Old Thousand
Smoked brisket goes into the fried rice, and that is the dish the room was built to be able to make.1
Why go
It opened in December 2016 as a deliberate thing rather than a mash-up that happened. James Dumapit came from Uchi and Uchiko, David Baek from Thai Kun and Uchi, and the stated aim was small: We wanted to create a neighborhood restaurant. A place with heart and soul and a positive vibe; a place that gives you a hug and makes you want to come back.
2 The opening menu ran pork ribs with caramelized honey and black bean, hamachi crudo with charred grapes and garlic chive oil, jellyfish salad with wood ear, dan dan noodles. Nine years on, Nicolai McCrary rates it 7.8 and draws the line where the kitchen itself draws it: the fusion half is where it is best, and nobody should come expecting classic dishes by traditional methods.1
Order this / avoid
- Order: the smoked brisket fried rice. The Chronicle's Melody Fury wrote in 2017 that it came with plenty of wok hei behind it, which is the thing that decides whether this dish is a joke or a dish.3
- Dessert: five spice churros, or the pecan bubble waffles.1
- Avoid: ordering it like a regional Chinese menu. Fury wrote in 2017 that the noodle dishes lost their texture under too much sauce, and McCrary wrote in 2023 that the kitchen is at its best when it leans into the fusion. Two reviews six years apart point the same way.1
What locals & experts say
- The Infatuation Austin, Nicolai McCrary, 13 April 2023, 7.8:
It's Chinese food that grew up in Texas, and it's food that you probably won't find anywhere outside of Austin.
1 - The Austin Chronicle, Melody Fury, February 2017: the Chongqing chicken read as a grown-up popcorn chicken under Sichuan chili oil, and the char siu as a real mash-up rather than a costume; the claypot rice missed its crust. Nine years old, and carried here as the early record, not the current one.3
Good to know
- Which door: this is 1000 E 11th St, Suite 150. There is a second Old Thousand on Burnet with a longer takeout menu. It has its own permit and its own record, and nothing on this page is about it.1
- Hygiene: Austin Public Health scores the kitchen 88, inspected 21 July 2025. The four-inspection run since August 2023 is 86, 91, 87, 88. Austin's is a 100-point demerit scale where higher is better and 70 is the failing line, so none of this is a finding.4
Verdict
could-visit — An East 11th room from two Uchi and Uchiko alumni, James Dumapit and David Baek, opened December 2016 as a neighborhood American-Chinese restaurant with better ingredients behind it. The Infatuation rates it 7.8 and is clear that the fusion half is the good half: smoked brisket fried rice, five spice churros, pecan bubble waffles. Go for that. If you want traditional methods and regional cooking, this is not the room.