Fuchsia Dunlop

Last week Barshu (the Sichuanese restaurant where I work as consultant) ran a team-building awayday for some corporate clients in the beautiful private room on the second floor.  The programme? A demonstration by two of the chefs, Xiao Wei and Xiao Hua, followed by a Chinese wine-tasting and a fabulous banquet. Xiao Wei and Xiao Hua showed the guests how to wrap various kinds of jiaozi dumplings, glutinous rice balls (tang yuan), and leaf-wrapped glutinous rice zongzi – the latter particularly appropriate as the event took place on the Dragon Boat Festival 端午节, when they are traditionally eaten. Some of the guests had a go themselves. And then they tasted a few Chinese wines and some sake, and then sat down to feast…

The pictures show Xiao Wei wrapping zongzi (top), Xiao Hua making tangyuan (right), and one of the guests trying his hand at wrapping jiaozi (below left).

One of the great things about having Chinese friends is that they really know how to look after you when you’re ill! I dropped into the restaurant for which I work as a consultant, Barshu, earlier this week with a rotten cold, and the manager, Juanzi, told me I should be eating 粥 (congee). She persuaded me to stay for half an hour while the chefs whipped some up in a pressure cooker – and so I left with a wonderful potful of sleek congee laced with slivered ginger, sliced 皮蛋 (preserved duck eggs, a.k.a. ‘Thousand-year-old eggs’), and pork ribs so tender they were falling off the bone. Oh, and two little packages of pickled vegetables to eat with the congee, and another potful of stewed Chinese honey dates 蜜棗 with crystal sugar. Yum yum.

Have any of you blog readers had similar experiences? What are your favourite Chinese comfort foods?