Corporate and Professional Services

Professional Services

We provide a wide range of professional services to corporations and other organizations. These include consultancy, menu design, staff training, corporate entertainment and event planning. Please see our case studies for some real-life examples of these. You can also take a look at a list of some of our corporate clients.

Consultancy

Jodie Tsao has extensive knowledge of Asia's food culture, with a special focus on China, Taiwan and ethnic Chinese communities. She can provide advice on marketing, presentation and product design for companies that are hoping to strengthen their position in the world's fastest growing markets.

Chef training

We are experienced in bringing Western chefs up to speed with Asian cooking techniques in a short time. These short courses provide a firm basis for further independent study by focusing on key practical elements and providing cultural background information that puts the cuisine in context.

Taiwan is an ideal base for this kind of program because the country has strong historical influences from China and Japan. Authentic cuisine from these countries is a standard part of the local diet. Taiwan also has significant immigrant populations from other countries in Asia, such as Thailand and Vietnam, so there are authentic restaurants serving these countries' food.

As well as having its own unique local food culture, Taiwan's history of immigration from China means that the country can present regional cuisines from all across China, prepared to very high local standards using traditional techniques preserved from pre-revolutionary China. You can take advantage of this to sample the best that Chinese cuisine has to offer, at affordable prices, and all without leaving Taipei city.

“Food is one arena where Taipei — the world’s most underrated capital city, according to Monocle magazine — blows Beijing away. Its food incorporates more influences, spans street food to haute cuisine with greater aplomb and is out and out more delicious”, the New York Times recently declared.

Menu design

We provide advice for restaurants outside Asia that would like to enhance their menus with new and exciting tastes from the region. For example, we can create a practical course of tuition and restaurant visits that can quickly introduce catering staff or executives to a variety of interesting new flavors from Taiwan and China, including innovative contemporary dishes. We also offer custom-designed new recipes for your restaurant, including innovative fusion dishes and traditional Asian recipes updated to suit modern Western tastes.

For local restaurants we offer a similar range of services with the emphasis on Western and fusion cuisine, and also advise on other factors such as pricing and restaurant design.

Events and entertaining

We offer cooking classes tailored to groups from companies and other organizations. The emphasis is on a relaxed, fun atmosphere, but this is still a genuine cooking class where you and your guests can improve your cooking skills and knowledge. These classes provide a memorable experience and are suitable as team-building exercises. Click here to see a sample program for a group class. Please take a look at our customer reviews section to see how happy our guests are with their cooking classes.

To ensure each student receives full attention from the teacher, we specialise in smaller scale cooking class events with groups of eight people or fewer. Larger events may be possible in some cases, but they will generally require a simpler program, and a more expensive external venue.

We can also provide catering services for small corporate events. Because this is a small company and we emphasise quality over quantity, we may not be able to offer full catering service for larger events. If you would like to use our services for very large events we suggest you work with another caterer for the majority of your requirements, and use Jodie's Kitchen for a selection of highlight dishes. 

Television and media

Jodie speaks fluent English, Chinese and Taiwanese and is available for interviews with international media, schedule permitting. She may also be available for presentations and other speaking events. Jodie has been consulted by reporters and researchers working for a variety of media, including the Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and various book projects, including travel guides and cookbooks. Jodie's Kitchen has been recommended and reviewed by publications such as the Washington Post, Taipei Times, etc. She recently appeared on the Discovery Channel show, World Cafe: Asia, which is broadcast worldwide by the Discovery Channel, the Travel Channel, and Discovery Travel and Living. Video clips are available on request. She also provided consultancy services for this TV program.