For sisters Jeanette and Joanna Liu, running Toronto’s oldest Hakka restaurant, Yueh Tung, isn’t just about preserving a community staple: it’s about honouring the sacrifices that built it, one heaping dish of chili chicken at a time.

To appreciate Yueh Tung’s legacy, you first have to understand Hakka cuisine — a food born of a subgroup of Han Chinese immigrants who travelled from North to South China due to war, social unrest over centuries.