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How Peb and Pat transformed a family recipe into Emily’s, one of Thailand’s fastest-growing food brands.
Some of the most valuable business lessons emerge during moments of uncertainty. The ability to recognise opportunity within a crisis, adapt to changing circumstances and respond with purpose often separate businesses that simply survive from those that continue to grow.
That mindset can be seen in one of Thailand’s most talked-about chicken noodle brands today, Emily’s, founded by Naiyanachanok “Peb” Patamasingh Na Ayutthaya and Thaparat “Pat” Waerojruedee. Their story offers a closer look at how adaptation and strategic choices shape how a business grows.
The Recipe That Started It All
In the era of TikTok, the story of Emily’s begins during the pandemic, when daily life slowed and social media became a space for creation, sharing and connection. During this period, Peb and her partner Pat started posting content that reflected their lifestyle, treating it as a digital diary. Their audience grew through these moments of everyday storytelling.
At the time, Peb and Pat worked in the beverage business. When COVID-19 affected operations heavily, they faced difficult decisions. One priority stood clear: avoiding staff layoffs. This led them to explore a new direction in food.
Meanwhile, attention in the digital space also grew around food from the Patamasingh household. Recipes from Peb’s family, shared by her mother Pinthipa Devakul, circulated online and attracted interest from a wider audience. These home-style dishes gained traction across social media and began to shape early awareness of the brand’s identity.
They started building Emily’s in 2022 with Mee Kai Cheek, a chicken noodle dish based on a family recipe introduced through a pre-order delivery model in Bangkok. The origin traced back to Peb’s childhood with her family’s crab noodle recipe. Because Pat has a seafood allergy, Peb’s mother adapted the recipe into shredded chicken noodles especially for her. That adaptation eventually became the foundation of Emily’s signature dish.
The team uses direct-to-consumer channels to test demand and further develop the product. As interest grew, the brand expanded into pop-up spaces in major Bangkok department stores and refreshed its packaging and visual identity. In 2023, Emily’s strengthened its operational structure by expanding delivery coverage across Bangkok, including Ladprao, Asoke and Charoennakhon.
Recognition soon followed with the Shell Chuan Chim Award and growing visibility across digital platforms, with TikTok content reaching hundreds of millions of views and international exposure including a Times Square feature in New York.
Emily’s continues to respond to changing lifestyle patterns. During the pandemic, delivery fit daily needs and became the main channel for customers. As restrictions eased, the brand moved into physical pop-ups in malls, creating a more accessible connection with audiences in everyday spaces.
Emily’s continues to scale through partnerships and distribution expansion while maintaining focus on its core identity: food shaped by care, memory and familiarity, shared from home kitchens to a wider audience.
Where Emily’s Feels Like Home
As Emily’s continues to grow, Peb and Pat saw an opportunity to take the brand beyond delivery and pop-up stores. Last year they introduced House of Emily, a full-service restaurant at Yard 49, Sukhumvit 49. The new space reflects something they had wanted to create from the beginning: a place where people could experience the warmth of their home beyond the screen.
The move came from a simple realisation. Online orders could bring Emily’s into people’s homes, but they could never replace face-to-face conversations or the feeling of sharing a meal around the same table. House of Emily closes that distance. Every detail, from the atmosphere to the service, draws from the way Peb and Pat welcome guests into their own home.
The menu now extends beyond the chicken noodles that first introduced Emily’s to customers. Family recipes sit alongside new interpretations shaped by Thai ingredients and contemporary ideas. Signature dishes include caesar salad served with cured beef or pork, grilled wagyu paired with Emily’s rice vermicelli and green curry sauce, a great-grandparent’s khanom jeen nam prik with lobster and Peb’s mother’s banana in coconut milk. Familiar flavours remain at the centre, while each dish introduces a different chapter of the family’s story.
House of Emily also reflects a broader lifestyle direction. The restaurant creates space for long lunches, family dinners and gatherings with friends, with hospitality that mirrors the care Peb and Pat have shared since the brand’s earliest days. The experience extends beyond the food itself. It carries the feeling of arriving at someone’s home, where conversation, comfort and familiarity hold the same importance as the meal on the table.
A Bigger Table
Growth continues with investment behind the scenes. A central kitchen and headquarters strengthened operations, while new hubs across Bangkok, Nonthaburi, Chonburi and Chiang Mai brings Emily’s closer to customers nationwide. The brand has also entered airport retail, launched e-commerce through Shopee and Lazada and introduced international pop-ups in Singapore and South Korea. A defining achievement has been the recognition of Emily’s as GrabFood Thailand’s top-selling brand.
Peb and Pat now look beyond Thailand. Their ambition is to introduce Emily’s signature chicken noodles to international audiences and share a flavour of Thai cuisine that inspires people to visit the country. They hope Mee Kai Cheek will one day be known as a dish that represents Thailand on the global stage.
