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Eat Bitter

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

Eat bitter is a Chinese proverb meaning ‘endure hardship to taste sweetness.’ For Lydia Pang, it embodies the struggles of her Hakka ancestors, a persecuted Chinese ethnic group whose ingenuity shaped a food culture rooted in fermenting and foraging.

Pang reimagines eating bitter as a philosophy to confront her own challenges: burning out, testing her marriage, navigating fertility struggles and caring for a parent. Through eight recipes, she shares food as memory and medicine: the silly egg noodles her father cooked when her sister was ill, the bone broth she boiled in New York while homesick and courgettes grown in rural Wales as a gesture of reconnection.

Eat Bitter is a beautiful and fearless exploration of food and feelings – with bite – for fans of Crying in H Mart, Butter and Midnight Chicken.

‘Touching, absorbing and unflinching… shows you how to stomach life’s shit, celebrate the ugly, and keep going' Angela Hui

© Lydia Pang 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026

Critics Review

'A beautiful book about family and food ... potent, honest, and unapologetic ...I wolfed it down'
Emma Gannon
'Bold, honest and utterly relatable ...shows how food can be medicine, memory and a lifeline all at once.'
Service95
'A riveting nosedive into the blood and guts of food, family and self compassion. Lydia Pang writes with raw passion straight from the heart, leaving us well fed, but still ravenous for more. A beautiful book.'
Tobi Coventry

'What Lydia Pang fearlessly captures in Eat Bitter is a glimpse into the life of a creative.
Nurturing and brave, her story inspires and her recipes warm.'

Danny Bowien
'Incredible... Pang beautifully explores what’s really important in our lives, while offering recipes that bring solace. You’ll be handing this book out to everyone you know.'
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