Yun Hai Taiwan Stories

When I started Yun Hai in 2019, I opted out of producing short-form email marketing and decided to go all in on long-form storytelling. If I was going to put my effort into something, I wanted it to be able to stand on its own, with original and lasting value. Nothing throwaway.

That commitment has manifested as this newsletter, now in its fifth year. I hope the words posted here outlive me in their impact, no matter how small the ripple. Sharing cultural stories and culinary knowledge is paramount—our mission to stand for Taiwanese sovereignty comes first. Our products are a means to that end, and not the other way around.

This has led to constant tension between telling a story and selling a product. What’s editorial? Commercial? Can the two meet? How do we walk the line between culture and commerce, art and business?

In my intellectual life, everyday experience and the domestic arts are a core area of interest. It’s our most intimate space, built on our histories, our triumphs, and our tragedies. Within this sphere, I find there to be infinite space for improvisation and creation. And within that, infinite latitude for joy and subversion. The way we live is the sum product of everything we’ve ever done, as a species, as a culture, and as individuals. Call me romantic, call me a homebody.

Now I Lay Me Down to Eat: Notes and Footnotes on the Lost Art of Living by Bernard Rudofsky. This book explores the cultural and historical aspects of basic human activities like eating, sleeping, sitting, cleansing, and bathing. Very influential for me.

The production of food is included in this larger interest. Agriculture is culture, and it’s generative, too. In this context, agricultural products could be thought of as the punctuation of a massive human effort, generations long, instead of a commodity to be sold. Another meaning for the word product is the result of multiplication, as in a multiplication of effort, knowledge, and sensibility. The thing itself is just the tip of the iceberg, and the iceberg is human.

Yi-Che Hsieh of Yu Ding Xing put it best: Making a bottle of traditional Taiwanese soy sauce is like writing a poem. Writing a poem requires hills and valley, rhyme, and constraints. A bottle of traditional Taiwanese soy sauce also has its own constraints...Human experience, open space, and time. Photo: Yu Ding Xing.

Unfortunately, the speed of production, frictionless commerce, big data, unethical labor practices, and all the trappings of late stage capitalism undermine this interpretation. It’s not escapable, we’re complicit by the nature of the society we live in, though we can fight to change it.

If exploitation is the starting point (whether resources, labor, consumer groups, regulations, or market gaps) and monetary gain is the end goal, the story falls apart. It’s no longer human but becomes anti-human.

Within this perspective, “SHOP NOW” is never enough for me. The products we select are the expression and manifestation of a long story. There’s so much friction in producing them, that I think there should be some in consuming them, too. We should work to understand, seek to know.

The big question for me is how do I, as a distributor, give people an opportunity to pause and and appreciate how lovely our world is and how much has gone into their daily experience?

Yu-Tu Hsieh of Yu Ding Xing soy sauce brewery as a young man, carrying on in the work of his family, brewing soy sauce in Xiluo. Photo: Yu Ding Xing.

Time, Terroir, Taiwan

The first two leaflets from the eponymous Yun Hai Press (internal name for seriously in-house passion project).

We had the idea to use the strength of what we’ve built over the past half decade to distribute small, free productions that share stories of the people that we work with. Between the shop, our wholesalers, and shipped orders, we could easily get a few thousand copies of printed matter out to our audience without additional logistics and for a low cost.

Little Dumpling Book kicked off our booklet series. Today, we continue it with Time, Terroir, Taiwan, a lovingly composed pamphlet that celebrates the soy sauce brewing process in Taiwan. It features our dear friends and third-generation soy sauce brewers, Yi-Cheng and Yi-Che Hsieh, and their family. This book captures only a fraction of what we’ve learned from them over the past seven years and is a follow-up to a documentary of the same name, produced by Yun Hai in collaboration with another dear friend Steve Chen, of Chen Office, in 2021. So many dear friends, I can’t stop loving them.

Photographed on none other than my parents’ aging vinyl mahjong table.

There’s some tension here. Because these pamphlets are, in the end, marketing materials, they can’t also truly be zines (in my opinion). But, we can take the ethos of the format (inexpensive, simple to put together, experimental, fun) and apply that to what we’d like to say.

This pamphlet has no buy button, no tracking cookies, and exists to be read, enjoyed, saved, and shared. It does, however, have a QR code that links to the documentary, which is so worth a watch if you have 15 minutes or so:

Find these booklets for free in every order (while supplies last), and in our shop. If you’re a wholesale customer, we’ll happily send you a stack. And if none of the above will work, send a SASE (self addressed stamped envelope, remember those) big enough to fit a 5”x7” postcard to the shop and I will gladly return it to you, filled.

Design Notes

Designing this was no small matter. I’ve been working on this for almost a year, on-and-off. Some things go quickly and some things very slowly, and, for me, that’s just the nature of creation. Artists may tell me to trust-the-process; marketers may suggest time-is-of-the-essence. They’re both right, I guess.

In any case, the objective was simple: share Yu Ding Xing's story more widely.

We thought we might be able to put the newsprint we wrap glass bottles with in the store to this purpose. We print 5,000 sheets at a time with an Asian-American web-printer based in Long Island City. Because we’re already printing them, we could embed the story of Yu Ding Xing into the sheet, and spread the word without spending any extra money.

The originating mock up.

In this decadent (in the original sense of the word) age of AI, I thought I should get back to something physical. I started by hand drawing titles and printing out photos to place onto scrap pieces of newsprint and similarly sized kraft paper. The plan was to then scan these compositions to create a special edition newspaper.

More mock ups on whatever happened to be around.

The design was more challenging than expected. It’s somewhat clear how one might make a sell sheet with product descriptions, bullet-pointed material, and a clear offer. It’s much more difficult to place text and image together on paper in way that’s a delight to handle, read, and remember. It changed at least seven times, evidence below:

More after the jump on how we arrived at the final design.

黑豆豉: We Are a Bean People

Lisa Cheng Smith — Thu, 26 Mar 2026 19:48:33 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

This week, I have the pleasure of reintroducing one of our longest-stocked products: Fermented Black Beans! This shit is ancient! It’s been around since the 2nd century BCE and has been flavoring our food and probioticking our guts ever since.

We’ve sold it for seven years (that means I’m old now), and I have never once written a newsletter about it. We’ve just relaunched it in new packaging inspired by Taiwanese herbal and medicine shops, with updated recipes to match.

New and improved and as old as ever.

Finally, you may remember that last time, I told you about QQ Horse and QQ Snake. Well, the zodiac workwear has landed. Preorders have shipped and they are all available to order. Please join me in the cult of the little jumping horsey, thank you.

*And a small aside: in this newsletter, and always and forevermore, when Yun Hai says “black bean” we mean “black soybeans,” which are classified as a superfood because of the anthocyanin in their pigment. They are distinct from the more commonly encountered yellow soybean. Fun fact: the ones our soy sauce brewers use often have green kernels, which are very special and nutrient-dense indeed.

Take me to QQ Horse

We are a bean people.

My mother spake it thus, pointing to her nose and referring to the Taiwanese spread in front of us. An instant hit in our family home, this idiom has remained an inside joke of choice since its emergence thirty-some-odd years ago. As kids in Texas, beans to us meant the cowboy variety, and the dishes on the table had nary a pinto in sight. Actually, no visible beans at all.

My sis, who I’m sure is reading, is, as of this moment, understanding the motivation behind this uncalled for text, because we never forget and do not need to be asked to remember.

But (and this is not the first time I have surfaced this in the newsletter), Mom was right. She was talking about the soy sauce, the bean paste, the tofu, the sprouts, the mung beans, the adzuki, and, of course, the DOUCHI!

Fermented black beans, straight up. Photo: Jasmine Huang

Douchi 豆豉, or fermented black beans, is the original fermented soy food, existing since at least 200 BCE. It is the king koji kernel, the natal nugget, the soy singularity, the origin of soy sauce.

According to Soy Info Center (a wow very thoroughly annotated compilation of thousands of soy-referencing historical documents), the oldest known douchi were discovered in 165 BCE, enshrined:

Fermented black soybeans are found clearly marked in Han Tomb No. 1 at Mawangdui near today’s Changsha, Hunan province, in south-central China. The tomb was sealed in about 165 B.C. and was first opened in 1972.

This is corroborated in a short paper by Chen Jianming of the Hunan Provincial Museum in Changsha, China, entitled On Chinese Delicacies 2,100 years ago: a Case Study of the Mawangdui Han Tombs in Changsha.

Think the rice is still good? Source: On Chinese Delicacies 2,100 years ago: a Case Study of the Mawangdui Han Tombs in Changsha.

This charming paper almost reads like a menu. The author illuminates the foodstuffs found in the tomb, which were listed on an official inventory written on wooden tablets attached to bamboo cases (bills of lading also date back to 200 BCE, btw). Death’s larder included “such spices as sauce, meat sauce, fish sauce, fermented soybeans, salt, sugar, honey, sweet wine, ginger, mustard, and bitter leaves.”

This discovery confirmed douchi as the oldest known fermented soy food in the world. Fermented black beans are the progenitors of soy sauce, which was first known as chizhi 豉汁 (or fermented black bean juice). According to Soy Info Center, this was “a kind of soy sauce with no wheat, resembling Japanese tamari,” mentioned as early as 150 CE in The Shiming by Liu Xi, one of the earliest etymological dictionaries published in China. Sounds a lot like the Taiwanese soy sauce we distribute, also made with black soybeans and no wheat.

Fermented black beans in process. Photo: Yu Ding Xing.

Douchi are still in wide use today. Though the specifics of production may vary, all are made by inoculating soybeans with koji (Aspergillus oryzae) or other compatriots in the mold world, salting them, and letting them ferment. Our friend Ken Fornataro recently did a deep dive on making a version of these at home in Cultures Group, his lo-technology hi-technicality newsletter on fermentation.

Black soybeans that have been inoculated with koji, and the yellow mycelium that forms. These are rinsed before being set aside with salt to ferment into soy sauce or age as fermented black beans. Photo: Yu Ding Xing.

We’ve carried douchi since the very early days of Yun Hai, when we started importing Taiwanese black bean soy sauce from third-generation brewery Yu Ding Xing 御鼎興 in 2019. They make Taiwanese soy sauce in a traditional manner, which starts with—you guessed it—fermented black beans.

The first jar of fermented black beans I ever hauled back from Taiwan, ca. 2019.

The brewers set aside a portion of the inoculated black soybeans before heading into the soy sauce production process. This portion ages and cures for another year or so, before transforming into their fullest fermented black bean flavor.

When I saw a small jar of these in their office, I knew I had to have some for my planned holiday soy sauce launch (I had a feature in Bon Appetit scheduled to be published a few short months later), but with no time to devise packaging, I ordered big bulk bags and packed them myself in NYC, in stand up pouches with a simple stamp.

The very first iteration of this product.

And our very first shipment of soy sauce by boat, ca. 2019 CE.

And our first ~~Inventory of Enshrined Offerings~~ Commercial Invoice.

Funny story, I promise it’s relevant: when this first shipment originally came in, my husband helped me receive it. He quickly looked into a box, saw a bunch of blurry black things in polybags, and signed off on the delivery because he knew I had ordered bulk beans. When I opened the boxes, the “bulk beans” turned out to be a mis-shipment of lanyard parts, as shown above. This was eventually all sorted out.

Since then, the fermented black beans have been consistently well reviewed, tend to sell out, and we absolutely adore them. I am not one to speak in superlative, but I do think they’re the best out there. Others agree:

We love to hear it.

In addition to the retail pouch, we have always sold this in 2 kg bags to restaurants like Win Son, so if you’re a restaurant, hit us up!

These little beans are such a big part of our day-to-day parlance that they’ve become affectionately known as “FBB” in the office. This is so second nature to me, that I forget people don’t readily know what I’m talking about.

If I explain fbb, will you explain two but also three?

We’ve finally worked out a new packaging design that’s worth its salt (snort), and are excited to reintroduce this ancient condiment in a tidy little jar that references Taiwanese everyday life.

Red-Topped Faceted Column Jar, for Lack of a Better Name

New look, same old flavor. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

It’s been almost seven (!) years since we first started selling fermented black beans. They’ve flown under the radar for that entire time, with the constant idea that “we would eventually update the packaging.” This goes to show that it’s hard to change a product after launch (are you with me fellow product developers). Once we released it in a stand up pouch, in a stand up pouch it stayed.

The packaging was actually pretty ok, but could be done better.

First, the pouch didn’t show the product or celebrate what was inside. This is something we really care about at Yun Hai. It isn’t so much a desire to “elevate” a product as an intention to communicate it.

Second, they’re hard to pack. Stand up pouches take up very little room in storage, but they need to be expanded and held open to be filled cleanly.

And third, the original packaging, made of kraft paper and mylar film, is not the easiest to reuse or recycle. Only a limited set of facilities can recycle that specific mix of materials.

Lovely jars at a lovely shop in Dadaocheng, Taipei. J’adore the aluminum foil shelf lining.

Of course, I looked no further than the daily life shops of Taiwan, where packaging is abundant and also abundantly recycled. I’ve long loved the red topped jars and bottles found in herbal and medicine shops. They’re inexpensive, lightweight, easy to fill, easy to get, available in many sizes, and are so beautiful, with the refractive effect of reeded glass captured in its faceted shape.

Red-topped jars in use at a shop on Di Hua St. in Taipei. From left to right: pearl powder, American ginseng, Asian ginseng, Stone Pillar ginseng, and unidentified herbal capsules, likely also ginseng. Note that one of the jars has a small piece of plastic film sandwiched between the lid and the bottle, a lo-fi airtight seal.

Our packaging also references the stamped labels commonly in use on these same jars, with typefaces varying from product to product or shop to shop. The labels, bordered with a strong red or blue stripe, also come in many different sizes, and are easily found at any stationery store.

A shop that sells red top packaging, just around the corner from the medicine shops. I could spend all day in a place like this.

Labels for sale at a stationery shop around the corner from the packaging shop around the corner from the medicine shop. Everything solved in one square mile.

We decided to package the black beans into one of these jars and encase it in a lightweight box, which solved all of our problems. You can see through it (box has a window); it’s affordable; it channels Taiwan sensibility; it’s easy to fill; it’s not a headache for the vendors to get, and, as it turns out, it’s made of PET, one of the most widely accepted 100% recyclable plastics in use today.

The originating sketch I shared with Pip of O.OO, our long time design collaborator.

I do love a good printed mockup.

And the finished product. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

More on the plastic point: we try to avoid plastics as much as possible, and lean into glass, metal, and paper. It’s not always an easy choice, when reviewed holistically. Aluminum requires lots of water to produce and glass is heavy to ship. Mylar film pouches are lightweight and recyclable, but difficult to find facilities that accept them. The PET used in this jar is the same material that soda bottles and peanut butter jars are made from, and if you’re going to go plastic, is probably the best bet for now because it is so easy to recycle.

Though I’d love to package these in a wax coated paper or similar, we do need a reliable vapor barrier that can be affordably and securely transported. This new iteration may look like more plastic than the kraft paper stand up pouches we were using previously, but it’s actually a far more recyclable product, and can also be reused!

HTCWFBB
(How to Cook with Fermented Black Beans)

Douchi are a perfect seasoning. They impart a rich, savory flavor to any dish. Find them in well-known dishes like Flies’ Head (quintessential chive explosion), Clams with Black Bean Sauce (Canto favorite), Mapo Tofu (a weeknight staple), and Twice Cooked Pork Belly (dec-a-dent, also kind of easy).

Think of them as a non-dissolving soy sauce bouillon. Take them out of the jar, soak them for five minutes, then rinse. Go from there.

The easiest thing to do is to fry them with garlic and ginger as a base for a quick improvisational stir fry (my tip: one veggie and one protein only with this flavorful mix). You could even go so far as to mash them up and blend them into a rich vinaigrette. I’ve even seen people make FBB butter. They’re just beans. Perfect, magic, punchy little beans.

Wok work.

I cooked through a few of my favorite recipes this past weekend, photographing them on a tray balanced on a stool, with a tripod on a cookbook and a tofu light in hand. All I can say is that for every good image there were many blurry ones. I prefer to photograph by chance.

Without further ado, here are the dishes. Bury me with them.

Ma Po Tofu
麻婆豆腐

The QQ horse shirt of dinners, works for every occasion.

This recipe is the oldest in the Yun Hai book, and uses our hot-and-numbing Su Chili Crisp to make short of the work, transforming this dish from an involved preparation requiring roasting and grinding Sichuan peppercorn to a weeknight staple.

Q: Why is this so good?
A: FBB
A: And Su.

Get the Ma Po Recipe

Take me to the Su Mala

Get the Flies' Head Recipe

Flies’ Head
蒼蠅頭

It’s a bug’s life.

No insects were harmed in the making of this dish; a large number of fermented black beans serve as their stunt double. This dish takes a little bit of pork, a whole lot of chives, a palmful of FBB, and as few or as many red chili peppers as you like—and transforms them into a pulse-quickening, hash-like dish best eaten with lots of rice. A Taiwanese homestyle favorite. My tip: go 1:1 on the chives and pork by weight, and use a cold-pressed peanut oil to warm up the whole dish.

Take me to the Peanut Oil

Get the FBB Cruller Recipe

Ozzy Hsieh's Green Pepper You Tiao (!)
青龍椒豆豉油條 (!)

Fermented Black Bean Bread

This original recipe was generously provided by Ozzy Hsieh, the producer of our fermented black beans (also an excellent chef). It’s something between a chao bing (shredded scallion pancake stir fry) and a…panzanella (don’t crucify me Taiwanese and Italian readers)?

Day old Chinese cruller is sliced up and tossed with a rich dressing made from tomatoes, chopped peppers, spicy soy paste, ketchup (👍), and, you guessed it, FBB. It’s warm and there’s no acid, so technically not a panzanella at all, but the tomato and pepper sauce absorbed by the yeasty cruller brings a Mediterranean vibe, in my HUMBLE OPINION. I did once have an Italian/Taiwanese food cart with my friend Michael, so if this feels like a stretch, chalk it up to that ongoing fantasy.

In any case, it was amazing! This was gone almost before I had time to photograph it; I was yelling at my family to “please do not eat from the pot during a photo shoot.”

Crullllllllers — get ‘em frozen at the Asian grocery store and whip this up in a pinch. Good with rice, too, especially if carb-loading.

Take me to the Spicy Soy Paste

Before I Go…

Pick up your QQ Horse and QQ Snake Merch online or in store! We’ve got sizing samples at the shop if you’d like to try them on. Make this your winter-spring transition piece of the 2026 season. Honestly, great over a swimsuit, I would know.

Works on horse boys too.

Speaking of the store, we’ve just restocked on nos books and added more Taiwanese art book titles and stationery (including elementary school Chinese writing practice books). Come see us!
I had a wonderful time speaking as a featured presenter at the Asian American Arts Alliance Town Hall hosted by the Museum of Food and Drink earlier this week. The theme was Culinary Arts; thanks to all who shared their work and pitches! Learn more about this organization and their wonderful events here.
From L to R: Me, Lisa Gold (A4 Executive Director), Yumna Madi and Rala Ziadeh of Lammeh, and Justine Lee (A4 Programs Director). Yes, I am wearing QQ Snake.
We continue on the march to Yun Hai Press with the release of a lovely informational pamphlet all about the Hsieh Brothers and what they’re doing for Taiwanese soy sauce at Yu Ding Xing in Yunlin, Taiwan. More details on this in a forthcoming newsletter, but as of today, one copy is being included in every order. It’s a small but big thing. We always seek to walk the line between culture and commerce, representing our producers without beating our customers over the head with product speak.
So excited about these; Jasmine Huang saw me scream when I opened the box, then immediately slam it shut and walk in a circle.
And finally, if you are in the Bay Area, don’t miss Lillian (co-owner and COO) at Preserved in Oakland tomorrow, 3/27. She’ll be running a soy sauce tasting spanning Yu Ding Xing’s offering, including our new fermented black beans. The new soy sauce zine will be on site as well! The event RSVP is full, but please join the waitlist to be notified of any last-minute availability.

