Oh.

Even though it's a little early for fried chicken,

and not the kind of thing I'd expect to eat at

a funeral, it's pretty unbelievable.

The island nation of Taiwan is known for

its incredible food culture.

And Taiwan's outdoor banquets known as bando.

And one of the countries oldest food traditions.

Prepared by village chef Sidon Po Si who

specialize in cooking for hundreds of people at

a time, outdoor banquets can be a celebration of

any occasion, from weddings and

birthdays to festivals, elections and funerals.

Let's get some food.

I like stinky tofu.

This is pretty heavy on the stink.

If I think of eating at a funeral in Canada or

the states,

it's pretty much bland catering sandwiches and

soggy fruit plates that come to mind.

But it Taiwan,

they do things a little differently.

My friend, George, invited me to attend

his grandfather's funeral and eat at

the outdoor banquet prepared in his honor.

He had already been filming the lead up

to the funeral and hoped that our film could be

a record of his grandfather too.

Lin He Xiuju was the village chef in charge

of the funeral feast.

At 4 AM the morning of the funeral,

I joined her at the largest fish market in

northern Taiwan, where she threw down the cash

on sushi-grade salmon, shrimp and shellfish.

It's unusual for

a village chef to be a woman, but Xiuju,

who also runs a small restaurant,

was clearly on top of her game.

I wanna point out that the stack of seafood we

bought is taller than the woman cooking it.

When we arrived in George's hometown of

FomeS, it was cold, damp and rainy.

People were paying their respects to George's

grandfather, who had been a town council leader.

Why do you need to stand next to the coffin?

The relatives have to keep the deceased

company.

One person on either side.

Does someone have to be here all the time?

Yes, you can't leave the coffin alone.

They're cooking outside because it's

traditionally really important for all of this

funeral stuff to happen as close to the home as

possible and we're basically like ten steps

from where the family of the deceased lives.

The first order of business is preparing

food for

all of the people who have come early.

Their job is to make food for

people that will fill them up and

maybe make them feel a little bit better.

So, yeah.

It's food made with love.

In Taiwanese custom,

we eat a pig's head and tail at a funerals.

It symbolizes respect for your elders.

This is Sesame Oil Chicken,

a dish I made specially for the pallbearers.

For a coffin this size,

it's gonna take 16 to 20 men to carry it.

The young ones might hurt their back carrying it,

so they will eat this beforehand.

It's got chicken and pork in it.

You can't drive after eating this, though.

It's got lots of alcohol in it.

I sat down with the team of pallbearers who were

having lunch before getting to business.

There was a lot more food than I was expecting.

Yeah the chicken is super, super tender.

Its got a little tingly from the alcohol.

The broth is basically just like booze with

some chicken juices in it.

Like when you sip it,

kinda is like doing a weak shot almost.

There's basically like something for everyone.

You got the mayotte, which is the traditional

thing that you have to eat if your gonna

be preparing to carry the coffin.

But everything else is just like people like

to eat good food and some might like the pork

more some prefer to eat fish or other seafood.

They wanna make sure that no one goes hungry and

everyone's satisfied.

So this is the spread.

This is the kinda dish that I like.

The pork belly.

Me too.

A lot of these guys aren't young either and

they definitely need as much warmth and

energy as they can get before the hard

work that's about to come.

After eating all of this stuff,

carrying a coffin up a hill in the rain is not

necessarily the first thing that comes to mind.

All the while, the rest of the funeral guests

were tucking into lunch.

I sat down to eat with George when he returned.

Admittedly, he wasn't that hungry.

My grandfather specifically asked us to

make sure the funeral guests are well and

get plenty of food.

A lot of old people tend to pass away at

the end of winter between Chinese New Year and

the Mazu Festival.

So there are a lot of funeral feasts around

this time.

Mm.

The food tastes good, but it's also really sad.

Would you say the tradition is in decline?

It's frightening to think about.

These old village chefs don't have students to

pass their skills on to.

As people from the older generation pass away,

this tradition will eventually die out.

We don't want to see this happen, so

we'll try our best to keep the tradition alive.

Funeral feasts are a tradition of remembrance,

it brings families and neighbors together,

and creates a bond between us.

