Shirley Fong-Torres

Shirley Fong-Torres was a chef, tour operator, and popular travel and food writer based in San Francisco, California, US.

Early life

Fong-Torres was born on November 16, 1946. Her father was Ricardo Torres. Due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, Fong-Torres' father, changed his surname to Torres and posed as a Filipino in order to immigrate to the United States. His family later adopted the hyphenated surname, Fong-Torres. As a child, she worked in her father's restaurants in Hayward and Oakland's Chinatown.

Education

Fong-Torres was a graduate of Oakland High School and the University of California, Berkeley.

Career

Early in her career, Fong-Torres worked at Levi Strauss as an operations manager in women's merchandising and taught middle school. She later founded Wok Wiz Chinatown Tours, which still offers cultural and culinary themed tours to locals and tourists. She developed the popular specialty tour "I Can't Believe I Ate My Way Through Chinatown." Wok Wiz Chinatown Tours continues today, led by her daughter, Tina Dong Pavao.
Shirley published four books: "Wok Wiz Chinatown Tour Cookbook", "San Francisco Chinatown: A Walking Tour", “In The Chinese Kitchen With Shirley Fong-Torres”, and "The Woman Who Ate Chinatown" .

Personal life

Fong-Torres' brother Ben Fong-Torres is an American rock journalist, author, and broadcaster.
Fong-Torres died of leukemia on June 18, 2011.