‘Showing of love’: Kansas City, Kansas, community celebrates Tao Tao restaurant chef
Annie Der walked out of her Kansas City, Kansas, restaurant as a joyful crowd outside yelled “Surprise!” and began singing happy birthday.
Customers, including police officers and firefighters — gathered outside of Tao Tao, a Chinese restaurant on Saturday afternoon, despite the cold temperatures, to celebrate the 75-year-old chef.
Der, her hair in a ponytail as is usual when she’s cooking, waved both her hands at the crowd.
“We love you, Annie,” someone shouted.
Der smiled behind her mask.
On Thursday, the Unified Government of Wyandotte County/Kansas City, Kansas passed an ordinance proclaiming Feb. 12 “Chef Annie Day.”
On Saturday, several of Der’s customers attended the surprise celebration. Most have eaten at the restaurant for decades. A few for half a century.
Mayor Tyrone Garner was there. So was Wyandotte County District Judge Tim Dupree, Kansas State Sen. David Haley, State Rep. Pam Curtis and deputy police chief Raymond Nuñez.
Dupree gave an invocation. Nuñez gifted Der with an official coin from the Kansas City, Kansas Police Department. An all of them gave her a hug.
“This is an awesome day that we all want to celebrate,” Garner said. “We all know that Wyandotte County/Kansas City, Kansas is a Unified Community of love. And this is a showing of love for you.”
The restaurant has been a staple in Kansas City, Kansas for 50 years located just a few miles from downtown.
The city has evolved since 1972, the year Tao Tao opened. The restaurant has made few changes. It’s still at its same location, 1300 Minnesota Ave. Still taking orders for their two most popular dishes: crab rangoon and Springfield Cashew Chicken — the only restaurant outside of Springfield that serves the dish and one of the reasons customers continue to flock to the restaurant.
And then there’s Der, still cooking and still giving food away for free to people in need. She has no plans of retiring soon.
Though she lives in Independence, as she’s gotten older driving has become more difficult. She doesn’t like to be late. She solved the problem by turning the restaurant building into her home, often sleeping upstairs in an apartment.
She doesn’t like attention for what she does. For her 73rd birthday, Tina Der played a prank on her mom by calling the Kansas City, Kansas, Police Department and asking officers to drive by with their sirens blaring, making Der think something had gone wrong.
When they did, Der came out panicking. Everyone else was laughing.
“Don’t you ever do anything like that again,” she told her daughter.
The beginning
When Der and her husband, Wally Der first met, she couldn’t cook, not even a bowl of gravy.
“My dad taught her everything he knew,” their daughter Tina Der said.
Wally Der was born in China as well and adopted by a Chinese family in Chicago when he was 12. The family owned Chinese restaurants and he grew up working in his family’s restaurant, cooking and dish washing. He soon moved to Kansas City and started working at Wong’s Kitchen in Olathe.
The restaurant was family owned and operated. At one point, Tina Der said, her father wanted a life like theirs: his own family-owned restaurant, with him and his wife cooking and their children helping run the operation.
But Wally Der was single and lonely, having moved to Kansas City not knowing anyone. He started writing to five pen pals in China — the family at Wong’s Kitchen helped find them. One of the women was Annie Der. She soon moved to Kansas City and married him. He was 20. She was 21.
At first, they had almost none of the money needed to start a restaurant. Wally Der worked two jobs: one at Wong’s Kitchen and the other at Kona Kai at The Plaza in Kansas City. Slowly, they saved the $8,000 they needed to open their own restaurant.
Tao Tao opened Feb 12, 1972.
It was a Saturday.
‘She’s everyone’s mom’
One aspect that has not changed in the 50 years the restaurant has been open is Der’s love for her customers. It’s not uncommon for Tina Der to get on her mom for giving people food for free.
“People’s gotta eat,” her mother often replies.
Tina Der put it simply at the Saturday’s ceremony: “She’s everyone’s mom.”
The restaurant has become a staple in the lives of customers, passed down through the decades.
Todd Hosseini began going to Tao Tao in 1978, when he was attending Donnelly College in Kansas City, Kansas. It was tough, he remembered, being a college student and living on a student’s budget.
“I’m just barely making it,” Hosseini, 60, remembered.
Hosseini wouldn’t just leave the restaurant with what he ordered — which was usually crab rangoon — but with more than he’d expected.
“She would give you a whole bunch of things besides what your regular order was,” he said.
Hosseini started becoming a regular. His kids eat there too.
Stephanie Campbell, 34, has been coming to Tao Tao from the age she first starting forming memories. She stops by about twice a week.
She marvels that Der is still working there at age 75.
“She’s supposed to somewhere with her feet kicked up,” Campbell said.
Wally Der retired in April and does not spend as much time at the restaurant these days.
But other aspects haven’t changed much. The bathroom is still around the corner. The arcade games up against the wall still work. The food is just as good. And Annie Der is still back in the kitchen.
“She’s been so loyal, so you can’t do anything but be loyal to her,” Campbell said.
