12 JANUARY 16-22, 2025 westword.com WESTWORD | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | Morning Glory A TRADITIONAL CHINESE BREAKFAST IS BEING SERVED IN AN UNEXPECTED PLACE. BY HELEN XU As soon as I saw the photo on Facebook, my mouth started salivating. Pictured were two lumpscious, golden yóutiáo as long as my forearm next to bowls of soy milk, crispy rice cake and purple rice cifantuan wrapped in cel- lophane. It was unbelievable — a true old-style Chinese breakfast, one that’s rare to see being served in a restaurant. I even had trouble fi nding it last time I was in central Shanghai, a city where the residents’ palates have grown more sophisticated than the simple breakfast that my mother’s generation ate every day. And this photo was taken at a restaurant in the metro area?! It’s true. You can now fi nd this spread from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. every Saturday and Sun- day at Chilgogi Korean BBQ, located at 9666 East Arapahoe Road in Greenwood Village. “It’s quite a story. We’re actually four families...there’s seven of us,” explains Con- nie Wang, one of the people behind the breakfast. The concept started quite uninten- tionally between Wang and her three closest girlfriends. All four love cooking and eating, and would often post their meals on Facebook and WeChat. When Wang posted a Chinese break- fast spread her friend had made on her WeChat, the comments started fl ooding in. “They say, ‘Wow, is it possible we can be invited? Can we taste it?’ And I say, ‘She’s my friend, she can- not serve a large group.’ But the ladies kept pressing; they said they wanted to buy from her.” The four friends were con- vinced the idea had potential, and they considered fi nding a commercial kitchen so they could share the food with the commu- nity. While discussing their plans at a Fourth of July party, they decided to loop in their husbands — one of whom is Tony Jin, owner of Chilgogi Korean BBQ. ”When they had this idea, they really wanted to do it, so I say, okay, you can just do it in my restaurant,” explains Jin, who opened Chilgogi fi ve years ago. He and the other six friends behind the new breakfast spread are ethnically Chinese, but he opted to open a fast-casual, build- your-own bowl concept focused on Korean barbecue fl avors because he saw a gap in the area’s restaurant scene. Each member of the group has had ac- complished careers since immigrating to the United States. “We all have our master’s [degrees]. There’s a Ph.D. Some of us are retired now, but most of us worked in IT. There’s an electrical engineer,” Wang notes. At this point, most have lived in the U.S. longer than they lived in China, but food from childhood always has a nostalgic appeal. For Chinese immigrants, one of the most elusive dishes to fi nd in the U.S. is yóutiáo, the quintessential Chinese breakfast staple. Simplistically, yóutiáo is fried dough. Sometimes referred to as Chinese dough- nuts, fried breadsticks or even Chinese churros, it’s really none of those things. The closest comparison might be a savory deep-fried cruller. Its Cantonese name lit- erally translates to “oil-fried devil,” and like many Chinese dishes, it has a drama-fi lled backstory dating back to the Song dynasty. It’s made with simple ingredients like fl our, egg, salt, baking soda, water and fat, but the process of making it is labor-intensive and time-consuming, and it’s really only good when it’s hot and fresh. Even in China, people rarely bother making it at home, instead picking it up from street vendors on their way to school or work. As a low-margin product that requires a twenty-hour overnight rise, it’s rare to fi nd in America. “Just to get good yóutiáo, [my husband] and I would fl y to Los Angeles,” laughs Wang. At high altitudes, the pastry process becomes even more complex. To ensure the best quality, the friends found that hand-kneading the dough was essential for achieving the light, fl uffy texture and big air pockets characteristic of high-quality yóutiáo. A good sign of quality? Squeeze the yóutiáo: The dough should be elastic enough to bounce back to its original shape, ensuring it’s got a chewy texture and the absorbability needed to soak up soy milk or porridge. Recognizing the labor-intensive process and slim profi t margins, “we didn’t have the idea of doing as a business; we still do as more like a hobby,” explains Wang. So in July 2023, the group made a huge batch of yóutiáo in Chilgogi’s kitchen and invited their friends to come in, try it and provide feedback. The response was overwhelming: Everyone urged them to keep going. And so they did. Every Saturday morning, subsets of the seven friends would wake up early and work the kitchen and registers. Over time, word spread among the Chinese community that there was a place doing an amazing, authentic Chinese breakfast, and the crowds started rolling in. Eating a fresh piece of yóutiáo is highly emotional for many Chinese immigrants, some of whom might not have gotten the chance to bite into the bouncy pastry since leaving China. “One of my friends told me the mo- ment she bit into yóutiáo, just bring back the memories of her grandmother and all the jokes and stories that happened on the way to school in China,” says Wang. When we visited, 100 percent of the tables were fi lled with Chi- nese families, and the only lan- guage we heard was Mandarin. As the breakfast crowds grew, the friends began adding more items to the menu, including soft tofu pud- ding, crispy rice cakes and cifantuan (rice rolls stuffed with yóutiáo as well as a savory combination of pork fl oss and pickled veg- etables or a sweet version made with sugar and black sesame). The most recent addition is shaobing (stuffed fl atbreads). The spread is intentionally more bland than its Western breakfast counterparts and is instead focused on digestive com- fort, condiments, practicality and speed. Though most of the food is unfamiliar to non-Asian Coloradans, the owners are hop- ing its popularity will spread beyond the Chinese community. “For [non-Asians] who come here, they’re willing to try something different, and I tell them, you don’t need to follow the way we eat, how we eat,” Wang explains. That attitude was on full display when we visited and my Caucasian dining partner took the crispy rice cake, which Chinese people eat plain or with some sugar and peanuts, and happily dunked it into a tub of chili oil while Wang nodded and asked curiously, “It’s good? You like that?” While the breakfast was listed on Chilgo- gi’s website at one point, it started to confuse the restaurant’s regulars, so it was removed, though word continues to spread via We Chat and certain Facebook groups. There’s no offi - cial name for it, either, and “Chinese Breakfast at Chilgogi on Saturdays and Sundays” doesn’t really roll off the tongue. But after half a year of running the business and ironing out the kinks of working with friends — they partake in a democratic voting system — “we’re get- ting serious,” Jin says. “We just registered as a business [in December 2024]. It’s called Joy Lounge. ... It’s going to be [at Chilgogi] initially, but we’re also thinking about doing it as a pop-up restaurant.” Regardless of any future location change, the quality will remain the same. “The menu was based on our own appetite. We can only make the menu that we know, and our mindset is we only want to deliver the product we want to eat. We have a very high standard,” Wang says. “This is a very type of Chinese thing. ... Most people, I think they try it, they may like it. So just try it. If you are interested in China, this is a part of our culture that we do. And for Chi- nese people, it means so much,” Jin concludes. Email the author at [email protected]. CAFE FIND MORE FOOD & DRINK COVERAGE AT WESTWORD.COM/RESTAURANTS A traditional Chinese breakfast spread. HELEN XU Longtime friends and now business partners Connie Wang (left), Xian Ye and Linda Jin. (Not pictured: Yijian Hua.) HELEN XU
