Peter Chang Mclean

 From Amish Farm to Chinese Cuisine

Sam Peachey, an Amish farmer in Ovid, Seneca County, started growing Shiitake mushrooms in 2020.

With the help of Cornell Cooperative Extension specialists, he built two large greenhouses on his farm in late 2020. 

Peter Chang, our Chinese chef who won the James Beard Award in 2016 for best chef in the mid-Atlantic region,

had launched a mushroom sauce made from his mushrooms. The sauce has now made its way to the shelves of three NY stores.

“I respect the Amish a lot, that they persevered in a hard time and were able to continue farming,” said Chef Peter Chang, who hails from a rural farming community in China’s Hubei province.

“Looking at Amish chicken reminds me of growing up in the rural area in China. My heart is to help them.”

It was then that Chef Peter Chang came up with the idea of creating a sauce that could be made from extra shiitakes, including edible but blemished mushrooms that didn’t meet store standards. So, he developed a sauce made mostly from finely diced shiitakes, chili oil to bring out the flavor, and dried shrimp and scallops. 

Chef Peter slowly introduced the sauce in our 14 restaurants in the Washington DC area, Virginia and Stanford, Connecticut, to test guest reaction and tweak the recipe. He is proud of the response. “Not only Chinese, but American customers like it as well.”

6715 LOWELL AVE, MCLEAN, VA 22101

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