THE KITCHEN

The kitchen is alive with a cacophony of sound. The heavy door to the walk-in fridge slams shut. Water runs steady as dishes are scrubbed clean. Tickets spill from the machine in quick succession. A spoon scrapes against metal, dipping into pots to check for flavor. Oil hisses as it hits the pan, while vents push out air to hold back the heat of a full-service kitchen.

But for Chef Josh, it’s not noise. It’s therapy.

“Kitchen? What’s it like… it’s therapeutic. Like hot oil—you hear the onions sizzling and you know you’re doing it right. You hear fried rice crackling, your wok spoon hitting the wok—it’s very therapeutic. Even though it sounds crazy, knowing all those things are happening means our dishes are being taken care of. The tickets are coming out, people are getting fed. It makes the experience fun. Sometimes I get nightmares, sure—but for the most part, it’s fun.”

Josh was a dancer long before he became a fine dining executive chef. The sounds that once guided his steps have shifted—from music to the cues of the kitchen. Now, his movements follow a different score: the hiss of oil, the clang of steel, the rush of steam. He moves with practiced awareness, the choreography of fire, steel, and heat guiding each turn.

“I cook by sound, but really it’s all my senses. Especially as the executive chef and leader of the team, I have to constantly be thinking: what’s going on outside right now? What’s in the oven? What’s in the walk-in that I need to take care of before it spoils? There’s always this constant alert. Like right now—I’m thinking: it’s about three o’clock, I’ve got a new chef coming in at three-thirty, I’ve got about a hundred people coming in today. Do I have enough? I’m always on. Smell, taste, sound—it’s like, is something burning? Is everything good? I won’t say I’m on edge, but I’m always alert, because at the end of the day, I take full responsibility for what happens here—good or bad.”

 

HIGH TOUCH

Outside the kitchen, Josh is just as present. We move our conversation into the bar at the front of the restaurant—a surprisingly luxurious space with cushioned stools and a well-lit display of top-shelf bottles. Josh says it’s one of his favorite spots, partly because it’s one of the few places in the historic brick building that catches natural light. From here, he can see everyone coming and going.

Every few minutes, our talk pauses so Josh can greet guests and staff. He offers hugs, high-fives, quick check-ins—always calling people by name. It’s tactile, constant. He calls it “high touch.”

“For me, when I get the chance to touch a table and show my appreciation—or to explain a dish and why I created it—it literally changes their whole experience tenfold. People come in hungry, sometimes hangry, maybe in a bad mood. But when I touch a table, say thank you, share the story of a dish—you see the change instantly. All of a sudden, they’re lit up. They feel cared for.”

It’s not just service. It’s connection.

“Sometimes now we’re getting busier, so I can’t touch all the tables like I used to. But I tell my servers: you’re an extension of me. Know my story. Know what my goal is. Even if you’re not Filipino—and most of our staff isn’t—you have to understand how to sell our food and our experience. Because it’s not just food. It’s who we are.”

At Sampa, high touch means food as presence. It’s how Josh makes sure every guest doesn’t just leave full—but leaves seen.

MEMORY ON A PLATE

Josh’s food is hard to categorize. It’s not strictly Filipino. Not strictly American. Not even strictly Los Angeles.

It’s Josh.

Over the years he’s created thousands of recipes, playful and serious, experimental and nostalgic. But the dishes that stay—the ones that people remember—are always the ones most intimately tied to his own story.

“You can go to your local Filipino mom-and-pop restaurant and find a lot of dishes I grew up with. But what I want is for people to leave here saying: I only got this at Sampa. I can’t go across the street and get the same thing. Every dish I make represents me—my story of growing up, my grandparents, my parents, my friends. That’s what inspires me.”

One of the first dishes that defined Sampa was the Sinigang Xiao Long Bao—a Filipino sour soup reimagined as a delicate dumpling.

“My first dish was the Sinigang Xiao Long Bao. I was working at a dumpling place for about a year, folding thousands of dumplings—literally thousands. Taiwanese chefs came in every month to train us. Michelin-star chefs. That’s not something a lot of people get. I was the only Filipino guy folding dumplings. So I thought, how do I take my favorite Filipino soup dish—sinigang—and put it into this dumpling? Years later, after more experience, I figured it out. Eighteen folds, very precise. When I made it, my brother was like, dude, you did it. That was the spark. That was the first true Sampa dish.”

That spark led to more experimentation: colored doughs, gelled broths, plated flourishes. The dumpling became tamales. The tamales became something else. Always evolving. Always Josh.

But sometimes the dishes that mean the most aren’t the most popular.

“The ones that bring me the most happiness are the ones tied to my parents or my grandma. Like my mom’s dishes—things she used to cook for me when I was younger. I change them up, make them my own. When my parents come in, I’ll say, do you remember this? My mom’s like, yeah, but it looks different. She’ll post on Facebook: I used to make this for him. Those moments bring me the most happiness.”

He laughs recalling one of his recent experiments: a riff on the blue Danish cookie tins so many kids grew up with—only to find sewing kits inside instead of sweets.

“I did a special inspired by that—because I grew up opening those tins thinking there’d be cookies, and instead there were needles and thread. That’s nostalgia. Those little surprises—that’s what makes people smile.”

CARE, CARRIED FORWARD

For Josh, cooking isn’t just about flavor. It’s about care. The kind that lingers after the plate is cleared.

“At the end of the day, I just want to push out what’s fun for me, what brings me nostalgia. You’d be surprised how many people have the same story. When they taste something here, they say, oh my god, my parents used to make this too. That’s what inspires me.”

This is why Sampa feels more like a gathering than a restaurant. Why the kitchen feels like music. Why every dish is its own love note.

ROOTS are not always visible. But at Sampa, you can hear them in the crackle of fried rice, see them in the hands that fold a dumpling, and taste them in every bite of a dish that could only exist here.

 

UPRISERS x Sampa The UPRISERS x Sampa collaboration for Family Style Fest carries the same spirit. Together, they’ve created the Baon Box—a quiet act of love in the form of a meal. “I see you. I feed you.” More than just a lunchbox, it’s an invitation to feel cared for with every bite. Rooted in the vibrant LA community, both UPRISERS and Sampa draw from American heritage while honoring their own ROOTS. The Baon Box design reflects the Philippines and the neighborhoods of Los Angeles that shaped them—bridging culture, care, and community into one shared experience. Experience the UPRISERS collab for yourself at the 2025 Complex Family Style Food Fest at the LA Historic State Park on Saturday, September 13.