A Few Words With: Food Entrepreneur Hsu Kang Li of Fatface Dining

This year our 2015 Reader Restaurant Awards have four personality-based categories: Best Chef, Best Manager, Restaurant Personality of the Year, and Food Entrepreneur of the Year. During the voting period that runs through March 8, we’re profiling a few of this year’s crop of nominees.

Today we present Hsu Kang Li, co-owner and co-founder of Fatface Dining, who along with his brother and co-conspirator Eric, have been nominated in the Food Entrepreneur of the Year category.

TBJ: Give us a snapshot of what you do.
Hsu Kang Li: We organize our own branded food social events in Beijing, ranging from cooking classes to food social parties for 120 plus people. We also provide quality Western-styled catering services for private parties, small to large companies and other organizations.

TBJ: How big is your operation?
Hsu Kang Li: We are a very small team of four people, because we are an event based company. So we commission adequate personnel to service the events, depending on the scale of the event.

TBJ: What was the inspiration behind this business idea?
Hsu Kang Li: Eric Li, our co-owner and co-founder, loves to cook. And I love to organize events. Fatface was a nickname we had for each other. Voila.

TBJ: How is your business contributing to the food scene in Beijing?
Hsu Kang Li: We give our community an alternative dining experience outside of restaurants, allowing our customers to sample a wide range of cuisine. For our own events we usually have multiple chefs, each bringing their own specialties to the table. But most importantly, we share a great dining experience with a lot of quality people, because an average of 80 people attend our food social events.

TBJ: Tell us about one of your favorite places to eat in Beijing, aside from your own.
Hsu Kang Li: For Chinese, I'd have to go with Siji Minfu Beijing Duck restaurant (四季民福). It’s the best bang for your buck in terms of Beijing duck.

Click here to read more editions of A Few Words With wherein we profile some of the top players in Beijing's food scene during the voting period for the 2015 Reader Restaurant Awards, which runs through March 8.

Images: Fatface Dining