasize central Thai cuisine, leaving American customers more familiar with dishes such as pad thai and curries.

Chao Baan was designed to broaden that understanding.

“The idea of Chao Baan is to bring those two regional cuisines together under one, harmonious concept,” Prapaisilp explains on the restaurant’s website.

That philosophy influenced everything from the recipes to the menu size.

When Chao Baan opened, Prapaisilp told St. Louis Magazine that keeping the menu relatively small was intentional. Too many choices, he believed, encouraged customers to fall back on dishes they already recognized.

Instead, Chao Baan encouraged diners to explore.

Its signature offerings have included khao tod nam sod, a crispy rice salad incorporating fermented pork sausage, ginger, herbs, lime and fish sauce; beef nam tok; mieng kham; and gaeng som, a spicy southern Thai soup.

Prapaisilp also made clear from the beginning that the restaurant wasn’t going to substantially dilute its regional flavors for an American audience.

“The flavors are full-fledged, there’s no holding back,” he told St. Louis Magazine when Chao Baan opened.

A restaurant built around family memories

The story behind Chao Baan goes deeper than creating another restaurant concept.

Many of its dishes came from Prapaisilp’s childhood.

His grandmother lived with the family while he was growing up and prepared the elaborate Thai dishes that became some of his strongest memories of food and family. Years later, those memories helped inspire Chao Baan.

In the closing announcement, Prapaisilp described the decision as “bittersweet” and recalled the connection between his grandmother and the food served at the restaurant.

“I wanted to give those dishes a place and share a part of Thai food that St. Louis had not experienced,” Prapaisilp said in the closing announcement.

In that sense, Chao Baan became more than a conventional restaurant expansion.

It was a way to preserve family recipes while introducing another generation of St. Louis diners to regional Thai food.

Prapaisilp family has decades of St. Louis history

Chao Baan is only one chapter in a much larger local restaurant story.

Suchin and Sue Prapaisilp helped introduce Thai restaurant cuisine to St. Louis decades ago. Historical profiles of the family trace their restaurant operations to King & I, which became one of the city’s longstanding Thai restaurants. The family’s business interests eventually expanded well beyond a single restaurant.

Today, those businesses include restaurants and international grocery stores.

Global Foods Market in Kirkwood says it is family-owned and operated and offers foods from more than 50 countries. The current market opened in 1999, while the family’s involvement in St. Louis international-food retail stretches back even further.

United Provisions followed in the Delmar Loop in 2014.

Shayn Prapaisilp had initially pursued a different career. After studying political science at George Washington University and earning a master’s degree in public service management from DePaul University, he worked in public policy and nonprofit-related positions.

His parents eventually asked him to help develop United Provisions after they were approached about an international grocery concept near Washington University.

The project changed his career.

When United Provisions opened in 2014, Prapaisilp returned to St. Louis and committed himself full time to the family business.

Five years later, Chao Baan opened.

A second-generation restaurant experiment

Chao Baan also represented the evolution that frequently occurs when a second generation assumes a larger role in a family business.

Prapaisilp has described differences between his approach and his parents’.

His parents spent decades learning what St. Louis diners expected from Thai restaurants and built successful businesses around those expectations. Shayn wanted to preserve that history while taking greater culinary risks.

Chao Baan became one of the clearest expressions of that philosophy.

“I wanted to prove we could do something new,” he told St. Louis Magazine in 2020. “I’m a different generation with a different viewpoint, so I need to honor them but continue the evolution of the business.”

The result was a restaurant deeply connected to the family’s past while intentionally introducing diners to something different.

Chao Baan survived an extraordinary restaurant period

The restaurant’s seven-year run is particularly noteworthy because of when it opened.

Chao Baan welcomed its first customers in June 2019.

Less than a year later, the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted restaurants throughout St. Louis and across the country.

Like other independent restaurants, Chao Baan had to adapt rapidly to a dramatically changed operating environment. Takeout became an important component of its business during the pandemic, allowing customers to experience dishes based on the Prapaisilp family’s recipes at home.

Chao Baan ultimately survived the pandemic and continued operating for years afterward.

Its closing in 2026 therefore should not erase what the restaurant accomplished during one of the most difficult periods the modern restaurant industry has faced.

The Grove loses another established restaurant

Chao Baan’s departure also comes during another period of change for The Grove.

Grace Meat + Three recently closed its Grove restaurant after nine years, consolidating its restaurant, catering and food-truck operations at Grace Chicken + Fish in Crestwood. Grace attributed that move to its lease expiration and its decision to consolidate operations.

At the same time, new restaurant concepts continue to open or plan locations in and around the neighborhood.

That makes it important not to oversimplify what is happening.

Two established restaurants leaving The Grove does not by itself demonstrate that the neighborhood’s restaurant economy is collapsing. Each closing has its own circumstances, while new operators continue investing in the area.

Still, losing established independent restaurants changes a neighborhood.

Restaurants such as Chao Baan contribute more than meals. They give commercial districts identity, employ local workers, attract visitors, and give residents across the metropolitan area reasons to visit a neighborhood.

What happens to Chao Baan’s space?

No successor for Chao Baan’s restaurant space has been announced.

Prapaisilp has expressed hope that another operator will eventually take it over and create something new there.

“We look forward to a great operator coming in and reimagining the space for the next chapter of a great restaurant in the Grove,” Prapaisilp said.

That space will be worth watching.

A new independent operator taking over an established restaurant location could add another chapter to The Grove’s continuing evolution.

The next chapter may be in grocery retail

Perhaps the most interesting part of Chao Baan’s closing announcement is what Prapaisilp intends to concentrate on next.

He has increasingly been drawn to the grocery side of the family business.

Global Foods Market and United Provisions occupy an unusual niche in the St. Louis food economy. Rather than simply selling mainstream groceries, the stores connect immigrant communities with ingredients from their home countries while exposing other St. Louis shoppers to cuisines and products from around the world.

Global Foods says it carries foods representing more than 50 countries.

Prapaisilp has described the stores as places where food becomes a bridge between cultures. A previous profile described Global Foods as a place where customers can hear numerous languages and encounter shoppers from multiple continents discussing unfamiliar ingredients and how to prepare them.

Now, Prapaisilp says he is thinking more and more about how those grocery businesses can evolve and serve more of the region.

“I’ve found myself drawn more and more to the grocery side of our business,” he said in announcing Chao Baan’s closing.

No specific expansion, additional store, or other project has been publicly announced, so it would be premature to conclude that a major grocery expansion is coming.

But his comments make the family’s grocery operations worth watching.

The final weekend for Chao Baan

For customers who have followed Chao Baan since 2019, the remaining opportunity to visit is short.

The restaurant’s final service is scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 20.

After that meal, one restaurant will disappear from The Grove, but the family behind it will remain deeply involved in St. Louis’ restaurant and international-food community.

King & I, Oishi Sushi, Oishi Sushi & Steakhouse, Global Foods Market, and United Provisions will continue to operate.

Chao Baan’s seven-year run nevertheless deserves recognition on its own.

It brought recipes rooted in Loei and Yala provinces to a dining room in The Grove. It encouraged St. Louis diners to look beyond the Thai dishes they already knew. It preserved foods connected to the Prapaisilp family’s history. It also showed how a second generation of a longtime St. Louis restaurant family could honor what came before while experimenting with something distinctly its own.

When Chao Baan serves its final customers Sunday, St. Louis will lose one of its more distinctive expressions of regional Thai cuisine.

The Prapaisilp family’s story, however, is far from over.

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