hi hi,
Lofi Kitchen is a pandemic-born cooking blog by me, Justen 思緣 Waterhouse—a Taiwan-raised1 American millennial cooking through the contradictions of the 21st-century while livestreamed Lofi music plays in the background. My cat Evee (aka Everest) hinders occasionally.
My childhood in Taiwan shapes my vocabulary in food. But I wouldn’t say that my cooking is extremely Taiwanese in taste nor do I cook true to traditional principles. Taiwan has been shaped by closely overlapping colonial powers, ethnically and regionally distinct ways of life, as well as a long-standing Western military presence, so a common definition of Taiwanese food is nearly impossible. In the same spirit, I take these contested cultural boundaries to heart and it is the wellspring from which I cook as a curious amateur.
On Lofi Kitchen, I’ll share recipes like Pickled Veg Stir Fry Rice and Zongzi Tamales, weekday meal plans, as well as my opinions on cooking as a daily practice.
Physically, Lofi Kitchen is a small apartment in Phoenix, Arizona with exactly one west-facing kitchen window. I frequently share my kitchen via Stories on Instagram.
Want more? Here’s more documentation of Lofi Kitchen.
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This is a fraught description but it was the best I could come up with. From ages 6 months to 18, I grew up in Taipei, Taiwan, near my mother’s side of the family. My maternal grandparents, both from Sichuan, China, fled to Taiwan in 1951. ↩︎