What Happened to De Rican Chef After Restaurant: Impossible (FN)?

Restaurant: Impossible (Food Network) featured De Rican Chef, a Puerto Rican restaurant on Virginia Beach Boulevard near the oceanfront in Virginia Beach, Virginia, in the episode "Ambush: Beneath the Surface," which aired March 16, 2016. Coverage of the episode describes owner Raquel being surprised by the crew after her daughter reached out for help, in line with the show's ambush format, and the renovation covering the dining room, kitchen, and menu during the program's usual compressed schedule. EntertainmentNow later reported that Robert Irvine returned to revisit De Rican Chef around 2020, and that coverage noted the business had since updated its menu and expanded to a second location beyond the original oceanfront address.

Yelp's page for "De Rican Chef - Oceanfront," covering the Virginia Beach Boulevard address featured on the original episode, was last updated in July 2026 and marks that specific location closed. That closure, however, does not appear to represent the end of the broader De Rican Chef business. A separate, actively updated Yelp page for "De Rican Chef - Holland Rd.," at 3208 Holland Road in Virginia Beach, was last updated in August 2026 and lists current operating hours running into the evening on weekdays and later on Fridays and weekends.

The brand's own website also lists a location associated with Norfolk's Oceanview neighborhood in addition to the Holland Road address. No source reviewed during this research specified exactly when the oceanfront location stopped operating relative to the Holland Road location's opening, or whether the same family continued to own both. Because the specific address featured in the original 2016 episode is confirmed closed by a dated business listing, while the same restaurant name continues operating at other Virginia Beach addresses under presumably related ownership, this record treats the featured oceanfront location itself as closed while noting the brand's continuation elsewhere rather than describing the overall De Rican Chef concept as having ended.