Advanced Recipes and Banquet Menus

This chapter contains lots of great recipes that I have cooked in my restaurants and at home. They all work brilliantly both as a simple dinner with a bowl of rice or as part of a beautiful shared table for family and friends. They exemplify the ideals of ‘balance and harmony’ with all the flavours adding up to a delicious total. I hope you enjoy making them.

Make sure one flavour doesn’t dominate your food. Look to balance each dish — not too sweet, not too salty, not too hot or sour. Look for clean flavours that leave a pleasant, long aftertaste — length of flavour is so important in food and wine. You are, in many cases, dealing with bigger flavours than we are used to in Western cooking.