Last year I came across an article in the Gothamist titled, A Taiwanese food crawl in the East Village with NYC writer Cathy Erway. I have of course heard of Cathy Erway and her cookbook and thought to myself, Why haven’t I had her on Talking Taiwan as a guest yet? For those of you who aren’t familiar with Cathy’s work, she is a James Beard Award-winning food writer and author based in New York City. Her cookbooks include The Food of Taiwan: Recipes From the Beautiful Island and Win Son Presents: A Taiwanese American Cookbook.

Her cookbook, The Food of Taiwan which was published in 2015 is the first cookbook from a major U.S. publisher to explore the food culture of Taiwan from home-style dishes to authentic street food. We talked about how publishers rejected the cookbook at first and how it eventually got published.

She also has a Facebook page called The Food of Taiwan, and if you’re a Taiwanese food lover, I highly recommend liking and following it. On the page, Cathy shares news about Taiwanese food like where to get the best Taiwanese food in and out of Taiwan, and new Taiwanese restaurant openings.

Cathy Erway’s journalism has appeared in The New York Times, Food & Wine, Eater, Grub Street, T: The New York Times Style Magazine and more. She is a columnist at TASTE, and received the James Beard Award for Home Cooking journalism in 2019. In 2021, she received the IACP Culinary Award for her column.

 This episode is part of the trailblazing Taiwanese women's series sponsored by NATWA the North America Taiwanese Women's Association, which was founded in 1988. To learn more about NATWA visit their website, www.natwa.com.

Here’s a little preview of what we talked about in this podcast episode:

• How Cathy started off writing a blog called Not Eating Out in New York, which led to her first book, The Art of Eating In

• Cathy’s cookbook The Food of Taiwan

• The article in the Gothamist about Taiwanese restaurants in the East Village

• Cathy’s Facebook page The Food of Taiwan

• How Cathy has had a Google alert set on the term Taiwanese food for 20 years

• How things have changed in the 10 years since The Food of Taiwan was published

• How the owners of Taiwanese restaurants in New York City (Win Son, 886, and Ho Foods) are all friends

• How Yun Hai Taiwanese Pantry has contributed to the interest in Taiwanese cuisine

• How Cathy learned to cook and her parents’ cooking styles

• How Cathy’s family is foodies

• Cathy’s connection to Taiwan

• What went into creating The Food of Taiwan

• How the photography of The Food of Taiwan was an important part of the cookbook

• How The Food of Taiwan got rejected by several publishers

• How The Food of Taiwan is a snapshot of all the foods in Taiwan including home-style foods and street food, up to 2015, the year it was published

• How The Food of Taiwan includes foods that are unique to Taiwan

• How the recipes in The Food of Taiwan suggests substitutions for certain ingredients that might be hard to find

• How Cathy met Josh Ku and Trigg Brown of Win Son

• How Cathy collaborated with Josh Ku and Trigg Brown of Win Son on Win Son Presents a Taiwanese American Cookbook

• How hard it was to convince the editor to publish The Food of Taiwan

• Other Taiwanese cookbooks that have been written by Clarissa Wei, Frankie Gaw, Tiffy Chen, and George Lee

• How Cathy is working on an article about the frozen dumpling business for Taste

• Topics that Cathy writes about like how tamari is a different product in Japan vs. the U.S.

• Té Company tea house in the West Village, Yumpling restaurant in Long Island City, Ho Food restaurant in the East Village

• Cathy’s favorite Taiwanese dish is sān bēi jī (three cup chicken)

• How Taiwanese breakfast foods are now available at Win Son Bakery and Ho Foods

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If you’ve been following our social media, you might already know that Talking Taiwan is participating in the Podcasthon which is a global movement calling on as many podcasts as possible to dedicate one episode of their show to a cause of their choice. The idea is to release these episodes simultaneously, from March 15-21, 2025 and by doing so this will create a massive and international wave of inspiring audio content.

We are proud to represent Taiwan in the Podcasthon and to dedicate this episode to FAPA, The Formosan Association for Public Affairs.

FAPA was established in 1982, during Taiwan’s 33rd year of martial law.

In this episode you’ll soon learn about all of the important, hard work that FAPA does in order to advocate for Taiwan in the U.S. For many Taiwanese Americans, friends of Taiwan and supporters of democracy, FAPA’s work will probably resonate with you.

Here’s something that will hit home especially for Taiwanese who have immigrated to the United States. Did you know that before 1994 Taiwanese Americans were forced to list "China" as their place of birth on U.S. passports? I’m old enough to remember this happening to my parents and some of my relatives.

This misrepresentation fueled a policy campaign by FAPA advocating to correct this oversight and affirm the rightful identity of Taiwanese Americans. As a result, Taiwan was allowed to be listed and recognized as a place of birth on U.S. passports. This is just one of FAPA’s lasting achievements and an example of how FAPA is a leading voice for Taiwan in America.

If this is the first time you are hearing about FAPA you might be wondering about FAPA’s name and where it comes from.

Once upon a time, Taiwan was known as Formosa. The name goes back to the Portuguese who named Taiwan “Iha Formosa!” which means Beautiful Island when they discovered it in the 16th century, back when Portugal was known for its exploration prowess.

But even knowing this, I still wondered why Formosa or Formosan was used instead of Taiwan or Taiwanese, so I asked around and FAPA’s current President Dr. Su-Mei Kao shared some stories that Taiwanese Hokkien speakers who are listening to this episode are going to be able to appreciate.

The early founders did try to come up with a name that used Taiwan, the Taiwanese Association on Public Affairs, but the acronym, TAOPA or when pronounced in Taiwanese Hokkien “TAOPA” sounds like “help hit” and then a shorter alternative, TAPA, “TAPA” sounds like the word for a Spanish appetizer.

It turns out, the acronym for The Formosan Association for Public Affairs, FAPA when pronounced in Taiwanese Hokkien “huapa” sounds like “calling to hit or attack.” The name has stuck and has served the organization well.

Last July while we were at the Taiwanese American Conference, we sat down to interview FAPA’s Executive Director, Anny Hsiao, President Dr. Su-Mei Kao, and Vice-President Chia-chun Chung.

Here’s a little preview of what we talked about in this podcast episode:

• Dr. Su-Mei Kao, Vice President Chia-chun Chung’s connection to Taiwan

• How and why Executive Director, Anny Hsiao, President Su-Mei Kao, Vice President Chia-chun Chung each got involved in FAPA

• The 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis and Taiwan’s first direct presidential election

• FAPA's major accomplishments and achievements

• FAPA’s Passport Place of Birth Campaign (1992-1994) that allowed the Taiwanese to list Taiwan as their place of birth on U.S. passports

• How has FAPA’s work changed since it was founded in 1982

• How U.S.-Taiwan relations have changed since FAPA was founded

• FAPA's programs and initiatives

• Why it’s important to change the name of TECRO (Economic and Cultural Representative Office)

• Why Taiwan should not have to compete at the Olympics under the name “Chinese Taipei”

• How Taiwan should be allowed to compete in the Olympics using the flag and anthem of its choice

• FAPA's mission

• FAPA’s Song Yea Lee Memorial Fund

• FAPA’s most famous intern is Hsiao Bi-Khim, Taiwan’s current Vice President

• What happens during FAPA's annual national advocacy training

• How overseas Taiwanese are in a unique position to advocate for Taiwan

• Anny, Su-Mei and Chia-chun’s hope and vision for the Taiwan American community

• How to get involved with FAPA or to donate

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