And with that, I guess I better get back to figuring out the whole it’s two but also three thing.

new and improved and as old as ever,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Written with editorial support by Amalissa Uytingco. If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

狂野西部: It's a Little Horsey

Wed, 04 Mar 2026 01:14:35 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Happy Lantern Festival! I’m so happy to announce that our Lunar New Year QQ Merch is ready for preorder, shipping late March. QQ Horse, this year’s zodiac animal, is done up in a Western wear-style, inspired by early cinema and my hometown of Houston. I’ve also included QQ Snake in complementary khaki, to make up for last year and not leave you snakies in the lurch. Though snakes may prefer lurches.

A quick word about merch, too. If you’re willing to wear it, merch is a wonderful way to show your support for small brands! It’s one item that we can make domestically (tariff-free), on relatively short notice (great cash conversion cycle), helps fund upcoming projects (noodles), and spreads the word about our brand (depending on how much you wear it). No pressure at all, but thought it would be nice to share that perspective, as you encounter other small brands making cool stuff.

And now, onto the introductions.

**Please note the QQ Merch is preorder only and will ship late March. Preorder items cannot be purchased with other products—they must be in a separate cart.**

Every Lunar New Year (more on that later), I draw a mascot to embody the zodiac changeover and set my intentions through the development of a character. They’ve ranged from a lovely little ox to a beckoning dragon.

Such pretty eyes.

The only requirement for this line of zodiac merch is that the animals have the letters “QQ” as eyes. This is inspired by the Taiwanese phrase “Q” (diminutive “QQ”), which is a term used to describe the perfect bouncy texture for everything from bawan to boba.

I also have a long standing love affair with this letter combination, because of its usage in early internet marketplaces, as in ebay, as in Leica 280mm f:4.8 Telyt lens, late style, US SELLER ”LQQK“.

Source: ebay.

Usually, we silkscreen our QQ zodiac mascots on a shirt, but this year we went for embroidery. Looking for a t-shirt? We’ve still got Hu Ye Tiger god shirts, too. Scroll on.

Introducing QQ Horse

This year’s mascot comes to you by way of my past.

It’s a little horsey. Photo by Jasmine Huang.

When I was in kindergarten, I was given the assignment of coloring in a horse. I gave mine a brown coat and a black mane, carefully rendered. Satisfied, I looked over at my neighbor, who had dressed hers in multicolor, a shiny princess. I ripped mine up and made a copy of hers, and never forgot the sense of regret I felt afterwards.

QQ Horse is Kindergarten Horse risen again, shining in postponed glory, adorned only by a pair of glittering, golden glasses. (I happen to be severely myopic and this is also a nod to that whole thing.) She’s embroidered onto a denim shirt, symmetrically mirrored across the centerline, inspired by Western wear and my deep Texan-Taiwanese roots.

I also have to admit that back when I was a design director at Areaware (sadly closing this year after a long, wonderful run), I’d often call things “a little horsey” to indicate they were a bit awkward and not ready for primetime. The irony of this does not escape me. Thanks to my friend Michael Hunter at Le Puzz for endearingly pointing this out ha ha.

But more than anything, this year’s horse is an invitation to run, bespectacled with clarity, into the future.

Shot in a swimsuit in Miami at the Venetian Pool minutes before a thunderstorm on a girl’s trip where we couldn’t stop laughing about how a tour guide asked us if we spoke Spanish and then proceeded to translate the word “loco.”

I struggled to draw QQ Horse this year (I struggle every year), and tried to avoid the barbie horse tropes of big hair and plastic-like body. As I worked, I thought of Eadweard Muybridge, who birthed a form of early cinema when trying to understand the mechanics of the horse’s movement. He set up a series of cameras with tripwire shutters and captured a horse at a gallop.

The Horse in Motion, by Eadweard Muybridge, dispelled the myth of the flying gallop and was a major part of the development of the moving image. Mine is inspired by second from the top left. Source: Smithsonian Institution.

The work, or series of works, is titled The Horse in Motion. People used to believe that the horse flew over the land with legs splayed in front and behind them (aka the flying gallop). Muybridge showed that yes, the horse does separate completely from the ground, but only with legs tucked awkwardly and expertly beneath. I tried to capture this moment of suspension, a moment of forward motion divorced from earthly matters. And a moment that spearheaded the development of cinema.

LQQK:

She’s Zodiac. She’s Wild West. She’s Kindergarten. She’s Nearsighted. She’s Cinema. She’s Floating. And, most of all, she’s Qute.

Meet QQ Snake

Last year, I failed to complete the QQ Snake assignment, for reasons only partially explained. So, like QQ Horse, QQ Snake rises, summoned into existence by my completionist heart.

She won’t bite. Photo by Jasmine Huang.

In trying to draw a snake, retroactively, I kept coming into forms that felt defensive (ready to strike), exoticized (sumptuously coiled), or politicized (god forbid I accidentally make a don’t tread on me flag). I looked into Muybridge again, and found that he had also studied the motion of the serpent. Unlike the yang horse, the yin snake is hard to read, a bit arbitrary in its position, and doesn’t seem to have a need to go anywhere at all.

Snake, Creeping by Eadweard Muybridge. Source: Smithsonian Institution.

I took from it that a snake was a line in space. Wherever its head has gone, so too its tail. I had a thought about the continuous relationship between past and present, as I drew the zodiac animal in the very end of the snake year. And I thought about how transformation need not be directional, but creeping.

I wondered what I might do with a line, and, very directly, I hid a Y and an H into QQ Snake’s body, representing Yun Hai. I started with the tail, and curved around the letter forms into the head. I added two wide open bright eyes, your standard forked tongue, and two nostrils, in homage to my sister’s hognose snake named Agnut. Finally, I added a segmented belly, to give it a little tread (on me).

Last year’s snake has motion, it starts at the tail and moves towards the head, which brings us just about to the present, ready to shed skin and transform.

LQQK:

She’s Zodiac. She’s Wild West. She’s So Last Year. She’s Twisted. She’s Hard to Read. She’s in Perpetual Motion. She’s Not Going Anywhere. And, most of all, she’s Qute, too.

QQ Merch

We put QQ Horse and QQ Snake on a new series, internally dubbed Zodiac Workwear, Practical Attire for Any Situation.™ The horse, fittingly, is emblazoned onto denim, and the snake onto khaki.

The workwear collection is now available for preorder, shipping late March. Preorder items cannot be purchased with other products—they must be in a separate cart.

I love a good oversized workshirt—I have at least 25 in my closet, either inherited from my dad or picked up at a thrift store in the image of him. I love to wear a size L and roll the sleeves up. It’s my uniform. Mirror selfie for fit reference, I’m 5’4.”

Hair styling implements left in hotel room on said girls’ trip to Miami, but now in the mail thanks to said girls.

The Dad Cut flatters with a boxy drape, easily transitioning from day to night, provided you are going directly home.

Also included are ball caps and kids’ safari hats, to round out the collection and keep things sporty.

We’ve worked closely with our partners at General Wear, Inc. (my new fave embroidery shop in NYC) to produce this “spec”tacular line. I made many prototypes, carefully specified the blank stock, annoyed the sh- out of everyone, and postponed this at least once to get it just right.

These are in production and will be embroidered in New York City, just a few miles away from our shop.

QQ Horse: Light Blue Denim Newhattan Baseball Cap
QQ Snake: Stonewashed Khaki Newhattan Baseball Cap

QQ Merch

Here’s a quick “roundup” of the whole line. How many more cowboy puns will be used in this newsletter? Lariat’s wait and see.

Work Shirt

Photo by Jasmine Huang.

These button-down work shirts have a 90s cut. Two zodiac animals are mirrored across the centerline, embroidered on the yoke of the garment, channeling a western wear aesthetic and calling back to Lisa Cheng Smith’s Texas roots, an important hotbed of Taiwanese activism back in the day!

QQ Horse: Long Sleeve Denim Shirt
100% cotton, 7 oz.

QQ Snake: Long Sleeve Twill Shirt
100% cotton, 5 oz.

Features:

Double-needle stitching throughout
Button-down collar
Left chest pocket
Rounded adjustable cuffs
4” wide QQ Zodiac embroidery on front left and right chest
1.75” wide Yun Hai logo embroidery on front pocket

Baseball Cap

Photo by Jasmine Huang.

These five panel baseball caps have an adjustable slider and fit even the largest of heads, as verified on said girl’s trip. They’re adorned with a zodiac animal on the front and a Yun Hai logo on the back.

100% cotton

Features:

3” wide QQ Zodiac embroidery on front
1.75” wide Yun Hai logo embroidery on back
Sliding buckle

Kids’ Safari Hat

Photo by Jasmine Huang.

These kids’ safari hats are just what’s needed on an adventure. They’ve got venting grommets up top, buttons on the side to flip up the brim, and an adjustable neck strap. They’re adorned with a zodiac animal on the front and a Yun Hai logo on the back.

QQ Horse: Sky Blue Newhattan Safari Hat
QQ Snake: Khaki Newhattan Safari Hat

Around 55 cm circumference.
100% cotton

Features:

3” wide QQ Zodiac embroidery on front
1.75” wide Yun Hai logo embroidery on back

Yee Haw

Not much more to say, but I’ve “corralled” a few links for ya:

Our Ai Yu Jelly Kit and Sesame Peanut Paste are on quick sale! We bought too many! Help us out and pick up a few units here.
It’s Lantern Festival, and that means it’s time for tang yuan. We’ve got some in the frozen section of the shop. Or, check out the last episode of Cooking With Steam to make some with me and my friend Jess.
If you’re in the mood for something Taiwanese with a Texas flair, check out our collection of fermented chili sauces by our friends at Empress Hot Sauce. I’d recommend Ghost Pepper Maqaw for a real kick.
Photo by Heami Lee.

And now, for my next act: how to combine a run bing and a burrito. Just kidding, run bing all the way. Or maybe flautas. I don’t know.

A little horsey,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Written with editorial support by Amalissa Uytingco, Jasmine Huang, Grace Jung, and Natya Regensburger. If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

Studio Notes 10: Milkfish Belly

Lisa Cheng Smith — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 19:46:02 GMT

Hi, it’s Lisa Cheng Smith, founder of Yun Hai. I write Taiwan Stories, a free newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Shop Online

One day, I dream of opening a small Taiwanese eatery, in a rural area upstate, supplied by its own garden, the farms of friends, and the exquisite foods we bring in from hardworking craftspeople in Taiwan.

This idea, an overwhelming desire, is absolutely a romanticization of a quiet life, and an underestimation of the business of running a restaurant, but I still believe, under some set of magical circumstances, it might be attainable. I would love for it to flourish financially, but would be equally happy with a retirement-style endeavor in humble environs for a very few people, more an invitation to an on-and-off project for friends rather than a sustaining business. On-and-off projects are all worth doing if you love them enough.

Last week (it feels like forever ago), I went to a magical place in Tainan that will be my forever model eatery. Almost every rule of conventional American hospitality was broken to create the most hospitable place I’ve been in recent memory.

It takes years to make a wall like this.

燒仙草: Hot Grass Jelly

Lisa Cheng Smith — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 18:12:23 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

The second season of our Taiwanese cooking show, Cooking With Steam, explores Taiwanese food through the lens of 古早味 gu zao wei. This phrase translates to “ancient flavor,” but largely refers to pre-war Taiwanese foods that feel especially homestyle to me.

The final episode of Cooking With Steam’s second season is out! I team up with my friend and collaborator Jess Wang of LA’s Gu Grocery to bring you Hot Grass Jelly and Tang Yuan 燒仙草, one of my favorite Taiwanese desserts, and perfect for the winter weather.

Lantern Festival, falling on the 15th day of the first lunar month (March 3rd this year), marks the end of the Lunar New Year Spring Festival period. During this time, it’s customary to make a tang yuan dessert to enjoy with your loved ones—the roundness of tang yuan 湯圓 and the yuan 圓 in its name symbolize togetherness and unity.

In this episode, Jess and I make tang yuan as a topping for hot grass jelly, a thickened pudding made with grass jelly herb. I’d enthusiastically describe this as the opposite of ice cream: warm, heady, and full of sweet herbal notes. The toppings add texture of all kinds, from the crunchy, toasted walnut to the chewy, sweet bite of the tang yuan.

I always say that one of my favorite things about Taiwanese traditional desserts is the N U T R I T I O N. This one is made from beans, walnuts, rice, spirulina, and herbal tea, with a little bit of rock sugar.

The secret to making tang yuan, learned from Jess, is going by feel. You’ll see in the episode how we judge the dough (with cheese analogs?), and add water or rice flour as needed. As seen below:

COOKING WITH STEAM Season 02 Episode 05
Hot Grass Jelly and Tang Yuan
好蒸氣第二季 05 | 燒仙草

Meet Jess Wang

Few people know a radish like Jess does. Photo: Jennelle Fong.

Jess Wang is an artist, pastry chef, and fermentation educator based in Los Angeles.

After a decade of experience in restaurant and catering kitchens, she started Gu Grocery, a Chinese Taiwanese grocery that’s been operating in the form of pop-ups and workshops in LA for several years. She collaborates with her Taiwanese-born Wenzhounese mama, Peggy, to preserve old family recipes and develop new ways of making food. She’s about to take Gu to the next level with the opening of a brick and mortar grocery and deli in LA’s Chinatown.

On set with Jess Wang and Jessie YuChen, our two guest hosts this season.

I’ve learned so much from her over the course of our friendship, not just about Taiwanese food, but also how to thoughtfully engage in community and family while inviting people into traditional foodways. For example, while preparing her grocery to open, she’s been teaching tang yuan making classes throughout the Los Angeles Public Library system. We’re so happy that she was able to make an appearance on the show, amidst all she has going on, and so grateful for her time and knowledge (and also the hardboiled egg she peeled for me on set).

In her words:

Gu Grocery is a dream come true Chinese Taiwanese online store offering high quality pantry staples and a collection of everyday home goods. We regularly pop-up around LA to serve a bakery deli menu of sorts, featuring nostalgic snacks, some surprises, and familiar comfort foods to nourish you.
Our long term goal is to open a shop where we can continue serving our loyal pop-up customers while also meeting the needs of the diverse residents of the Chinatown community. Located in the heart of Chinatown, our future brick and mortar store will accept EBT and offer senior discounts.
You may be wondering what Gu means? Gu stems from the Chinese character for mushroom that is traditionally a symbol of prosperity and fertility. In Mandarin, it is also the word for Aunty, which honors the strength and generosity of women who have filled the role of intergenerational caretakers in our families 🍄
Inspired by our fungi friends and their crazy mycelium network - we believe in the power of a community and see ourselves as just a few among many spores in supporting you on your food journey. Whether it’s creating access to healthy food options or providing opportunities to learn about fermenting, cooking together is a wonderful healant. We invite you to join us in the heart of the Gu kitchen.

So much of this is inspired by and informed by Jess’s mother, Mama Peggy, whom we also adore. She came to Frankie Gaw’s First Generation Book Opening party (hosted at Yun Hai) and spent the whole evening celebrating with us (and went and got pizza for everyone too). Her generosity says it all.

Peggy and Jess, mother daughter duo. Photo: Vivian Khanounsay.

If you’re ever in LA, don’t miss your chance to experience Gu Grocery at one of their many pop ups or their forthcoming space in Chinatown.

The Recipes

Hot grass jelly is really easy to make! The tang yuan are a cinch, too, once you’ve got a sense of how the dough should feel. Once you’ve got the basics down, it’s fun to play with colors (dragonfruit juice!) and fillings (black sesame!).

I love making a big batch of tang yuan all at once and freezing them. You can freeze them directly after rolling, and cook them from frozen too. Just separate them on a baking sheet or platter, and par-freeze them for an hour or two before transferring them to a container or plastic bag for long-term storage, to prevent sticking.

I prepare the grass jelly tea in a Tatung Electric Steamer, but you can also do it in a stockpot on the stove. The full recipes are posted on our site. Get the recipes or the grass jelly herb below:

Get the Recipes

Get the Grass Jelly Herb

Ingredients and Equipment

I love to show off my collection of ceramics, props, everyday objects, and kitchen tools on the show, many of them gifted by friends or collected personally over the years. Here’s a little more information on what I used this episode.

The HeySong 黑松 glass is a vintage piece I found while shopping in Taiwan.

The blue and brown bowls for holding the toppings and serving the final dessert were made by my friend and ceramicist Matthew So. The green colander for holding the non-dairy creamer is from a little hardware store I walked past years ago in Taiwan.

I brew the grass jelly tea in the 11-cup Tatung Steamer.

And, we used grass jelly herb that we import ourselves as the foundation of this dessert.

Please reach out with any other questions on sourcing or ingredients. Happy to help, as always.

Gratitude and Acknowledgements

We couldn’t have done this without the support and passion of our friends and community. So much love and gratitude to Night Shift, who produced this, and all our creative collaborators for giving the show its unique voice.

Rebecca Alexander (hair makeup), Jessie YuChen (food stylist), Amalissa Uytingco (culinary producer), Alec Sutherland (director), and Sam Broscoe (producer) in “the pit,” watching the monitors and keeping me honest. Photo: Rachel Watson.

Credits

Produced by Night Shift and Yun Hai
Made possible by Tatung Taiwan

Team:
Lisa Cheng Smith, host
Jessica Wang, guest talent
Jessie YuChen, food stylist & guest talent
Nicole Wang, culinary assistant
Amalissa Uytingco, culinary producer
Sam Broscoe, producer
Alec Sutherland, director & editor
Nathan Bailey, director of photography
Rob Woods, camera operator
Taylor Dekker, camera operator
Alexandra Egan, art director
Kyle Garvey, sound mixer
Jinho Myung, editor
R. Hollis Smith, mix
Rebecca Alexander, hair and makeup
Dustin Wong, music
O.OO, graphics
Jil Tai & Ben Hill, motion design and title sequence
Rachel Watson, behind-the-scenes photography

Our Set

Our set features props from Taiwanese, Taiwanese-American, and international friends worldwide, creating those Taiwancore vibes we love so much at Yun Hai.

Thank you for the beauty Mikey Chen, Lillian Li, Emilie Liu, Debbie Carlos, Matthew So, Kelli Cain, Material Kitchen, Mogutable, Felicia Liang, Sam Tilney, Lulu Yao Gioiello, Grace Jung, Eric Sze, Julianne Ahn, Alice Chai, Stephanie Smith, Rio Chen, and Leh Lin.

And much gratitude to our friends who contributed to wardrobe: Everybody World, Judi Rosen, Whimsy and Row, RMS Beauty, and Christine Mai Nguyen.

Special Thanks

Russell Wang, Maggie Chang, Shirley Liu, Ivan Wu, Feng Hsieh, Hollow, Chris, Leon, Simon, Agnes, Jim, Lillian Lin, Jasmine Huang, Natya Regensburger, Jeremy Hersh, Cat Yeh & the entire Yun Hai Team, our partners, and our community.

