Food Network’s Molly Yeh Brings Her Dim Sum to Miami

Dim sum-body say roasted carrot steamed buns and dumplings with a side of milk tea tiramisu and cute bowtie pasta-patterned outfits?

Food Network television star, food blogger, best-selling cookbook author, and restaurant owner Molly Yeh is bringing her love of colorful desserts and delicious dim sum recipes to Miami at the South Beach Wine & Food Festival this weekend.

On Sunday, the host of Girl Meets Farm on the Food Network will host the now sold-out Champagne Dim Sum Brunch, one of several brunch events occurring this Sunday, February 25, at the South Beach Wine & Food Festival.

Yeh spoke to New Times‘ food editor Nicole Lopez-Alvar about the influence her Chinese-Ashkenazi heritage has on her cooking, her favorite memories at the festival (including the must-see photo of her daughter trying her very first ice cream with a fellow Food Network star), the delicious dessert she’s serving at her event, and her two favorite Miami restaurants she always has to grab a bite at while visiting sunny Miami.
 
For those who can’t make it to her event at Hutong Miami in Brickell this Sunday, there’s great news. Her dishes served at the event will remain on Hutong’s brunch menu throughout the month of March, with a portion of the proceeds going to the Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism Management at Florida International University. Therefore, you’ll be able to try her delicious dim sum dishes each Saturday and Sunday from noon to 3 p.m. until March 31.

New Times: I know you love making recipes that represent your Chinese-Ashkenazi heritage. As a fan of your show, I’ve seen how you pair so many influences into a single dish! Since you’re hosting the Champagne Dim Sum Brunch, do you incorporate some of your Ashkenazi heritage into your dim sum recipes or in the way you prepare them?

Molly Yeh: Yes! I love diving into the intersection between Chinese and Ashkenazi food. As obscure as that may sound, there are actually a lot of connections to be made, the most obvious being the age-old Jewish tradition of eating Chinese food on Christmas. So I’ve spent a lot of time creating recipes for my family’s annual Jewish-Chinese Christmas and growing a collection of dishes out of that. One of the recipes that we’re featuring at the Champagne Dim Sum Brunch is my roasted carrot steamed buns. They were inspired by a steamed bun I had at Dirt Candy in New York and I’ve made them countless times for Jewish meals because the carrots are such a delicious substitute to the typical traif pork in the filling. I love them so much! I’ve also done fun fusion-y things like pastrami egg rolls and red bean hamantaschen…the possibilities are endless and usually very carb-heavy, which I’m all about.

You’ve featured dim sum on your television show, Girl Meets Farm, and I know you’ve hosted this event before, so you know a thing or two about pairing spring rolls and soup dumplings with Champagne! What can we expect to be on the menu at your Champagne Dim Sum Brunch in Miami this year?

Lots of steamed buns and dumplings and just enough greasy food to justify having this event in the morning after all of the great festival parties. I also have a recipe for jianbing out of my book, Home is Where the Eggs Are, which is a Chinese street food that’s not as well known here (yet!). It’s a savory crepe rolled up with an egg and a ton of salty, spicy sauce.

What dish are you most looking forward to at your Champagne Dim Sum Brunch at Hutong Miami?

The Hutong team is making milk tea tiramisu! I don’t normally freak out about tiramisu, but a milk tea tiramisu is going to be wild.

You started your culinary career as a food blogger/recipe developer when you moved to North Dakota (but have always loved to cook). Do you think cooking shows and cooking demonstrations on television are still important in the era of Instagram and TikTok? Why are they still so impactful to home cooks and future chefs alike?

I truly believe there’s space and purpose for both. They’re such different mediums that cater to different audiences and different types of content, and creating them is two totally different processes as well. As someone who creates content for both Instagram and TV, I feel like one offers the space for very casual sharing of ideas and some experimentation, while the other demands a much more in-depth way of recipe writing, styling, and filming. At least, that’s how I’ve approached it. It’s kind of like the difference between that family heirloom box of recipe notecards that are all stained and have recipe directions like “bake it until it’s done” with no time or oven temperature versus growing your cookbook collection with books that have all been through very rigorous editing processes. Both are great, both are useful, both are inspiring.

When you are in South Florida for the festival, what are your favorite restaurants, bakeries, or coffee shops to visit in Miami? I feel like you’d love to try some pastries in Miami!

 Zak the Baker and La Sandwicherie are always at the top of my list for places to go. I am also really, really excited for Hutong because even though I’ve never been to the Miami location, I’ve been to the New York location, and it was life-changing.

I know you’ve been attending the South Beach Wine & Food Festival for a few years now. What’s been your favorite memory at the festival?

Four years ago, when my daughter Bernie was one, she ate her very first ice cream cone with Duff Goldman at his ice cream social!

Do you have any chefs or chef friends you’re excited to see at the festival?

Everybody! I am so excited for Rachael Ray and Bobby Flay’s events, and I’m hoping to make friends with Hunter Fieri and Tara Bernstein. I just signed up for the celebrity chef pickleball tournament that they are hosting, and I am both excited and terrified. I have only ever played pickleball twice.

Champagne Dim Sum Brunch. Hosted by Molly Yeh. Noon to 2 p.m. Sunday, February 25, at Hutong, 600 Brickell Ave., Miami; sobewff.com. Sold out.