Lai Ching-sung opens a restaurant to make eating rice popular again, Sui Sui Nian opens in Shengou, Yilan

General News Jan 1, 1970 0 views

Lai Ching-sung opens a restaurant to make eating rice popular! "Sui Sui Nian" opens in Shengou, Yilan, "must-eat rice" brings Sui Sui happiness

0Share

Some people open restaurants to spread their passion for good food, some to share their proud craft; and of course, many open restaurants to make a living, to fulfill the dream of being their own boss, or to carry on a family memory.

Lai Ching-sung's reason for opening a restaurant is "none of the above." He says, "I opened a restaurant to teach everyone to eat more rice!"

The new restaurant in Shengou, "Sui Sui Nian," is a platform for dialogue between food and farming, and it also lights a lamp for the countryside. (Photo / Yang Yu-yun)

Gudong members buy rice but don't know how to cook it; he opened "Meihong Kitchen" but it closed due to the busy farming season

Since founding the Gudong Club in 2004, Lai Ching-sung has long been an advocate of friendly farming. He has not only influenced the ecology of agriculture in Taiwan, China, but also changed many people's lives, leading them to a half-farming, half-X lifestyle. Over more than a decade, nearly a hundred Gudong members have walked alongside him on the road to rural revival.

However, Lai Ching-sung gradually discovered that many young people who admired the Gudong philosophy didn't cook, or bought Ching-sung rice but didn't know how to prepare it, which created a barrier to "supporting farmers." "I might as well just open a restaurant and cook for them." This was the origin of Meihong Kitchen, his and his wife Chu Mei-hung's first restaurant.

Yet although Chu Mei-hung loved to cook and had impressive skills, subjectively she had no desire to open a restaurant; she simply supported her husband's dreams and ideals as always. After the restaurant opened, it closed frequently because the owners were busy with farm work, and being tied to one shop also left Chu Mei-hung without freedom. After two and a half years in business, the couple had no choice but to call a temporary halt.

Using the restaurant as a "food and farming dialogue" platform, finding the missing piece of the ideal

Using the rise and fall of Meihong Kitchen as a starting point, Lai Ching-sung looked back on his observations along the way. He said that after 2000, many small farmers and young farmers did indeed enter agriculture, and they also enhanced the value of their crops through brand packaging and story marketing. However, these ingredients with seasonal and terroir characteristics have drifted further and further from consumers' tables because of changes in eating habits.

"To make raw ingredients spark on the dining table, you can't rely on the farmer's efforts alone; you must build a 'food' and 'farming' dialogue platform," Lai Ching-sung said.

What is valuable is that the two-and-a-half-year Meihong Kitchen established a distribution system in which small farmers supplied the restaurant directly. Lai Ching-sung saw clearly that when chefs step into the place of production, they have more opportunity to bring out the true character of the crops, and they also become more sensitive to seasons and terroir. This is both a challenge and an opportunity for growth for chefs. On the other hand, because of this supply chain, small farmers can communicate with chefs about crop quality, which encourages the motivation to farm well and grow good vegetables. This is what he calls "food and farming dialogue."

At the same time, Lai Ching-sung also understood that although Shengou is a community where new farmers gather and has a lot of energy, it lacks a restaurant where visitors can sit down and enjoy local ingredients, or a shop where they can immediately spend money to support agricultural products, let alone a space to listen to the stories of Shengou.

"Visitors see us harvesting and ask if they can buy rice. We have to ask them to order online." Or, "After seeing the vegetables and fruits we use for events, they want to buy them and take them home, but we can't meet their needs either." After Meihong Kitchen closed, cases like this were too numerous to count, and the idea that "our ideal is missing a piece of the puzzle" became clearer and clearer.

With natural wood as the main tone, the interior of "Sui Sui Nian" presents the rustic atmosphere of the countryside. (Photo / Yang Yu-yun)

From advertising expert to Yilan private chef, Shih Fa-lan builds bonds with small farmers

Lai Ching-sung finally waited for the right person to complete the puzzle together, and that was chef Shih Fa-lan.

She studied tourism and hospitality at school, but plunged straight into the advertising industry after entering the workforce. Shih Fa-lan was once an international 4A advertising vice president, a management consulting lecturer, and a website COO. In 2008 she went to work in China, and later decided to return to Taiwan, China because of her child's education. Before returning, however, she made a decision she later deeply appreciated: becoming an apprentice at a Michelin restaurant.