Before I Go…

Join us at Yun Hai Shop (170 Montrose Ave), for a Lunar New Year party to ring in the Year of the Horse this coming Sunday, 2/22, between 12 and 4 pm. We’ll have a New Year’s toast at 2 pm, followed by a joss burning ceremony, led by our friend Kimberly Chou 周存安. Enjoy complimentary tang yuan (black sesame and peanut), Win Son pineapple cakes, Taiwanese snacks, hot tea, and more!
RSVP Here

Lunar New Year QQ merch is coming for lantern festival! We’re going all embroidery this year and are in the process of perfecting the last samples. Sign up to be notified when these drop!
it’s a little horsey

And while you wait, don’t forget that our Hu Ye Tiger God Shirts by Emilie Liu are back in stock. Get yours before they run out!
A couple of very goofy Hu Ye Tiger God statues on display at the Tainan Art Museum this month.
Emilie Liu’s faithful depiction. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

Thanks, as always, for all your love for Cooking With Steam! We’re excited to wrap season two and get to work on the next one.

going by feel,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Written with editorial support by Amalissa Uytingco, Jasmine Huang, Grace Jung, and Lillian Lin. If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

馬上過好年: Happy Year of the Fire Horse

Lisa Cheng Smith — Mon, 16 Feb 2026 23:34:20 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Today, I have nothing more to do than to wish you a Happy Lunar New Year and invite you to our store this coming Sunday, February 22nd, to celebrate with us in person. We’ll have tang yuan! We’ll have red envelopes! We’ll have a community altar! We’ll be burning joss ceremonially with our friend Kim! And I’ll just be back from Taiwan with many goodies to share from the Lunar New Year markets. Hope to see you; details are at the end of this letter.

Don’t forget about our Little Dumpling Bundles, discounted 12% (打88折), and our Little Dumpling Book, included free in each order online and in store, while supplies last.

And finally, a heads up that we’re putting the finishing touches on this year’s QQ zodiac mascot, dropping around Lantern Festival in early March. More soon!

Shop Lunar New Year

Take Me to the Dumpling Bundles

Tonight, we welcome the year of the fire horse, or 丙午年 bing wu nian.

Passionate yang fire combines with the already hot, swift, stupendous nature of the horse into an explosive formula. A raging double conflagration will bring simmering tensions to the surface, followed by rapid change and upheaval. Clarity and conviction will be needed; boldness will be rewarded and hesitation challenged. We must drive like we know where we’re going.

what a raging double conflagration actually looks like

I hope that the fire horse will bring about swift change in the right direction, burning away destructive forces and leaving flowers in its wake, as so expertly illustrated in this decoration I saw hanging in a bawan 肉圓 shop in Hengchun 恆春 town, in the very south of Taiwan, only yesterday.

I’ve never passed the new year (guo nian 過年) in Taiwan before, but I’m here now with my family of four. It’s been so inspiring and fun to experience the frenzy of preparations, layer upon layer of decoration, and the togetherness of the communities we’ve visited.

Hand-painted lanterns hanging across a street in Tainan.

Growing up in the states, Lunar New Year was never an official holiday. My parents celebrated with colleagues and neighbors in university halls, community centers, and Chinese restaurants, planning around everyone’s work schedules, as few had time off. We all made the time.

Being in Taiwan this year and experiencing Lunar New Year as a national period of rest, celebration, and worship is new to me. It feels like a homecoming—with the customs of my family magnified by the lens of full-on cultural immersion—and an education—with so many new things to see, taste, and understand.

This year’s zodiac inflatable at the Di Hua St. Lunar New Year Market. I feel the cat might be stealing the show here? Horse so generous and uncomplaining.

We’ve been happily flaneuring and taking in the energy of the new year. In Taipei, we visited the traditional Lunar New Year Market on Di Hua Street with friends, where I sampled way too many sweet things and bought something like 5 pounds of New Year candy to give away in the shop when I’m back. Highlights for me were the traditional biscuit stand (I also bought 5 pounds of these for the store); the wide variety of dried seafood snacks, from sweet, sinewy dried squid to crispy fish chips; and the very lovely calligraphy shop selling spring couplets and auspicious decorations (also 5 lbs).

Traditional Taiwanese snacks of all kinds: scallion cracker sandwich cookies with lemon cream (yes, really), preserved radish crackers, cat ears, and umbrella cookies. My favorites are the big ears 大耳朵 on the right, a sort of Taiwanese palmier.

<1% of the candy varieties on offer at the market.

All manner of dried fish and squid, ready for snacking. Look at the size of those bins.

Small New Year decorations hand-painted with auspicious calligraphy. So many decorations are mass produced, it’s rare to see a little shop like this.

The calligraphy shop’s garbage bin is beautiful through and through. Also spent time wondering what emergency trash that isn’t smelly might be.

In Tainan, we lost ourselves in the streets surrounding the Yamuliao Traditional Market 鴨母寮市場 in the North District, filled with adorned fruits, flower arrangements, sticky rice cakes (nian gao 年糕) of all kinds, barbecued and stewed meats, and packets of herbal remedies and stock starters. The stalls were overflowing with abundance for family gatherings and offerings to the gods and ancestors.

Yamuliao Traditional Market 鴨母寮市場 on the last weekend before the new year.

Nian gao 年糕 or sticky rice cake. I wasn’t sure the flavor, but these look like they may have big red beans and smoked longan. The brown varieties are likely sweetened with brown sugar. It’s common to eat them sliced and fried up, sometimes with an egg wash.

These are fa gao 發糕 or prosperity cake. When steamed, the top pops open like a laughing mouth. These are presented in pink plastic rice bowls, very typical to Taiwanese roadside banquets.

More fa gao and nian gao in little pink plastic bowls.

The smallest pineapples adorned with the biggest bows.

As things have quieted around the arrival of the holiday, we’ve moved to Kenting National Park, with the idea of taking in the spectacular natural beauty of Taiwan as the world around us comes to rest. It’s a wonderful time to relax and reflect on life from the vantage point of Taiwan.

墾丁白沙灣 Kenting’s Baishawan beach is beautiful and family friendly. You can’t see it here, but a sea turtle spent the afternoon with us, just out of reach in the water.

Coral formations create cliffs, caves, and gorges in Sheding Nature Park, a very low key and very cool place to experience local geology. I hiked it in rubber wedge mules; would not totally recommend that.

Lunar New Year Celebration at Yun Hai

Join us at Yun Hai Shop (170 Montrose Ave), for a Lunar New Year party to ring in the Year of the Horse this coming Sunday, 2/22, between 12 and 4 pm.

RSVP Here

We’ll have a New Year’s toast at 2 pm, followed by a joss burning ceremony, led by our friend Kimberly Chou 周存安. Enjoy complimentary tang yuan (black sesame and peanut), Win Son pineapple cakes, Taiwanese snacks and candies straight from Taipei’s Lunar New Year markets (5 lbs, see above), hot tea, and more!

We also welcome you to bring offerings for our communal altar—citrus fruits, good luck foods, talismans, lottery tickets—as we honor past energies, transform the stagnant, and welcome in the new! Joss paper and incense will be provided.

On this day, all purchases in-store will be a lucky 88折, or 12% off. Receive a free Little Dumpling Book (our newest book of recipes) and a pack of red envelopes with every order.

RSVP is not required to attend, though we would appreciate your kind response to help us plan!

RSVP Here

Before I Go…

I urgently need to share this image of the official face of the Year of the Fire Horse, as seen at a wedding salon in Hengchun.

Pony energy strong.

And, if you’re in the New York area, I want to make sure you know about the Asian Vegetable Club, a weekly subscription of lovingly grown East Asian vegetables and herbs running from May 28 to Nov 5, 2026. Each vegetable share includes locally grown produce at its absolute peak, and will be available for pickup every Thursday from 4 to 8 p.m. at five NYC locations across Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens.

It was put together by our friends at Choy Commons, “a nonhierarchical cooperative of Asian-led farms engaging our communities in building food sovereignty for the Northeast.” They’re the best. Learn more here or sign up here.

Source: Choy Commons.

And with that, I’ll get back to my…

raging double conflagration bringing simmering tensions to the surface,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

餃子小書: Little Dumpling Book

Lisa Cheng Smith — Fri, 06 Feb 2026 15:57:32 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Happy Year of the Fire Horse! I’m sitting in the airport waiting to board a flight to Taiwan. I’ll be spending the Lunar New Year there with my family for the first time.

This week, I’m excited to introduce Little Dumpling Book, our first ‘cookbooklet,’ shipping free with all orders during the Lunar New Year period. This is a special collaboration with our friends at Taiwanese cooking blog CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW, who have just launched a new online dumpling course. (P.S. They’re offering Yun Hai customers 10% off the course with code YUNHAI). We’re also offering Little Dumpling Bundles, recipe kits corresponding to the book, priced at 12% off (or 88折, scroll down for explanation).

In addition, our Year of the Horse Red Envelopes are here! We make red envelopes every year with O.OO, our design collaborators in Taiwan, who print them in their risograph studio. We’re including one set free of charge in every order over lucky $88; just be sure to add a set to the cart.

And! as! promised! QQ Horse and QQ Snake are happening this year. If you read my last newsletter, you know I never made QQ Snake, and now I’ve made that right. Scroll all the way to the end of the letter for a sneak peek and a rundown of more upcoming events.

Take Me to the Red Envelopes

Check Out The Dumpling Club

Make dumplings like you never have before, because it’s hard times right now and we need all the symbolic unity, hope, and prosperity we can get.

Dumplings have come to symbolize good fortune, and are especially popular during Lunar New Year. Making them together reinforces our bonds, reaffirms our best intentions, and sets the tone for a fresh start to the year. Freeze them and gift them to your neighbors and friends. Invite people over to share them with you in the coming months. Let food be a means to connect and show care.

Just a few of the dumplings featured in our Lunar New Year publication. Photo: CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW

Last Friday, Yun Hai participated in a national strike for one day. We closed our brick-and-mortar and online shop for 24 hours to protest and condemn ICE, remember those who have been killed and hurt by them, and to stand in solidarity with all those resisting in Minnesota. ICE OUT EVERYWHERE.

Source: Yun Hai Instagram.

We did this to make noise by being quiet, and to exercise our right as business owners to close, communicating that we prioritize people over profit, community over convenience. It was our way of demonstrating to the world what we care about and what we will not stand for.

With a responsibility to care for and provide for their employees, many businesses couldn’t close for the strike, and we respect that, too. But many of them stood in solidarity with those protesting in Minnesota, regardless, and said so. Thank you to all those who closed, all those who supported, all those who protest and resist, and all the immigrants in this country who continue to show up for their friends, family, co-workers, and community, despite the dangers they face.

When I checked our almanac that morning, I saw that the advice was to avoid all matters. I had already made up my mind the night before, but the almanac corroborated the decision to close in a beautiful way. Source: Yun Hai Instagram.

Instead of business hours, we held gathering hours, and invited folks to come to the shop to share jam sandwiches and something warm to drink. A few friends stopped by to share stories, experiences, hopes, and angers. I felt angry, but also found hope in stories of decentralized networks of aid, communication, and support.

The Yun Hai team, at work but not at work.

It felt powerful to stand in a circle with those across the country to vocalize our commitment to humanity, and that it still exists and isn’t for the taking. It was its own kind of dumpling making: connecting with each other, setting and affirming intentions, and bringing about what I hope will be an inflection point at a time when every day brings new lows. ICE OUT EVERYWHERE.

Photo: CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW.

This Lunar New Year, we’ve collaborated with Minnesota-based Taiwanese cooking blog, CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW, to bring you original dumpling recipes and curated product bundles. All this is the brainchild of Tiffany Alexandria, who grew up in Taiwan and has worked tirelessly to bring Taiwanese food to her community in Rochester, Minnesota. When we started the collaboration, we didn’t know what would be happening in her state a few months later.

I reached out to her just after the strike to ask how we at Yun Hai could help. Here’s her thoughtful reply.

So how can people in New York help? I think continuing amplifying the voices of people in MN is so important, we want people to know the truth, the situation we’re living in and any other city could be next, we definitely don’t want that. People need to learn and know how severe this actually is and take it seriously to drive changes for the whole country.
Here is a list of organizations I gathered from friends who are on the ground helping or reporting on what’s happening:
The Salt Cure Fund to support Minnesota’s restaurants.
Marcia Howard 38th Street: a collection of links to support the various organizations at the intersection where George Floyd was killed.
COPAL Minnesota, the MN chapter of a member-based organization established to improve the quality of life of Latiné families.
The Alliance of Chicanos, Hispanics and Latin Americans (ACHLA) a grassroots nonprofit serving the Rochester area and southeastern Minnesota.

I hope you’ll all consider Tiffany’s words and supporting the organizations she’s shared. And now, more about our Lunar New Year collaboration.

Little Dumpling Book

Hot off the press this morning.

I’ve been dreaming about publishing lo-fi, lo-key Taiwanese ‘cookbooklets’ for a while. Because of our growing audience base, we now get enough orders to justify a large print run, and can produce mini cookbook pieces at quantity and give them away to our customers by keeping them low-cost.

When I told Tiffany about this idea, she graciously agreed to develop the recipes for us as a way to kick off her new dumpling course with a bang (or a fold?). Our role was to design the publication and cover the printing. It’s a win-win!

To keep them inexpensive enough to give away, we focused on a few criteria:

no binding (so we folded it)
limited colors (so we went with our red and green)
low cost materials (so we chose lightweight paper)
high print run (so we decided to put them in every online order and give them away with purchases at the store—they are slated to arrive at the store this afternoon, so it’s safest to swing by from Saturday on)

A few iterations of the book, from an early mockup made for a photoshoot, which quickly evolved into our little red and green pamphlet. Just a reminder that what starts bad can end good.

Here’s what’s inside:

Gu Gu Chicken Dumplings, with goji berry, wood ear, and shiitake mushroom, to nourish the body and soul.
Mala Beef Gyoza, bursting with all the flavor of a hot-and-numbing hot pot, commonly enjoyed during the New Year.
Oolong Shrimp Dumplings, where Taiwanese Three Delicacies meets Dragon Well Green Tea Shrimp.
Fly’s Head Dumplings, capturing all the flavor of a favorite homestyle Taiwanese dish, bursting with chives.
Bloom and Blossom Dumplings, a vegetarian number inspired by cai bo dan 菜脯蛋, or preserved radish omelet, a Hakka dish common throughout Taiwan.
And Passion Fruit Hot Mustard Gyoza, a sweet and tangy take on a gyoza featuring Passion Fruit Mustard hot sauce from our friends Empress Hot Sauce in Taiwan.

Unfolding the pamphlet reveals all six recipes on an 11x17 piece of paper. Light enough to magnet to your fridge, small enough to fit folded into a kitchen drawer.

The recipes are a testament to the skill and creativity Tiffany brings to the practice of making them. Here’s more about the Dumpling Club, in her words:

The Dumpling Club is an invitation to cook alongside Tiffany of CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW in your own kitchen. It will transform the way you cook, taste, and understand dumplings—giving you the confidence to make them part of everyday meals and meaningful celebrations alike.
What started as a way for Tiffany to reconnect with her Taiwanese roots through dough and filling has become an online dumpling masterclass that turns folding into a cultural journey. She’ll guide you through making soft, chewy wrappers and juicy, flavor-rich dumplings from scratch—showing you what to look for, what to feel, and why it matters.
Along the way, she will share the tips behind techniques, family stories, her mom’s secret recipes, and how thoughtful, high-quality Taiwanese ingredients elevate every bite. This is slow, intentional food—meant to be shared, remembered, and passed on.
Cook along at home, deepen your craft, or host a dumpling party with people you love.

Save 10% On The Dumpling Club Course

While you’re at it, check out this great video Tiffany made about Wah Kueh in Tainan, complete with vivid scenes of Taiwanese street life. As I said, I’m on my way now, and can’t wait to eat this savory steamed rice flour pudding.

Little Dumpling Bundles

For our Lunar New Year bundles this year, we decided to adopt a convention common in Taiwanese shops, and offer a 12% discount, written above as 88折.

In the US, we’re used to discounts being presented as what’s being removed, but in Taiwan, discounts are presented as what’s still being paid. In other words, 12% off is 88% on. This may be helpful to you if you’re walking around shopping in Taiwan and see a lot of high number “discounts.” 95折 does not mean 95% off, but 5% off! And even more confusingly, if just one digit is used, it’s referring to the tens place, so 9折 means 10% off. It took me way too long to learn this.

So, as is customary, we’re offering three dumpling bundles at 88折, each one based on a different recipe in the Little Dumpling Book. Each bundle also comes with a bamboo dumpling filling paddle, engraved with the Yun Hai logo, aww.

Bloom and Blossom Dumpling Bundle

Photo: Jasmine Huang.

This vegetarian dumpling recipe bundle is inspired by Hakka-style preserved radish omelet 菜脯蛋. Preserved daikon radish adds salty, piquant crunch to a rich filling of egg, firm tofu, green beans, and bean thread noodles.

Take Me to the Bundle

Photo: CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW.

Fly’s Head Dumpling Bundle

Photo: Jasmine Huang.

This dumpling recipe bundle puts a twist on classic pork and chive dumplings. Based on the Taiwanese stir-fry dish Fly’s Head, it gets its punchy, funky flavor from a mix of fermented black beans (the “flies’ heads”), garlic chives, and ground pork. Bonus: garlic chives symbolize longevity, so eating these dumplings brings double the good fortune, symbolizing both prosperity and long life.

Take Me to the Bundle

Photo: CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW.

Gu Gu Chicken Dumpling Bundle

Photo: Jasmine Huang.

This dumpling recipe bundle pays homage to mushroom (gu gu 菇菇) chicken soup, a warming elixir that draws deep flavor from dried shiitake and richness from chicken. Balanced with woody camellia oil and sweet goji berries, these dumplings will nourish your soul.

Take Me to the Bundle

Photo: CHOOCHOO-ca-CHEW.

Year of the Horse Red Envelopes

Free with an $88+ purchase, but don’t forget to add it to the cart! Photo: Jasmine Huang.

As we do every year, we collaborated with our close friends at design studio O.OO to create this set of three unique red envelopes celebrating the Year of the Horse. They feature Lunar New Year iconography and wishes of good fortune.

This year’s designs were inspired by the Eight Horses, an animal motif in traditional Chinese art that references the steeds of the legendary King Mu of Zhou. Each horse represents a fortuitous quality such as wisdom, harmony, and strength.

Embodying the charged energy of the coming Fire Horse year, every envelope is printed with a dynamic horse-related saying:

馬到成功: “victory is achieved when the warhorses arrive,” to wish one swift success
馬踏飛燕: “the horse treads on a flying swallow,” one name for a Chinese bronze artifact depicting a galloping horse balanced atop a swallow—it represents swiftness, freedom, and mastery
萬馬奔騰: “ten thousand galloping horses,” referring to an overwhelmingly powerful force

Designed and printed in Taipei with soy-based inks on a risograph printer.

Get the Red Envelopes

A few more things before I go…to Taiwan (yes, I’m literally boarding)

QQ merch is underway! Here’s a sneak preview. Yes, it’s a long story. Yes, it involves the history of photography. Yes, it also involves kindergarten. Yes it’s got a Western Wear Flair. And yes, it’s wearing glasses. Coming February 16th, and QQ Snake will be there, too. Sign up to be notified when these drop!
Save the date for a Lunar New Year QQ party in our shop on Sunday, February 22nd. I’ll be back from said trip to Taiwan and am bringing a suitcase specifically dedicated to party favors.
And our Hu Ye Tiger God Shirts by Emilie Liu are back in stock! Our Sourcing Manager Feng, in Taiwan, shows it off perfectly below. Don’t all come running at once. Ok, do.
Our much loved Kumquat Slices are back for the season! We’re getting these especially for Lunar New Year. Kumquat is auspicious because of its Chinese name. The first character 金 means “gold,” and the second character 桔 is a homophone for fortune 吉. There’s a saying “金為財，桔為吉” that roughly translates to, “gold represents wealth, kumquats represent good fortune.”
In case you missed it, here’s the most recent episode of Cooking With Steam, featuring congee three ways. Look out for our final episode coming just ahead of Lantern Festival, featuring our friend Jess Wang of Gu Grocery and her tangyuan techniques!

