You found us! We are a family of four (Bill & Judy, and daughters Sarah & Kaitlin), and The Woks of Life is our way of sharing our recipes & travels with each other and the world.
What began in 2013 as a quest to document our family’s history through food has become a robust online community. Since then, our blog has been recognized as the online authority on Chinese cooking.
Whether you’re:
- A food lover interested in going beyond Cream Cheese Wontons and Sesame Chicken…
- A college student with a drawer full of wrinkled take-out menus and only rudimentary knowledge of how to boil an egg…
- Or just someone looking to make weeknight dinners a little more interesting…
You’ve come to the right place!
Allow us to quickly introduce ourselves:
- Judy (the family matriarch) regularly scours Chinese cookbooks for new ideas and wants to keep traditional recipes alive for new generations of home cooks.
- Bill (the patriarch) grew up working and cooking in restaurants, including years of experience at his own parents’ Chinese takeout joint, which is why you can be sure our American Chinese takeout recipes are legit!
- Sarah and Kaitlin are millennials who grew up cooking from a young age, learning from grandparents, their very cool parents, and of course, food TV.
Judy
Bill
Sarah
Kaitlin
The fact that we all cook can admittedly lead to the odd kitchen squabble. But we bond over and overanalyze our food, think about what to make for dinner before lunch is over, and are relentless about perfecting our favorite dishes.
The Beginnings of The Woks of Life
The Woks of Life was born in 2013, when half of our group (the parental half) relocated to Beijing. Kaitlin was in college stateside, and Sarah began moving between both China and the U.S. whilst figuring out the meaning of post-college life.
Between all the plane rides and intermittent Skype conversations, it became difficult to stay up-to-date on all our day-to-day comings and goings, let alone what we were each preparing for dinner.
We also realized that the kid-parent separation led to said kids eating a lot less of the Chinese food normally served up by said parents.
Because let’s face it…though the two daughters of this family could make restaurant-quality thin crust pizza like nobody’s business, they hadn’t exactly been studying up on dishes usually left to the older generation.
Our solution? This website and blog, where we could share recipes, kitchen exploits, and travels.
We’ve kept it going ever since, even now that we’re all back in the U.S. Our recipes represent our own culinary genealogy, from the simple to complex, the traditional to the reinvented.
So take a look around. Pour a beverage and find tonight’s meal. Pick up some travel tips, wok shopping advice, or an explanation of what the heck Chinese black vinegar is.
(It’s the nectar of the gods, is what it is.)
Happy Wokking!
Want to know more? Check out our bios here:
The Woks of Life Family Bios
Bill: Dad/Husband
Grew up in upstate New York, working through high school and college in restaurants with his father, a chef. Rose from modest beginnings as a Burger King sandwich assembler to Holiday Inn busboy and line cook, to cooking at the family’s Chinese restaurant, while also learning the finer points of Cantonese cooking from his immigrant parents. Specializes in all things Cantonese and American Chinese takeout.
Judy: Mom/Wife
Born in Shanghai, and arrived in the U.S. at age 16. Pretty much a boss when it comes to languages, being fluent in both English and three separate Chinese dialects. And boy, can she fold a spring roll (the rest of ours tend to just fall apart. It’s sad). Plus, she’s the only one in the family who’s actually good at reading Chinese, so she’s our professional menu-translator when we’re eating our way through China.
Sarah: Daughter/Older Sister
Born and raised in the Garden State, growing up on episodes of Ready Set Cook and Iron Chef. Writer, photographer, marketing professional, and daydreamer, with a penchant for Quick and Easy recipes that take less than 20 minutes to make. Like the rest of the family, she loves the outdoors and writing delightfully detailed posts about the Art of Cooking Outside.
Kaitlin: Daughter/Younger Sister
Notoriously unable to follow a recipe (usually preferring to freestyle it), Kaitlin’s the family artist, chunky-sweater-obsessed knitter, and keeper of an unreasonably detailed knowledge bank of Korean pop music. The master of all things sauces and condiments on the blog (her chili oil is legendary) and steward of our drool-worthy Instagram account.
Photo credit: Sarah Yeoman
Just discovered your website and it is GLORIOUS! Do you have/plan to have a cookbook? Thanks for doing what you do!
You’re welcome, Kat! No cookbook announcements just yet, but hopefully soon! ;)
I just absolutely adore your recipes and your story. Thank you so much sharing yourselves with us!
Thanks for reading, Angelica!
I thank each one in your dear family for working so diligently to record and test all these recipes. My mom and dad emigrated from China in 1949. I and my 3 sisters were born in the USA in a NH town where we were the only Chinese family. We loved our moms cooking and have many fond memories of her stir frying or deep frying or pressure cooking something yummy. They have since passed and also all of mom’s Chinese recipes. Your website has recreated these delicious records of our growing up. Now I can make Cantonese steamed ginger scallion fish or sticky rice or black bean ribs…. oh so good. what a gift of culture and history you serve up with every bite. Your writing and instruction are excellent. Such a joy during these isolating days for my family and for me – reliving my childhood with my parents long since passed. Thank you!