I wanted to learn more

about the origins of village chef cuisine,

so I traveled to its birthplace,

the small town of Niemen in southern Taiwan.

Hi, Mr. Lin.

Hi.

You look American.

I'm Canadian.

Oh, Canadian.

Liu Ruizhang has been a village chef for

more than 40 years.

He works with his wife and youngest son

catering outdoor banquets and serving local

specialties from the front of his apartment.

When I arrived Lin's son was preparing

the family's signature pork leg.

The flavor isn't quite there yet.

Yeah Oh I see.

It's still a bit salty right now.

Once we bring out the sweetness

of the the pork, it won't be as salty.

While the pork was cooking the elder

Lan showed me his take on sweet and sour fish.

I'll make some fish.

Just keep frying it til it gets golden brown.

Okay.

It's super crispy and they just put it back in

the wok for a second to kinda flash fry it again.

Then we add some seasoning: sour, sweet,

spicy.

A bit of garlic, onions, white pepper and vinegar.

Then some broth.

And finally, to make it sweet and

sour, we add a bit of sugar.

It's ready.

The flavor is pretty well-balanced.

Now we'll make a gravy.

Put it on slow heat.

Then a bit of ketchup.

To make it sour.

Let's pour it on top.

Here it is, Sweet and Sour Fish.

Sour, sweet, spicy, salty.

It's got everything.

Shall I bring it to the table?

Yes, we're gonna eat it.

Okay. Now drink with me!

Happy birthday.

Whose birthday is it?

Whenever a friend from faraway comes for

a visit, we say "happy birthday" to celebrate

Oh yeah.

It's a Taiwanese folk tradition.

Oh, I was still pretty full from the previous

day's funeral feasting but it wasn't hard to

convince myself to keep eating.

Why am I passing this to my son?

I pass it along to him so

that he can have the means to make a living.

Otherwise he might end up becoming a construction

worker or something,

he'd be lost in a different profession.

It's the same for you.

If I ask you to try a different profession,

you might not succeed.

Like father, like son.

He likes this profession so

I'm passing the torch to him.

I've been watching him cook since I was little.

My Dad cooks so well,

I should really learn from him.

I'll try my best to reach his level and

add my own interpretation into some dishes.

What's the difference between traditional

outdoor banquets and

a meal you'd get in a restaurant?

At a restaurant you have a lot

of frozen ingredients.

Here, everything is fresh.

Everything is prepared fresh at every step.

What do you think the culture of outdoor

banquets will become in the future?

They used to be a real sense of community in

Taiwan.

Oh.

When we used to have a neighborhood gathering,

everyone in the neighborhood would come

help out with the kitchen work.

You don't get that anymore.

Outdoor banquet culture is in decline not because

of the dishes or anything.

It's because we don't

have that sense of community anymore.

Even if the traditional role of the village

chef risks slowly fading away, interests in

the old-school culinary masters and

their outdoor banquets is

seeing something of a resurgence.

I wanted to see what the future of village chef

style food could have in store.

So I went to meet Wen Guozhi,

an expert in traditional Taiwanese recipes at

the culinary school where he teaches in.

Being a Village Chef is a very traditional

profession in Taiwan, but recently there have been

some development in the cuisine.

What do you think about this.

Traditional Village Chefs either only had a primary

school education or weren't educated at all.

These days we have apprenticeships,

which has helped raise the level of education

for young chefs.

Today we're making Scallops with

Shredded Bamboo Shoots and Egg Skin,

it's one of the village chef's specialities.

We start off with the carrots.

We peel of its rough skin.

This is a regular cleaver,

and a bone cleaver.

We prep 90 percent of the ingredients using just

these two knives.

Maybe it's because resources were scarce

back in the day.

So people did all their cooking with just these

two knives.

I thought I was a decent cook but

next to Wen Guozhi, I felt pretty inept,

even when it came to frying an egg or

stir frying some vegetables.

How is it.

It's so good.

This is the part where the music is supposed to

come on.

It's got a light scent of bamboo shoot and

shiitake mushroom.

We have the scallop which is soft, and

the bamboo shoot which is crispy.