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Bernice Chan

Umberto Bombana marked his first visit to Canada in January by preparing a special menu for an Arthritis Society Canada fundraising event held in downtown Vancouver.
The chef, who is known as the “king of white truffles”, wanted to include both black and white versions of the fungus in his dinner, but a bad white truffle season posed challenges.
“At this time of year, it is the end of the white truffle season and the start of the black truffle,” he said. “But this year the white truffle season was not good. There was a lot of rain.”
Nonetheless, Bombana came up with a meal that event chair Cecilia Tse Pui-suen called “really really good”.

His menu featured dishes such as confit abalone carpaccio, risotto with black winter truffles, roasted lobster and artichoke, braised short rib and beef tenderloin, and roasted local pears with mascarpone cream.
The dishes were paired with Italian wines unavailable in Canada.
The dinner was enhanced by multimedia projections and music by Normal Studio, a video production company based in Montreal known for its “Beyond Van Gogh” immersive experience of the Dutch painter’s works.
The dinner raised CA$1.35 million (US$950,000) from donors.
All this industrial food, it’s all garbage. We need to go back to the old way
Umberto Bombana
Tse wanted a culinary superstar to create the menu and immediately thought of Bombana, whose 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo in Hong Kong has retained its three-Michelin-star rating since 2012.
“The theme of the dinner is ‘food is medicine’, and the society wanted this message to go across Canada and beyond,” Tse said. “So I started with Hong Kong – where I’m from – and wanted to involve a chef from there.
“We don’t have hotel kitchens in Vancouver where we can cook Chinese food, so it had to be Western.”


She asked her friend Raymond Chow Ming-joe, the former executive director of property developer Hong Kong Land, to ask Bombana if he was interested in cooking for the event. The chef, originally from Bergamo, Italy, said yes right away.
The fundraiser was an opportunity for Arthritis Society Canada to raise awareness of the disease that does not only affect seniors, but also children and babies.
One in five people in Canada suffer from arthritis, a ratio that is similar around the world.


The society’s president and chief executive, Trish Barbato, said the disease can debilitate children for the rest of their lives.
She said the proceeds of the evening’s fundraiser would go to research and fund summer camps where children with arthritis can meet each other.
While there is no cure for arthritis, Barbato said eating healthy food such as fruits and vegetables, doing regular exercise, and avoiding smoking and gaining weight can delay the disease’s progression.

“There’s not a lot of definitive research, but Italians live seven years longer than most other countries,” Barbato said. “Their health costs are way down. And I don’t think it’s that they’re super active and they all go to the gym. It’s that the quality of the food is so good. They don’t like GMO [genetically modified organisms], they eat locally.”
“All this industrial food, it’s all garbage,” Bombana added. “We need to go back to the old way of buying carrots, potatoes, olive oil, and not too much sugar.
“Sugar is so bad. I eat a lot of sugar, and that’s why I’m so fat,” he said, patting his stomach.


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Food and Drinks

Hong Kong truffle king’s meal helps raise almost US$1 million for arthritis charity

Bombata’s short rib and beef tenderloin. Photo:  Arthritis Society Canada

Italian chef Umberto Bombana shaves truffles for guests at the Arthritis Society Canada fundraiser in Vancouver in January. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

Bombana with Arthritis Society Canada president Trish Barbato (left) and event chair Cecilia Tse (third from left) at the fundraising event. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

Bombana’s risotto with black winter truffle served at the event. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

Montreal-based production company Normal Studio arranged the projections for the dinner. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

Bombana’s short rib and beef tenderloin served at the event. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

Bombana’s cavatelli with shellfish ragout and sea urchin served at the event. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

Bombana smells black truffles before the fundraiser dinner. Photo: Arthritis Society Canada

How Canada’s Yes Shef gives women chefs exposure and fights sexism in hospitality

Samantha Garizurieta (left) one of 30 female chefs and trainee chefs who took part in Yes Shef, a fundraiser in Vancouver, Canada, for the Worth Association. Photo: Vision Event Photography

Araxi’s executive chef, Ying Ying Gao. Photo: Vision Event Photography

Araxi’s smoked gravlax with dill and mustard-cured salmon, roe, orange citrus reduction, pickled vegetables and horseradish crème fraîche. Photo: Bernice Chan

