The Techniques

Appears in

Published 1985

About

Let us begin with two premises: One, virtually everybody loves Chinese food. Two, virtually everybody knows that to prepare it is most difficult, too time-consuming, that the culinary world of the wok and the cleaver is not for the non-Chinese. Well, the first premise is true; the second is nonsense.

Learning to cook in the Chinese manner is not difficult. I have taught many people to cook everything from perfectly boiled rice to Peking Duck. It is true that Chinese food of all regions and of all varieties can be enjoyed in restaurants today, but that should be no excuse for not learning what is surely one of the most creative and varied cuisines in the world. Not to learn it at home is to cheat yourself out of the satisfaction and well-being that come with creation. Chinese cookery, perhaps more than any other, is constantly changing, being added to, being altered by the creativity of its practitioners. It is a living cuisine.