Chef Natascha Hess has made a name for herself in recent years. She showcased her expertise in Asian cooking on episodes of “Beat Bobby Flay” and “Chopped.” In September, her Denver restaurant Ginger Pig received a Bib Gourmand in Colorado’s inaugural Michelin Guide for its high-quality, affordable Pan-Asian cuisine.
Hess learned to cook traditional Chinese and Asian fusion dishes from the family she lived with in Beijing during summers as a college exchange student from the University of Wisconsin. She cooked meals with the mother and daughter, Nalu and Na Zhang, learning recipes like Chinese borscht, dumplings and Yu Xiang Qiezi (Sichuan eggplant) — now her signature dish.
“It blew my mind when I first had it,” Hess said. “It was the first thing I’ve ever eaten that was sour, spicy, sweet, salty, umami, everything in one bite.”
Now in her 40s, Hess spent five years perfecting her Sichuan eggplant recipe, aiming to recreate how she prepared it with the Zhangs. It came down to finding the right doubanjiang, a mixture of fermented fava bean and chili paste, for the eggplant’s garlic, ginger and scallion sauce.
“Normal recipes don’t take me years,” Hess said, but she wanted to find the balance of flavors she experienced when cooking with her host family. “It took me years and years to make [it] good enough that I felt like I could share with people.”
Sichuan eggplant is on the menu at Ginger Pig in Denver, which Hess opened in 2020. It is also featured at her new eatery in Boulder.
In late October, Ginger Pig launched on University Hill with a Pan-Asian dinner menu inspired by Hess’ travels abroad. Starting this month, Ginger Pig added lunch hours and is now open from noon to 8 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday, in a 400-square-foot kitchen with a walk-up window.
“It’s basically like a food truck,” Hess said, a fitting description considering the restaurant’s origins.
Ginger Pig started as a food truck in Boulder in summer 2016. It was one of the first food trucks at Rayback Collective and the first at the Boulder County Farmers Market. In 2019, Ginger Pig moved from the truck to Rosetta Hall, where it was one of the inaugural stalls before closing in 2020 to open in Denver.
“This was our home, and it’s exciting to come back” after more than three years, Hess said. “Boulder supported us for years. It’s like going back to our roots.”
Ginger Pig’s Boulder menu includes signature dishes from its food truck days, alongside recipes Hess developed for The Hill location. Because of its proximity to CU Boulder’s campus, the new Ginger Pig offers several grab-and-go options for students, mainly banh mi sandwiches.
While the classic banh mi comes with Vietnamese cold cuts, house-made pâté, cucumber, pickled daikon and carrots, there are also variations with sardines and hot dogs. Hess said the “‘taiko tots,” tater tots sprinkled with furikake and served with cod roe mayo, also make a good on-the-go snack.
In Denver, Ginger Pig serves entrees with Thai jasmine rice and a Chinese smashed cucumber salad. Boulder offers options like Sichuan eggplant and bo luc lac (Vietnamese shaking beef with ribeye, onions, scallions, tomatoes and garlic butter sauce) as a rice bowl, banh mi sandwich, banh mi rice bowl or a rice noodle bowl.
Also unique to Boulder is the tom yum noodle, a spaghetti dish with Alba white, brown hon-shimeji, trumpet royale and velvet pioppinni mushrooms, plus shrimp and tomatoes. For winter, Hess is adding sipping broth to Boulder’s menu, along with kimchi stew with pork and house-smoked barbecue tofu.
Hess created her cornflake-crusted Hong Kong French toast with coconut jam for dessert for The Hill’s location. Due to its popularity — “people are saying it’s the best thing I’ve ever made,” Hess said — it has been added to the Denver menu as well.
‘Somewhat authentic, somewhat fusion and somewhat playful’
In 2001, Hess moved to Denver to work as a TV production assistant. Two years later, she pursued a law degree at the University of Denver, starting her own firm in 2006. But in 2015, she decided to change careers again when her best friend from college was diagnosed with ALS.
“I was so unhappy at my job, and I was realizing that you really don’t know how long you’ve got. You better do something you like,” Hess said. Inspired by her college summers in Beijing and backpacking trips through Manila, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, Hess thought of the cuisine that defined her travels.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about the food that I’d eaten and thinking about how I couldn’t go get that anywhere,” Hess said. “I wanted to make it and share it with people.”
So in 2015, Hess began developing a food truck menu with help from her husband, Steve, who worked in a restaurant for eight years. Though he has a day job in biotech, Steve helped run the food truck in the evenings and on weekends, helping create many of Ginger Pig’s initial dishes.
“Our food is somewhat authentic, somewhat fusion and somewhat playful,” Hess said. “A lot of it starts from things we’ve [eaten], or even just things we have on hand.” An example is a Vietnamese cold noodle salad the food truck sold. One day, Hess poured the salad’s dressing over watermelon, which isn’t traditionally Vietnamese, because she thought it would taste good. She added it to the menu.
“I try to make sure that I’m covering all the countries that I’ve been to and love,” Hess said. When she travels, Hess said she sometimes eats seven meals a day, taking cooking classes, visiting farms and signing up for food tours around town. “I spend a lot of time doing as much learning about food as possible.”
Earlier this year, Hess traveled to Asia for the first time since 1999.
“My sous chef in Denver was like, ‘I hope, when you go, you’ll remember why you fell in love with all of this in the first place.’ And that’s exactly what happened.”
In May 2024, Hess will return to China to visit her host family’s daughter, Na, for the first time in almost 25 years. Na’s mother passed away before Ginger Pig opened, but Na has shared her appreciation for the restaurant over phone calls and emails.
“I’m excited to go see her, cook for her and cook with her,” Hess said.
Ginger Pig is open Tuesday through Sunday, noon to 8 p.m., at 1203 13th Street in Boulder.
