Morning Brew - 🍳Made with Lau

Time-saving tools and products we’re really into rn.

🫠 Got a jet engine loud air conditioner? In this heat? A Sidekick staff fav, the Midea air conditioner, has a special U-shaped design so you can still open and close the window with the unit installed. It’s super quiet and has a remote smart control to chill your pad before you get home.

Traveling is all fun and games until you’re delirious for two days with jet lag. Jump ahead of the clock with Timeshifter and adjust your sleep schedule before you land. (And if you need more apps for your trip, check out our full list.)

If you want to spill the tea about your manager, do it over a margarita far, far away from the office—and definitely not on the company laptop or Slack. Your boss could be reading your messages, and that’s not going to work out well for anyone.

“I find that gratitude helps me stay grounded and appreciative for everything that’s happening because we’ve grown really quickly. It helps to remind me that there are a lot of things that had to [come together to] get to where we are.”

Randy Lau is the genius behind the Made With Lau YouTube channel, which has over 800k subscribers. He and his dad, a former chef, make classic Chinese dishes like sticky rice ball soup, mapo tofu, and char siu—meals that come straight from his family’s kitchen.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Kickoff: “[My mornings are] kind of all over the place right now. We just had our second kid, [and] she’s three months old, so I feel like every two weeks she has a new leap. So we’re still adapting. I used to have a really regimented morning routine. I’d write in a gratitude journal and then meditate and reflect. But that’s moved to nighttime now, when the kids are asleep and I have time to do stuff I used to do in the mornings.”

Starting Made With Lau: “My dad is this super talented chef. He’s been cooking for 50 years, and he used to have his own restaurant. I was spoiled with all this amazing food growing up. And I have so many memories of eating it. And even though we had a language barrier, I never doubted that he loved me because food was our love language.

I pitched my parents the idea. And my mom was on board very quickly after I explained how YouTube monetization works…My dad is not that expressive. So I didn’t have a read on [him]. If he had decided that he wasn’t excited about it, there’d be no way this would’ve worked because [these are his] recipes. But then the next day, he was like, ‘Hey, I defrosted some pork. You want to come and film?’ And I was like, ‘Dude, I’m not ready!’”

Finding his identity: “I’m the son of two immigrants. My parents were both born and raised in China, and they came here in the 1980s. So growing up, I was straddling two different cultures. I never felt Chinese enough because I’m not fluent in Chinese. [A lot of] my relatives are more well-versed in Chinese culture and language than I am. So I always felt kind of insecure about that. The flip side was living in a suburb in California, [where] I didn’t feel American enough. So I’ve always felt this kind of hyphenated identity [that] I think a lot of people can relate to. Wanting to deepen my understanding of Chinese culture has always been a driving force for me.”

Finding balance: “I’m grateful I have this much excitement and passion for what I’m doing. But it’s hard to turn off. I’m still working on that balance. When we started out, it was just me, and I treated it like a full-time business even though we weren’t making money. From the day we launched on September 1, 2020, I was putting in 60-hour weeks—editing, promoting, [and] filming. I was constantly on the verge of burnout. But in June 2021, I started hiring people [since] our growth had accelerated quite a bit. That was a huge shift for me.”

Advice for saving family recipes: “My dad cooks with a lot of intuition. So if I left him to his own devices, he would just cook in silence and not say anything. So I think having a video camera on, even if you don’t plan on publishing it, will help. Also, a big thing was forcing my dad to use standard measuring tools. When we started, he would just use random bowls and cups. And I’d be like, ‘No one’s gonna know how to replicate this because they don’t have this bowl.’ Then I’d say, ‘Please, please, use a teaspoon.’ Be inquisitive, try to ask a lot of questions, [and] just have fun with it.”—MW

Your punch list for when you punch out.

Read: It’s time to kill the election coverage paywall! A recent Poynter article points out the obvious, which is that true democracy doesn’t exist when major news outlets keep their stories inaccessible to those who need them most.

Listen: The podcast Sorry About The Kid follows Alex McKinnon as he tries to understand the tragedy around his older brother, who died when a speeding police car hit him at 14 years old. Delving into grief and the nature of trauma and memory, McKinnon takes the listener on a tough but important journey.

Drink: Follow this recipe to wow your buddies with strawberry Starburst jello shots. They look just like mini watermelon slices! What more could you ask for?

Candid convos with industry icons: Hosted by Brew co-founder Alex Lieberman, the Imposters podcast delves deep into the personal and mental challenges some of the biggest names in biz have faced while reaching their most resounding achievements. Listen here.

Burning questions of our time.

Mental health on a schedule:

When you wake up with chills and a fever, you call up your boss and take a sick day (I hope). But when you wake up feeling sad and unmotivated—like you just can’t get out of bed—do you do the same?

As wellness issues in the workplace have become less taboo, companies started adding scheduled mental health days into benefits, and they built mental health programs for employees. But workers still feel guilty about taking unscheduled mental health days, even when they’re necessary. Should it be required to give advance notice for mental health days? Or is it OK to take one as suddenly as any other sick day? Hit Reply and let us know your thoughts in the Inbox!—SS

And now, your thoughts on explaining résumé gaps:

“It’s worth a bullet point on your résumé because hiring managers always do the math. I’ve seen a lot more people being more candid on their résumés of late, putting in qualifiers like ‘Covid layoff,’ ‘caregiver leave,’ ‘illness,’ ‘sabbatical,’ ‘three-month intensive pottery retreat,’ etc., and I respect the hell out of that. There’s no need to be apologetic for a global pandemic, making a career pivot, or taking care of a family member or your mental or physical health.”—Beth