“We always had food in common,” Thy Mitchell told the Houston Chronicle in 2024.

The co-owner of the restaurants Traveler’s Table and Traveler’s Cart believed food could connect anyone: strangers overseas whose language she didn’t speak, fellow restaurateurs in Houston, small business owners trying to break through.

On May 4, police found Mitchell, her husband Matthew Mitchell and their two children, 4-year-old Max and 8-year-old Maya, dead in a suspected triple-murder suicide. The Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences determined that Thy, Maya and Max were shot and killed in a homicide, while Matthew died by suicide.

Since then, the grief of the Houston restaurant community has made clear just how many people had food in common with Thy Mitchell.

Friends and colleagues gather at Traveler’s Cart for a vigil for Thy Mitchell and her children in Houston on Monday, May 11, 2026.

Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle

Friends and restaurant industry acquaintances described her as a driven and logical business owner, a connector, a “little ball of energy,” an extrovert who didn’t know a stranger, a fashionista, a restaurateur who was always generous with her time to other people in the business. She loved to promote other people’s restaurants on her own restaurants’ social media. She did cartwheels in the street to celebrate the end of construction in front of Traveler’s Cart.

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Mitchell and her husband were both well established in the local food scene. In 2019, they opened Traveler’s Table with a global menu that put the couple’s love of travel on a plate. Guests could order dishes from Thailand, India, Nigeria, Japan and Singapore in one place. Their second restaurant, the street food-inspired Traveler’s Cart, debuted in 2024.

But even though the Mitchells ran their restaurants jointly, Thy left her own impact, a legacy of her willingness to push and pull until other people in the industry joined up to work together.

“She had this incredible way of elevating everyone around her without being pushy in any way,” said her friend Angelique Gioldasis, who also styled Mitchell’s travel fashion brand Foreign Fare. “You just found yourself doing the best.”

Photos of Thy Mitchell and her children are on display during a gathering in their memory at Traveler’s Cart in Houston on Monday, May 11, 2026.

Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle

Houston food was part of Mitchell’s story from the outset. She grew up here. Her dad worked at NASA; her mom and grandmother ran a Vietnamese restaurant, where Mitchell helped out.

She worked hospitality jobs throughout college before moving on to HR. Then she met Matthew, who worked as CEO of the pharmaceutical company Texas Center for Drug Development.

In various interviews and online, they suggested that their first date was over sushi or at House of Pies. They married in 2015, and four years later, switched careers and went back to her restaurant roots.

That’s around when Lukkaew Srasrisuwan met Mitchell. Srasrisuwan had just launched her Thai restaurant, Kin Dee, and she bonded with Mitchell over their budding restaurants, love of fashion and former corporate careers.

At Traveler’s Table, Srasrisuwan teased Mitchell about one of the dishes: khao soi, a Thai curry noodle soup. It wasn’t quite right, Srasrisuwan said. So she offered up some feedback on Thai cooking. It became a running joke: Every time she and Mitchell went to Traveler’s Cart, Mitchell would tell Srasrisuwan not to order Thai food. Srasrisuwan got it anyway.

They ate together at Toca Madera and Chardon in between working on fashion shows. They talked adventure: Mitchell had visited Vietnam, Indonesia, Costa Rica, Japan and so many more countries, but she told Srasrisuwan she still hadn’t traveled enough. And they discussed business — SEO and marketing for their restaurants, Mitchell’s plans to expand her catering.

“She’s one of those who will not even keep anything, any idea to herself. She’s not thinking about competing,” Srasrisuwan said. “She will want to share everything to the group.”

Houston chef Nikki Tran hugs Ryan Browne, director of operations for Traveler’s Cart and Traveler’s Table, during a vigil for owner Thy Mitchell and her children in Houston on Monday, May 11, 2026.

Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle

Other chefs agreed. Nikki Tran, of the now-closed Viet-Cajun restaurant Kau Ba, said Mitchell had offered her the chance to run a multi-day pop-up at Traveler’s Cart however Tran wanted, a rare show of faith. Lena Le, a close friend and the chef at Lena’s Asian Kitchen, said Mitchell was one of her earliest customers. Mitchell first hired Le as a private chef, then supported her meal prep catering, and then came out to her brick-and-mortars.

Last fall, Mitchell decided to host a Diwali event at Traveler’s Cart, so she got in touch with Sharan Gahunia, a second-generation owner of long-standing Indian restaurant and dessert shop Raja Sweets. Gahunia took Mitchell to Hillcroft to shop for clothes in preparation for the event. Mitchell tried on some 19 outfits and bought three, she recalled.

Then they ate at Raja Sweets, and of course, Mitchell posted the experience on social media.

“She saw a small mom-and-pop business, and she was like, ‘OK, I want to bring you along, and I want to expose you, and I want to uplift you on my platform,’” Gahunia said.

Thy Mitchell celebrated Raja Sweets' 40th anniversary with Sharan Gahunia.

Thy Mitchell celebrated Raja Sweets’ 40th anniversary with Sharan Gahunia.

Sharan Gahunia

Daniel Wolfe, the owner of City Cellars, said that Traveler’s Table helped inspire his restaurant. The food menu at his new speakeasy, Cocktails Unknown, represents his take on his travels, much as Traveler’s Table and Traveler’s Cart did for the Mitchells.

“Some of the presentation and some of the inspiration for some of those dishes came from learning how they travel and how they see the world,” he said.

Beyond offering inspiration, though, Mitchell wasn’t afraid to pester in the interests of uplifting someone. She convinced Gahunia to join the board of the Asian Pacific American Heritage Association, telling her that Raja Sweets was 40 years old, so of course its owners should be involved in local restaurant life.

Mitchell got involved in the community too, joining the board of the Texas Restaurant Association’s local chapter in February. Her restaurants supported Sky High for Kids, a pediatric cancer group. And when Patrick Magee held a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society, he said she not only catered the event but designed the menu and came out to deliver the food herself.

On a personal level, Mitchell could be logical and organized, but also fun.

At one Foreign Fare fashion show, her friend and stylist Gioldasis remembered seeing Mitchell’s daughter Maya clutching a clipboard and checking in the prop luggage — the perfect “mini Thy.” (Her son Max was more on the “wild side,” Gioldasis said.) Mitchell would also goof around, making friends like Le record silly videos to post on Instagram.

She had the energy, Srasrisuwan said, to be everything to everyone. To take care of her kids. To offer advice to restaurant folks all over the industry. To run fashion shows. To travel the world.

“There’s not many people who work this hard and put it all in and have a heart,” Srasrisuwan said. “I tried to do that. I can’t be half of her.”