Joanna Jagger founded Worth Association after experiencing sexual harassment in the hospitality industry. Photo: Worth Association

From left: Jagger, Tash McLeod and Danya Wheeler from the Worth Association. Photo: Vision Event Photography

Yes Shef participant Tia Kambas from Chambar restaurant in Vancouver serves her dish: filo nest, shiitake mousse, tamarind and hibiscus gel, Douglas fir caramel. Photo: Vision Event Photography

From kimchi to kimbap, Korean food culture gets exposure in English-language picture books

The cover of Who Made Gimbap? by Jimin Lee, one of many English-language picture books promoting Korean food to a global audience. Photo: courtesy of Moonlight Books

Jimin Lee wrote Who Made Gimbap? after realising there was a dearth of authentic Korean cultural representation in children’s literature. Photo: Jimin Lee

A page from Who Made Gimbap? Author Lee says it wasn’t until moving to the US from Korea that she realised how much effort goes into making the dish. Photo: courtesy of Moonlight Books

Hannah Chung, author-illustrator of The Most Perfect Persimmon. Photo: Hannah Chung

The cover of Chung’s book. Photo: courtesy of Astra Young Readers

Chung says she wanted to create “a genuine and heartfelt story” based on her own childhood experiences. Photo: courtesy of Astra Young Readers

Chung features the magpie, her “favourite Korean bird”, in her book. Photo: courtesy of Hannah Chung

Yangsook Choi, author of the Slippery, Spicy, Tingly: A Kimchi Mystery. Photo: Yangsook Choi

The cover of Choi’s book. Photo: courtesy of Carolrhoda Books

The cover of Kimchi, Kimchi Every Day by Erica Kim. Photo: courtesy of Soaring Kite Books

In Birthday Soup, author Grace Seo Chang celebrates miyeokguk, a seaweed soup Koreans consume to honour mothers. Photo: courtesy of Viking Books for Young Readers

Thai named Asia’s Best Female Chef 2025, Tam Chudaree Debhakam, on her vision

Tam Chudaree Debhakam has been named Asia’s Best Female Chef 2025 by Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants. She talks about flying the flag for Thai produce at her restaurant, Baan Tepa. Photo: Baan Tepa

The main dining space at Chudaree’s Bangkok restaurant Baan Tepa. Photo: Baan Tepa

The heritage building that houses Baan Tepa has been in Chudaree’s family for three generations. Photo: Baan Tepa

The renovated two-storey house provides a sophisticated setting for the modern Thai cuisine Chudaree’s Baan Tepa serves. Photo: Baan Tepa

An important element of Baan Tepa is the garden where Chudaree grows aromatic herbs and plants for cooking. Photo: Baan Tepa

Chudaree was inspired by the women she grew up around, who maintained a strong work ethic and passion for their interests. Photo: Baan Tepa

‘Mysterious’ fish that’s famous in Fukuoka, and why it is sumo wrestlers’ food of choice

Fukuoka chef Kazutaka Hagiwara prepares longtooth grouper. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

Ingredients for “chanko nabe” or sumo wrestler’s stew, including longtooth grouper, a fish Japanese call kue which is a speciality of the southern city of Fukuoka. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

Kazutaka Hagiwara, chef de cuisine of sushi restaurant Tomozuna on the top floor of the Hilton Fukuoka Sea Hawk, gets to work on a longtooth grouper in its kitchen. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

Hitoshi Hirokawa, executive director of Fukuoka’s Nagahama Fish Market, calls longtooth grouper “the most famous fish in Fukuoka”. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

The sharp teeth of the longtooth grouper make it difficult for sushi chefs to handle. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

Dishes prepared using the flesh of the longtooth grouper fish, including sashimi (front). Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

A longtooth grouper at the seafood market in Fukuoka. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

Longtooth grouper stew. Photo: Llewellyn Cheung

Lifestyle

Food & Drink

Umberto Bombana of Hong Kong’s 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo was in Vancouver in January wowing diners and raising money for Arthritis Society Canada


Umberto Bombana of Hong Kong’s 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo was in Vancouver in January wowing diners and raising money for Arthritis Society Canada.


Canada