Mushrooms are having a moment in Los Angeles, including an increased interest in foraging, recreation, and preparing fungi as medicine. Cremini, portobello, and white button mushrooms have always been prevalent on menus here, but Asian varietals are now seeing an uptick on menus, too.
Mushrooms were reportedly consumed in Asia as early as 4,000 years ago. Current favorites such as enoki and shiitake are believed to have been first cultivated between 1000 and 1100 AD and used predominantly in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean dishes. These varieties, along with wood ear, are now so sought after stateside that commercial farmers harvest them for a tidy profit.
The cross-cultural appeal of mushrooms in Asian communities makes it an ideal time to recognize their bountiful presence at Los Angeles restaurants during Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month. A downtown restaurant hosts a mushroom yakitori party, black mushrooms star in a noodle dish at a rare Uyghur restaurant, and a Westwood Iranian restaurant swaps meat with fungi in a traditional barley soup.
Read on for four mushroom dishes that showcase API pride.
Mushroom party at HATCH (Downtown)
When Akarad Tachavatcharapa, Nara Latip, and Daniel Shemtob opened HATCH in 2018, their mission was to make socializing as delicious as possible. By combining their Singaporean, Thai, Indonesian, and Jewish backgrounds, the three co-founders frequently reference ingredients personal to their cultures to create playful dishes.
Enter the Mushroom Party. Aptly named for its celebration of variety, the Mushroom Party features shiitake, button, and oyster mushrooms grilled to amplify the different textures and flavors of each mushroom, particularly their earthy, buttery, smoky, and briny qualities. A sprinkle of seaweed flakes adds the final touch.
The Mushroom Party arrives cooked at the table and can be shared by two people alongside other protein-rich yakitori. The restaurateurs feel the dish perfectly encapsulates their background and love for food.
“The Mushroom Party yakitori is an homage to the diverse background of people coming together to build HATCH,” the co-founders say.
Fried mixed mushrooms at Bistro Na’s (Temple City)
Bistro Na has become an exciting destination for elegant Manchu dishes in the San Gabriel Valley, where more than two-thirds of the Asian American population are immigrants. It earned a MICHELIN star in 2019 and for a while was the only Chinese restaurant in the Los Angeles area with one.
Bistro Na’s spotlights dishes inspired by the history of royal Manchuria (a region now in eastern China), including mushroom-loaded snacks that are a nod to fungi’s use in Chinese imperial cuisine for good health.
One of Bistro Na’s most irresistible plates is the snackable fried mixed mushrooms with rice cracker bites. Chef Tian Yong says the mushrooms in the dish end up tasting “similar to meat,” and that each of the mushrooms have “its own unique flavors.”
Hon Shimeji, or wild beech mushrooms, star in the preparation and are fried to a crisp alongside slices of shiitakes. A sweet and sour glaze along with the rice crackers for crunch bring it all together.
Yosenabe at Eigikutei (Little Tokyo)
To make the dashi broth found in its yosenabe sets, Eigikutei prides itself on using freshly dried shiitake mushrooms for an extra earthy flavor. Dashi or soy sauce-based broths are central to yosenabe, a type of hot pot preparation that’s popular throughout Japan.
Eigikutei is hoping to popularize it further in Los Angeles. Alongside premium shabu-shabu and sushi kaiseki sets, the new Little Tokyo restaurant offers different versions of yosenabe. The dish comes with fresh enoki, nameko, and shiitake mushrooms to dip into the simmering hot pot alongside ribeye, vegetables, and udon. With seemingly endless options for customization, hot pot lovers can make their broth as rich and savory as they like.
The restaurant particularly stands out among peers in the city thanks to the wide variety of mushrooms it uses in the hot pot—and for first-timers hesitant to try it, the staff will explain that the broth tastes similar to miso soup and udon bowls.
Laghman at Dolan’s Uyghur Cuisine (Alhambra)
Black mushrooms are central to Uyghur cuisine, and as one of the most celebrated Uyghur restaurants in LA, Dolan prides itself on its mushroom preparations.
Dishes at Dolan represent the food of East Turkistan (a region in northwestern China) and celebrate the small yet mighty Uyghur American community in the area.
The beloved Central Asian hand-pulled noodle dish, laghman, is a favorite on Dolan’s menu, restaurant manager Memet Jan says. Dolan’s version tosses beef and black mushrooms in a spicy and savory sauce along with the noodles. The stir-fried black mushroom and celery dish is another highlight, Jan says.
Lisa Kwon is a reporter and writer focused on arts and food culture in Los Angeles, CA. Find Lisa on Instagram and Twitter.
