Hey- I'm Trang, the taste tester, recipe developer, food photographer, and writer here at Trang's Kitchen Table! Here at Trang's Kitchen Table, you'll find elevated comfort food, healthy twists on classic recipes, and some of my favorite asian recipes, including recipes that pay homage to my parents and my Vietnamese-roots. These recipes cater to dietary restrictions of all groups, as I tend to love them all (in recent years I learned the term 'flexitarian' and as a meat eater, I also very much love tofu and vegetables). You'll find both sweet and savory recipes here and I hope you'll think they're as delicious as I do!
If you're interested in me and my ADHD yapping- buckle up!
How it all started..
Growing up in a Vietnamese household, food was at our core. My mom cooking every morning for us before working her two jobs was her love language. When something went wrong, she never said 'sorry,' she would instead apologize through a plate of peeled fruit. Both my parents rarely said 'I love you' growing up but the absence of those words always translated into love through their devotion to giving my siblings and I a good life, which meant working multiple jobs to put food on the table.
Food was the sole reason we spent time together as a family. We didn't go to the movies or go skiing like other families but instead, we'd plan our hangouts around what we were going to eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
When we would watch TV together, it was always the Food Network. I grew up watching Emeril Live and Iron Chef (the Japanese version, way before it became Iron Chef America). It was always a dream of mine to be a guest judge on Iron Chef or even just sitting at the counter and having Emeril cook for me live. I never fathomed that eating good food could be a career, but little Trang was a dreamer.
Picking up my first spatula..
While most people started cooking when they were forced to, whether because they were living on their own or just trying to survive, I started cooking because I genuinely wanted to. Food fascinated me. I was the youngest of three and was 'babysat' by my older brother and older sister when my parents would go to work everyday. Everyday my mom would come home and ask me if my siblings bullied me into making food for them. I always said no of course, because it wasn't bullying if you enjoyed it, right? 🙂
I would cook the simplest but most comforting things to my childhood- sautéed Chinese sausage and rice. When I was feeling fancy, which was often, I would add a fried egg and garnish it with scallions. I always felt proud of myself for being able to slice scallions at that age. I felt like I was really 'cooking' because I could cut up some green stems. When I wasn't feeling fancy however, it was a package of Indomie Mi Goreng or Mama Tom Yum noodles with an egg yolk mixed into the broth.
Now I will add, my brother never really bullied me into cooking (oops, that leaves you as the culprit sis ;)). He was actually an early inspiration into my cooking and baking journey! He's the oldest of us three and would often take it upon himself to cook for my sister and I. I'll never forget this incredibly flavorful yet simple dish he would make us; ground pork sausage and sriracha over rice- that's it!! It was so good and so easy. He hyper-fixated on that for a while and I didn't hate it one bit.
His next hyper-fixation really had me going though; tiramisu. When he first learned how to make homemade tiramisu, he would not stop making it. We had tiramisu for weeks! It was delicious. And then it was too much. And then we basically never had tiramisu again haha.
My love for baking..
Home Ec (aka Home Economics) was a required class in middle school. At the time, they taught us how to sew, repair random things, but also how to cook! This was the start of a long cooking and baking journey.
Growing up, I always baked from boxed mixes and it was honestly the only way I knew how to bake. I couldn't fathom baking a cake without a boxed mix and it took me a while to even wrap my head around the idea of baking from scratch.
I had a group of five friends and for all of our birthdays, we always baked a cake for each other. One of my favorite cakes I made at the time was a cake in the shape of a peace sign, for my friend Grace who loved peace signs! It wasn't until my friend Steph made a cake from scratch that my mind was truly blown away. The baking possibilities were much more than the Funfetti Cake mix that I knew like the back of my hand.
My sort-of professional intro into cooking..
In my senior year of high school, I had an extra elective I could take. While I easily could've used that elective to take a class that all my friends were in, I opted to take Culinary Arts with the other 'weird' kids. I use that term lightly and with the same tone as how the 'popular' kids viewed theater kids back then. Creative subjects and creative people had a negative stigma, for whatever reason. Anyways, I digress.
This was my most life changing class. I learned core fundamentals of cooking, without having to pay for culinary school. Now we didn't go as far a learning the mother sauces, but I did learn about knife skills, mise en place, how to make a roux, baking gingerbread from scratch, and so on. This was also when I first learned about puff pastry and how easy it was to make a turnover and danish. I never put down puff pastry after that.
This class taught me the key to making the the best corn chowder is mostly by adding more cream and salt. I learned how to make gingerbread houses in the shape of New York City skyscrapers (it was my dream to move to NYC one day, and oh man did I manifest the heck out of that). I had my first and might I add, the BEST Cubano I ever had, to this day. I'll forever thank Mrs. Lombardi for that and everything she taught me in that class about cooking.
Early college..
College was a pivotal point for my cooking in many ways. It took a halt and then we went from 0-100. Freshmen and sophomore year, I ate at dining halls for every meal. I gained the 'freshmen 15' and 'sophomore 30' (I mean to be honest, could you blame me? James Madison University was ranked #3 for best campus food in the nation at the time. I really couldn't help myself!).
I wasn't going to the gym and I wasn't running like I was in high school during lacrosse season. The only constant was that I knew I wanted to be in the hospitality industry. My love for food and fancy hotels drew me to that major, which was its own degree outside the school of business. I went about college for a few years until my dad pulled me aside one day and told me he wanted me to pursue a technology degree.
My parents weren't like other Vietnamese parents, not to say there's anything wrong with traditional Vietnamese parents. They just didn't fall into the stereotype of being tiger parents who wanted their children to be doctors or lawyers (no shade to those whose parents did, but the world should know that not all Vietnamese parents are raised the same- something I definitely wish I told my ex-manager). They just wanted us to be successful and if anything, more successful than them. So while it felt like my dad was now telling me how to live my life, I know that he did it in fear and his own anxiety that his daughter would live a hard and difficult life, one that he knew too very well.
My parents immigrated to America after the Vietnam War. They struggled to learn English and worked multiple jobs in order to raise my siblings and I and to give us the life we have now. I am forever thankful and grateful for their love, support and devotion to us.
It wasn't until 2024 when I thought I was going to lose my dad for the second time (the first scare was to a heart attack in 2008 when he was on a ventilator for 11 days and the doctors told us he wasn't going to make it) that he told me it was after a long day of me working as a poolside server at a resort, for basically no pay, that he realized this wasn't the life he wanted for me. It hurt him to watch me struggle, so he steered me towards a job that was much more financially stable and had more of a work life balance. I did as he asked and I don't regret it.
TBC..