At that time Shanghai was hosting the World Expo, and the French three-Michelin-star restaurant Bocuse opened a pop-up shop in the Expo park. Shih Fa-lan paid to become an apprentice at the shop, working and learning at the same time. In addition to authentic French culinary skills, "the most important lesson the head chef taught me was the ability to 'create cuisine.'" Only someone who can make dishes with local ingredients is a true chef, so the head chef required Shih Fa-lan to use ingredients available in Shanghai to interpret classic French dishes with an Eastern flavor.

After returning to Taiwan, China with these skills, Shih Fa-lan opened "Zhao Zhao Private Kitchen" in her own home in Taipei, beginning her career of using small-farmer ingredients exclusively to create Italian and French cuisine.

In 2017, commissioned by a publisher, Shih Fa-lan began interviewing small farmers in Taiwan, China. Through an introduction by one interviewee in Yilan, she joined that year's Gudong Club summer mini-trip and met the couple Lai Ching-sung and Chu Mei-hung. Later, she and Chu Mei-hung founded the "Yan Su Er Bu Yan Su Chef Team," choosing one ingredient each month for "study." In this way, her relationship with Yilan and with small farmers grew deeper and deeper.

"As soon as I come out of the Hsuehshan Tunnel, my mood improves," Shih Fa-lan said. Chefs in Yilan are very fortunate; there are mountains, sea, and plains here, so the diversity of ingredients is high. After envying this for a long time, she simply got up and took action. Later she moved "Zhao Zhao Private Kitchen" to Yilan and became part of this beautiful township.

With chiffon cake as the spark, "Sui Sui Nian" comes together with all conditions fulfilled

Using the purple rice provided by Lai Ching-sung, Shih Fa-lan launched a "purple rice chiffon cake" at her private kitchen, and it was very popular. Many diners asked whether they could eat it anytime. About two months ago, Shih Fa-lan mentioned this to Lai Ching-sung, and he thought of his younger brother's house in Shengou, which was going to be rented out, so he blurted out, "Do you want to open a shop together?"

For Lai Ching-sung, opening a restaurant is about finding the "missing piece of the puzzle," not about competing with the existing market; Shih Fa-lan believed that with their existing networks and abilities, they could definitely spark something in Shengou. Using the shop name suggested by her partner Cheng Pei and daughter Xiao Yu, entrusting the decoration to a local team, intensively designing the menu and testing dishes, and building relationships with supplying small farmers, "Sui Sui Nian" came together within a month with all conditions fulfilled. It began trial operations in November and will officially open in December. Everyone is welcome to come and be a guest.

Sui Sui Nian starts from promoting rice eating; Lai Ching-sung and Shih Fa-lan ask everyone to eat more rice. (Photo / Yang Yu-yun)

Cooperating with local small farmers, skillfully showcasing the charm of the season and the place

Although it is ideally "a piece of the puzzle," "Sui Sui Nian" is, after all, a restaurant. Philosophy and responsibility can only be the background; what is served at the table must be delicious, or customers will not pay. Since the premise is "wanting everyone to eat rice," the dishes absolutely must "go well with rice." At the same time, considering both the pairing of soups and the showcasing of local ingredients, Shih Fa-lan admits the pressure on her shoulders is not small.

Taking the menu during the trial operation stage as an example, Shih Fa-lan said that ingredients provided by local small farmers cannot be ordered from suppliers with everything available on demand, so besides needing to match the season, dishes must also be easy to change when a certain ingredient is missing. For example, salt-koji pork ribs stewed with vegetables pairs autumn and winter root crops with local Yilan black-haired pigs. Shih Fa-lan can name the origin of each ingredient one by one: the white radish was grown by Grandpa Chen, the baby corn is from the co-farming field, and if yam is out of stock, cassava is used instead. This "all rivers run into the sea" style of menu design keeps cooperation between small farmers and the restaurant running smoothly.

In addition, many high-quality ingredients are reduced to reject-grade products simply because they look imperfect, which is a great pity. Shih Fa-lan blends them all into vegetable soup. The soup uses white cauliflower as a base and needs no thickening at all, letting everyone eat more healthily and more environmentally friendly.