And finally, consider making an Ai Yu Jelly Punch for your Lunar New Year gathering—a great large-format cocktail for entertaining parties.
Photo: Off Hour Studio.

88折,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

三種粥作法: Congee, Three Ways

Lisa Cheng Smith — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 16:19:32 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

The next episode of Cooking With Steam is here! And it couldn’t be simpler: Congee Three Ways 三種粥作法.

Congee is a magical dish. With a handful of rice (really, very little) and a whole lot of water, you can make dinner for a crowd. Add flavorful odds and ends you might have on hand like sweet potato, bits of meat or fish, leftover stock, and veggie scraps from last night’s stir fry prep. It’s easy to scale up, keeps well as leftovers, and warms the body from the inside out.

The simplest congee can be made with only rice and water, with garnishes like pork floss, fermented tofu, and sweet and spicy pickles. But, this is just the tip of the congee iceberg (yes, it can also be frozen). To demonstrate the versatility of this dish, I share three congee preparations that you might come across in Taiwan: sweet potato congee, fish congee, and century egg pork congee.

COOKING WITH STEAM Season 02 Episode 04
Congee Three Ways
好蒸氣第二季 04 | 三種粥作法

Congee Three Ways

The recipes I present here are all based on a common ratio of 1:6 rice to liquid, but I switch up the stock base and the included ingredients. I demonstrate how to prep these add-ins and when to introduce them into the cooking process, depending on their relative robustness, for the best flavor and texture.

These versions (and their garnishes) were developed to capture my favorite combinations, with pantry staples I typically have on hand. In your kitchen, you could do the same, treating congee as a canvas to invent new combinations, use up leftovers, or recreate your favorite traditional styles.

Thanks, as always, for watching!

The Recipes

I prepare congee in a Tatung Electric Steamer, but you can also do so in a pot over the stovetop. These recipes are adapted from the Yun Hai Tatung Family Cookbook, and are all available online:

Get the Recipes

Ingredients and Equipment

The brown serving bowl used for the sweet potato congee and the white serving bowl used for the century egg pork congee were made by my friend and ceramicist Matthew So.

The gray and blue bowl used for the fish congee was made by my friend and ceramicist Debbie Carlos.

For the recipes, I chop the vegetables and the pork shoulder using our Maestro Wu Cleaver. I slice the fish using our Maestro Wu Fish Knife. I also switch between a round ironwood cutting board, which I purchased from an Asian grocery store in Detroit over 15 years ago, and a Material Kitchen cutting board. To cook the congee, I use the 6-cup Tatung Steamer.

And, for the recipes, we incorporated a few things from Yun Hai Shop, like our penglai short-grain rice, Amber River soy sauce, Su chili crisp mala, frizzled ginger in sesame oil, white sesame oil, frost salt, and fleur de sel.

Take Me to the Warehouse Sale

Please reach out with any other questions on sourcing or ingredients. Happy to help, as always.

Gratitude and Acknowledgements

Credits

Produced by Night Shift and Yun Hai
Made possible by Tatung Taiwan

Our Set

Our set features props from Taiwanese, Taiwanese-American, and international friends worldwide, creating those Taiwancore vibes we love so much at Yun Hai.

And much gratitude to our friends who contributed to wardrobe: Everybody World, Judi Rosen, Whimsy and Row, RMS Beauty, and Christine Mai Nguyen.

Special Thanks

Before I Go

Lunar New Year is around the corner!

Do androids dream of electric sheep? Do zodiac animals wear glasses?

We’ve got a number of seasonal specials dropping in the next few weeks, including our QQ Horse merch (and a QQ snake redux); a seasonal restock of kumquat slices; red envelopes (next week); and a very special collaboration with Tiffany and Sean of Choochoo-Ca-Chew, one of the first Taiwanese recipe blogs I ever frequented. Stay tuned for a limited edition (free) dumpling zine featuring five of their recipes and an introduction to her new online dumpling course, The Dumpling Club.

always be mocking up

And, for those patiently waiting, Emilie Liu’s Tiger God shirts should be back by early February, too.

Stay warm,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

雲海迎新歲: 2025 Yun Hai Year in Review

Lisa Cheng Smith — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 17:24:55 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

As we embark on a new year and reflect on the one just past, I continue my annual tradition of returning to the wisdom of the garden, especially when times are tough. Read on to find out how a creative failure shifted my priorities this year and twelve selected newsletters that reflect that. I’m so grateful for all that’s come to pass, and the continued privilege to do this work. Here’s to 2026!

And finally, a reminder that today is the last day of our warehouse sale, a good opportunity to stock up.

For me, the garden as a metaphor for business and life serves as an antidote to the hubristic ambition that surrounds us, beckoning. I’m not only referring to the dark political climate we’re in, or the very real threats to Taiwan’s continued existence, but also to the ever-accelerating domination of technology, simulacra, and data as a stand-in for experience.

The tools built to “free” us (from what? to do what?) increasingly feel like shackles. There are so many intermediaries, platforms, and algorithms (this email is produced on substack, guilty as charged) to attend to. But digging around in the dirt is a technology, too. Produce.

A field of flowers blooming next to a dormant rice paddy in Meinong, Taiwan.

At the beginning of 2025, as a business owner with almost everything on the line, I was feeling anxious about succeeding, at least as defined in terms of the top and bottom line: how much we were selling, how much we were spending, and finding survival somewhere in the optimization between. I’ve always maintained the vision of Yun Hai as a conduit between Taiwanese producers and American consumers, with the mission to tell Taiwanese cultural stories, but my decisions felt increasingly driven by the expectation of throughput, output, and result.

In February, I failed to produce our annual zodiac lunar new year mascot-to-be, QQ Snake. What used to be a joyful marking of the season had turned into an expectation with numbers attached to it. Combined with pronounced burnout and the Sisyphean feeling of pushing ever upwards, I simply could not get around the creative block. I still carry it as a wound: a failure of my intentions and an abandonment of a ritual I used to love.

The originating QQ concept drawing, featuring a Formosan Black Bear, from 2021.

Trying to ground myself again, I revisited a newsletter I published at the end of 2023, a love letter to the distinctly non-Taiwanese gardening handbook The Know Maintenance Garden, by Roy Diblik. I shared this quote then, but it feels even more relevant now.

Diblik writes:

We must abandon the tradition that one method of gardening fits all plantings. We must be more creative with our thinking, our approach, and our participation. And we need to establish new gardening traditions, modeled after the knowledge, awareness, spirit, and joy we bring to each day. So, what should we do in the garden?
Stay involved! Be attentive!
Look to nature, both without and within.
Keep things simple
Dream ahead, and yet recognize the beauty of the present
Redefine the rules
Look for relationships—that’s what holds things together
Share and participate

And here, too:

Beauty is in everything, everywhere, and always re-created. Sunrises, rainy evenings, grandchildren, dogs, a nice dinner, a walk, family, friends. That’s how we live.
Art is a habit we should never break. Painting the house, taking pictures of our travels, cooking meals, choosing a new sofa—all tap the creative part of us.
Community awakens us to our place. It’s our culture, where and how we live and relate to all our neighbors and friends. It’s the wonderful diversity of our lives.
Ecology is being aware that we coexist, living lovingly with others. It’s where we are—the sky, this moment, every leaf you’ll ever see—and it’s also the places we cannot see: distant woods, snowy mountaintops, wide oceans, a village in Italy, a small park in Sweden.
Health is what keeps each of us living in the present and looking forward to tomorrow. We all try to make intelligent choices that will keep us well, physically and mentally.

In reviewing this, I noticed the author doesn’t mention anything about watering the garden, or any of the daily activities required to maintain it. That is a necessity, but not the driving force. What we should do in the garden is enjoy the garden. What we should do in life is be aware of our own ecologies, and sustain the places we live in as we live in them, exercising our creativity at every moment.

A small succulent propagation work area in front of a cafe in Taimali, Taiwan.

I realized I’d been approaching success the wrong way. Financial solvency isn’t a goal in itself, but a non-negotiable constraint. It’s the watering of the plants: you need to take care, but water alone doesn’t determine the constitution of the garden, or how it’s experienced.

What I ought to do with the business is enjoy it, and make it enjoyable. I decided that instead of letting the day-to-day stressors of financial solvency and performance guide my decisions, I’d prioritize three things—cultural joy, creative well-being, and sustaining our community—while balancing our constraints as a small but growing entity.

Freshly picked Kumquats in Taipei, February 2025.

A Year in Letters

I let these principles guide my 2025, and I think we’re much better off for it, even as the world stormed around us. I responded to challenges by writing about them, which has been a wonderful outlet for working things out and processing ideas. Thank you, as always, for reading.

Below, I’ve picked twelve newsletters that capture the difficulties and successes of the year and embody our priorities. There are many more where these came from; find them all here.

In chronological order:

I don’t think we’ve ever worked more feverishly, more flexibly, or with higher stakes. We made it through, stronger than ever, and that can be attributed to the dedication of our team and your enthusiasm.

I cannot overstate the gratitude or the blessing. I’m so lucky to be here, doing this work, with our incredible team (Lillian Lin, Amalissa Uytingco, Jasmine Huang, Natya Regensburger, Jeremy Hersh, Grace Jung, Feng Hsieh, Ivan Wu, Pip Liu, Cat Yeh, and all our wonderful collaborators). Like a garden, this project, started almost 10 years ago, continues to provide and surprise. I couldn’t ask for more.

Happy New Year, and thank you!

QQ Snake and QQ horse coming soon,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

虎爺: Tiger God Merch

Fri, 26 Dec 2025 18:30:20 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Happy Holidays, everyone! I hope you’re finding rest and joy as this year winds to a close. It’s been a challenging one, with so much to fight for and protect, and still plenty to be grateful for. Our office is closed until the new year (yay), and I’ve got a looonngg list of hobbies to attend to, so I’ll keep this short.

This week, I’d like to introduce Hu Ye, the Tiger God, rendered in a playful cat-like form by Emilie Liu on the occasion of our store renovation. They’re the star of our new line of store merch, which launched in-store just before winter solstice and is available online from today. We started with a small batch, so if your size is out of stock, please sign up for the waitlist on the product page, and we’ll be sure to order it for you when we restock early next year.

And, we’re back in stock on most items. If you’ve been following along, you know that the dried fruit went out of stock early, along with several Tatung models and a few other items. We got a shipment in from Taiwan just before Christmas. Our warehouse is full again, though it may take a few days to get stock into the store.

2026 almanacs also sold out in record time; we’ve got a small amount that we shipped over from Taiwan arriving in the store as early as this Saturday. Please give the store a call during business hours to reserve one. We’re closed today but will be open again this Saturday.

Finally, don’t miss our annual warehouse sale, starting today, where we clear out the old to make room for the new. Save up to 30% off select items, now through 1/1, online and in-store.

Shop the Warehouse Sale

This month saw a substantial overhaul of our brick-and-mortar, with the help of our friends at Future Expansion and Off Cut Design and Fabrication. We reopened only a few weeks ago and are so pleased with the results! I feel we’re just at the beginning of figuring out how to use the new space; there’s so much more room for new products and displays.

New shelves and cabinetry to house our collection of Taiwanese heritage goods.

We occupy a very small footprint—about 250 square feet—and any change has a big impact on the feel of the store and how we operate it. We replaced a small counter with a long one and put up a wall of cabinets. This new millwork has changed the experience of the store almost completely, while highlighting the existing look of the shop. We continued to incorporate the warm woods I love so much, and the long counter references traditional apothecaries.

Yun Hai 2.0.

I’m drafting a Studio Notes newsletter with a behind-the-scenes look at the store evolution: what we did, why, and how. For now, I invite you in to come visit. I love hanging out in there and chatting with friend and customers.

Emilie Liu’s Hu Ye 虎爺 Tiger God

On the occasion of our updated store, friend-of-the-shop Emilie Liu (creator of the poodle painting up by our register that has become synonymous with our brick-and-mortar) has created a new series of painted works featuring Hu Ye 虎爺, the Tiger God, who typically stands at attention in temples in Taiwan as a guardian spirit—warding off evil, protecting children from illness, and bringing in wealth.

Protection, 2025, 28”x 28”, by Emilie Liu. Part of the Hu Ye series on display at Yun Hai shop.

Emilie has imagined Hu Ye as maneki-neko, the beckoning cat placed at the entrances of many Taiwanese, Chinese, and Japanese businesses to bring in customers and fortune. As Hu Ye is typically hard at work protecting us, we thought Yun Hai could be a space where they’re off-duty: free to clean whiskers, scratch an itch, frolick, and stretch out.

During her research, she learned that Taiwanese depictions of the Tiger God (an immortal well known throughout the Chinese diaspora) were based on household cats, as Taiwan didn’t have tigers around to model. Hence Hu Ye’s unequivocal adorableness.

All paintings are on view at the shop through the end of January. Works are available for sale; please reach out via email reply or instagram DM to @yunhaishop for a price list!

Hu Ye 虎爺 by Emilie Lie
on view at Yun Hai Shop
now through the end of January
store hours here

Emilie and I behind the counter at the show reception.

Read more about the history of Hu Ye and how the tiger god influenced this body of work in Emilie’s artist statement:

When I began creating a new store mascot for Yun Hai’s grand reopening, I searched for a uniquely Taiwanese character, one that could serve as a Taiwanese version of the Maneki-neko. That’s when Hu Ye (虎爺), the Tiger God, came to mind.
In Taiwan, Hu Ye is often the last god worshipped in temples. According to folklore, he became a sacred protector after being tamed and turned into the mount of the Earth God (土地公) or City God (城隍爺). Born in the Year of the Tiger, and having grown up with a beloved stuffed tiger, I felt an immediate connection when I encountered Hu Ye at Taipei Songshan Ciyou Temple (台北松山慈祐宮).

A Taiwanese Hu Ye figure, part of the Emilie’s research when developing her artwork. Image: National Center of Traditional Arts.

The most fascinating discovery I made during my research was about Hu Ye’s original appearance: since there were no native tigers in Taiwan during the 17th century, the original sculptors carved the wooden figures based on domestic cats.
This explains why the Tiger God is typically small, rounded, and incredibly adorable! Traditionally, Hu Ye brings wealth, wards off evil, and protects children from illness.
This series begins with the most common Yellow Hu Ye, symbolizing protection, wealth, and health. The works expand into different colors inspired by the Chinese Five Elements, each carrying its own energy. In these pieces, Hu Ye reveals a playful, almost human side, roaming freely through the Ocean of Clouds (雲海 Yun Hai).

Early sketches for Hu Ye by Emilie Liu.

Emilie Liu x YH Store Merch

Hu Ye shirt on display in the shop. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

With Hu Ye as our new store mascot, we couldn’t wait to collaborate on some merch, so we took the first painting of Hu Ye and turned it into a store t-shirt, conceptualized as both a souvenir of the shop and store “uniform” (always optional).

Our shop slogan. Image: Jasmine Huang.

On the front, we’ve created a store graphic with a cheeky slogan inspired by a Taiwanese colloquial expression that references the chaos of the marketplace. It reads 什麼都有，什麼都賣，都不奇怪，天天都在, or We have everything, we sell everything, nothing’s too strange, we’re here every day. The design references information graphics from store bags and business cards, so we’ve proudly put our essential info on there, including our precious support email address. Ha ha.

Emilie and I modeling our new Hu Ye t-shirts at her show reception.

Shirts are availabe in beige and green. This was a bit of a challenge to produce, as we wanted to keep the organic texture of the painting in the graphic on the back. Thanks to fine screenprinters at Works in Progress for working with me on this and taking comments on press!

If your size goes out of stock, please sign up for the waitlist on the product page, and we’ll be sure to order it for you when we restock early next year.

Photos: Jasmine Huang.

Shirt by Comfort Colors
Silkscreened by Works in Progress

100% ringspun cotton, 6.1 oz. heavyweight
Pre-shrunk, soft-washed, and garment-dyed

Features:
1” ribbed collar with double-needle topstitched neckline
Double-needle stitched sleeves and bottom hem
Twill taped shoulder-to-shoulder
Set-in sleeves

About Emilie Liu

Emilie Liu is a Taiwanese painter and digital artist who works with both analog and digital media. Born and raised in Taipei, she has been based in New York since 2010.

Her objectives are to capture the emotions she has experienced while living in a diverse and dynamic city, while her color palette is influenced by the exuberant natural landscapes of Northern California, where she briefly resided. Emilie Liu has spent over a decade working in the design industry.

Emilie’s painting of Jupiter, her poodle, has been up in the shop since we first opened. Photo: Meghan Marin.

When she welcomed her dog Jupiter into her home four years ago, he inspired Emilie to seek a louder artistic voice. Most of her early work captures Jupiter’s lively micro-expressions. Jupiter’s positive energy radiates through Emilie’s brush strokes, applied in such a way as to achieve human scale. Other portraits capture canine companions belonging to strangers whose vibrant presences and quirks left an impression on Emilie that compelled her to document them on canvas.

The culminating works of this series are Emilie’s personalities made manifest. These portraits are projections of Emilie’s emotions and reflections from her daily experiences. Energetic and unexpected, Emilie’s work evokes a sense of wit and play.

Sweet scenes from the Hu Ye reception on a snowy Saturday earlier this month. Thanks so much to Nin Hao for the dim sum and Joyce for the tea eggs!

Warehouse Sale

Not our warehouse but it might as well be. Taken when shopping in Taichung with my pal Ivan.

Don’t forget to take advantage of our warehouse sale. It’s not just the holiday dregs, but anything we ordered a little too much of, including our beautiful Maestro Wu knives, 11-cup bamboo steamers, Irwin mango jam, and some of our favorite soy sauces. Worth a look!

Shop the Warehouse Sale

Expect discounts from 10 to 30 percent off on select overstock items online and in store. Sale ends at 11:59pm PST on Thursday, 1/1.

And now on to the rest of this holiday week. I’m hoping to knit a square bandana, finish that Chuck Klosterman book about the nineties, and finally make some black sesame shortbread. Expect to hear from me next week with my annual year-in-review post; it’s been one for the books.

And just a note that our Brooklyn store will be closing earlier than normal (5pm) on New Year’s Eve and will be closed New Year’s Day. We’re back to regular hours on January 2nd.

Don’t forget to contact the store to scoop up our last remaining almanacs!

nothing’s too strange,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Studio Notes 09: Winter Solstice

Lisa Cheng Smith — Sun, 21 Dec 2025 18:29:21 GMT

Hi, it’s Lisa Cheng Smith, founder of Yun Hai. I write Taiwan Stories, a free newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

In the spirit of the holidays, today’s letter has no paywall; thanks for reading and supporting Taiwanese culture!

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Happy Winter Solstice! This important Taiwanese holiday, known as dongzhi 冬至, is today, December 21st, marking the winter solstice solar term.

It’s the longest night and the shortest day of the year. This may sound suboptimal, but night is beautiful, too, and from here on out, light stretches a little bit longer with each passing moment, slowly bringing us back into the glory of spring and summer. It’s an inflection point. Another year done, and we’re on our way.

