#RODigitalAmbassador: Canadian chef shares his love for Romanian recipes online
Hahn Park Chan, a Canadian chef of Taiwanese and Romanian descent, has amassed nearly 100,000 followers on Instagram with his mouth-watering Romanian recipes. He sat down with Romanian Insider to tell us more about himself and his love for Romanian food.
Hahn has cooked and taught in award-winning kitchens in Denmark, France, Singapore, China and Canada, and his successful social media pages include: Shiroba de Miel (lamb soup), Papanashior chorba de perisciore (Meatball soup).
Hahn’s cooking style is heavily influenced by his mixed-race background and a mix of Eastern and Western flavors, and he adds that personal touch to Romanian cuisine as well. He currently lives on Salt Spring Island, British Columbia, Canada with his beautiful little family. Currently, he focuses on running private dinners, cooking workshops, and creating social media content that shares his love for traditional Romanian recipes.
Your Instagram page is full of delicious-looking classic Romanian recipes. What inspired you to create content about Romanian food?
I grew up eating Romanian food, so Romanian food has always been an important part of my life. I still eat Romanian food once a week. So it was a natural progression for me to post Romanian food on Instagram. But what I quickly realized was that there was a huge demand for traditional Romanian recipes presented in English. Many Romanians live abroad and would like to be able to share the food they grew up with with non-Romanian friends, spouses, colleagues, etc. I think I have now found my niche. And here’s the feedback: Overwhelmingly positive and heartwarming.
What does Romanian food mean to you? There’s an obvious family connection there.
Romanian food means everything to me. To some Romanians living in Romania, this may be hard to believe because I don’t look like the average Romanian.But my bunica (grandmother) and mother were both born in a small Transylvanian village called Hagig (near Brasov). So I grew up eating food from this region of Romania. The flavors of the Romanian kitchen have had a huge impact on my food memories and my own cooking style. Plus… any dish seems incomplete without sour cream… so that must be saying something!
Your post will get thousands of likes. Romanians seem to be your biggest fans. What kind of reactions do you get from people who are not familiar with Romanian cuisine?
Yes, amazingly, my videos are getting hundreds of thousands, even millions of views…which still completely shocks me. And I’m honestly so grateful for the support I’ve gotten from the Romanian community. I think many non-Romanian people have no idea what Romanian food is. So when they learn that our food is full of deep history, diversity, and most importantly deliciousness, they want to try the recipes I post. Another thing I love is learning about similarities between cultures when it comes to food.I recently posted a recipe chorba de perisciore And so many Mexicans said it was very similar to their version of meatball soup.
You have a cooking booklet about Romanian cuisine. Tell us a little bit about how it was received.
Yes, we recently published a booklet with the following title: 11 delicious Romanian recipes. Inside I have a collection of Romanian classics that I have put my own spin on. We also collaborated with a Romanian artist named Alexia Udriste from Craiova, who was responsible for the original artwork for all the recipes. This is a passion project for me and I’m very proud of it. We received great feedback from Romanians and non-Romanians alike. I received so many heartwarming messages from everyone that I honestly felt like crying! The success of this booklet inspired me to create another booklet…I am already planning to work with new artists, but this booklet will focus on the food that my grandmother grew up eating in Transylvania. I plan to guess.
Lastly, what is your favorite Romanian recipe?
This is easy for me.my bunika Prajithura Ku Mele (Apple cake). This is my all-time favorite dish she has made for me and I hope this recipe lasts for generations in my family. There’s nothing better than a warm oven-baked apple cake to share with friends and family.
(Photo: Provided by Haan Palcu-Chang)
radu@romania-insider.com
