For a decade, Gizela Ho helmed the kitchen at one of the hardest-to-book San Francisco restaurants, creating playful, global-inspired dishes that married her Cantonese roots with the tenets of California cuisine. Now, after leaving Rich Table in November, she is ready to step into the spotlight and open her debut restaurant, Good Morning 96. 

Though she has yet to finalize a lease, she envisions a restaurant that reflects her experiences growing up on Guam and summers spent in Hong Kong — a modern version of a Hong Kong-style cafe. She hopes to open in mid-2027. “I want it to be a fun, energetic space,” she said.

Ho has secured about 40% of the funding needed for the restaurant and is in talks with A-Frame Hospitality, a consultancy that worked on the opening of The Happy Crane last year. She expects the menu to lean heavily into seafood and vegetables. “That’s what I really loved eating growing up, and I want to bring a little bit of that excitement to the menu,” Ho says. 

The name refers to “good morning” towels, which are ubiquitous and affordable in Hong Kong and across Southeast Asia. Often used by working-class laborers and in cha chaan tengs, or Hong Kong cafes, they’re easily recognizable by their red stitching reading “good morning” in English and Chinese. The year 1996 refers to when Ho’s grandfather opened his restaurant in Hong Kong after being a street vendor for years.

While she’s working on the restaurant, diners can get a taste of what’s to come through monthly collaboration events. Ho has partnered with restaurants in San Francisco and Oakland, including Nisei in May, Ox & Tiger in June, Prubechu in July, and Peony Seafood Restaurant in September.

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In April, she collaborated with baker Jessica Little Fu on a pastry pop-up at On Waverly in Chinatown. Boxes included a Hong Kong sausage cocktail bun, black sesame cookie, milk tea, berry cream puff, and a char siu puff pastry.

Ho has been busy testing recipes, from crudos and ceviches — “I’m really hoping to have an extensive raw menu,” she says — to a mapo schnitzel. It was on the Rich Table menu, and Ho is excited to bring the dish back, but with a twist: She’s trying out a Hong Kong-style pork chop.

For desserts, she plans to partner with a local creamery on custom flavors. She’s also experimenting with her own items, including a cookie made with black sesame paste, Okinawan crushed brown sugar, and roasted golden sesame seeds sourced from San Francisco’s Japanese Pantry store.  

“I’m excited to show people food that I’m most passionate about,” Ho says.