Portland Vegan Pop-Up Surong Is Rooted in Traditional Chinese Medicine | Eater Portland

"At the Surong pop-up I encountered osmanthus syrup–drenched lotus root slices stuffed with sweet sticky rice, cumin-spiced lion’s mane mushroom skewers with peanut sauce, beancurd skin rolls bathed in a ginseng-mushroom-star anise brine, and five-spiced yuca-and-taro cakes topped with Sichuan dry-pot brassicas and figs. Hannah Che, a food blogger-turned-vegan chef, melds traditional Chinese cooking with Oregon-grown vegetables, mushrooms, fruits, and nuts to make dishes that feel distinctively Chinese yet rooted in local produce and the principles of traditional Chinese medicine. Menus change by season and by how Che balances the five flavor elements, and her Lunar New Year five-course tasting will showcase daikon, carrot, beet, fennel, and ginger with dumplings served two ways (a daikon-eggplant-tomato wonton soup and beet-and-shiitake crystal dumplings), pearl sticky rice “meatballs” made from tofu skin and carrots with carrot hoisin, a Chinese vegetarian roast “goose” of layered beancurd skin and julienned vegetables using fennel, and a dessert mashup of douhua, red-bean tangyuan, and taro sago; the project is not about mimicking meat but about letting vegetables, tofu, and beancurd skin shine while honoring centuries-old culinary and medicinal philosophies." - Waz Wu