With 'Umma,' Sarah and Nam Soon Ahn bring their family recipes to the page

Sarah Ahn and her mother Nam Soon Ahn became internet stars with the TikTok and Instagram videos Sarah Ahn created of her mom cooking traditional Korean family recipes

Now, the pair has published their first cookbook, "Umma: A Korean Mom's Kitchen Wisdom and 100 Family Recipes."

The title is especially meaningful: It means ‘mom’ in Korean, and mothers are at the heart of Korean cooking.

Sarah Ahn put together the book with the help of America’s Test Kitchen, where she’s the social media manager. And it’s already number two on the New York Times’ Best Seller list.

Nam Soon Ahn was initially hesitant about writing a cookbook.

“ Korean food, what I've learned, it's very easy to make. But there are a lot of easy steps that you have to do in order to make it truly at an umma’s level, a Korean mom's level,” Sarah Ahn says. “And [Nam Soon Ahn] was aware of that going into it, and she didn't want to disappoint anyone, and so she knew it was going to be a big labor of love. And being the wise woman that she is, she knew that without even knowing much about cookbooks and what she was getting herself into.

Nam Soon Ahn didn’t learn to cook from cookbooks. Sarah Ahn had to teach her mother how to use measuring spoons in the process.

At first, Nam Soon Ahn couldn’t take the precise measuring method seriously. Now, she uses measuring spoons to get consistent results in the kitchen.

The mother-daughter duo wrote the cookbook to pass down the tradition and legacy of Korean cuisine.

“ I'm Korean American and I'm starting to lose how to speak Korean just by living here,” Sarah Ahn says. “I learned that if I don't put in the effort to learn Korean, my ability to speak this language and pass it down, it's going to diminish. And that's the same with food. If we don't learn how to make kimchi the way our ummas make it, part of our identity, I felt like, would diminish as well. And so it was very important to us that we share recipes that have been passed down through generations and to continue that.”

Emiko Tamagawa produced and edited this interview for broadcast with Todd Mundt. Allison Hagan adapted it for the web.

By Sarah and Nam Soon Ahn

Excerpted from "Umma" by Sarah Ahn & Nam Soon Ahn. Copyright © 2025.