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L.A. Son
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  • Published: 9 May 2023
  • ISBN: 9780593677766
  • Imprint: RH US Audio Adult
  • Format: Audio Download
  • RRP: $23.00
Categories:

L.A. Son

My Life, My City, My Food

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The maverick chef and co-founder of the wildly popular Kogi BBQ taco trucks, pays homage to the city he loves with this cookbook that captures the inventive, creative, and border crossing spirit of Los Angeles

“Spaghetti Junction” is the bittersweet nickname native Angelenos use to describe the famously tangled freeway interchanges that define L.A. For Roy Choi, the neighborhoods in the shadow of these overpasses are emblematic of all that he loves about the city: its sense of invention, its resourcefulness, the way disparate cultures come together to form their own patois, street food, music, insults—and the energy that results.

A gritty, charming, and flavorful love letter to Los Angeles, L.A. Son is the story of Choi’s love of food and his evolution as a chef. Choi returns to his childhood afternoons at his parents’ Korean restaurant, his nights in L.A.’s gambling halls, and his pizza-fueled studying at the Culinary Institute of America before making his way into some of the best restaurants in America.

It is a transporting, multifaceted story that tells the unlikely tale of how a Korean-American kid went from lowriding in the streets of L.A. to becoming an acclaimed chef.


* This audiobook edition includes a downloadable PDF with recipes and tools from the book.
  • Published: 9 May 2023
  • ISBN: 9780593677766
  • Imprint: RH US Audio Adult
  • Format: Audio Download
  • RRP: $23.00
Categories:

About the authors

Roy Choi

Roy Choi was born in Seoul, Korea, and raised in Los Angeles, California. Choi is known as one of the architects of the modern food truck movement through Kogi BBQ. He is co-host of the Netflix cooking series The Chef Show with Jon Favreau. Choi is a voice and advocate for street food culture past, present, and future, and he is the co-owner, co-founder, and chef of Kogi BBQ, Chego!, and Tacos Por Vida in LA, and The Chef Truck and Best Friend at Park MGM in Las Vegas. Choi is a Time 100 Honoree and recipient of both an Emmy and a James Beard Award for Broken Bread. He lives in Los Angeles.
RC

Tien Nguyen

Tien Nguyen has been writing about food and culture for over a decade. She is the co-author of several cookbooks, including the New York Times bestseller L.A. Son: My Life, My City, My Food with chef Roy Choi, and The Red Boat Fish Sauce Cookbook, one of NPR’s Books We Love. She also has written for the Los Angeles Times and Lucky Peach, among other publications, and her work has been honored by the Association of Food Journalists. She lives in Los Angeles.
TN

Natasha Phan

Natasha Phan is an award-winning producer, author, co-owner of Best Friend, and the CMO and business partner for all of Roy Choi’s endeavors. She was born into a family who owned a prominent Asian grocery store in L.A., and she’s been in food ever since. Her work with Roy and Kogi have helped shape the modern food truck movement and the way Angelenos eat. Among other initiatives, she co-authored the New York Times bestselling cookbook-memoir, L.A. Son, produced the Netflix series The Chef Show, and executive produced the Emmy-winning Broken Bread. A graduate of UCLA, she lives in Los Angeles.
NP

Praise for L.A. Son

Street-wise, honest in its admission of trials and punctuated with vernacular swagger, Choi’s debut pays tribute to family and his enduring fascination with the melting pot of Los Angeles. -Kirkus Reviews

“While [Jacques] Pepin’s autobiography was the epitome of the traditional chef’s life, it may be that Choi’s will be the same for the new generation … “L.A. Son,” co-written with Tien Nguyen and Natasha Phan, pops with Choi’s hip-hop verbal rhythms.” -Los Angeles Times
‘With driving metaphors coming fast and furious throughout this memoir cum cookbook, there is no doubting and no pulling away from Choi’s gritty embrace of L.A.’s mean streets.” -Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Choi is the rare chef whose life story--which includes working with chef Eric Ripert and a weeklong cocaine binge--is as compelling as his food.” -Food & Wine

“At the moment, Roy Choi is one of the most prominent lenses the nation has into L.A.” -Los Angeles Times

His beautiful book .... is two parts story (Choi’s coming up), one part recipe (his OMG crazy good creations, like ketchup fried rice). You may never cook from this book (though the recipes are eminently doable), but it won’t matter. It’s a fun flip even if all you do is drool.” -Associated Press

“A a memoir-cookbook that moves like a novel.” -New York Times, cover of 'Dining' Section, in article about Roy's new restaurant
“In its pages, and even more so in person, one finds in Choi a personality who is at once high-end and low-end, flawed and at the top of his game, relentless and chill, coarse and refined-and absolutely, unapologetically authentic.” -Ad Week