Southern Agenda

The Tao of Bao


Bao is about to go big time in Rockville. Local chef Kevin Hsieh, a competitor on the Food Network’s Great Food Truck Race, is expanding from a ghost kitchen serving takeout to a dine-in fast-casual restaurant. But the specialty will remain the same: Taiwanese street food, and especially the fluffy Chinese steamed buns called bao. Television host Tyler Florence recalls them as “nothing short of extraordinary… a perfect blend of flavor and texture. I have no doubt that his bao will quickly become a local favorite.” Hsieh’s restaurant’s name, Bao Bei, plays on a Mandarin term of endearment meaning “precious one.” Indeed, the dish is precious to Hsieh, who took inspiration from his grandmother’s bao: “It’s the recipe I used to eat as a child.” He expects his bestseller will continue to be his pork belly bao, which are bigger and meatier than typical slider-sized bao, he says. “People are always stunned by the size of them. One is a meal.”

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