Like many celestial phenomena, this one is celebrated as a festival in Taiwan. It’s a customary day for togetherness and sharing tang yuan (sticky rice dumplings) served both savory and sweet. The round shape symbolizes completeness, togetherness, and reunion.

A bowl of savory tang yuan prepared at Yun Hai Shop in 2022, at our Lil’ Tang Yuan pop up with Jessie YuChen. Photo: Grace Anne Leadbeater.

On the topic of togetherness, we are immeasurably blessed by our friendships. The strength of these relationships was brought into sharp relief by the challenges of 2025; we’re so thankful for you all.

I thought I’d take the occasion of solstice to celebrate our long-running collaboration with Taiwanese chef Jessie YuChen, seen here preparing tang yuan at a winter solstice pop-up we hosted in December 2022, the first year the brick-and-mortar was open.

Jessie, turning our back of house into a proper restaurant, as she does. Photo: Grace Ann Leadbeater.

We collaborated on a holiday party, titled Lil’ Tang Yuan, to celebrate solstice, with two tang yuan dishes: one savory with celery and mushroom, and another with sweet red bean soup. I can hardly believe it’s been three years since we did this; I’m still feeling the blessings.

I was not as quick on the pick-up back then, and I don’t think these beautiful shots by Grace Anne Leadbeater were ever published beyond social media. Never too late, right? Especially on the longest night?

I love seeing people meet and gather outside our shop. Photo: Grace Ann Leadbeater.

Tang yuan in sweet red bean soup, our dessert offering for the day. Photo: Grace Ann Leadbeater.

Solstice vibes <3 <3 with friend Heami Lee, Jessie YuChen, and other guests of the shop. Why am I not wearing socks. Photo: Grace Ann Leadbeater.

For me, warm, chewy tang yuan are as nostalgic as mulled wine or egg nog at this time of year. It’s a holiday food to celebrate the end of the season and a new beginning, and to share with friends and family.

The official holiday is today, but for me it’s tang yuan season all month long, and even into Lunar New Year. If you’re interested, we have a great recipe for a Hakka-style savory tang yuan, developed by our friend Cat Yeh. Or, if you’re short on time, swing by the shop and pick up some frozen ones (we’ve got peanut and black sesame).

Friend of the Shop

Jessie is one of those multi-dimensional talents that has contributed to Yun Hai in myriad ways over many years: as a food stylist on our Tatung cookbook and Cooking With Steam series; a guest on said cooking show; a pop-up chef for Yun Hai holiday celebrations (see above); beer and popcorn provider (see below); and all-around good spirit.

On set with Jessie.

You can read more about her background in this newsletter (the one where we make eggs together). Like many of those working in the forefront of Taiwanese food, the hustle never stops for her. I thought I’d take time today to share three of Jessie’s recent projects—things you really ought to know about!

For the Love of Kewpie

When we were shooting the second season of Cooking With Steam, Jessie was simultaneously working on a cookbook project with author Elyse Inamine and photographer Heami Lee (also a long time friend of the shop), featuring one of our favorite East Asian ingredients: Kewpie mayonnaise. Until we are able to import Taiwanese mayonnaise (a thing all its own, blessing Mei er Mei 美而美 breakfast sandwich shops throughout the island), Kewpie is the closest analogue we can easily find.

In For the Love of Kewpie, Jessie and Elyse develop a wide range of recipes incorporating the condiment, taking it out of just a sandwich or salad dressing.

One of my favorite ways to make grilled cheese for a crowd is by slathering the outside of the bread with mayonnaise and roasting it on a sheet pan. This recipe, excerpted from the book, takes the same concept, but leans Taiwanese, with a crispy tofu battered with panko crumbs and smothered in scallion-ginger sauce.

I’m making Peking Duck for the holidays, and looking for impressive and easy sides. This will be on the table. Thanks for Workman Publishing for this excerpt!

Recipe: Crispy Tofu with Scallion-Ginger Sauce

Excerpted from For the Love of Kewpie by Kewpie Corporation, Elyse Inamine and Jessie YuChen (Workman Publishing). Copyright © 2025. Photographs by Heami Lee.

The key to crispy tofu isn’t pressing all the water out of the slab or frying it in a lot of oil—it’s coating the tofu in Kewpie Mayonnaise. Once these mayo-covered slices of tofu are slid into the oven, the oil in the condiment ends up frying the tofu, no eggy dredge or deep-fry needed. The tofu is crunchy on the outside, in part thanks to a panko-studded exterior, and squishy-in-a-good-way on the inside. This dish comes together in 20 minutes, making it a strong contender for a busy weeknight dinner—the tofu can be roasted alongside a tray of vegetables for a complete meal.

Ingredients

1/4 cup (25 g) finely minced scallions
3 tablespoons (40 g) finely minced ginger
1/3 cup (80 ml) toasted sesame oil
2 teaspoons salt, plus more as needed
One 14-ounce (400 g) package firm tofu, drained and sliced 1/2-inch-thick (12 mm)
6 tablespoons (90 ml) Kewpie Mayonnaise
1 cup (100 g) panko bread crumbs

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 425° F (220° C).
Make the scallion-ginger sauce: In a small bowl, combine the scallions, ginger, sesame oil, and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Mix thoroughly and season as needed.
Pat the tofu slices dry with paper towels.
In a small bowl, mix the mayonnaise with 11/2 teaspoons salt. Brush to coat all sides of the tofu slices with the mayonnaise mixture, and then apply the rest of the mixture to the top of the tofu slices. Sprinkle the panko to cover the tops.
Place the tofu slices on a baking sheet with a fish spatula. Bake for 15 minutes, then broil on the top rack for 1 to 2 minutes, watching closely, until golden brown on top.
Carefully transfer the tofu to a serving plate and finish with the scallion-ginger sauce.

Boomipop: Popcorn Chicken Popcorn

Another great one for holiday season snacking is Boomipop, Jessie’s brand of popcorn-chicken-flavored popcorn. We are so excited to stock this in the store, it’s been a popular snack and stocking stuffer this season, and is such a fun way to share Taiwanese flavors.

Jessie, improving popcorn at Farm.One. Photo: Grace Anne Leadbeater.

The story of this is a fun one: At a pop up a few years ago at Farm.One, Jessie was working in a brand new kitchen (everything was being used for the first time). As the case may be when working in a brand new space, there were some kinks to iron out, and the food was late. In a pinch, Jessie improvised a quick popcorn to hold off the hungry crowds with a bag of kernels and ingredients she had on hand: five-spice powder, white pepper, salt, and chicken fat.

Boomipop lifestyle images shot in my dining room with my kids’ Chutes and Ladders set and their tiny play coffee mug ha ha ha. Photo: Boomipop.

It was a hit, and she’s since figured out how to package it for sale, much to the benefit of our shop and everyone who visits us. Highly recommended as an airplane snack or stocking stuffer.

Bubble Team

And finally, one of the most exciting developments at the shop this year has been adding Taiwanese craft beer to our assortment, thanks to both Formosa Imports and Bubble Team, Jessie’s newly minted Taiwanese craft-beer distributorship. When I asked Jessie why she took on yet another additional business and thing-to-do, she responded with a simple and direct answer: “It should be available here.” Can’t argue.

Some of the Ugly Half brews with a popcorn chicken platter by Jessie Yu Chen at the James Beard Foundation. Photo: Bubble Team.

Thanks to this strong sense of determination, we’re now able to stock beer from Taiwan’s Ugly Half brewery on a regular basis. I love them all (the Hazy IPA, the TOASTea ale based on breakfast toast and oolong tea, and the modern rice lager), but my personal favorite is the Guava Gose, with the guava notes and plum powder accompaniment.

Stop by the shop and pick some up, or head to any of the following establishments in NYC to find them on the menu:

As of now we’re the only retail spot that carries it! Swing by!

Peak tang yuan. Photo: Grace Ann Leadbeater.

As a friend of mine and I love to say (quoting some Asian stationery we once came across) “the best ship is friendship.” In this very difficult year, the bright lights for us were indeed our many friends and supporters that came out to help and inspire. Thank you to Jessie and the many others who have contributed to our continued success and sense of joy.

More to come from this community soon, including an online merch launch with artist Emilie Liu (next week) and an episode on making tang yuan with Jess Wang of Gu Grocery, for lantern festival early next year.

Happy Tang Yuan Day,
Lisa Cheng Smith

The ideas and opinions expressed in Studio Notes are mine, and don’t represent the larger Yun Hai organization. Thanks to Amalissa Uytingco for the proofing. I read all email replies and comments, so please reach out. Photographs, unless credited, are by me. If you enjoyed this newsletter, share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

How to Make Lu Rou Fan

Lisa Cheng Smith — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 18:49:55 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

The second season of our Taiwanese cooking show, Cooking With Steam, explores Taiwanese food through the lens of 古早味 gu zao wei. This phrase translates to “ancient flavor,” dbut largely refers to pre-war Taiwanese foods that represent a more agrarian diet and, to me, feel especially homestyle.

The next episode of Cooking With Steam is here: Lu Rou Fan 滷肉飯.

In episode three of season two, I demonstrate my recipe for Taiwanese braised pork over rice, featuring a surprise secret ingredient. This dish is THE Taiwanese comfort food and cure for (or progenitor of?) acute homesickness. It can be found across Taiwan in homes, street stalls, and restaurants. For me, it’s a national dish with endless variations: from oily and unctuous to sticky and sweet.

COOKING WITH STEAM Season 02 Episode 03
Lu Rou Fan (Taiwanese Braised Pork Over Rice)
好蒸氣第二季 03 | 滷肉飯

Get the Lu Rou Fan Recipe

I wrote all about this dish last year when we introduced Chez Kuo’s travel guide Luroufan Taiwan, celebrating this dish and all the best iterations of it found throughout the island.

There are many versions of the perfect Lu Rou Fan, and each one is correct. Mine has a thin, fatty sauce, with only a touch of sweetness and meltingly tender pieces of fatty pork belly. It doesn’t sit on top of the rice like a stew, but soaks into it the way a pat of butter would, leaving all the tender pork morsels on top, like jewels. Treasures.
The version I see most often in the US comes with a braised egg, a slice of yellow pickled daikon, and a piece or two of bok choy. While this bento-style lu rou is one way of serving it in Taiwan, I experienced something different at small establishments around the island, where lu rou isn’t really a main dish, in the American sense of the phrase.
At these eateries, it’s a side and a staple at the same time. Instead of a bowl of white rice, one might order a serving of lu rou fan and a selection of vegetables, soups, and other small dishes. All servings are small, on equal footing, and provide a variety of color, texture, and flavor at the table. Lu rou in this context isn’t usually served with any particular de facto garnish, though some places have a signature pairing, like sour vegetable, black pepper, or even fish floss.

Read the full piece below:

We still have a few copies of Chez’s book left online and in store; it’s a great gift for anyone planning to travel to Taiwan (or homesick for it).

Chez Kuo’s book on set with us. Photo: Rachel Watson.

Get the Book

The Recipe

This recipe comes from our Yun Hai Tatung Family Cookbook. I’ve prepared it on the stove, but you could also do this in a Tatung Electric Steamer.

The formula is pretty simple: bloom your aromatics; brown your pork belly (or mushrooms as the case may be); add your seasonings, sauces, and sweetener; and let it bubble away with a spice pack until the sauce is reduced and the pork slices (or mushrooms) are tender.

Ingredients and Equipment

The Taiwanese icon-patterned serving plate used to mise shiitake mushrooms was made by Taiwanese artist Hsiang Jung Chen, a precious gift to me from Taiwanese art director and designer Yenwei Liu.

The celadon serving bowl used during the demo and the white serving bowl used for the beauty shot were both made by my friend Matthew So.

For the recipe, I slice the pork belly using our Maestro Wu Cleaver on a Material Kitchen cutting board. I chop the aromatics using our Maestro Wu Fish Knife on a round ironwood cutting board, which I purchased from an Asian grocery store in Detroit over 15 years ago. To steam the rice, I use the 6-cup Tatung Steamer.

And, for the recipes, we incorporated a few things from Yun Hai Shop, like our Thirteen Spice Braise Pack, Firewood Soy Paste, Vat Bottom Soy Sauce, dried shiitake mushrooms, and penglai short-grain rice.

Please reach out with any other questions on sourcing or ingredients. Happy to help, as always.

Gratitude and Acknowledgements

Credits

Produced by Night Shift and Yun Hai
Made possible by Tatung Taiwan

Our Set

Our set features props from Taiwanese, Taiwanese-American, and international friends worldwide, creating those Taiwancore vibes we love so much at Yun Hai.

And much gratitude to our friends who contributed to wardrobe: Everybody World, Judi Rosen, Whimsy and Row, RMS Beauty, and Christine Mai Nguyen.

Special Thanks

Before I Go

We have remodeled the store! In fact, I’m sitting in it right now, trying to wrap this letter up so I can put it all back together before we open again tomorrow. It’s so, so exciting.

Thanks to Jess Chen, Deirdre McDermott, and Nicholas McDermott of Future Expansion, Jason Chernak (one of my oldest friends!) and his crew at Offcut Design/Fabrication, and our store team Jeremy Hersh and Natya Regensburger for all their input, support, and production on this. We’re solidly in the era of Yun Hai 2.0.

Behind-the-scenes on the build of our new countertop and cabinet.

We’ll be open again in our new form from tomorrow, December 6th. A few reminders before I sign off for today and get back to merchandising.

Holiday Shopping Event: Please join us on Sunday 12/14 from 11-5pm for a special grand reopening event, where we’ll be welcoming you into our updated space, with new furniture, never-before-seen artworks from Emilie Liu, brand new store merch, Taiwanese marshmallows (my hobby, apparently), and gift-wrapping in Yun Hai newsprint.
Last Day to Ship: The last day to ship in time for arrival before Christmas is December 14th. Please plan accordingly!
Almanacs: We are sold out of lunisolar almanacs online. However, copies are still available for purchase at our Brooklyn store. For stockists outside of New York, Park Life (San Francisco, CA), Abacus Row (San Francisco, CA), and Chess Club (Portland, OR) also have limited copies available at their shops. Otherwise, please sign up for the waitlist to be the first to hear when our 2027 lunisolar almanac launches preorders.

Your resident Lu Rou Fan fan,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Written with editorial support by Amalissa Uytingco, Jasmine Huang, and Lillian Lin. If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

Studio Notes 08: Taiwanese Art Books

Lisa Cheng Smith — Mon, 01 Dec 2025 20:34:33 GMT

Hi, it’s Lisa Cheng Smith, founder of Yun Hai. I write Taiwan Stories, a free newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

I’ve just booked another trip back to Taiwan (yessss), and one of the first things I’m looking forward to doing is visiting my favorite art bookstores to see what’s new in the world of independent print. I originally shared my go-to spots in Studio Notes 04: Taiwanese New Wave, which I’ve taken off paywall for the moment—click here if you want the full list.

In a country that dominates high-tech manufacturing, print isn’t dead, it’s kicking, at least from where I’m sitting. And I’m sitting in this bookstore, Pon Ding.

Leafing through Taiwanese art books always gives me a larger sense of the material culture in which they’re produced, providing an understanding that wouldn’t be possible to pick up from digital experience. Not just “what’s here,” but also “who’s here” and “what are they saying” and “how did they choose to say it.”

Case in point: on my last trip to Taiwan in February of this year, I picked up this zine, Miscellaneous Thoughts #1. Saw it, loved it, bought it; the absurdist cordoned-off under-maintenance area on the cover and the fruit sticker on the back called out to me from the void. I brought it back to NYC, shared it with the team and filed it into our growing reference library (“things we love”) at the studio.

Fast forward a few months to May in New York City. I was very fortunate to meet Hai-Hsin Huang and Luc Jolivet, Taipei-based artists that work closely with Taiwanese publisher nos:books. The circumstances were serendipitous; they had come with a friend to a dinner party at my place and Hai-Hsin told me she had illustrated the label of the beer I was drinking.

The beer I was drinking (incidentally also available at Yun Hai Shop with other excellent brews from Ugly Half, a Taiwanese craft brewery).

We became friends and I spent the next few months getting to know her work. Hai-Hsin has a cute-grotesque style and a sharply critical, comedic sensibility regarding the absurdity of everyday life, as observed in Taiwan and abroad. If you’re in the market for oil painting or searching for an artist to exhibit, please consider her work. Would that I were a gallerist.

Human Design, 2022, Hai-Hsin Huang

Free Time, 2020, Hai-Hsin Huang

金面山 Jinmian Mountain, 2021, Hai-Hsin Huang

The other day, I was working on a publication for the shop. Seeking inspiration, I pulled out Miscellaneous Thoughts #1 and started flipping through it. Looking through it again, something felt strangely familiar.

Fitness theme?

Absurdist situation with boulder?

Butts and Bikes?

Sure enough, I turned to the last page and it’s… Hai-Hsin’s book. Edition #1 of 50.

I sent a pic to her immediately, got goosebumps, and thought of the phrase yuanfen 緣分, a Buddhist term that refers to a predestined connection between people in the future and the past. Was Hai-Hsin...once a sister in a past life? A warrior on the same battlefield? The tree that I lived in as a young bird?

So I asked my possible-past-life-sibling all my burning questions about this observational zine that telegraphed the Taiwanese daily experience so well.

The drawings were created over years, mostly real scenes she observed in Taiwan. She felt these sketches weren’t serious enough to develop into full blown artworks, but also too good not to share, so she published them into this collection. They’re random moments that made her laugh, as she puts it. I think the sum of the drawings also describes the Taiwanese everyday experience—its poetics and absurdities.

The paper she chose also channels Taiwanese material culture. It’s typical Taiwanese copy paper, which comes in several different shades of yellow (cool). It’s often used to make shu wen zhi 疏文紙, or ceremonial letter-writing paper, burned to carry messages to the deities. And on the back? A fruit sticker she bought from a produce market, confusing the vendors who definitely noted that she was not also buying the proper quantities of fruit to stick them onto.

Dear Gods, who is Hai-Hsin Huang and why do I have the first edition of her zine and how long have we actually known each other?

This was a long, fateful story to say that I LOVE TAIWANESE ART BOOKS. And this holiday season, I’m really excited we have a small collection of them in the brick-and-mortar shop, in honor of the many Taiwanese artists and publishers putting their daily experience, cultural observations, and poetic voice onto paper.

Print Matters

At Yun Hai, we aim to represent contemporary Taiwanese voices alongside traditional foodways. We recognize that Taiwanese identity is constantly emerging, and the rediscovery, production, and invention of culture is ongoing. Taiwanese designers and artists have their own collective voice and sensibility, informed by the unique Taiwanese experience. Yun Hai cannot claim to support Taiwanese culture without also sharing those voices. To this end, it feels right to finally have a significant collection of Taiwanese art books in the shop.

Studio Notes 05: Old Yellow Book

Our seasonal display of Taiwanese art books at Yun Hai Shop in Brooklyn.

We’re starting with a selection of publications from Makan, nos:books, dmp editions, and good timing, all based in Taiwan or representing Taiwanese artists. We also have some postcards and souvenirs from moumoumarket, a selection of prints from Felicia Liang, and a handful of zines and printed material from other Taiwanese and Taiwanese-American artists and authors.

Hai-Hsin Huang & Luc Jolivet, representing nos:books, and Shauba Chang of dmp editions dropping books off at the shop earlier this fall.

