THE RELUCTANT MEMOIRIST Restaurateur shares his personal struggles with mental illness and what he's learned in new book
Eat a Peach: A Memoir David Chang Clarkson Potter
“In some ways,” says David Chang of his new memoir, Eat a Peach, “it's the least important thing.” Much has changed since he started work on the book several years ago — especially since May, when it was originally scheduled to come out. “I really am in a place where I'm less sure about anything than ever before,” he says, laughing, “and I don't think it's just me.”
Chang is a reluctant memoirist. The highly influential chef and restaurateur is more comfortable thinking of Eat a Peach “as a textbook on what not to do when starting a business,” he writes, than an account of his life. True, there's much to be learned about the business of restaurants from Chang's telling of Momofuku's origin story. What started in 2004 as a noodle bar in New York's East Village — staffed only by Chang and Joaquin (Quino) Baca, who had answered an ad on Monster. com — has grown to encompass 14 restaurants in New York, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Toronto and Sydney, Australia.
But Chang's culinary accomplishments and epiphanies are only part of the story. With bracing honesty, he shares his experiences with depression, bipolar disorder and suicidal thoughts. Mental illness, he says, has been interwoven into much of his adulthood — playing a role in both his successes and failures. While he doesn't intend for it to be seen as a crutch, Chang emphasizes, it's central to understanding who he is.
The lingering stigma around suicide and mental health serves as an indicator of how little people understand it, Chang writes. While the book “is a source of near-constant uneasiness,” he feels some optimism when considering the ways in which it might help others in their fight against mental illness.
“Sometimes the easiest thing is just to talk about your own shortcomings, and have that be a stepping stone for others,” says Chang. “The one thing I wanted to admit was not just my own mental health issues, but my failures (regarding) that. And the loneliness and the struggle. And ultimately changing the idea that asking for help is a sign of weakness … It's the hardest thing you can do. And that doesn't mean that it's weak. It means that it's something else.”
For him, help took the form of medication and consulting the right people. He credits the reliable rhythm of talking to his psychiatrist over the years for keeping him alive. Dr. Eliot, his therapist, is a recurring character in the book. Part 1 (“Up the Hill”) focuses on events Chang has gained perspective on over many years in treatment, while Part 2 (“Down and Back Again”), delves into subjects he hasn't fully processed yet.
Living with mental illness, Chang says, has caused him to look back at the events of his life differently. He understands he has a platform, and it's important to use it. Whether it be to highlight issues of Asian American representation and Asian identity, or to scrutinize the culinary industry and the trappings of ambition. “At the end of the day, you can look back and ask yourself, `Did you add more value than otherwise?' That's how I look at it,” says Chang. “In the scope of mental illness, it causes you to reflect on why and how, and was it worth it.”
As in conversation, Chang's candour spills onto the page. He exposes the challenges of translating the events of his life in a linear way — while it may seem like each win logically flowed into the next, in reality, they were punctuated by doubt. As his career has progressed, he says, this uncertainty hasn't become any easier to handle.
Adding to the book's sense of transparency is the fact that Chang admits to not having all the answers. Quite the opposite: He wrote the book at a time in his life when he was questioning all previously held assumptions. Chang addresses his “blind spots.”
“The obvious one — the big, glaring, ugly thing I didn't grasp — was about the women in our industry,” he says. He shares his thoughts on the #MeToo movement, gender inequality and being part of the culinary world's boys' club. (The latter was immortalized in Time magazine's “Gods of Food” cover story: “I'm literally one of the poster children for the kitchen patriarchy.”)
He also opens up about his anger, which has coloured nearly two decades of work in professional kitchens. Where a culture of rage and high-decibel tension was once accepted, he encourages burgeoning chefs to challenge it.
“Every time I think I know something, I realize I don't know anything. I think it's a good reminder that I need to be humble,” he says. “If anything through this struggle, I know what my default setting is. And sometimes that's a good person. More often than not, it's not a good person. And I need to really check myself, and to understand that's not an excuse. I have to hold myself accountable and be better.”
As open as he is about any shortcomings, Chang shares his expertise freely — offering insight into Momofuku's philosophy, which is still evolving: “Nobody knows anything, so do what you want”; “Gather from everywhere”; “The dining room is your classroom.” And what he considers his greatest strength, fostering growth and success in others (“I love teams”). Inspired by Jerry Saltz's essay on How to Be an Artist, he ends the book with his 33 rules for becoming a chef.
Reading Eat a Peach, in many ways, feels like an escape from the present. From Chang's remembrances of blaring Lambchop, Silver Jews and Pixies in the open kitchen during Noodle Bar's buzzy early days, to more recently opening Bang Bar, a standing-room-only spit-roasted meat stall, these experiences seem far from the realm of today's reality. Slurping a bowl of ramen in the crush of a crowded restaurant has become a treasured memory in the space of months.
As many as 60 per cent of restaurants could close permanently by November, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce says. In May, Momofuku CEO Marguerite Zabar Mariscal announced the permanent closure of two restaurants — New York's Nishi and Washington, D.C.'s CCDC — due to COVID-19.
With the book's delayed publication, Chang added an afterword addressing the events of the past several months: the colossal number of restaurant jobs lost to the pandemic, chefs' dreams dashed and the worldwide Black Lives Matter protests against racism and police violence. “We just wanted to make sure that it was almost like a time capsule of what was,” he says. “And be able to be forward-looking.”
Despite the significant challenges facing the industry, Chang says he has faith in ingenuity and the entrepreneurial spirit. “Canada is in a different place because of better leadership, first and foremost. The restaurant industry certainly had setbacks this year, but it's not like in the urban centres of the U.S. We're going to see a crazy amount of closures if we haven't already,” says Chang, adding he believes restaurants in Canada have a potentially brighter future than those in the U.S. because there are fewer systemic issues to overcome.
“From the U.S.'s perspective, we need to fix this metaphorical car. We can't fix this while it's driving anymore. And there's certainly jealousy on my end to see this car that's being driven by people in Canada. Where I'm like, `(Wow), that's a much better car than what we have,'” he laughs. “You have better mechanics and a better whole system around it. And we just don't have that.”
He stresses the importance of being prepared to change your perspective — in business as in life. Reflecting on other points of view, Chang says, has helped him learn to be less critical of himself and to forgive in order to “be better.” Recent events — including the June death of his father, whom he had “a very complicated relationship with” — have helped him gain clarity and recognize the validity of other viewpoints. Now a father himself, he's “wrestling with everything” and re-evaluating the very notion of success.
“I judge everything on a platonic ideal — an absolute idea, or some version of the truth that is absolute perfection. But nothing in the world is like that,” Chang says. “The failure of me, and I feel like sometimes culture at large, is we want things to be perfect. We expect to be born perfect. That's a fallacy. What we need to be doing is encouraging people to have reflection. To give people the opportunity to improve.
“I'm fortunate and privileged enough that I've been given that opportunity, and I don't want to squander it.”
■ Feel like you need help and want to speak with someone? For 24/7 help call Canadian Suicide Prevention Services at 1-833-456-4566, contact a local crisis centre or call Kids Help Phone at 1-800-6686868.
Every time I think I know something, I realize I don't know anything. I think it's a good reminder that I need to be humble.