Tasya Hardono thought hard about where to locate the midwest’s first and only Indonesian grocery store.
Meanwhile, Hardono was bouncing back from an especially difficult year. She was born in Jakarta and for the better part of the last 25 years she’s worked in middle management at fast-casual chain restaurants in the northern suburbs, moving up from server to manager at Panda Express, and going on to oversee multiple KFC/Taco Bell locations. Just before COVID-19, she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
She showed up an hour before opening the next morning and began pitching in—and pitching. “The next day she was like, ‘I want to invest,’” says Avila. “‘I can help you run the financial part and run the front.’ My mom said, ‘We can trust her.’” Hardono took orders, helped with opening and closing, and generally took care of the front of the house as traffic in the food hall gradually began to increase.
Hardono, who divides her time between Minahasa and the store, stocks close to 600 different items. That includes some 25 varieties of chips and crackers, (shrimp, tapioca, squid, etc.), 20 different kinds of sambal, and dozens of premade spice mixes and pastes for quick and easy versions of dishes like rendang, soto ayam, nasi goreng, or bumbu rawon—plus most of the raw ingredients you need to make them from scratch (including kluwak kupas).
Meanwhile, Hardono’s buying power allows her to supply Minahasa with staples like terasi shrimp paste from northern Java at import prices, skipping the wholesale markup. “That’s where the best shrimp comes from,” she says.
2217 W. Schaumburg Rd., Schaumburg (833) 927-6364@waroeng_chicago on Instagram
