Leona Botanical Cafe & Bar

Dee Dee's fried chicken comes out under hot honey and Thai chili, off a first-ever full kitchen and a menu twice the size of the food truck's.3 1

Why go

Two teams built it and both are worth knowing. Lakana and Justin Trubiana run Dee Dee, and this is their first brick-and-mortar. Reyna and Maritza Vazquez run Veracruz All Natural, and here they added breakfast and lunch items including a torta. A third counter, Bun Bun Burger, is still an announcement rather than a kitchen: three sources across November and December 2025 describe it as planned, the most recent putting it at spring as a fusion concept from both teams.1 3 The site is five acres on Brodie Lane in Sunset Valley, with 7,000 plants across 80 species and more than 90 existing trees kept in place while Clayton Korte built around them. It opened on 11 November 2025.

Order this / avoid

Order: off the Dee Dee counter, and Austin Monthly names two: the spicy-sweet fried chicken that drips with hot honey and Thai chili, and the roasted chicken with Jim Jeow sauce and sticky rice.3 Take a Veracruz torta on the house-baked bread, or a breakfast taco earlier in the day since that counter opens at 7:30am.
Drink: the Green Papaya Margarita, which Caer Maiko Ferguson wrote off a Thai salad.1 Order it against the Thai food on purpose: a som tam is built on lime, fish sauce and chile, so a margarita carrying that same sour and saline profile keeps pace with the heat where a sweet drink would just amplify it. The coffee runs on Proud Mary beans, including a banana milk hojicha and a Thai pumpkin latte, and there is a hibiscus piloncillo tea for anyone off both.
Avoid: waiting for a number before you go. Two Austin desks have written about the food here and neither of them publishes scores, so a rating is not coming any time soon.

What locals & experts say

CultureMap Austin (31 October 2025): the drinks program is shaped by Caer Maiko Ferguson, who was named CultureMap Austin's Bartender of the Year at the 2019 Tastemaker Awards and who ran the traveling Asian cocktail pop-up Daijoubu after bar jobs at Peche, The Roosevelt Room and DrinkWell. Her list crosses East Asian, Southeast Asian and Mexican, and several drinks are built to work with or without alcohol.1
Justin Trubiana of Dee Dee, in the release: We've been dreaming of making this project a reality since we first met when our two food trucks were neighbors on the east side back in 2018.1
The pastry case is a rotation, and CultureMap names the bakers. It opened with Amanda Rockman at Rockman Bakery, changing every three months, with Teal House, Sour Duck Market and Texas French Bread named to follow.1
Austin Monthly ate here and named dishes. Ruvani de Silva, in the January/February 2026 issue: the roasted chicken with Jim Jeow sauce and sticky rice shows off chef Lakana's native Northeastern Thai home cooking perfectly. Maritza Vazquez on the torta bread in the same piece: The bread has this incredibly fluffy, buttery texture you won't find anywhere else.3
The Infatuation logged it on 12 November 2025 without eating. Nicolai McCrary's page describes a shared space with a cafe, bar, and two counter-service restaurants and vouches for the operators rather than this address: Both spots have long been home to some of our favorite versions of their respective cuisines, so these new openings are exciting. He then says it outright: We haven't been here yet, but want you to know this spot exists.2
The Austin Chronicle knew what the garden was for before it opened. Brandon Watson's January 2025 piece on farm-to-table calls Leona a concept anchored by a culinary garden and quotes Justin Trubiana on why: since Lakana started growing, she hasn't had to outsource any of her papaya, wax gourd, butternut squash, Kaprow basil, lemon basil, mint, lemongrass, or Thai bird-eye chilis, which are used in all of her dishes and chili pastes. Note that the two desks split on the regional label, Austin Monthly writing Northeastern Thai and the Chronicle writing northern.4
Nothing scored exists. The Infatuation is the one Austin desk that publishes numbers and it has stated it has not visited.

Good to know

Where it is: 6405 Brodie Lane, Sunset Valley, across from Lowe's and diagonal to H-E-B.
Hours, and they are three sets: the site runs 7:30am to 11pm daily. Veracruz serves 7:30am to 9:30pm and Dee Dee serves 10:30am to 9:30pm.1
Hygiene: no inspection record exists for this address.5

Verdict

should-visit — Two of the better trucks in Austin took permanent counters on five acres in Sunset Valley and opened on 11 November 2025. Dee Dee, from Lakana and Justin Trubiana, is doing country-style Thai off a menu twice the size of the truck's, which is the first time that food has had a full kitchen. Veracruz All Natural, from sisters Reyna and Maritza Vazquez, runs breakfast from 7:30am and added a torta here. Caer Maiko Ferguson wrote the drinks, and she took CultureMap Austin's Bartender of the Year at the 2019 Tastemaker Awards; the Green Papaya Margarita is built off a Thai salad and the coffee runs on Proud Mary beans. Pastry rotates quarterly through local bakers, starting with Amanda Rockman. Order Dee Dee's spicy-sweet fried chicken with hot honey and Thai chili, or the roasted chicken with Jim Jeow sauce and sticky rice, both of which Austin Monthly picked out. The Infatuation is the only Austin outlet that publishes a score and it says it has not been yet, which is the only thing holding it off the top rung.

Leona Botanical Cafe & Bar.