Leeann Chin (restaurateur)

Leeann Chin (February 13, 1933

Chin began selling clothes out of her home in South Minneapolis[4] while she and her husband raised their five children. Her interest in food and restaurants began while she was still running her clothing business from her home. Chin cooked free meals and hosted dinner parties^[3] for her customers as a way of thanking them for their business.^[2][4] Soon, customers requested that Chin host cooking classes and cater events, according to her daughter, Laura Chin.^[2]

Chin opened her eponymous first restaurant, Leeann Chin, at the Bonaventure Mall^[3] in Minnetonka, Minnesota in 1980.^[2] The restaurant, which was one of the first to offer Cantonese and Sichuan cuisine in the Twin Cities area,^[3] initially offered more than 100 menu items,^[2] most of which were created and developed by Chin.^[3] The first Minnetonka location featured a sit-down dining room and menus embellished with calligraphy.^[3] The restaurant proved an immediate success, with some food, which took days to make, selling out quickly.^[3] Chin soon converted it into an 80-seat buffet-style eatery to keep up with customer demand.^[2]

Chin opened her second location in the Saint Paul Union Depot in downtown Saint Paul, Minnesota in 1984,^[2] while a third Leeann Chin restaurant opened at the International Design Center in Minneapolis that same year.^[3] Another location, which also opened in 1984 in downtown Minneapolis served more than 1,000 customers on an average business day.^[3]

In 1985, Chin, who had run the day-to-day operations, sold the rights to her name and her restaurants to

Leeann Chin died from complications of liver cancer on March 10, 2010, in Seattle, Washington, aged 77.^[1][2][1][2] Her husband, Tony, died in 1994.^[1]

References