Here are a few titles from our current collection. Maybe you’ll find something from a past or future friend:

To Be Your Saint by Hai-Hsin Huang

Aforementioned past-life-sibling-artist Hai-Hsin Huang spent a week at a silent meditation retreat and wrote a comic about it. Astute, funny, endlessly entertaining and also bilingual! Followed up with I’ll Be Your Saint #2, where she volunteers as a canteen worker at the same retreat (who do not have to be silent btw) and wrote a comic about that, too. That book is also in store.

published by Hai-Hsin Huang

Terrible Fever by One Key

This romp of a book is best understood through the words of the author, One Key:

these are doodles around the feeling of peacefulness in Taiwan where news about new noodle shops, cute heartbreaking stories of gogos and miaomees, etc., tend to make bigger headlines than over-dramatized global catastrophes. The very real constant proximity with the Chinese threat feels like it actually sets a general pragmatic and humorous mood in the Taiwanese society, a better-laugh-while-we-can-than-cry mood.

I love it for its familiarity, cacophony, hyperbole, and comedy.

published by good timing

Imagine a Flaw by Son Ni

In this book, artist Son Ni depicts the confinement of one’s own mind and a longing to be free. Simple, abstract line drawings are construed and misconstrued into an imaginative, maze-like narrative of escape and entrapment. I can’t help but think of the Deleuzian fold (“the world is a body of infinite folds that weave through time and space” la la la), topology, möbius strips, and fractals.

published by nos:books

Taipei by Ibi Ibrahim

This photobook by Yemeni-American artist Ibi Ibrahim explores the scenography of the morning streets of Taipei, as observed on early morning walks. It’s a love letter to one of my favorite cities at its quietest moments. Inspired by the sets of Taiwanese New Wave Cinema, but a quietly observational book all its own.

published by makan

I Got out of the Car; the Lighting was Bright by Val Lee

An intricately layered and finely produced book by Taiwanese artist Val Lee, weaving essay, drawing, photography, and script into a dreamlike narrative. From the artist:

The inner pages use different textures of paper and feature rounded corners to simulate a personal notebook’s private feel. It serves as both an artist’s portfolio, a poetry collection, and perhaps even a unique narrative experience created through the book as a spatial medium.
At first, what Val Lee wanted to do the most was to gather participants at an abandoned banquet hall in the middle of the night. There, they would watch a black dragon-dance puppet twist and turn in the thick fog. Meanwhile, someone would ride a skateboard, drink some fruit juice.

I think this title exemplifies what the publisher, dmp editions, does best: connecting text, image, photography into well-designed bilingual books that represent the diversity of the Taiwanese art scene.

published by dmp editions

Night in Morning by Chihoi

This quiet but beautifully printed booklet features a selection of the pencil drawings made by Hong Kong artist Chihoi between 2011-2018, capturing qualities of light and darkness simultaneously, as the early morning arrives to separate night and day.

published by nos:books

I’m so looking forward to seeing you all in the store this season! Just a reminder that we’re closed the rest of this week—Dec 2 through Dec 5—for store renovations (getting a new counter and some shelves, nothing too drastic) and look forward to seeing you again on Saturday, Dec 6th.

your past and future friend,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

選物推薦 : Yun Hai Holiday Gift Guide

Wed, 26 Nov 2025 20:28:32 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Holiday season is upon us, and I’m feeling fortunate. Yun Hai has grown in so many ways this year, and we’ve prioritized creative well-being, cultural joy, and progress over perfection. We’ve thrived despite outside turbulence, all due to the largesse of our community, the passion of our team, and the dedication and support of our partners in Taiwan. There are so many good things happening for Taiwanese culture and visibility in the United States, and we’re proud to be part of the movement. Thank you!

I am ✨so happy✨ to let you know that the almanacs have arrived, preorders have shipped out, and we have a few more copies available for anyone who wasn’t able to order in advance. Scroll on.

Get the Almanac

Shop Gifts

We’ve been in so many excellent gift guides this year, I can hardly believe it. Our products have been featured in the New York Times, The New Yorker, the Strategist, Food and Wine, and The Atlantic. And that’s not to mention all the gracious (and very well-worded) shoutouts from some of our favorite writers and brands: Robin Sloan, Alexis deBoschnek, Christine Mai Nguyen, Kerrilynn Palmer, and Cup of Jo. I’m so happy to see these Taiwanese products getting the attention they deserve. Thank you to all who included us!

The Tatung Electric Steamer headlined this food gift guide by Helen Rosner over at The New Yorker.

Shop Gifts

‘Tis the season to return the favor. In this newsletter, I’ve gathered gift recommendations from myself, the Yun Hai team, and friends of the shop Jessie YuChen, Jess Wang of Gu Grocery, and Cat Yeh.

2026 Yun Hai x O.OO Lunisolar Almanac

First up: the almanac is here! It’s just perfect enough, and I love it so much. If you preordered, those started shipping this week and should be with you soon. If you haven’t, well, we have at least a few cases more, and it’s my number one recommended gift for anyone on your list. Limit 3 per customer.

Our crowning achievement of 2026.

Find it on the website, or read Studio Notes #05, which I’ve just removed the paywall from, that describes all the different parts of this almanac and how design studio O.OO, editor Kimberly Chou, and I approached this tangle of a project.

It merges the Gregorian and lunar calendars, Chinese astrology, agricultural timings, and folk beliefs into a book of seasonal cycles, daily recommendations, and predictions. Throughout Taiwan, people consult it to plan weddings, engagements, agricultural schedules, and many other aspects of daily life.

Get the Almanac

Each page a day. Each day a fortune.

Don’t miss our gift bundles and sets this year!

For the first time ever, we’ve got customizable gift boxes so you can tailor each one specifically for the person you’re giving it to. Check them out out: Taiwanese Tea Time Gift Set, Yun Hai Starter Kit, the Taiwanese Chef’s Box, and our Taiwan Nostalgia Gift Box.

Don’t forget about our Taiwanese Jam Box (see below), designed with vintage Taiwanese newspapers, and the ever-popular Dried Fruit Gift Box, with graphics inspired by Taiwanese produce cartons (pictured in the header of this section).

Shop Gift Bundles

In addition to our brick-and-mortar-shop, we maintain a studio in Queens, where we do our own photoshoots, develop products, prototype packaging, and, occasionally, print our own wrapping paper (see above). I thought it would be fun to share a few of my favorite daily use studio objects for this guide.

A-OK Teapot

I’m never very far away from my A-OK tea pot. It’s 200 ml—the perfect size for a mug—and has a charming, pot-bellied shape. The stainless steel strainer components fit together perfectly. Added bonus: the lid has a star-shaped vent-hole and the words A-OK emblazoned on it. It’s the one thing I’d take with me to a desert island, though I’m not sure how I’d figure the hot water.

A-OK Teapot

Yun Hai x BANGtea Taiwanese Oolong

Photo: Jasmine Huang.

If you know me, you also know that I’m never more than five feet away from a vessel of hot amber-colored liquid.

My tea purveyor of choice is BANGtea. I love their tea so much that we collaborated on our own house line of Taiwanese oolong tea for Yun Hai Shop. The flavors across the collection are charmingly different, from the creamy, brioche-like milk oolong to the warm, barley-kissed black oolong.

Yun Hai BANGtea Oolong Trio

My Favorite Drinking Glasses

I broke one of these glasses just before writing this newsletter by pouring hot water directly into it to brew tea BECAUSE MY A-OK TEAPOT WAS DIRTY, which caused it to crack. I reordered immediately because these are my favorite one-of-a-kind glasses that manage to exude “clown” and “venice” at the same time. Not Taiwanese at all, but absolutely beloved.

"Clown" and "Venice"

Chen and Kai Serpent Lighter Holder

This metal keychain fits a bic mini lighter perfectly and will give you an edge that you don’t actually have. At least that I don’t actually have because I only use this for lighting incense.

A favorite gift from my friend Chen and always in my pocket. For the incense.

Serpent Lighter

The Incense

This is the signature scent of our store, our studio, and my home. It’s Tibetan incense imported by the Taiwanese organic brand Heartland. Made from powdered juniper root and countless other Tibetan herbs from Yunnan, it channels the beautiful smell of the streets of Taiwan. Sorry, nothing compares.

In store only.

Visit the Store

Hi-Tec-C by Pilot

Hi-Tec-C at Yoseka

I am so conditioned to these pens from hours of trying to draw Japanese Manga in high school that I can’t properly write with anything else. I order these by the bucketload from Yoseka, a Taiwanese stationery shop in Greenpoint, and keep a stash at the store too. It’s a gel pen with a very fine point. I’m not particularly good at drawing, but these lend a character of precision to the amateur line:

Design sketch of the Yun Hai storefront made with a Pilot Hi-Tec-C.

And on a somewhat unrelated note, I just found this old file folder from before I met my first Hi-Tec-C and was pleasantly surprised to see that Turtle, Fish, Singing, and Whisper of Death were among my top interests in 7th grade.

Recycled Glass Mug

Photo: Mogutable

In my daily rotation is the W mug by Taiwanese design studio HMM. It’s made from recycled cell phone screen glass at Springpool glass foundry in Taiwan. Delightfully weighted, with a perfect amber color that reminds me of younger days hanging out at House of Pies. Stacks easily.

Visit the Shop

Out of Office by Luc Jolivet

Half of the Yun Hai team has this book, either picked up in an art bookstore in Taiwan or from our own shop, where we stock it. It’s a charming accordion book cataloging office furniture that has moved on to better, freer lives outside. A lovely slice of Taiwanese urbanism that’s been kicking around our studio for the better part of the year.

Published by nos:books and available in the shop, in our new art books section, newsletter forthcoming.

Visit the Shop

We live to eat, and eat to live, and also love to import delicious things from Taiwan that were carefully made by talented and compassionate people. Our favorite snacks and ingredients, below.

Yu Ding Xing Taiwanese Soy Sauce

The handmade, naturally fermented, black bean Taiwanese soy sauce we import from Yu Ding Xing has been a core offering of our line since 2019. It was the second thing I ever imported, and one of the first Taiwanese artisanal soy sauces to hit American shores (at least that I know of).

Yu Ding Xing soy sauces at our Brooklyn shop. Photo: Heami Lee.

The brewer describes them as “wild and crazy like a monster,” a good thing if you’re a chef looking for your inner dragon. Most also happen to be gluten-free because Taiwan didn’t really grow wheat inthe old days, and did not use it in the production of soy sauce.

We have many different kinds, all with a different character and use. To me, Taiwanese food doesn’t taste like Taiwanese food without it. Read all about them on our website.

Yu Ding Xing Taiwanese Soy Sauce

I love Yu Ding Xing so much I made a documentary about them with my friend Steve Chen, a filmmaker and architect, in 2019. If you have time, take a look. I’m forever full of admiration for this family so keen on protecting and passing on their craft.

Yun Hai Shop Staff Picks and Fan Favorites

Everyone’s got a different favorite item at the shop. Some folks, like store manager Jeremy Hersh, are so passionate about them that we call sales bumps of his favorite items “the Jeremy effect.”

Here’s what everyone picked:

I love the Amber River Soy Sauce, Wu Yin Black Vinegar, and Taiwanese Jams because they’re all so good, you can eat them straight. These items are my go-to for gifting––Wu Yin and Amber River for the home chefs, and jam for the sweet tooths.

Jasmine Huang
E-commerce Manager and House Photographer

Black Oolong Tea
This is my favorite oolong from our tea collection. When we did our team tasting with Sam of BANGtea, we were instructed to deeply inhale each brew, and this one immediately sent me to my favorite breakfast stall in Taichung. It’s got this 古早 fresh soy milk aroma with black sugar undertones. When sipping, I get malty sweetness right off the bat, but it quickly evolves into a slight tartness with a nutty aftertaste, reminiscent almost of goji berry.

Kitchenware from the Shop
(available in store only)

I love gifting and being gifted kitchenware. The shop will be well-stocked this season with a curated selection in varying price ranges: vintage Tatung rice bowls from the 60’s (I suspect these will go quickly); speckled Julianne Ahn soy sauce dispensers; HMM W mugs made from recycled glass (I especially love the turquoise blue color); fragrant chopsticks fashioned from salvaged hinoki cypress; and more!

(Look for these from Dec 8 and on at our brick-and-mortar in Brooklyn)

Amalissa Uytingco
Brand Marketing Manager and House Food Studies Scholar

Guava Gose Beer by Ugly Half Brewery
(available in store only)

This beer is so delicious and punchy. Each bottle comes with a packet of plum powder that adds an extra layer of fun and flavor customization.

Natya Regensburger
Store Merchandising Manager and House Sign Maker

Dong He Cold-Pressed Camellia Oil and Peanut Oil

Because of the oil lamp at the center of the fable of Hannukah, camellia oil! Also, peanut oil, which is great for frying potatoes.

Jeremy Hersh
Store Manager and House Person-That-Seems-To-Know-Everybody

Dong He Crispy Shallot Oil

One of my favorite Yun Hai items is 香蔥拌醬 or Shallot Oil. It’s great sauce to make 乾麵 dry mixed noodle. I usually add the shallot oil with a little bit of black vinegar and mix it with some cooked noodle, and that’ll be a meal for me or a main carb dish for my family.

Grace Jung
Operations Manager and House Bilingual Parenting Consultant

Lion’s Mane Mushrooms

I know these are for cooking with, but I love adding bits to my daily morning coffee for enhanced focus during admin hours.

Jess Wang
Friend of the Shop, Guest of Cooking With Steam, and LA-based Taiwanese Grocer at Gu Grocery

Dried Green Mango

I have to still list this because it’s SO GOOD and so guilt free. I have a toxic relationship with gummies and whenever I have that craving (which is often) I go grab a chilled bag of the Dried Green Mango in my fridge. It immediately satisfies that craving for something sour and chewy.

Red Guava Jam

I can literally eat this out of the jar. The guava taste just hits home and most importantly… It’s not too sweet. I love putting it on milk bread or drizzling it on lemon sorbet.

Cat Yeh
Friend of the Shop, Videographer, and Recipe Developer at Off Hour Studio

Tea and Dried Fruit Pairing Bundle

This is the best little gift bundle with the cutest tea pot, Taiwanese dried fruit and tea leaves. It’s a delightful time for one, or two if you feel like sharing.

Jessie YuChen
Friend of the Shop, Guest of Cooking With Steam, and NYC-based food writer and chef

Now for some of our favorite food gifts outside the four walls of Yun Hai:

XMJ Club

One of my favorite things to gift this year has been the Xiao Mi Jiu (millet wine) produced by our friend Cat Yeh.

It’s a traditional fermented drink of Taiwan’s aborigines and also the oldest on the island. This light and creamy natural wine embodies a one-of-a-kind taste that seamlessly blends sweet, sour, and bitter flavors. The recipe is adapted from Cat’s Tai’an Atayal tribal village.

Follow the XMJCLUB instagram account for special holiday order announcements! They only sell via preorder for now.

XMJ Club

Formosa Chocolates

You know how sometimes chocolates say they’re one flavor but when you actually eat it, you can’t really taste it? This is not the case here. Kimberly’s bon bons have a super intense and rich flavor, and are delicately decorated. I like to order the custom box and pick your own flavor—esp the Formosa coffee, black sesame, and matcha hazelnut crispy.

Lillian Lin
COO

Formosa Chocolates

Sweet Mary Bakery

A Taiwanese mom based in NYC and NJ who makes homemade Taiwanese baked goods that are very delicious. My kids used to take Mandarin pastry classes with her, and we always loved them. My favorites from her shop are the taro and pineapple cakes and the mung bean pastry is incredible.

Grace Jung

Sweet Mary Bakery

At Yun Hai, we’re always sharing books and printed material with each other at the studio. Don’t miss the aforementioned Taiwanese art book section at the shop too!

A few of our favorite titles:

Taipei by Ibi Ibrahim

Our favorite meditation on our favorite city, Taipei, by Ibi Ibrahim, is a book of photographs taken on walks in the early morning.

Each image has the quality of a stage, waiting for its actors. For a more evocative reading, overlay the scene with the imagined sounds of the location: a distant temple chant, the sound of doves, a low micro-clamor of shops beginning to open, old Mandopop on tinny speakers.

An excellent gift for anyone who’s ever visited Taipei, or plans to.

Taipei, $48

A-Gong’s Table by George Lee

Ostensibly, it’s a cookbook. It makes a great gift for the avid cook—it’s well-researched and highly educational, deep-diving into a variety of ingredients, techniques, and practices in Taiwanese home cooking. But the avid reader can certainly also appreciate it for its reflections. It’s a poignant and thoughtful piece of literature that pays homage to George’s family and his upbringing through every essay, every recipe. Laurent Hsia’s moody photography of the food and of moments across Taiwan imbues the text with a layer of visual nostalgia.

Amalissa Uytingco

A-Gong's Table, $28

The AZN AMERICANA Hot Asian Hunks 2026

We already sell a calendar but I guess I could get this too. You know, to support.

This is a project I was privileged to be a part of, something to keep it steamy all year round, while supporting the Asian creative community. All proceeds will go directly towards AZN AMERICANA nonprofit programs for Asian women and femmes.

Jessie YuChen

Hot Asian Hunks, $29.99

Toyota Sabaya by Kelly Shami and Daleen Saah

I got this book Toyota Sabaya from Makan’s table at a book fair. I am obsessed. It’s a combination of vaporwave/car culture/internet aesthetics. And it’s in my favorite color.

Jasmine Huang

Toyota Sabaya, $45

Tools of the trade and things we love to keep in our kitchens.

Tatung Electric Steamer

I’m hesitating to even put these here because they sell so fast I’m not sure we’ll have enough of all the colors and sizes to get through the end of the year! But this rice cooker (no, electric steamer) is my end all be all. To me, it’s the Taiwanese hearth.

Tatung Electric Steamers

Read more on our site or check out the cooking show I make dedicated to the nuances of Cooking With Steam.

Watch Cooking With Steam

Maestro Wu Knives

Maestro Wu chef’s knife—the story is just amazing—knives made out of old bombs?? Super sharp and nice to handle, the curved shape of the chef’s knife makes it easy to cut quickly and versatile across all cuisines.

Lillian Lin

Maestro Wu Knives

Wooden Rice Paddle

Consider the Gu Grocery x Would Works rice paddle in walnut or cherry. These steamed rice serving utensils are available in 2 styles, made in collaboration with executive director of Would Works, Michele Liu, a fellow Taiwanese American. These are produced by the wood shop team at nonprofit Would Works, whose mission is to help young adults with barriers to employment heal, learn new skills, build confidence, and prepare for future opportunities by providing paid, creative, hands-on woodworking training within a supportive community.

Rice Paddle

Ceramic Chopstick Rests

I love the entire Mogutable Chopstick Rest Collection. These are so delicate and charming. You really can’t go wrong with any of them, but my favorites are the bok choy, Kewpie mayo, and red turnip.

Natya Regensburger

Chopstick Holders

Beo Issue Soaps

(Available in store only)

I’m obsessed with these Beo Issue soaps! The vetiver + kaffir lime scent is my favorite. It is herbaceous and lovely.

Natya Regensburger

Visit the Shop

Before I Go

Our little mountain outpost at Luck Dragon in Delhi, NY. Photo: Kelli Cain.

In December, I’ll be turning my attention to our retail footprint. We’ve got an exciting shop-in-shop in the Catskills this season, hosted by a favorite shop of mine: Luck Dragon in Delhi, NY.

I’ll also be spending lots of time in our own brick-and-mortar. We’re installing a new counter and wall shelving at the beginning of the month, and I’ll be gearing up for a little holiday shopping event (will be wrapping presents) on December 14th. Visit us!

