Lucky Chow

Comfort food is nostalgic, hearty, soothing, and has never been more indispensable. Whether it’s Chinese food made at home with an assist from cooking blogs like The Woks of Life or Taiwanese and Indonesian classics reimagined by young chefs like Eric Sze (886), Trigg Brown (Win Son), or Cedric Vongerichten (Wayan), fresh takes on familiar flavors are finding a new generation of hungry fans.

We look into the future with three acclaimed women chefs in the Pacific Northwest; the founder of Pared, the game-changing app that has revolutionized how restaurants hire staff; Robert Wang, who invented the Instant Pot as something to help him cook healthier food for his children; and Lucas Sin, chef and founder of Junzi Kitchen, who is bringing awareness to the diversity of Chinese food.

In this episode, we meet the editors of Banana, a magazine creating a voice for contemporary AZN culture, visit an urban rice paddy in the heart of New York City, and talk to the creator of the hot Chinese cooking blog, Omnivores Cookbook. We also spend time looking at the future of Asian cocktail culture and how traditional Asian brews like sake and shochu are growing in popularity stateside.

Explore the idea of functional food and tell stories of individuals who are looking to heal the body, spirit, and global community one meal at a time. Accomplished multi-hyphenate Waris Aluwahlia, celebrated chef Su-Mei Yu along with Nimai Gupta, a farmer who is dedicated to practicing Ayurvedic agriculture show us that consciousness and intent are two of the most powerful ingredients in life.

Explore the vast Asian diaspora. Cultural and culinary mashups take form in Park’s Filipino-American BBQ; J.J. Johnson’s Afro-Asian rice bowls, Llama San’s take on the unique Peruvian-Japanese flavors known as Nikkei cuisine; and James Syhabout, the two Michelin-star Lao refugee chef who keeps one foot in the past while forging new flavor frontiers.

A fourth-generation Japanese-American farm. America’s oldest tofu shop in the hands of a surprising new owner. A mother-son relationship built on a passion for food and a love of heritage. A historic Hollywood cafe that is part culinary hotspot, part history exhibit. A former commander in the South Vietnamese army and CIA collaborator who now owns a James Beard award-winning restaurant.