Thanks for sharing your story with us, Kathy! We are so happy that our blog and recipes can recreate the food you grew up with and bubble up those memories. :) You’re very welcome!
I have just discovered all of you while searching for Lao Gan Ma and am so happy to see all your wonderful recipes. I have a Chinese granddaughter, so I am always looking for authentic and delicious recipes. I myself was born and raised for the first ten years of my life in Indonesia, so I am familiar with Asian foods and am still learning so much about Chinese food. Thank you, thank you for bringing me some good eating!
Very cool, Marijke! Happy cooking and hope you enjoy the recipes!
What a wonderful blog! I’ve just discovered the pleasures of cooking homemade Chinese food through Fuschia Dunlop and have been looking at other Chinese cookbook authors to expand my horizon but haven’t come across many – then I came across your blog whilst looking for a recipe for General Tso Cauliflower and have been immersed in your family story and recipes since! What an excellent resource, and superb selection of vegetarian meals too! Thank you to your lovely family! ps. if there are some Chinese cookbooks you really rate, it’d be great to hear your opinion!
Hi Izzy, thank you so much! ^_^
Can’t go wrong with anything from Grace Young or Martin Yan, though Grace Young might be a bit more user-friendly. We also liked the Xi’An Famous Foods Cookbook that came out recently! My Shanghai is not yet released, but we’re eager to check that one out too.
Thank you for this wonderful blog! I am half-Chinese (my mother came to the U.S. in 1947 from Shanghai to attend Columbia U. for grad school and met my Caucasian dad in class, as she flashed her “big jade ring”). Mom was a great self-taught cook, but when I married a grad student from Northern Italy, I focused mostly on cooking Italian, Euro-oriented, and American food (and went out for Chinese!). I look forward to learning more about Chinese food and travel through your posts.
That’d be lovely, Joan. We are here if you have any questions. :-)
OMG, your blog and social media is a SALVATION!! I love seeing these recipes that I remember my grandmother and aunts making, but that have somehow become lost as we moved further away from family, and became more assimilated. My children are 5th generation Chinese Americans, and my grandfather was a founding father of Chinatown LA, but having these recipes at hand is like restoring my childhood to me! Thank you!!!
Hi DWY, you’re welcome and so glad you found us and our recipes!
first I want to say your family looks so very happy and the photos are lovely smiling faces. One can feel the family closeness. “Joie de vivre” is the expression that comes to mind. Mr. Bill, (I could not find your last name), you come across as a true raconteur who may have kissed the old Blarney Stone a few times. I can’t wait to try some of your recipes. I must, in all honesty, confess I avoid following recipes as I get neck spasms going back and forth from cooking and reading the instructions. If there are more than 4 steps to the recipe, I am prone to drop-kick it out of frustration. I learned to cook by taste. I watched my mother, grandmother, and aunts cook. No one used recipes. I developed a very discriminating taste that I, just by taste, could tell what ingredient was missing and make the correction. My husband, son, and my 14yr. old grandson are comfortable using recipes. My husband was never deterred by a recipe even if it had 25 or more instructions. He was such a purist who never veered away from following each step exactly as written. For example, if a recipe called for 1/4 teaspoon of tomato paste and we did not have it on our shelf, he would go to the supermarket and buy a gallon if that was all he could find. Not me. I would maybe create a short cut mixing Catsup with flour. I love traditional Chinese food. It’s tasty, vegetable centered, and smells so wonderful while cooking. Hence my happening upon your site I am willing to attempt to follow your recipes. As an aside, I never give out my AOL address as I reserve it for friends and family members only. I hope by giving it to you I will not be inundated by ads, etc. We’ll see. Question: I do not own a Wok and I don’t think the configuration of my stove-top is suitable for a Wok. Can I use my black cast iron frying pan? In closing, I look forward to your Newsletter and exploring your recipes. By-the-by, include more family stories. They are fun to read.
Thank you Rosalind, if you subscribed with your email address, we never send ads—just updates on what we’ve most recently published. Thank you for sharing your story, and so glad you found our blog! In terms of a wok, you can use a flat-bottomed carbon steel wok on almost any stove set-up (more on that in this article: https://thewoksoflife.com/best-wok-to-buy/), but yes, you can use your cast iron frying pan for stir-frying.
I am going to give your birds nest recipe a try. Always wanted to make this. Your explanation of various Chinese vegetables and condiments was/is very enlightening.
Thanks so much, Darryl! Enjoy the Seafood Bird’s Nest! It’s definitely an impressive dish.
I really appreciate the posts about different ingredients – it helps me navigate my local Asian grocery store and encourages me to try new things. Also the format of your website is fantastic – it is so well-organized and easy to use. The recipes and techniques are clearly explained so that even someone like me who isn’t very familiar with Chinese cooking can follow along. I am glad I found your website – I know I will visit often!
So happy to hear you’re enjoying the website and finding it easy to navigate, Amber! That’s what we hope our readers experience when they land on our blog, so it’s great to hear that feedback. :)