A kind reminder that the store will be closed a few days for rest and reno; please see the full schedule above.

Kam Sia,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Written with editorial support by Amalissa Uytingco, Jasmine Huang, Grace Jung, and Lillian Lin. Photos of gift-wrapping by Jasmine Huang. If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.

桑葚 : Taiwan's Berry

Lisa Cheng Smith — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 20:19:46 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

This week, I have the pleasure of announcing the limited release of a new dried fruit for holiday.

It’s special, it’s exquisite, and it’s very Taiwanese: dried mulberry, an unsung hero of the Taiwanese fruit line up. Mulberry trees are common throughout the island (there are seven species, at least), but the fruit is most often found grown at home, foraged, and shared among friends, since the berries are notoriously difficult to harvest.

We love them and are so happy to offer them this season. This is a limited release, so when they’re gone, they’re gone. Unless hundreds of you ask us to bring them back sometime before next spring. Read on for more about this delightful fruit.

Take me to the Mulberry

I can hardly believe I’m saying this, but we’re rapidly ramping up for the holiday season (gah). Almanacs are almost done printing, the store is getting an entire new back counter in very early December, a new artist-collaborative merch line is in the works with Taiwanese artist Emilie Liu, new gift bundles are dropping later this month, and we’re planning a fun tasting and shopping event in the store, highlighting our favorite Taiwanese heritage products (ya, soy sauce) and maybe premiering my Taiwanese-inspired marshmallows. Save the date—December 14th. Thank you for considering us this holiday; your decision to shop with us makes our world go ‘round!

Finally, don’t miss our Pineapple Cake event next week at our New York City storefront with Rose’s Pineapple Shorts, happening Saturday, November 15th. We’re running it Sunny Hills style, with a free sample and oolong tea for all. Swing by the shop to pick up a box of six for your holiday gathering. Scroll to the end for deets.

Ok, I’m officially homesick.

I’m supposed to be writing about our new (phenomenal) dried mulberries, but, as I dive into my photo archives in search of all my past berry encounters, I keep getting sucked into beautiful images of fruit stands, giant vintage clocks hung on the stuccoed walls of alleyways, and stacks and stacks of faded, colorful, neatly maintained produce crates.

I’m talking about the streets of Kaohsiung, people! A gem of southern Taiwan. Just look at it:

Ham shop with terrazzo floors.

Fruit stand with impeccable merchandising and dish dryer covering the menu.

Temple dragon looking after all on earth, plus some mid-century shell chairs and a pretty classic looking trash can if you ask me.

I brake for crates.

This is relevant today because it was here that I fell in love with the mulberry. Here’s the dish that made the Taiwan-Mulberry connection click for me:

It’s fresh mulberry shaved ice with ✓whole berries, ✓mulberry syrup, ✓salted starfruit syrup, ✓condensed milk, and ✓flan at Po Po Ice near the Kaohsiung City Harbor. This is among the best desserts I’ve had: the rich taste of the inky berries was offset perfectly by the salty citrus flavor of the brined starfruit. The flan was absolutely glistening, almost its own light source entirely.

Look into my eyes for they are caramel-colored.

Pairings, texture, and over-the-top descriptions aside, what’s special about this dessert is its high seasonality and significance to Taiwan. As far as the Taiwanese fruit scene goes, mulberry comes up much less often than tropical charmers like mango and pineapple. But it is Taiwan’s berry, rooted in a rich history of sericulture (silkworm cultivation) and agricultural development. Mulberries were first introduced to Taiwan from China in the 17th century; and many more additions were brought from Japan, Australia, South Asia, and Central America. Taiwan is home to seven identifiable mulberry species and many other unidentified populations produced from the cross pollination of the trees. As silk production declined, some began to cultivate trees better suited to the production of fruit, as mulberries are well-loved for their health benefits.

Mulberries at the farm we’re working with.

Still, despite the widespread presence and long history of mulberry in Taiwan, commercial cultivation is uncommon, compared to other better-known fruits and crops. The harvest season is short (just one month), and the fruit is extremely delicate, with a limited shelf life. It must be harvested by hand, which is labor intensive. It doesn’t withstand transportation and packaging all that well, so the harvest is most often preserved as a jam (yes we sell one), which is then used directly as a fruit sauce, made into a cordial (mix jam concentrate with seltzer for a spritzer, alcohol optional), or poured over shaved ice à la Po Po.

Here’s a quote from a 2023 mulberry article posted on News Market, one of our favorite Taiwanese agriculture blogs:

The sweet and sour mulberries are a traditional snack for farmers, but not many people cultivate them for commercial purposes. Because cultivation and harvesting rely on manual labor, and the harvest and sales period is short, the planting area has been declining year by year. Currently, there are only 56.92 hectares of mulberry trees in Taiwan.

Only 56.92 hectares of cultivated trees? This is minuscule compared to the quoted 16,313 hectares of mango trees grown in Taiwan. In many ways, mulberry is the most common of fruits, easily forageable from wild mulberry trees, and often shared among neighbors. Lillian, my partner in all things Yun Hai, used to pick them from a tree in the backyard of her kindergarten, standing on top of a big rock. But when it comes to commercial cultivation, it’s truly rare.

Yun Hai’s newest team member Grace (welcome!), reminisced with me yesterday about how her mother would collect berries and preserve them in sugar, used to make a drink later. This is a typical practice when it comes to mulberries, as the shelf life is incredibly short but the fruit is plentiful, and Taiwanese are experts at processing crops for preservation.

Mulberry fruit “tea” is really a reconstituted juice made by mixing water with concentrated mulberry preserves. Sometimes the fruit is included, and sometimes it’s strained out.

My kids and their Po Po sipping down mulberry tea in Taimali, Taitung.

So, though this dessert is topped with a glossy, attention-grabbing flan, the real rarity here is the mulberry, harvested lovingly by hand from a darling fruiting tree, transported gently to avoid bruising, and appearing for just a very short time on the menu of this ABSOLUTELY DELIGHTFUL AND NOT TO BE MISSED ice shop near Kaohsiung’s City Harbor. While you’re there, don’t miss the tomato slices, dipped in soy paste and licorice, or the mung bean mash on top of almond bean curd. Also the perfect fruit stand I showed earlier is actually a sub-area of this Po Po Ice, so please go bask in that glow, too.

Love u, Po Po.

Now onto our newest product:

Dried Mulberry

Having learned and experienced all this about mulberries, I’m overjoyed to announce that we are adding this hard-to-find fruit to our collection. Because of the short season and scant availability, we are not always able to get it, but this year, we have it for the holidays.

Take Me to the Mulberry

Each box contains more berries than you’d believe possible. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

This dried fruit is incredibly unique, and not quite like anything I’ve had before. The mulberry flavor is rich and condensed, and with all the crunchy seeds, the texture is almost like a dried fig. Though we do add sugar to the fruit because it’s necessary to preserve them (mulberries don’t have enough sugar on their own), they are only lightly sweet, and the natural, almost savory, taste of the fruit shines through.

Handfuls of berries are packed into small boxes, a new and experimental dried fruit form factor for us. But don’t be fooled by the size—each pack contains roughly 130 handpicked berries. Yes, one hundred and thirty. I counted them carefully, three times, with chopsticks in front of everyone in the office.

Hand for scale. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

I would recommend enjoying these on their own as an afternoon snack, accompanied by our oolong tea. Or sprinkle them over yogurt, add into granola, or use in baking breads and cookies (millet mulberry miso chip, anyone?).

And of course, there’s also the shaved ice option. Top a pile of fluffy ice with a couple spoonfuls of our mulberry jam and a handful of dried berries for texture. Simulate the star fruit element with a bit of lemon zest and flaky salt, drizzle on the condensed milk, and add the flan if you want. If I ever open that Taiwanese diner of my dreams, this will be on the menu as an homage.

We’re selling this in single boxes and discounted packs of three. We’ve also bundled this with our beloved mulberry jam for double the fun, perfect for recreating the Po Po experience at home.

Thank you for your continued support of and participation in Taiwanese fruit farming! This is a labor of love and passion! Appreciate you all so much!

Take Me to the Mulberry

Double mulberry bundle. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

Where Our Mulberries Come From

I mentioned mulberries are hard to find commercially. So where did we get them? Answer: from a retired couple that are absolute mulberry enthusiasts and have decided to do this as their “retirement project” in the mountainous foothills of Gaoshu, Pingtung 屏東高樹鄉.

They’re holding hands! Mulberry stained hands! Sooo cute!

This lovely couple were originally urbanites, but bought land in the countryside after their children left home. In their pursuit of an agrarian lifestyle, they were determined to produce healthy food in a healthy way. Mulberries were selected as their crop of choice for their health benefits (antioxidants! anthocyanins!) but also because they are naturally pesticide resistant, and could be grown reliably without them.

The mulberries we source are grown completely naturally, with no pesticides. Because of their small scale, the farmers haven’t sought US and Taiwan certification, so we can’t officially call them organic.

To produce these, the berries must first be hand-picked during the brief and bountiful harvest season. They need to be carefully handled one by one. If plucked too aggressively, the berry will be damaged and unusable. One person can pick only a few dozen kilograms of fruit a day. It’s a race against time to pick and process them all to avoid oxidation and loss of freshness.

Picking and sorting mulberries on the farm.

To dry them, they’re first lightly blanched to sha qing or kill the rawness. A heat-based process of the same name is also used in tea production to stop oxidation and preserve the flavor right where it is.

Then, the mulberries are mixed with Taiwan Sugar’s premium granulated sugar as a necessary preservative. This mix is then dehydrated at a low temperature to remove moisture. This method retains as much of the mulberry’s original flavor as possible, preserving that sweet and tangy taste with a soft, chewy texture.

Then they’re packed into a foil bag and into our boxes, and make their way to you.

For reference, we probably purchased over 200,000 individual berries from this hard-working couple. They may call it a retirement project, but I think it’s a true dedication to the fruit, and we’re so blessed to be their customer.

Take Me to the Mulberry

Before I Go

In case you missed it, the second episode of our second season of Cooking With Steam is out! It features Taiwanese chef, writer, and photographer Jessie YuChen—also the first-ever guest feature on our Taiwanese cooking show. Together we put together a homestyle Taiwanese dinner featuring a cold dish and preserved radish omelet. It’s pretty fun, if I do say so myself.

The charming selection from Rose’s Pineapple Shorts.

If you’re in NY, save the date for Saturday, November 15th. Rose’s Pineapple Shorts will be popping up in our Brooklyn brick-and-mortar with classic buttery pineapple cakes, as well as fun options like spiced mango pineapple and cranberry macadamia nut. More details to come on Instagram.

And finally, yes yes, it’s gift guide season. Thanks to the NY Times for the very high profile inclusion in their 2025 gift guide!! And Forbes for featuring our dried fruits as top of the list for the snackers in your life.

ABSOLUTELY DELIGHTFUL AND NOT TO BE MISSED,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Cooking With Steam S2E2: Preserved Radish Omelet with Cold Dressed Yuba Salad

Lisa Cheng Smith — Sun, 02 Nov 2025 15:20:43 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Episode two of Cooking With Steam Season Two is here! We’re faster on the rollout this time around; getting better every day. Thank you to our producers at Night Shift for making this happen!

This episode is a bit of a departure from previous episodes, as we shift focus from steaming in the Tatung to other Taiwanese cooking techniques. Today, we feature a simple pairing of preserved radish omelet 菜脯蛋 with a cold dressed salad of yuba (tofu skin) and wood ear 涼拌腐竹木耳. This vegetarian pairing comes together in a flash, and, when served with rice, makes a hearty lunch or dinner.

Nothing more fun than being on set with friends.

We’re also excited to welcome our first guest: Taiwanese-American food editor, photographer, food stylist, chef, and friend of the shop Jessie YuChen! We’ve been working together for years, and in addition to being an accomplished pop-up chef and Taiwanese food expert, she provides several of our favorite products to our gamadiam. Scroll past the recipes to read more about our longtime collaboration.

COOKING WITH STEAM Season 02 Episode 02
Radish Omelet with Yuba Salad
好蒸氣第二季 02 | 涼拌腐竹木耳菜脯蛋

Get the Cold Dressed Yuba Salad Recipe

To start, Jessie demonstrates a cold dressed salad she developed for the show. It’s a wonderful counterpoint to the omelet, bringing snappy textures and vibrant flavors to the rich simplicity of the eggs.

Jessie’s yuba wood ear salad.

This salad recipe is a type of liang ban 涼拌, or cold dressed dish, one archetype of Taiwanese xiao cai 小菜, or small plates. These are sides that accompany the main event, usually found in self-serve fridges at street side eateries and restaurants. At home, many styles of xiao cai can be made ahead and kept in the fridge for a few days. It’s an easy way to fill out any lunch, breakfast, or dinner.

A variety of xiao cai 小菜 in a fridge at a Taiwanese eatery.

Next, we move onto the main: the preserved radish omelet, a staple of Taiwanese food that reflects the rich contribution of the Hakka people to the cuisine. The word Hakka, or 客家, means “guest families” and reflects the long history of migration and hardship this Han Chinese ethnic group has endured. Originally from parts of Northern China, they migrated southwards and have established themselves across China, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, and overseas communities around the world.

A lovely preserved radish omelet.

In Taiwan, Hakka communities have contributed a wealth of techniques, ingredients, and preparations to Taiwanese cuisine. This omelet features preserved radish, also known as cai bo 菜脯, a typical Hakka preserve. It lends a savory flavor, meaty texture, and lots of nutrition to any dish it’s used in. You’ll see in the show how Jessie wonders if there’s actually sausage in the omelet; there’s not, it’s just that rich in flavor.

A Hakka-style lunch prepared for me and my family by the incomparable George Lee in Meinong, Taiwan. Note the omelet, top right.

The Recipes

To limit the length of these newsletters, we’ve started publishing full recipes on our website. See below:

Today’s lunch set: preserved radish omelet and cold-dressed yuba and wood ear salad.

Cold Dressed Yuba with Wood Ear

This beauty of this dish (textures! colors! flavors!) masks its simplicity. The key is to prepare all your ingredients carefully and uniformly, then quick-blanch them to sha qing 殺青 or “kill the rawness.” The quality of the ingredients in the dressing matter, too, since they’ll bring almost all of the richer flavors to the dish.

Once you’ve mastered the technique, try varying it on your own. You can do this with other kinds of vegetables and different condiments.

Preserved Radish Omelet with Duck Eggs

There isn’t much to this recipe, as it’s a very simple and typical dish. There are only a few ingredients: eggs, white pepper, a bit of oil, a touch of soy sauce, preserved radish, and a sprinkling of scallion. My recipe features duck eggs, which are optional but provide an extra richness and robustness in texture.

Get the Preserved Radish Omelet Recipe

Technique does matter, and I’ll be the first to admit that I’m afraid of omelets. The ultimate custardy omurice feels like it requires the perfect combination of correct pan, properly sized recipe, elbow grease, timing, and technique. I’m constantly disappointing my kids with broken (literally) promises of tornado-style eggs.

I have found, after making very many Taiwanese preserved radish omelets, that they are relatively easy to make, especially if you accept the idea that you don’t need to flip them perfectly to get a beautiful finish. Prioritizing the perfect flip over the perfect result may keep you from the lightest possible texture.

I demonstrate my home-cook-friendly method in the video. First, I fuss around with it a little, breaking the omelet to allow the liquid from the top to run into the bottom. The eventual flip could not even truly be called one, it’s more of a coax. And then there’s a glue-together step where the still liquid egg re-coalesces the disparate parts back into one piece. The end result is elegant, whole, and, more importantly, not overcooked! It’s not going to win any James Beard awards, but it is effective.

A few thoughts on this homestyle method:

If you cook the omelet until it’s easy to flip, it’s likely to fall on the overdone side, especially if you aren’t paying attention, your pan is a little too hot, or your spread is a little too thick or thin.
If you don’t disturb the eggs a little while cooking in the beginning, the eggs on the bottom may cook faster than the rest, potentially browning and filling the kitchen with that overdone egg smell.
If you flip when all the eggs are cooked through but then break the omelet, there may not be any runny egg remaining to fill in the cracks.

It occurs to me that this is not entirely dissimilar to the way Julia Child made a French-style ham omelet on the first season of The French Chef, where she also stirs the omelet to start and recommends shaping it with your hand if it doesn’t turn out the way you want. And of course, she mentions using dirty plates and making a general mess of the mise. What an inspiration.

Meet Jessie YuChen

Jessie (center) catered our very first Mid-Autumn BBQ at Yun Hai Shop in 2023 with Taiwanese style sausage, mushroom, tofu, and fried fish cake skewers. We beat out a giant rainstorm, had a telescope on the moon, and had a fantastically good time. Photo: Grace Ann Leadbeater.

After graduating from medical school, Jessie transitioned into the culinary world, working in restaurants before discovering a love for photography and food styling. Known for her unapologetic flavors and innovative techniques, Jessie made a mark working at Bon Appétit with her distinctive style. Jessie lives in New York City with her extensive pantry collection.

More Recipes from Jessie

We’ve worked together on many Yun Hai projects, from one of our earliest Yun Hai pop-ups (Winter Solstice Tangyuan 2022) to food styling our Yun Hai Tatung Family Cookbook. Jessie also produces Boomipop, her house brand of Popcorn Chicken Popcorn (which we sell in our store) and is the brains behind Bubble Team, a Taiwanese craft beer distributor.

Most recently, she’s co-written a Kewpie Mayo cookbook. Not Taiwanese, per se, but we’re very excited about it, given the prevalence of mayo in many Taiwanese snacks! Scroll to the end of this newsletter for more info on that.

We’re constantly impressed by Jessie’s integrity and prolific repertoire, and are so grateful she made time to style Cooking with Steam Season Two and make a cameo on the show. Thank you Jessie!

Some of Jessie’s work for our Yun Hai Tatung Family Cookbook. Photo: Robert Bredvad.

Ingredients and Equipment

Going on much too long about my favorite plate. Photo: Rachel Watson.

The Taiwanese icon-patterned serving plate for the yuba salad was made by Taiwanese artist Hsiang Jung Chen, a precious gift to me from Taiwanese art director and designer Yenwei Liu.

The gray and blue plate used to mise the garlic and chilies was made by Taiwanese-American ceramicist Debbie Carlos. The red speckled dish used to hold the cane sugar was made by Alice W Chai of MAT Ceramics, also a Taiwanese-American ceramicist. The red rice bowl is a vintage ceramic from Tatung. Finally, the blue serving plate for the omelet is not Taiwanese, but was purchased from this lovely shop.

For the recipe, Jessie and I chop using our Maestro Wu Vegetable Cleaver on a round ironwood cutting board, which I purchased from an Asian grocery store in Detroit over 15 years ago. To steam the rice, I use the 6-cup Tatung Steamer.

And, for the recipes, we incorporated a few things from Yun Hai Shop, like preserved daikon radish, pineapple soy sauce, Taiwanese black vinegar, white sesame oil, Su chili crisp, and penglai short-grain rice.

Please reach out with any other questions on sourcing or ingredients. Happy to help, as always.

Gratitude and Acknowledgements

Credits

Produced by Night Shift and Yun Hai
Made possible by Tatung Taiwan

Our Set

Our set features props from Taiwanese, Taiwanese-American, and international friends worldwide, creating those Taiwancore vibes we love so much at Yun Hai.

And much gratitude to our friends who contributed to wardrobe: Everybody World, Judi Rosen, Whimsy and Row, RMS Beauty, and Christine Mai Nguyen.

