University to small business

Recounting the experiences

  • Journey to Cloud Kitchen: Recipe Development (Batter, part 1)

    I am trying to develop a cheung fun recipe to sell in a cloud kitchen context. This recipe seemed like a good start (credit to KP Kwan at tasteasianfood.com).

    To summarise:

    100g rice flour

    10g wheat starch

    10g tapioca starch

    1tbsp oil

    1/4tspn salt

    Steam for 2 minutes

    ——

    I didn’t have dedicated equipment, so I just used the restaurant’s woks. Knowing that woks have so much power, I intuitively (but mistakenly) lowered the recommended steaming time from 2 minutes to 1 minute. The result:

    (Tasting was done without soy sauce or fillings). It’s frankly quite bad. 3/10. There is a pasty, raw texture and taste to it. Yet, there are micro-tears that indicate overcooking(?)

    Naturally, I tried following the recipe guidelines to steam for the full 2 minutes. This is the result of steaming for 1 minute longer (still using the restaurant woks):

    The micro-tears are more pronounced, and part of it became a crust – not what I was looking for. There is no longer a pasty texture, but the raw rice flour flavor still persists, if to a lower degree. Strangely, the cheung fun must be fully cooked, but there is still a raw flavour. 4/10. Some upsides are that the consistency is quite good (thin but not watery), and it does have a delicate chewiness to it that resembles proper cheung fun.

    It’s certainly not servable, but it is serviceable, at least in these early stages. Once I taste it again with a proper soy sauce blend, along with fillings, I may get a better picture. Using something less powerful than a wok for steaming is probably sensible as well. Trial and error.

    A

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  • Journey to Cloud Kitchen: Cheung Fun Choice

    Although a safe option, I think dim sum is the way to go to compete with Tim Hortons. Not where we are, but in downtown Toronto, there is this restaurant called “Yin Ji Chang Fen (Cheung Fun)”, and they base their menu on two key items: cheung fun (steam rice rolls) and congee. In particular, cheung fun should work because there is nothing like it around here, and it’s very delicious yet filling. There’s not too much ‘wow’ factor in cheung fun – after all, its toppings are covered – but this is okay for a family oriented neighborhood, unlike say a mall. Cheung fun is also made to order, unlike other dim sum items (eg. bao) which may have to be tossed if unsold.

    Next step is learning how to make good cheung fun. I think the best strategy is try a wide range of recipes. Pictures from some recipes don’t look great, but that’s okay, I’ll still try them. There are many variations, all of which are valid, so it’s good to try many recipes to get one that I’m satisfied will sell in a restaurant context.

    Some alternative ideas, which were discarded:

    -“Affordable gourmet” (as a juxtaposition). This would be incredibly hard to pull off due to my beginner culinary skills.

    -Cheaper alternative to a family brunch spot across the street (ie. copying). Sure, this is possible, but the spot across the street is well established, and I don’t find creative stimulation in copying a cuisine that’s already in the neighborhood.

    A

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  • Journey to Cloud Kitchen: Philosophy and Risks

    Philosophy

    There is something pure about cloud kitchens that is hard to describe. To call them the quintessential business would be incorrect. In my opinion, that label requires that the business be tested by its location, and cloud kitchens bypass that. Though comparable, they are also different from posting an ad on classifieds, such as for trades services. Here, creativity, on top of technical quality, is required.

    I think that cloud kitchens represent a very pure challenge of just two things: identifying market demand, and serving good food. Determining market demand should be the “easy” part. I’m leaning heavily towards a breakfast/brunch menu, as the Tim Hortons across the street gets tremendous orders during morning/lunch hours. Thus, introducing something different, with similar casual pricing (though we note that Tim Hortons is getting expensive nowadays!), should be the right direction. Food quality is the difficult part. In our restaurant’s neighborhood, we rely on return customers, and not heavy marketing, so it’s especially unforgiving. But if the food is indeed good, the turn-key benefits of cloud kitchens kicks in. Things like equipment access and overhead costs are already shared with the main kitchen. It’s all about the food. As such, from a culinary standpoint, it would be incredibly instructive and rewarding if the offerings gain traction.

