Hong Kong Chinese Cooking at the School of Wok

Hong Kong is one my favourite cities in the world for a gourmets holiday. It is not only the best place for amazing Chinese restaurants, but they have some top Japanese, European and International restaurants with Michelin stars too. From my time living in Hong Kong as an expat years ago, I found that they take their food very seriously.

On my trips to Hong Kong, much like my other Asian trips, I tend to plan my itinerary according to where we can get reservations to dine. I always try to rope in my friends in Hong Kong to take me to their newest haunts and over the years we have discovered some amazing places. For example, this underground Shanghainese restaurant in Central that served amazing, authentic and reasonably priced food. This place was one of those word of mouth discoveries that was housed in the back of a nondescript office building with no signs at the door.

In Hong Kong, land is scarce, property is very expensive, consequently, flats and kitchens are mostly tiny so the locals tend to eat out a lot. It’s a lucky thing that there are so many fantastic restaurants and casual eating places within easy reach. There are thousands of restaurants on the tiny island of Hong Kong and the adjoining Kowloon across the Harbour including about 75 restaurants with Michelin stars.

Being at the Southern part of China, next to Guangdong Province, most of the population are Cantonese with a smattering of Hakka. The Chinese cuisine available in Hong Kong is predominantly Cantonese but there are some exceptional Shanghainese and other regional restaurants too.

Recently, the Hong Kong tourism board hosted a Chinese cooking lesson at the School of Wok. We learnt to cook 3 dishes, a Chinese dim sum dumpling, Hong Kong fried noodles and a chicken and mushroom claypot rice. Chef Jez taught us some essential wok cooking techniques, fiddly dumpling wrapping and lots more about basic Chinese seasonings and cooking.

We all had great fun at this cooking lesson and I was especially thrilled to learn to cook the Claypot Rice. It’s time to buy one of those claypots to recreate this dish at home. Here is a video of Jez introducing the claypot rice in Hong Kong.

http://youtu.be/dJMHvxjuqf4

Hong Kong cooking (64)-001 — Our version of the Claypot Chicken and Mushroom rice

Hong Kong cooking School of Wok — Learning to fry noodles

Hong Kong cooking Deep fried Chinese Dumplings — Deep fried Chinese Dumplings

If you are planning a trip to Hong Kong, get their handy travel app. You can get help with planning your itinerary on there or take advantage of the Hong Kong Tourism board’s initiative to pair you up with a local under their Hong Kong pal programme. I’ll list some of my favourite places to eat in Hong Kong on the blog later this year.