The Choi of Cooking
Roy Choi, Tien Nguyen, and Natasha Phan
An excerpt from The Choi of Cooking
I've spent the last few decades learning the rules of cooking, and then breaking those rules and combining those broken pieces to make a whole new piece. It's like the Watts Towers, but instead of found objects, my piece is built on scraps of my life experiences and approach to cooking. And by passing what l've learned to you, I hope you can learn those lessons, too, without needing to take the long way around. So, embedded in the recipes and throughout these pages are bits of guidance that expand on my cooking style and philosophy.
About the Authors
Photo: © Bobby Fisher
Roy Choi
Roy Choi was born in Seoul, South Korea, and raised in Los Angeles, California. Choi is known as one of the architects of the modern food truck movement through Kogi BBQ. He is the author of the New York Times bestselling LA Son: My Life, My City, My Food and co-host of the Netflix cooking series The Chef Show with Jon Favreau. Choi is a voice and advocate for street food culture past, present, and future, and he is the co-owner, co-founder, and chef of Kogi BBQ, and Tacos Por Vida in LA, and The Chef Truck and Best Friend at Park MGM in Las Vegas. Choi was named one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People and received a James Beard Award and multiple Emmys for Broken Bread. He lives in Los Angeles.
Tien Nguyen
Tien Nguyen has been writing about food and culture for over a decade. She is the co-author of several cookbooks, including the New York Times bestseller L.A. Son: My Life, My City, My Food with chef Roy Choi, and The Red Boat Fish Sauce Cookbook, one of NPR’s Books We Love. She also has written for the Los Angeles Times and Lucky Peach, among other publications, and her work has been honored by the Association of Food Journalists. She teaches food journalism at the University of Southern California and lives in Los Angeles.
Photo: © Audrey Ma
Natasha Phan
Natasha Phan is an award-winning producer, author, co-owner of Best Friend, and the CMO and business partner for all of Roy Choi’s endeavors. She was born into a family who owned a prominent Asian grocery store in L.A., and she’s been in food ever since. Her work with Roy and Kogi have helped shape the modern food truck movement and the way Angelenos eat. Among other initiatives, she co-authored the New York Times bestselling cookbook-memoir, L.A. Son, produced the Netflix series The Chef Show, and executive produced the Emmy-winning Broken Bread. A graduate of UCLA, she lives in Los Angeles.
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