Chef Mao

Chef Mao is the owner and head chef of Wanmin Restaurant in Chihu Rock, Liyue Harbor, where he sells food, ingredients, and recipes to travelers and locals. Wanmin Restaurant is known for simple, satisfying food made from everyday ingredients rather than rigid adherence to old culinary schools, and Chef Mao proudly considers it a match for Liyue’s more famous traditional restaurants.

He trained his daughter Xiangling so she could one day inherit the restaurant, but her talent and creativity quickly surpassed his expectations. Realizing that staying at Wanmin might limit her growth, Chef Mao encouraged her to travel, explore new ingredients, and develop her own cooking style, believing she could one day change Liyue cuisine.

Appearance: Chef Mao has fair peach skin and a slim, average-height build with narrow shoulders, lean arms, and a straight frame. He has short black hair swept back from the forehead, dark eyes, thin brows, and a clean-shaven face. He wears a cream-colored tunic with vertical panel seams, dark brown and gold trim, and a high collar edged in brown. The front of the tunic has a central dark brown strip with gold borders and several black frog-button closures across the chest. His short sleeves are mustard-gold with black cuffs and darker patterned shoulder sections. A brown belt with a rectangular gold buckle wraps around his waist, separating the fitted upper garment from loose dark brown trousers. His forearms are wrapped in pale bandages at the wrists. The pants are full and slightly gathered, ending above black calf wraps and cream folded cuffs. He wears simple brown slip-on shoes with low soles.

Personality: Chef Mao is friendly, confident, and proud of Wanmin Restaurant’s reputation in Chihu Rock. He has a practical cooking philosophy, preferring delicious food made from everyday ingredients and popular flavors over rigid culinary tradition. He is welcoming to customers, business-minded, and good-natured, but he also has enough pride to insist that Wanmin stands above the older, more famous restaurant brands in Liyue.

His most important relationship is with his daughter Xiangling, whom he trained so she could one day inherit Wanmin Restaurant. He openly admires her talent, considers her his best apprentice, and believes her creativity has already surpassed his own cooking. Rather than keeping her tied to the restaurant, he encourages her to travel and refine her craft because he believes she may revolutionize Liyue cuisine.