The Chefs of New York's Asian Food Mafia are Staying Strong Through Community

Between 2014 and 2015, the chefs Chris Cheung, Doron Wong, Medwin Pang, Suchanan Aksornnan (who goes by Bao Bao), and Lien and Edward Lin opened their New York restaurants, all around the same time. Identifying connections in their hiring, opening, and press cycles, they started to meet at each other’s restaurants to taste and talk shop. After realizing they could further the education and appeal of Asian food through a collective presence in the media and at food events, they formed an unofficial club—the Asian Food Mafia—working together and celebrating successes as each operation grew in the coming years. 

But when 2020 came along, “the pandemic hit the city like a tsunami,” says Bao Bao. By mid-March, on-premise dining was prohibited, and among the chefs, discussion shifted from communion over how to update Asian-American cuisine to discussions about how they’d survive if only selling it to-go….

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