Lunar New Year Pop-Up Dinner

A multicourse dinner with wine and beer for sale. This is not a cooking class. Guests will be seated at communal tables, most dishes will be served family-style. Review our registration and cancellation policies here.

Get ready for our Lunar New Year pop-up dinner extravaganza, featuring our three 18 Reasons Instructors: Linda Tay Esposito, Elise Hayashi, and Henry Hsu!

You may be familiar with each instructors’ own classes, from folding baos with Henry, blending sambal and simmering laksa with Linda, and rolling various kimbap and maki with Elise. However, for one night and one night only, they have joined forces to collaborate on a menu that embodies the essence of Lunar New Year: prosperity, good health, and abundant joy. They’re bridging their creativity, different cultures, and shared love of good food to create a feast to properly ring in the new year.

Grab a seat at the table for a night filled with warmth, community, and the kind of food that dreams (and good fortunes!) are made of.

MENU

Savory Bites to Start

Oolong Chili Spritz 
Jeon — Battered Zucchini and Stuffed Perilla 
Bakwa – Sweet Dried and Grilled Pork
Radish Cake with Shiitake, Sausage, Dried Shrimp

Sharing Around the Table

Yu Sheng –  Family Style Prosperty Salad with Raw Fish
Tteokguk – 48-hr Beef Bone Broth, Brisket, Rice Cake

Bossam – Collaborative Wraps: 

Hong Shao Braised Pork Belly
Bulgogi Sirloin
Roasted Whole Fish with Sambal Belachan
You Fan Taiwanese Sticky Rice
Fresh Radish and Asian Pear Kimchi, Ssamjang, Seojeot 

Sweet Bites to End

Sweet Tang Yuan – Filled Sweet Rice Balls, Sweet Peanut Broth
Yaksik - Brown Sugar Cinnamon Sticky Rice with Chestnuts and Jujubes
Malaysian Pineapple Tart 

This menu contains the following common allergens: Eggs, Fish, Milk, Peanuts, Shellfish, Soy, Tree Nuts, Wheat. If you have allergies or dietary restrictions that concern your ability to cook along, please e-mail info@18reasons.org before purchasing a ticket.

Let’s Cook Together! 

Born and raised in Colorado, Elise Hayashi grew up in a family where knowing how to use a paring knife was more important than riding a bicycle. This sparked her passion for food and cooking at an early age, and she enthusiastically relocated to the Bay Area to study nutrition science at UC Berkeley. Outside of the classroom, Elise helped implement childhood obesity and exercise research, and worked as a pastry assistant to fill her free time with galettes and mousses. She also broadened her experience with food by studying and cooking her way through the Mediterranean diet in Italy, and working on an organic farm in Japan. Now, she is excited to merge her gastronomic backgrounds, and lean into her Japanese and Korean heratige to share her love of food with the 18 Reasons community. During the rare moments when she is not eating, Elise can be found trying out new sports, playing and listening to live music, or wandering the aisles of grocery stores and farmers' markets. 

Oakland dumpling maker, Henry Hsu’s past identities have included public health advocate, architect, and designer. He immersed himself in the local Bay Area food scene working at Oakland tofu maker, Hodo Foods for over a decade and most recently spent the past year working at Dumpling Club in San Francisco.  Henry’s perspectives on food are shaped by his Taiwanese heritage, Gulf Coast upbringing, Midwestern education and years of living in Latin America. From immigration to assimilation to seeking cultural identity through his food heritage, he began seeking out what Taiwanese food means to him through cooking, teaching, sharing and storytelling. He’s learned that cultural identity in food is simply not as monolithic and neatly squared away as we’d all like it to be! He also leads food tours, teaches dumpling making, hosts Taiwanese pop-up dinners & occasionally you can find him working a farm stand at a local market! Follow his pop-ups on Instragram @eatorasama 

Linda Tay Esposito is a teaching chef whose food represents a tribute and a commitment to the authenticity of the cuisines of the Pacific Rim. For the last two decades, Linda has shared her passion and knowledge of East and Southeast Asian cuisines by teaching at many notable cooking schools in the Bay Area. An all around food professional, Linda works on placemaking projects by building equitable food systems through the intersectional lens of food, sustainability and equity. She led the development of La Cocina’s municipal marketplace as well as the food program at the Presidio Tunnel Tops. She currently works on ground floor activation initiatives at several affordable housing projects in San Francisco. Linda's specialties include Malaysian cuisine, Chinese cuisine, and various Southeast Asian cuisines. She teaches both public and private cooking classes and hosts pop-up dinners at 18 Reasons. Follow her on Instagram @flavor_explosions