photograph by michael donahue
Somehow, my first visit to A-Tan Restaurant was just a few weeks ago. I’d heard about the place for years from family members;
I just never went there. But now I’m glad I did.
Even two-time Oscar-winning actress Jessica Lange had been to A-Tan before me. She signed one of the curtains inside.
A-Tan is almost a two-in-one Asian restaurant. One side, with long wood-and-metal tables, features a Japanese hibachi menu with a chef’s center stage for slicing and dicing chicken, steak, shrimp, and vegetables. The other side — with red paper lanterns, plants, and a framed watercolor of red peonies (Mutan Garden, by Taiwanese artist Kwang Tao Dong) — offers Chinese cuisine at tables, booths, or at the full-service bar.
photograph by michael donahue
L-R: Brandon Vo, Tristina and Chian Wen.
Tristina Wen, who owns the restaurant with her brother, Brandon Vo, tells me to make sure and add “Restaurant” after “A-Tan” in my story. Some people are confused when they come in, because, she says, “They thought it was a tanning place.”
The owner and her family are Vietnamese, but A-Tan doesn’t serve Vietnamese food. Wen doesn’t want to spread herself too thin with an overloaded menu.
Tristina’s husband, Chian Wen, named A-Tan after his mother, the late A-Tan Ferguson, when he and his two sisters opened it in 1989. They had previously operated the Formosa restaurant on Summer Avenue near East Parkway. Opened in 1978, they sold that restaurant in 1990 later to Eddie Pao, who now owns Mosa Asian Bistro.
Before A-Tan, Chian worked with his mother and sisters at the old Peking restaurant in Poplar Plaza. There, they only served meat on skewers, including beef and chicken kabobs. But business wasn’t good, so they changed their selections to Chinese fare.
A few years or so after opening A-Tan on Poplar, Chian opened A-Tan East in Germantown. He sold that location in 1996 and opened Shogun in Poplar Plaza, but he had to change the name to “Shogu” because there already was a “Shogun” in Germantown. He also opened A-Tan Buffet on Poplar Avenue at I-240.
In 2008, he branched out with locations in Texas, opening A-Tan Asian Bistro in New Braunfels. He later added one in San Marcos, Texas and a third location near Braunfels. All are still owned by family members.
Chian’s mother helped out at the A-Tan on Poplar, Tristina says. “She was a really sweet lady, a really good cook. So is he.”
Tristina met Chian at A-Tan when she was 20 years old and a student at the University of Memphis. “I’d get food to go,” she says. “I love his hot and sour soup.”
While in college, she worked at Milwaukee Tool in Olive Branch, Mississippi. She had to rush to get to A-Tan after work because she “was craving his hot and sour soup. I had to run down there before they close.”
Tristina began working for Chian as a server in 2000 before moving up to cashier. She always kept an eye on what was going on in the restaurant. “I want to know how to do everything.” She continued to work at the restaurant after she and Chian married 25 years ago. Tristina and Vo became co-owners when Chian retired in 2024.
They began selling sushi at A-Tan a few years after Shogu shut down, Tristina says. Shogu customers missed the sushi, so they built a sushi bar.
Vo knew how to cook hibachi-style Japanese food because he had worked at Nagasaki Inn. So Chian leased the space next to A-Tan and opened the hibachi side in 2006.
photograph by Madelyn Gray
Michael Donahue enjoying General Tso’s chicken.
Tristina doesn’t cook Chinese food, “because the wok is really heavy.” She does know how to make sushi, but her early efforts weren’t that great. Some of her initial rolls came out broken or greasy. “I feel sorry for my husband,” she says. “He had to test my sushi every day.”
Tristina also learned how to cook hibachi. Now, when needed, she works at the sushi bar and on the hibachi side. Her philosophy? “You have to cook just the way you cook for yourself. All nice and clean.”
Their most popular items are General Tso’s chicken and sesame chicken.
Notable A-Tan customers have included basketball player Rudy Gay, former U of M coach John Calipari, former Mayor Jim Strickland, and former Shelby County Mayor A C Wharton.
Jessica Lange visited the restaurant with the internationally known photographer (and Memphis resident) William Eggleston, Tristina says. Eggleston, who was an A-Tan regular, posed for a photograph with Tristina. Lange didn’t want to be photographed, but she autographed one of the curtains.
“Most of the customers we have are regular customers,” Tristina says, adding, “They all know my husband. He’s been in Memphis over 40 years.”
Tristina says she and Vo have no plans to open another restaurant. And she’s happy with A-Tan the way it is.
“We’re not going to change anything,” she says. “Whatever my husband created, we keep it the way it is. We want to keep it original, and just make sure the quality stays good.”
A-Tan, 3445 Poplar Avenue in Dillard Square Shopping Center
