Race, Food and Who We Are
Born in Washington D.C., Eddie Huang grew up in Orlando, Florida in an immigrant family from Taiwan. Growing up, he watched his mother cook at home and also learned techniques from chefs of different cultural backgrounds and cuisine styles working in his father’s restaurants.
Celebrated as a chef, restaurateur, food celebrity, and clothing designer, Huang is also a lawyer and writer. His memoir, Fresh Off the Boat (2013), was reviewed by The New York Times as “... a surprisingly sophisticated memoir about race and assimilation in America ....” An ABC sitcom based on the memoir is the first Asian-American family-centric TV series in nearly 20 years.
A colorful figure, Huang is not without controversy. He speaks about appropriation of ethnic cuisines and yet has faced criticism for cultural appropriation himself, particularly of hip-hop culture. The New York Times described him January 2013 as “walking mix-tape of postmodern cultural appropriation.”
Huang’s new book, Double Cup Love: On the Trail of Family, Food, and Broken Hearts in China, was published in May 2016.
Food for Thought: Podcast with Eddie Huang