28 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 For Lin and Chen, who are pushing a lot of buttons with their surging two-year-old restaurant, they have something to prove. "There's this pressure to continuously be interesting in the attention economy," Lin says. "A lot of restaurants are doing collaborations to stay relevant and keep people excited about them. We get that and we want to do it too, but also staying true to who we are." Chen used the opportunity on the trip down to visit other establishments in the city as well and glean design, culinary, and hospitality ideas — a reverence to SF dining that she gleefully proclaims. Yet the pair concedes that success for Xiao Ye in this foray isn't measurable in the traditional sense. "If we can show that we can hang in the kitchen with the best restaurants in each city and show that we have what it takes, then hopefully people can see Portland again like in its big renaissance ten years ago." Collaboration dinners are nothing new to the well-oiled HiNeighbor Group's (7 Adams, Trestle, Mama's, The Vault) Executive Chef and Partner Jason Halverson, who's been running the Eat Like A Chef, Drink Like A Somm series since 2014. This year's series featured dinners with critically acclaimed chefs like Che Fico's David Nayfeld, Azalina Eusope of Azalina's, and Geoff Davis of Burdell (recently named both Food & Wine's Restaurant of the Year and SF Chronicle's #1 restaurant in the Bay Area). The ethos behind the series is charity, and each year, all proceeds from the dinners benefit a different cause. This year, it was Sprouts Chef Training, which provides hands-on culinary training to youths experiencing hardship. "We were never going to be the people who can write this big fat check," Halverson says. "But we know how to work for it. So when we opened our first restaurant, the basis of this was charity and working with people we know and love." Davis says the charity was a driving force for his involvement, saying that he's had 4-5 "Sprouts" work in his kitchen since Burdell first opened in 2023. "It's a mission I really believe in," he says. But even though Burdell is a highly decorated operation that can stand firmly on its own, Davis saw another opportunity to cook dishes like juicy heritage pork with pig head beans, crispy ears, and dandelion greens with the Hi-Neighbor team in San Francisco for a night. "It's in SF and there's probably a lot of people who act like the bridge is a wall," he says. "So if you can get in front of another person’s audience and present yourself, something analogous to the person you're collaborating with, it can be impactful. And in some ways, it's like a pop-up." Chef and owner Chris Yang of the Mission's superb Asian comfort food outpost Piglet & Co. said that being able to host pop-up chefs was an intentional part of his and partner Marcelle Gonzales Yang's plan. Before Piglet & Co., Yang was an active pop-up chef himself. Recent guests in the 'Piglet & Friends' series included former Nisei sous chef Haley Garabato and Ken Turner, shortly after he closed his beloved sandwich shop, Turner's Kitchen. “This cross-pollination of ideas really helps spark future inspiration” 2 3 4
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