Popular Korean Food Truck Opening Brick-and-Mortar Soon

Denver has an extensive food truck scene and, over the years, many have become brick-and-mortar businesses.

The latest is Mukja, which has been cooking up a Korean fusion menu since 2019. In that time, it has developed a loyal fanbase for its amazing, stretchy Korean cheese dogs on a stick. It is now steering into a new adventure, opening a permanent location while still operating its popular mobile kitchen.

The Rivera family — headed by Julia and her daughter Kayla, and aided by son James and Julia’s husband Victor — will continue to drive around town to serve up their tasty fusion of Asian and Latino cuisine, but you’ll also be able to order off a full menu at a new spot opening May 8, at Assembly Student Living.

Where else can you order up wonton nachos and kimchi fries alongside birria ramen, Kpop Chicken, Taiwanese popcorn chicken, and a variety of cheese dogs?

Assembly’s former lobby-turned food hall is more of a food hallway that’s currently home to Maíz Denver Cafe, another former food truck that moved into the space in February 2025. When the space next door became available, Maíz owner Maria Rangel told Rivera that it would be perfect for Mukja.

Anyone driving by I-25 and 38th Avenue has seen Assembly, which once upon a time was a Regency hotel. It has been student housing for two decades, adorned with a colorful mural painted on its exterior.

Mukja co-owner Julia Rivera is half Korean, born in Incheon, South Korea. She was adopted by an American couple and brought to the U.S. when she was eight years old. Her father is Caucasian, and her mother is Korean, so she was raised surrounded by lots of Korean relatives and culture.

“That’s kind of unusual, yeah, usually it’s like Caucasian couples who decide, ‘Oh, we want a Korean kid,’” Rivera says. “But my mom and my dad were living in Korea, and they weren’t looking for a baby or anything. Then my grandma went to this house, and they were like, ‘You know, we have this baby and we can’t take care of her.’ My grandma brought me home to my mom and my dad, and because my dad’s American, they did the whole adoption process, and Korea made it really easy.”

That, she explains, is why “I still have the Korean culture, and I speak Korean. You know, we do all the Korean things like holidays, because my mom’s side of the family, they’re all Korean. So they’re all here now. I never thought I was adopted because I have Koreans all around me.”

She attended first and second grades in Korea, then her family moved to Georgia. When she was in middle school, they relocated to Denver, and she graduated from Gateway High School in Aurora. After earning an accounting degree and spending twelve years in that profession, she started dreaming of rebelling against her career stereotype.

“In the end, I just didn’t feel like that was my calling,” she says.

A born foodie who appreciates world cuisines but especially Korean food, Julia found herself discussing her passion for food with her daughter, Kayla, and the pair decided to make the leap into hospitality, starting with a food truck.

She says she was inspired, in part, by traveling to various cities to check out their food scenes. Along the way, she met Roy Choi, the founder of LA’s pioneering Kogi BBQ. “He opened up to me when I met him, and he was like, ‘Do it. Just do it,’” Julia recalls.

Kayla’s college schedule allowed her the time to help run a food truck several days a week, and the two were off and running. “I really had to convince my husband,” Julia admits. “It wasn’t like I’m gonna do my job and do my food truck. It was like I quit my job because I want to do this. And he was like, ‘No.’”

But she convinced him it would work, Julia says with a smile, and it did. Mukja has since won top honors in a local competition for a pilot episode of Food Truck Prize Fight hosted by celebrity chef Jet Tila. “When Food Network reached out, we thought it was a prank or a scam, whatever. But they kept reaching out, so we’re like, okay, maybe it’s real.”

As the family prepares to welcome guests to their new, very real home, which includes plenty of indoor and outdoor seating plus easy parking, they hope their fans will follow them to Assembly and continue to seek out their mobile kitchen.

Mukja’s will open its brick-and-mortar location inside Assembly Student Living at 3900 Elati Street on May 8. For more information, including its food truck schedule, follow it on Instagram @mukjafoodtruck.