Who says mum can't... start a new career at 57?
Former accountant Yap Joo Eng (left), 61, co-founded Ye Traditions with her daughter Jinyen, selling handcrafted red and yellow rice wines. ST PHOTO: LIM YAOHUI
Who says mum can't... start a new career at 57?
SINGAPORE – It was more than 30 years ago that Madam Yap Joo Eng first fell in love with the traditional red rice wine that ended up kick-starting her second career.
In the late 1980s, her then prospective mother-in-law, who hailed from Fuzhou, China, had prepared the heritage dish of red wine chicken mee sua for her w hen they met for the first time.
Madam Yap, who is from the Hokkien dialect group, had never tasted it before.
She recalls: 'The colour was a scary red, but it was yummy. I fell in love with the chicken and the husband.'
Over the years, Madam Yap, now 61 with four adult children, mastered her mother-in-law's homemade recipes of red rice wine and yellow rice wine.
Rice wine dishes featured in every celebration she cooked for, from Chinese New Year to birthdays.
Madam Yap, a former accountant, also fermented her own brews when her family of six lived in Shanghai for 12 years from 2002.
Her 65-year-old husband was then working as the general manager of a multinational company in the Chinese city, while Madam Yap worked at furniture giant Ikea in Shanghai in various roles, including as a purchasing manager, site manager and internal auditor.
Later, Madam Yap moved alone to Dubai for a two-year stint at Ikea there, returning to Singapore 10 years ago. Due to health issues, she took a five-year hiatus from work.
The homebound days at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 gave her time to experiment.
Her eldest child, tech professional Yap Jinyen , 32, saw her mother brewing red rice wine at home, and asked: 'Why don't you sell it?'
Madam Yap recounts: 'I felt there was a void. I needed to find a purpose. She said, 'Mummy, you need to do something with your life', and I said, 'Let's go ahead.''
That was the start of Ye Traditions (yetraditions.com), which uses the family name. Co-founded by mother and daughter, it sells red and yellow rice wines (from $16 for a 250ml bottle), as well as other products like red rice lees (from $17) and bentong ginger tea ($30).
Bottles of yellow rice wine, bentong ginger wine and red rice wine inside Ye Traditions brewery.
ST PHOTO: LIM YAOHUI
They first sold their red rice wine online on Carousell where, to their surprise, a wait list quickly formed.
The business has since expanded. Ye Traditions opened a 200 sq ft brewery in Yio Chu Kang in April 2024, and plans to launch a retail store in Ang Mo Kio and conduct rice wine brewing courses in June .
Madam Yap says: 'People told me the taste of our rice wine is so familiar, that it reminds them of food made by their late relatives, which gave me goose bumps. It makes me passionate to continue this, even though it can be tedious.'
Part of the process involves steaming 80kg of glutinous rice in metal and bamboo steamers, over multiple batches, then leaving it to ferment for 90 to 100 days.
Madam Yap says she took a year and a few rounds of fermentation to develop the brand's bentong ginger rice wine, launched in late 2024, to her satisfaction.
Mother and daughter have discovered new aspects of each other since founding the business together.
The younger Yap says: 'There were many surprises along the way, from the demand for our products to the learning process. One that stands out is my mum's transformation. I was surprised by how much energy she poured into this second career.
'It gave her a new sense of fulfilment and identity. None of us imagined she'd take on entrepreneurship at this stage in life.'
Madam Yap says: 'I encourage all mothers to do it, to pursue their passion and career. Don't take too long to do what you want to do.
'We should put ourselves first, since the kids are all grown up. We should be good to ourselves; I'm still learning to do this.'
Venessa Lee is a senior correspondent at The Straits Times who writes features on parenting and social issues.
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