    Risks

    Purity does not mean an absence of risk. At this stage, introducing a cloud kitchen to the main kitchen is merely a side venture, and so I have to be extremely careful to not risk the main kitchen’s operation. I find two types of risks that the cloud kitchen imposes: spatial, and temporal. Spatial risks are mitigated by carefully picking what cooking equipment I need for the proposed cuisine. For example, if the woks are critical for the main kitchen operation, and if they are often occupied, then I should count them out. Similarly, I should not have any fried items, as leaving the deep fryers on standby will unnecessarily degrade the oil, in contrast to how it’s used for higher volume orders for the main kitchen. Turning up the oil for the sake of a few orders would indirectly increase the cost of goods sold, as we would have to change the oil more often. The temporal risks go hand-in-hand with spatial risks: I don’t want to be jumping in and out of kitchen spaces during the rush hours of the main kitchen, which is ~4-8PM. Additionally, not temporally separating the kitchens would present a potential conflict of interest between them, as customers may conflate the menus when ordering.

    All of this suggests that I should plan for a brunch menu that uses light equipment, with no woks or deep fryers.

    A

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  • Journey to Cloud Kitchen: From Zero to Hero

    This post’s title may seem like it was generated by ChatGPT, but I promise that it was not. It’s the result of pushing myself to start this blog, and that entails writing poorly.

    I think I want to start documenting my journey in launching a successful cloud kitchen. Here is why:

    

    1) A gap in social media

    I’ve been absorbing a lot of social media content lately, and what I find to be missing is people documenting their journey to their successes. I think the closest things are those “Day in the life (of a Software Engineer, Student at Harvard, etc.)”. But showing viewers of oneself eating breakfast or going to the gym after class does not deal with the main topic at hand which is, of course, working or studying. It’s difficult to express this phenomenon, because most would argue that the lifestyle surrounding a particular job/academic career is vital for one’s success. Yet, I would argue that there is too much momentum going in that direction, at least on social media. I want to see more technical details, be it an actual task at work (rather than a 2 second clip of you coding), or how you’re trying to understand a particular topic in school (rather than a 2 second clip of you twirling your pen looking at a notebook with notes that we can’t read).

    This applies to cooking content. Often, we see recipe videos by highly experienced chefs, but little of the journey in becoming so skilled and successful. The closest are chefs mentioning “this recipe has been developed for 20 years.” Okay, so what did the recipe look like in the beginning, and what prompted the changes that made the recipe so perfect? Besides cooking, there is also the “business” side of restaurants, such as deciding a menu, pricing, sourcing supplies/equipment, marketing, etc., that once again I find to be lacking in social media. Most of what we see is the end state, be it an already perfected recipe or finalised launch of a restaurant.

    

    2) Chance to learn to cook

    Yes, I’ll need to finally learn how to cook to embark on this journey. Admittedly, it’s quite difficult. Having bought and started to watch a Udemy beginner’s cooking course, seeing the concepts on my computer screen makes me think, “this is incredibly simple”. But once you hand me a chef’s knife, I’ll falter in front of the onion that I’m supposed to cut.

    Nonetheless, I find the physical aspect of this journey to be a unique counter-balance to the digitisation of everything nowadays. I’ll have a chance to combine tradition and innovation together in a physical space, which is quite exciting, though understandably it will take a lot of work, both physically and mentally.

    

    3) Continuing to write

    Strangely, it’s towards the very end of my academic career that I find the importance in writing. Documenting this journey will at least keep me writing on a regular basis. I think for many people, writing is enjoyable, but few, including myself, bring themselves to do it outside of school.

    I think this is a good point to discuss the recent ChatGPT. As with most of the world, I’ve been pondering use cases of ChatGPT, and its benefits along with risks. After some thought, I will try to limit the usage of ChatGPT, just like how an aspiring chess master may limit the usage of a chess engine when studying. ChatGPT will not be the driving factor for ideas. I think its ideas are useful to act as a “reference of the norm”, from which we can agree, disagree, or innovate upon. Using ChatGPT to write is out of the question.

    

    4) Learn videography

    Knowing myself, even just learning to cook and writing on occasion is a lot to ask. However, I’ve recently been inspired by YouTube videos, such as this one and this one, which imbue a sense of calmness, with the calmness acting as the perfect foundation for an extended, detailed discussion. Again, knowing myself, I probably won’t get started soon on a video component, but at the same time I’m excited to delve into it.

    There is certainly a lot to write about next, be it scheduling, menu item ideas, learning recipes, marketing (if any), etc. Thanks for making it this far. If you have any insights to these types of endeavors, be it cooking or literally anything else, please let me know, so we can exchange ideas, or even collaborate.

    

    A

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