09/14/2026
10 Entrepreneurs. 10 Years. These Are Their Stories.
In 2017, UNDISCOVERED SF opened at the San Francisco Mint in SOMA with a simple belief: Filipino entrepreneurship deserves a stage. What happened next changed the neighborhood — and for the entrepreneurs who showed up in those early seasons, it became part of their story.
As we celebrate Season 10, we’re looking back at ten businesses. Not just where they started — but where they are now.
Their stories inspired what comes next. On September 29th, we’re bringing a new generation of entrepreneurs together at the UNDSCVRD Entrepreneur Summit to help shape the next 10 years.
Read the full blog on undiscoveredsf.com/stories
Swipe to meet them. →
Kristen Brillantes and JP Reyes were both miserable at their desk jobs. Every morning they’d take BART together from Daly City to Embarcadero and say the same thing: I hate my job.
They bet on themselves instead — and started serving Filipino comfort food from a food truck at UNDSCVRD Season 1 in 2017.
Their vision was simple but radical: Filipino food for everyone at the table. Inclusive, communal, no explanation required. Tofu sisig. Halo halo milk tea. Adobo. Food that didn’t ask you to prove your Filipino-ness first.
From that food truck, the trio went to Chase Center as part of the Golden State Warriors Taste Makers program, then to The Meeting Place — a downtown SF food hall backed by IKEA’s sister company — and now to a residency at Kaiser Geary, redefining what hospital food can be.
Featured on KQED’s Check, Please! Bay Area. NBC California Live. One of the defining Filipino food success stories of the decade.
The Sarap Shop JP Reyes Kristen Brillantes James Brillantes
Lines went out the door. Colin Kaepernick showed up. She cried in the corner — the good kind.
Reina started as a personal chef after leaving a decade in corporate work. She opened Nick’s Kitchen in Daly City in 2016 — the first Filipino vegan restaurant on the Peninsula. Expanded to three Bay Area locations. Lost them all to COVID. And rebuilt from scratch under her own name — Chef Reina — her face, her story, front and center.
Netflix. Food Network. CNN. New York Times. PETA Cultural Trailblaz
