Page 16 - The Valley Table - Winter 2022

FAMILY VALUES
Most food influencers start their social media journey because they love to cook, or love to eat—or
both. Instagrammer and Kingston resident Phillipe Trinh is definitely passionate about food, cocktails, and kombucha—but Whiskey & Booch, his culinary brand born in 2020, goes beyond the basics by exploring both tradition and experimentation.
Trinh, a first-generation Vietnamese American, shares recipes passed down from his mom and dad, who fled Laos and Vietnam during the Vietnam War. “The heart of my project is to honor my parents and our culture, to tell our stories and preserve our memories through food,” says Trinh. His “stories” include delicious, authentic recipes for crispy pork belly, kimchi fried rice, beef pho, and much more. His parents even make cameo appearances on his cooking videos (@whiskeyandbooch, whiskeyandbooch.com) and they are quite the cute bunch.
Trinh has garnered over 15,000 followers on Instagram (check it out!) and has launched a successful, Valley- based kombucha brand, Seek North, with his partner Julian Lesser. We chatted with him to learn more about
his business, favorite foods, and go-to ingredients.
You used to be a fashion designer, how’d you get into food?
I designed for Joseph Abboud, Phillip Lim, Perry Ellis International, and many others for nearly 15 years. Building my career involved long hours at the office and a lot of networking, and I found myself dining out frequently. A month before the pandemic hit, I was laid
off and I decided to take the leap and
move from NYC to our Kingston home full time. During lockdown we were forced to cook multiple meals a day.
I can cook, but I wasn’t used to that much cooking.
It was a tough time, but it awarded me the space to reflect on my life
and my relationship with my parents.
I started to miss them and all the Vietnamese comfort foods I grew up with. And as I thought more and more about them, something hit me: What
if my parents passed? Did I know all their stories? Did I know any of their recipes? The answers were all no. I decided that there was no better time than the present to learn more about their (and my) origins and start cooking all the traditional dishes they used to make for me.
What’s the inspiration behind the name “Whiskey & Booch?”
The name was inspired by two of my favorite things: whiskey and kombucha.
Tell us about Seek North.
My dad taught me how to ferment food when I was young, and it’s
14 the valley table
dec 2021 – feb 2022
PHOTOS COURTESY OF @WHISKEYANDBOOCH