Special Thanks

Before I go, I wanted to share a little more about the Kewpie cookbook we mentioned, co-written by Jessie YuChen with Elyse Inamine and photographed by Heami Lee (another longtime Yun Hai friend and collaborator!).

Source: Hachette Book Group.

For the Love of Kewpie (aka The Kewpie Mayo Cookbook) is both a cookbook and history book dedicated to the iconic babyfaced condiment of contemporary Japan. There are 55 recipes across categories, from appetizers like smoked fish dip, to mains like katsu sando, and desserts like lemon cupcakes. If you’re a kewpie-head, like me, you can order your copy here.

Enjoy the food!

Elegant, whole, and, more importantly, not overcooked,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Studio Notes 06: Mian Hua Tang

Lisa Cheng Smith — Mon, 20 Oct 2025 18:05:06 GMT

Hi, it’s Lisa Cheng Smith, founder of Yun Hai. I write Taiwan Stories, a free newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

Your paid subscription supports the free newsletter and our cooking show, Cooking With Steam. If you’re a paying subscriber, thank you! If you’d like to read behind the paywall but aren’t able to subscribe, I also trade words for words—reply to this email and let me know.

Oh, also, I misnumbered the last Studio Note as seven, so this one’s number six.

Visit Yun Hai Shop

Take Me to the Pour Spout

PSA! We are raffling off a complete family of green Tatungs (11-cup, 6-cup, mini, and ultra mini vending machine figurine) to fundraise for Gaza mutual aid. 100% of proceeds will go to Gazan families in need, via a grassroots fund organized by Taiwanese artist and ceramicist Stephanie Shih.

The Tatung electric steamers have symbolized the metaphorical Taiwanese hearth for decades, and we’ve put together a whole family of them to rally our collective hearts and pull together mutual aid funds for Gazan families in need. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

How to Enter: Venmo @yunhaishop with your email address in the payment note. $5 per entry. Multiple entries welcome—send one payment for multiple entries (e.g., $25 for 5 entries). Entries accepted through Wednesday, October 22nd. Prize ships within the US only. We will contact the winner on Monday, October 27th.

If you wish to donate, but do not wish to enter the raffle, add “no entry” to your payment note.

More details on Instagram.

I’ve been on a quest for the perfect marshmallow. As someone who has not, until this time, ever shown any particular interest in or love for marshmallows, I never thought I would type those words.

Before you stop me and say “I thought this newsletter was about Taiwanese food,” let me stop you: yes, it is, and the marshmallow does have a place. Read on.

When my friend Natasha Pickowicz—pastry chef, bake sale organizer, and cookbook writer—asked me to join one of her community bake sales, I immediately agreed. Not only because it would be one of the most fun pastry events of the year, or that it would benefit four NYC-based organizations (for which I have endless gratitude and appreciation), but also because there’s nothing I love more than a recipe challenge.

I’m not a baker, but I do love Taiwanese candies with their robust ingredients, not-too-sweet flavor, and cornucopia of textures. Since my oven scares me (requesting a YouTube series called Cooking with Oven if anyone could oblige), I thought candy would be the way to go.

This bake sale was going to be extra-big, and I needed to make 100 portions from my home kitchen.

My criteria:

batchable
shelf-stable
relatively simple
Taiwanese or Taiwanese-inspired

I settled on the idea of making Taiwanese milk nougat 牛軋糖, a favorite candy of mine. It’s endlessly variable, and found in probably every 7-11 on the island.

7-11 Nougat. Source: 7-11.

Traditional nougat is a candy made from sugar, an emulsifying agent, and various mix-ins. The sugar is whipped, aerated, and mixed with flavorings. The type of sugars used ranges from regular granulated sugar to honey or maltose, and the aeration agent is usually egg whites. The batter is left to set, and then cut into pieces when cool.

There’s another version of this, too: marshmallow nougat. It’s not a true nougat in the traditional sense, though it exists comfortably in the same family. In this version, one starts with marshmallows, melting them in butter and mixing in milk powder, nuts, and dried fruit. Then the batter is set into a rectangular shape, cooled, and cut into bars.

This kind of nougat is a little softer and easier to work with. It mirrors the gelatin-based nougats sometimes found in candy bars, but is produced with marshmallow as an intermediary shortcut. I thought I’d go this route since it would be more viable to make in volume.

And, this is where I confirm that this newsletter is still firmly about Taiwanese food and I haven’t gone Pumpkin Spice on you.

Here’s an example of this style:

I made a few batches, with the idea that I’d fold all kinds of fun things in, from dried green mango to sweet potato Kuai Kuai, but I just couldn’t get past the taste of the conventional American marshmallow base, with its cloying sweetness, whipping agents, blue dye, corn syrup, and processed sugars. I was chasing delicateness, sophistication, clouds, and the not-too-sweet nutritive character of Taiwanese dessert, so I decided I should try to make my own.

I never got past this step. I made marshmallows for a week straight in all my free time (late nights, early mornings). I became obsessed with how well they could telegraph and capture flavor, and show off the qualities and textures of different kinds of sugars. Taiwan has produced sugar for centuries; it’s actually a foundational crop, and I realized candy-making was a fun way to think through this.

Though I never got to the nougat (next newsletter, ok), I did manage to come up with a process for making not-too-sweet marshmallows using unrefined or partially refined sugars common in Taiwanese cuisine: black sugar, golden sand sugar 二砂糖 (similar to demerara), and red rock sugar. These range in how refined they are, but all retain some level of their original color, flavor, and minerals and none are fully refined.

For flavorings, I leaned heavily into ingredients that I’m fond of in Taiwanese candies and tea shops. I ended up with three varieties that I sold in a mixed bag of six:

Taiwanese Black Sugar Marshmallow (pure and simple)
Golden Sand Sugar Marshmallow with Red Date, Ginger, and Walnut Powder
Red Rock Sugar Marshmallow with Oolong Tea

Others that i’ve thought of that I hope to experiment with:

Pearl Guava with Plum Powder
Grass Jelly
Soy Sauce Caramel

I made over 600 of them for Natasha’s bake sale fundraiser. Because I ran out of time to put them into boxes, I improvised a night market stand, displaying them in bowls and baskets and distributing them in little popcorn chicken bags with bamboo sticks. I was a little worried about how they’d be received—marshmallows being slightly cheugy and the presentation skewing savory—but I thought, hey what could go wrong? It’s a donation. If there’s any time to zag, it’s now.

Here I am with the Taiwanese marshmallow concept, fully rolling last Saturday at the sale:

Little known secret about red jumpsuits: they do wonders to mask sleep deprivation.

I think it went over well! Chef Lucas Sin came by to let me know they were one of the best things he’d eaten all day. Video producer Inga Lam storied them as being incredible. Fellow vendor Parlor Coffee came by with a gift of (excellent) roasted beans and told me they’d been hearing that the marshmallows were the sleeper hit of the fest. I’d be happy with them anyway, but it was nice to get some direct evidence of success.

I thought these looked like tofu, so I wrote the analog tofu style on the cards, for fun. Lu wei is a style of soy-braised tofu that’s dark in color.

Bai yeh is a tofu mixed with starch, that’s extra springy.

Salt and pepper was a joke about the oolong tea leaves looking like pepper. Luckily, this confused no one but me.

I went home and happily slept for 7 hours straight, which is about all I can manage at once these days, given my steady diet of oolong tea. I dreamed of nougat possibilities and what else I could do with these. Jeremy, our store manager, texted me with the suggestion that we close the shop and become a marshmallow bakery. Then I sat down to write this newsletter. We’ll see what happens.

Jeremy always knows just what to say.

For paid subscribers, here’s my base recipe and some tips on flavoring, which I encourage you to endlessly vary any which way you please.

Recipe: Mian Hua Tang

A marshmallow is three things: water, gelatin (or marshmallow root sap), and sugar. All this is heated and aerated in a simple way to create a fluffy, sweet, cloud-like batter that then sets up into a squishy, shelf-stable candy.

Conventional recipes on the internet will tell you that the marshmallows ought to contain corn syrup, agave syrup, or other invert sugar (read: syrup), which will help stabilize the candy and keep it from recrystallizing. I ignored this completely because I found it cloying and used 100% unrefined or partially refined sugars.

The process of changing rock sugar into a cloud has a poetic aspect to it that I just can’t walk away from. And then powdering that same sugar to coat the marshmallows, dusting itself in itself? Alchemic.

Cooking With Steam S201: Taiwanese Bawan

Lisa Cheng Smith — Sat, 27 Sep 2025 00:31:35 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

This week, I’m thrilled to share Season Two of Cooking with Steam, our self-produced Taiwanese cooking show. It’s a true labor of love. We’ve been working on this with our friends at Night Shift Studios since June; you may have seen some behind-the-scenes content over the past few months.

This season is a little different from the first. Instead of focusing on the Tatung Electric Steamer, we’re featuring Taiwanese food in general. Steaming, and the idea of it, continues to guide our conversation, and represents a dedication to a gentler form of cooking and eating. The Tatung still features in many episodes, but we also cook in the wok and stockpot.

There’s nothing I love more than cooking with pals, and this season also features two guest hosts! Look for episodes with Jessie YuChen and Jess Wang, long time friends of the shop and giants of the Taiwanese food world, East Coast and West.

See the Season 2 introduction below, but keep scrolling for the first episode.

One more thing: if you happen to be a fan of our Taiwanese soy sauces, we just launched pour spouts. They’ll turn any soy sauce bottle of ours into an instant dispenser, table ready.

Actually still one more thing: Save the date for a Mid-Autumn Festival BBQ at our brick-and-mortar gamadiam in Brooklyn with Win Son Bakery the evening of Friday, October 10th. And if you’re looking for mooncakes, see our list at the very end for a few ways you can get them.

CWS Episode One

Cooking With Steam Season Two is here!

This season, I explore Taiwanese food through the lens of 古早味 gu zao wei. This phrase translates to “ancient flavor,” but largely refers to pre-war Taiwanese foods that represent a more agrarian diet. Dishes described this way often predate post-war food aid from the United States and the mid-20th century wave of Chinese migration. Rice, sweet potato, starches derived from tubers, pork, seafood, bamboo, and other ingredients easy to grow or procure in Taiwan itself feature prominently in this gu zao cuisine.

These types of dishes feel especially homestyle to me, but are often overshadowed by megastars like beef noodle soup and gua bao, which grew out of the relatively recent availability of beef and wheat in Taiwan.

I thought it might be nice to shine some light on older dishes this time ‘round. Season Two will feature Taiwanese bawan (crystal dumpling), braised pork rice (lu rou fan), hot grass jelly, tang yuan (glutinous rice dumplings), tofu skin salad, preserved radish omelet, and congee. Join me!

Season Two, Episode One: Taiwanese Bawan 肉圓

First up is Taiwanese bawan 肉圓, aka Taiwanese crystal dumpling. The name translates to meatball, but it’s actually a rich, pork and seafood-based filling encased in a dough made from rice flour and starches (no wheat). The texture is bouncy and chewy—also known as Q—and it’s usually served drenched in a savory, tangy sauce.

This classic food has seemingly endless variations, which differ by region, and even down to the specific shop. I would break them down for you, but I think it’s almost impossible to do that accurately, even in the seemingly endless space of this newsletter.

A bawan vendor making them in the Taichung style, slow simmered in oil. Photo: Lillian Lin.

The consistency of the dough, the shape, and the filling can all vary. But beyond that, so can preparation: bawan might be steamed, slow simmered in oil, or deep fried, which all result in a different texture to the skin: soft, smooth and taut, or bubbly and crispy.

One of many different styles that can be found in Changhua county includes this deep fried bawan, cooked in very hot oil to make a crispy skin. Seen at A San Bawan. Photo: Amalissa Uytingco.

And, there’s the sauce. Some include ketchup, others plum powder, and others even rice milk.

This bawan features a more translucent skin, cut open roughly, and is absolutely swimming in sauce. Also, please remind me to always serve soup with a giant hunk of tofu in it. Perfect. Photo: Feng Hsieh.

Aficionados will wax on about their favorites, and rightfully so. As I mention in the show, I love them all equally. You cannot count on me to break a tie. I will never actually tell you what my favorite one is for fear of angering the bawan gods, not to mention my discerning Taiwanese friends.

Yun Hai fam Jasmine and Lillian sharing two kinds of bawan and a mi gao near Taipei Main Station. Also they might have found the most orange wall in all the world. Photo: Jasmine Huang (or whoever she handed the phone to).

But, there is one version that I feel pretty comfortable making, and it’s the one I conjured for this show. It’s a fairly common style of filling, featuring pork, shiitake, bamboo, and shallots. The dough leans more heavily into sweet potato starch than rice flour, which is a personal preference of mine (I like the chew, I like the clarity). And, it features sea mountain sauce, or 海山醬, a tangy, unexpected combination of miso, tomato, chili sauce, and soy paste.

Watch me make it:

COOKING WITH STEAM Season 2 Episode 01
Taiwanese Bawan (Crystal Dumpling)
好蒸氣第二季 01 | 肉圓
sponsored by Tatung Taiwan

The Recipe

As mentioned, the recipe I present in the video is shaped by memory, personal preferences, and (largely) constraint. I choose to steam only rather than deep fry, for convenience in the home kitchen. I will never omit shiitake mushrooms, bamboo shoots, shallots, or paper shrimp. I opt for a looser filling that reminds me of the bawan I had in Beidou, but I make a sauce inspired by the tomato-leaning version I had in an alley with my uncle in Taipei.

Get the Recipe

One of my favorite things about bawan is how easy it is to reheat. It’s a perfect batch food. Steam forty one weekend, freeze them, and have bawan all year. Steam them to reheat from the freezer and dress with sauce.

If you’re craving deep-fried bawan, you can fry them up after you steam them. Easy as pie, really, except I don’t have a true exhaust in my NYC apartment, so I try to avoid it for the sake of the smell of our clothes.

One last tip: serve this with a fork. Your diners will thank you, but it’s also the Taiwanese custom.

Hope you enjoy this as much as I do.

Ingredients and Equipment

The gray and blue striped bowl used to hold the shallots was made by Taiwanese-American ceramicist Debbie Carlos. The green, red, and blue speckled dishes were made by Alice W Chai of MAT Ceramics, also a Taiwanese-American ceramicist. Finally, the mise bowls for the flour and the final serving bowl for the bawan were made by my friend Matthew So.

For the recipe, I use the 11-cup Tatung Steamer, outfitted with a Bamboo and Cypress Steamer Set, to steam the bawan. To chop, I use our Maestro Wu Vegetable Cleaver on a round ironwood cutting board, purchased from an Asian grocery store in Detroit over 15 years ago.

And, for that classic bawan flavor, I incorporated a few things from Yun Hai Shop, like dried shiitake mushrooms, Firewood Soy Sauce, Miso Soy Paste, and Nyonya Garlic Chili Sauce.

Take Me to the Pour Spout

Please reach out with any other questions on sourcing or ingredients. Happy to help, as always.

Gratitude and Acknowledgements

Credits

Produced by Night Shift and Yun Hai
Made possible by Tatung Taiwan

Team:
Lisa Cheng Smith, host
Jessica Wang, guest talent
Jessie YuChen, food stylist & guest talent
Nicole Wang, culinary assistant
Amalissa Uytingco, culinary producer
Sam Broscoe, producer
Alec Sutherland, director & editor
Nathan Bailey, director of photography
Rob Woods, camera operator
Taylor Dekker, camera operator
Alexandra Egan, art director
Kyle Garvey, sound mixer
Rebecca Alexander, hair and makeup
Dustin Wong, music
O.OO, graphics
Jil Tai & Ben Hill, motion design and title sequence
R. Hollis Smith, mix
Jinho Myung, editor

Our Set

Our set features props from Taiwanese, Taiwanese-American, and international friends worldwide, creating those Taiwancore vibes we love so much at Yun Hai.

And much gratitude to our friends who contributed to wardrobe: Everybody World, Judi Rosen, Whimsy and Row, RMS Beauty, and Christine Mai Nguyen.

Special Thanks

Soy Sauce Pour Spout

Ever since bringing on Yu Ding Xing's collection of Taiwanese soy sauces, I’ve been dreaming of a dispenser for them. Well, the prayer has been answered, because the third-generation brewers of Yu Ding Xing have worked tirelessly on a pour spout designed to custom fit their bottles. It’s cute—a great maroon color with a little cap that mimics the form of their terracotta brewing vessels.

I’ll probably never stop putting my finger over my rice wine bottle to slow the flow (alcohol kills germs yo), but for soy sauce, this is my new go-to. I wish I would have had it on set this time, the perfect enabler of cooking by feel, impulse, and without measuring at all.

Pours like a dream. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

The patented shape slows down the flow, so the bottles can be used to dispense even a small amount of soy sauce. It’s made of heat resistant, food-grade silicone, and seals with an airtight lid that keeps your soy sauce fresh. And, it’s dishwaser-safe. Bing, bong, boom.

The cap is designed to mirror the shape of the lids of the terracotta brewing vats. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

Added bonus: it will fit any bottle opening with an inner diameter of 17-19 mm, so when you’re done with the soy sauce (and before you get more) try it with another oil, wine, or vinegar in your pantry. Thank you, Yu Ding Xing, for this fabulous design!

Bundle with a soy sauce and save a dollar. Photo: Jasmine Huang.

Save $1 on one pour spout for each bottle of soy sauce purchased. Discount applies automatically in cart. Not suitable for soy pastes, which already flow slowly.

Take Me to the Soy Sauce Collection

It’s Mooncake Season

Mini mooncake sampler. Photo: Little Moon Bakehouse.

Save the Date for a Mid Autumn BBQ at Yun Hai Shop with Win Son on October 10th from 6-9 pm at our Brooklyn storefront, which also happens to be Double Ten Day, a national holiday in Taiwan.
On Saturday, September 27th (tomorrow), Bay Area-based vegan bakery Little Moon Bakehouse is popping up at our storefront from 10am-3pm with mooncakes: red bean ($5 each), black sesame ($5 each), and a mini mooncake sampler set of five ($28). Limited supplies available.
Also tomorrow, if you’re in the Bay Area, we’ll be tabling at the Moon Festival Carnival in Cupertino, from 10am-5pm! Stop by for Taiwanese dried fruit and jams, and stay for the performances and activities.
Foundry Bakery is offering a special jujube walnut mooncake this year, in addition to green bean, taro, and black sesame. Photo: Foundry Bakery.
And you’ll probably recall those beautiful mooncakes we sold and shipped last September. This year, you can buy a set directly from Foundry Bakery, who ships nationwide.

Your Bawan Buddy,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉

Take Me to the Taiwanese Oolong

青心: Shennong Style

Lisa Cheng Smith — Fri, 12 Sep 2025 22:01:59 GMT

This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.

This week I have the joy of launching the Yun Hai Taiwanese Tea Collection, our newest addition to the house brand. With this introduction, we hope to bring awareness to all kinds of Taiwanese teas and their masters.

Our first lineup includes three Taiwanese oolongs from our friend Sam Tilney at BANGtea. I’ve been selling her tea in the shop since the beginning, and drinking it (daily) for even longer. I appreciate her meticulous approach to sourcing, brewing, and tasting, and her dedication to representing Taiwanese tea culture, specifically. Scroll down for more about Sam, a description of all the teas, plus our notes on how you might go about tasting and brewing them.

Finally, Mid-Autumn Festival is around the corner: October 6th. We aren’t shipping out mooncakes this year, but we’re excited to host Little Moon Bakehouse for a mooncake pop-up on September 27th. And, finally, expect details on our annual Mid-Autumn party soon.