Fuchsia Dunlop On Duck, Slithery Things and Proving Herself to Chinese Cooks
Fuchsia Dunlop is a champion of Chinese cuisine, responsible for opening new worlds of the country's regional foods to Western readers. But besides writing beautifully about Sichuan, Hunan and other cuisines, she's also got a fierce way with the wok herself.
Tomorrow, Ms. Dunlop will host a lunch at Capital M featuring dishes from her own cookbooks, after which she'll be talking about her latest food explorations. We've just been told the event is already fully booked, but in our experience it never hurts to keep calling back to check on cancellations, perhaps even through tomorrow morning (6702 2727).
In the meantime, we've asked Fuchsia all about her early exposure to Chinese food, how to prove to Chinese chefs that a laowai can in fact make a good yuxiang qiezi, and the strange animals she's eaten:
What’s the first ever Chinese dish you cooked?
A fish braised in chilli bean sauce, from Yan-kit So's Classic Chinese Cookbook.
What’s the Chinese dish that made you fall in love with Chinese food? A few dishes I shared with a couple of local friends in Chengdu in 1993, including fish-fragrant aubergines, fire-exploded kidney flowers and cold chicken in a chilli oil sauce. That lunch was a revelation, and was one of the reasons I decided to return to the city to study the following year.
Do you ever come across Chinese folks who are skeptical that a foreigner can cook Chinese cuisine as well as you? I suspect Chinese people are always skeptical about a foreigner like me cooking their food! Once I asked a restaurant in southern Sichuan if I could observe for a few hours in their kitchen, and they challenged me to prove my mettle by cooking a dish. So I went into the kitchen, found the ingredients I needed, and under the scrutiny of about a dozen chefs and kitchen staff, made them a mapo tofu. They were pretty surprised to see that I could make it properly, and let me stay!
What recipe are you most excited about in your newest book, Every Grain of Rice?
I love the twice-cooked chards, which is a recipe taught to me by the brilliant Sichuanese chef Yu Bo. It's a perfect example of the ability of Sichuanese cooks to use fermented seasonings to transform a cheap, common vegetable into something scrumptious.
What Westernized Chinese dish is your guilty pleasure?
The crispy aromatic duck with pancakes that is ubiquitous in London's Cantonese restaurants: It's basically an easy version of Peking duck, and delicious.
What have you found to be the hardest Chinese ingredient or dish to convince people in the UK to eat?
Slithery, rubbery things tend to be the hardest sell, but my friends are quite adventurous, and I don't cook the most challenging things for public cooking demonstrations!
Is there anything in Chinese cuisine that you won’t eat, due to either ethics or preference?
Ethically, I try to avoid foods that are not environmentally sustainable, culturally I'll eat anything.
Have you ever eaten dog? Or monkey?
I have eaten dog, but not monkey.
Do you adhere to TCM or other traditional Chinese practices which suggest eating certain foods at certain times of the year?
I use TCM at home in London as well as in China, and I'm strongly influenced by the Chinese approach to diet.
What is your favorite cuisine besides Chinese?
English or Turkish.
What is an English dish or ingredient that you think would benefit from a Chinese treatment?
Many dishes, including salads and cooked vegetables, would benefit from a Chinese approach to cutting, and the flavours of fish, meat and poultry can all be enhanced by using Chinese blanching and marinating techniques.
Where in England have you found the best Chinese food?
For restaurant cooking, either the dim sum at Royal China Club or the Sichuanese food at Barshu (for whom I work as a consultant). For home cooking, the Shanghainese dishes made by a Shanghainese friend in London.
You’ve just gotten home late from work with no time to cook a big meal ... what do you eat?
A bowlful of buckwheat noodles with Sichuanese seasonings and a fried egg on top, and a salad of smacked cucumber or slivered kohlrabi.
Are there still Chinese meals that surprise you/absolutely blow your mind?
Yes, all the time. The most recent was possibly one in Hong Kong that involved suckling pig with the most shatteringly delicious skin. But the week before I had some amazing food in Hangzhou.
What’s the first food item you head for when you return to England? What about when you arrive in China?
In London – hummus. In China – it depends completely on the region, but perhaps fresh bamboo shoots, which are divine and totally unobtainable in England.
How do you stay in shape?
I'm not sure that I really am in shape! But I try to intersperse the gluttonous episodes with periods of gentler and more vegetarian eating, and to get some exercise.
Photo: Courtesy of Capital M
