20th Nov 2014, today, Erik and I had our lesson back to the traditional venue – Tamk’s classroom. We utilized the class room at H0-27, and I believe that both of us had a nice time there. Before this lesson we’ve already met up quite a few times in some more casual settings, like café, canteen, badminton and so on. I could see that Erik was knee to be back in the classroom again!
Our topic today was Chinese regional cuisines. As the topic of food, I was quite excited and confident in teaching, as this is the major I have already been studying for 2 years. (My major is Culinary Arts) I have learnt different Asian cuisines back in my Uni, so talking about the major Chinese cuisines was at ease for me. There are in fact 8 different Chinese cuisines, and they are distinguished by their unique ‘using of ingredients’ and ‘methods of cooking’. However I felt introducing him all the 8 different Chinese cuisines was way too much for him to enjoy and absorb our lesson, so I decided to shortlist down 3 major Chinese cuisines, they are Chuan cuisine, Beijing cuisine, and Yue (HongKong) cuisine. One is my hometown, one is my current residence in China, and one is the place I have traveled to. As a bonus in the end, I have also introduced him some specialties from Malaysia.
I have to admit that, it was quite a personal sort of proud out of my hometown’s food that I talked lengths on Chuan cuisine. But as a chili lover, I could tell that Eric was pretty much fascinated and surprised by the signature dish out of my hometown – hotpot! His eyes went sparking and saliva formed a waterfall, while we were looking at some videos about foreigners trying hotpot in Chongqing.
What I have delivered to him in this lesson were certainly:
- The differences btw hotpots in Chuan regions and Beijing.
- Chinese don’t eat bugs as much as southeastern Asians do, however we are the ultimate winner for eating animal inner organs and some other weird parts.
- The signature dish of Chongqing – Hotpot.
- The signature dish of Beijing – Beijing duck.
- The signature dish of HongKong – Dim Sum.
- The signature dish of Malaysia – Nasi Lemak.
- China as a country doesn’t really have a national dish, if there has to be some; I guess probably they must consist of the signature dishes out of each and every 8 regional cuisines.
- How some parts of China could eat food at the craziest spicy level, and how some parts couldn’t take it at all.
- Hotpot meal is a social meal.
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