Family, History, and Sustainability

How Chef Li-Guang Han Achieved Culinary Stardom

by Cary Wong

Chef Li- Guang (LG) Han has come a long way in his unusual culinary journey. Growing up in a family that has a rich history with food and beverage, one would imagine he would pick up the mantle from the start. Surprisingly, however, that was not the case.

My granddad used to own a couple restaurants back in the heyday (including) Singapore’s most premium steakhouses back in the 1960s and it ran for almost thirty years. He also had a Szechuan restaurant and a more casual Western restaurant,” Han says. “My grandma, she’s a fantastic home cook. She cooks for the family every week, the extended family— uncles, aunties, cousins, myself. She’s my hero.

Not only that, but Chef Han’s father also worked in the hotel industry, managing finance and corporate assets. Having graduated from the London School of Economics with a degree in accounting and finance, the plan was for Chef Han to have a comfortable and stable life working at a desk. His passion for food was so great, however, that he decided to quit the finance industry and began apprenticing at Garibaldi, an Italian restaurant and bar, despite not having any formal training.

“Cooking has always been a passion of mine since schooling days and I made the jump to the F&B industry... because of pure passion. I really like to create, trying to find an outlet to express my creativity and cooking,“ he says. “The feeling and the joy when I cook, it really transported me to a different dimension, and that’s what made me fall in love with cooking.”

After stints of apprenticing at events, attending cooking school for six months, and launching Tanuki Raw, a modern Japanese restaurant/bar, he felt it was time to start his own place. The family was hesitant at the beginning as his father “saw how hard it was for my grandfather, in terms of running a business.”

Undeterred, he opened Labyrinth in 2014 with a “dine-in-the-dark” concept. It was a rocky start so he decided to pivot to serving molecular cuisine. Even though the change proved popular and won the team their first Michelin star in 2017, something was amiss.

“They weren’t techniques that I invented. They were basically techniques that were around in books and online around the world, and (I applied) it to playbooks that already existed in Singaporean hawkers (food stalls). So, it wasn’t really my own voice,” he says.

With that, he decided to alter his approach to one that emphasized local produce and sustainability, marrying them with the Singaporean culinary heritage. That change, however, presented lots of challenges. To start, the Singaporean government did not particularly care about sustainability back then. In addition, the guests did not think that these products warranted the price premium.

In order to change that market, he had to build close relationships with the farmers and understand that part of the equation. It required more than understanding the farming methods or having open dialogues with the farmers; he also needed to do extensive research on his own.

For example, he learned about various natural farming techniques and what makes things tasty. He also investigated why natural soil and nutrients make food taste better than hydroponics.

Most importantly, however, he checked out the producers in person. “I made sure we see every farm… it’s not just about the farming methods that (could) convince me. I wanted to make sure the farmers ain’t bullshitting,” he says. “The farmers needed to be able to respect their own produce that they’re growing and be proud of it, the same way we chefs are proud to cook our dishes for our customers.”

If the restaurant was to work with farmers who were there purely for commercial gains, that trust would be lost. Being a smaller restaurant with a menu comprised of up to 80% local products, order size was an operational issue that also had to be solved.

We’re not a big restaurant but we want the produce to be as fresh as possible. We have to do smaller orders almost every day or every other day of the week. From a farmer’s perspective, with limited resources and costs, it doesn’t make sense to (harvest) two kilos or something all the way from the north (and send that) down to where we are.

For the concept to work, Chef Han and his vendors need to have trust and close personal relationships.

Whenever I meet with them, I don’t ask about the price,” he says. “The relationship is important and sometimes, things do fall apart… sometimes people just have a different direction of where they want to go (that is different than mine). But (those who stayed behind) are the farmers that I’m really close to and they will stick their necks out for me whenever I need them.

Continue reading at https://issuu.com/rareluxuryliving/docs/raremagazinesustainablepages/98