Growing up in the skate culture of suburban Los Angeles, Keegan’s teenage home became the hangout house. Its popularity was due largely to his mom, Julie Chen Fong, a self-taught cook who put a new spin on homestyle Chinese cooking, and who radiated hospitality. She served up the personalized recipes that are unique to both moms and home cooks—traditional dishes full of substitutions, hybrid flavors, and unconventional modifications. Along the way, she earned the moniker “Mama Fong” for the “always room for one more” atmosphere she fostered.
Remembering his mom’s special gift for infusing meals with warmth and welcome, Keegan was determined to take her cooking beyond his own dinner table. The enthusiastic response to a series of pop-ups featuring her stir-fried noodles proved to be just the encouragement he needed. He left his full-time job as a marketing professional, and focused instead on sharing his mother’s story.
Six years later, the street events and pop-ups have evolved into a full-time family affair. Keegan and his mom oversee two Woon Kitchen restaurants in L.A., and a retail line of condiments. They embody the soul of Mama Fong’s recipes—along with a dash of comfort and love.
Recently, we caught up with Keegan to learn more about his journey and hear his advice for fellow entrepreneurs.
1. Why did you start Woon Kitchen?
Woon was born out of a desire to share my mother’s story. “Mama Fong” was born in Shanghai, grew up in Hong Kong, and immigrated to Los Angeles in the ‘60s. We began this journey as a simple pop-up cart in 2014, cooking my favorite stir fried noodles and pork belly baos that I grew up with.
Fast forward to 2019. I left my steady marketing job to open our first brick-and-mortar restaurant in Los Angeles. The core menu is based on Mama Fong’s original recipes. She worked in the restaurant every day, for the entire first year until COVID hit.
We were lucky to be busy during COVID, but like a lot of other businesses, we were forced to evolve quickly. That’s when the line of pantry staples we coin “Homestyle Goods” was born, to bring the same Woon story into people’s homes.
Six years later, we now have a second restaurant located in Pasadena, and a growing line of pantry staples sold nationwide!
2. What obstacles did you face along the way?
At times, running a restaurant can seem like the world is working against you in every way possible. Adding a scaled packaged goods company on top of two restaurants created even more obstacles along the way.
However, the only way forward was to continue to forge a path, even if it’s an uphill battle. Perseverance will always get me through the hardest of times. My cheesy, but honest saying is, “There are always a lot of problems, but a lot of problems always create a lot of solutions. ☺”
3. What lessons do you have for other entrepreneurs?
There will always be the highs and lows, but how you get through the lows is what is important. For me, I always try to reset my baseline, and accept that nothing will ever go as planned. How do we find solutions and prevent the same issues from happening in the future? How do we reset our expectations to deal with any potential issues, rather than focus on the fact that there are issues?
4. What’s on the horizon for Woon Kitchen?
We just opened our second restaurant in Pasadena, so we’ve been focused on that operation. For our pantry items, we really hope to continue to expand and share Mama Fong’s story nationwide! It’s our goal to be a pantry staple in everybody’s kitchen. We have a wide range of pantry products that we offer in our restaurants and hope to expand those offerings to a Bristol Farms near you soon!
5. How do you keep work/life balance? What drives/inspires you?
This may be one of the biggest challenges for me. I am a workaholic. Having my own business makes it hard to create boundaries, but I think having two young kids has really forced me to create some structure in my life. I will say it’s still not perfect, but having children and an amazing team to help run our businesses has helped me better prioritize my family over work in most cases. It’s still a work in progress, but my kids have really inspired me to not only work harder, but to work more efficiently.
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