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).

Last night I went to a press screening of Food Inc, Robert Kenner’s film about the corporate takeover of the American (and global) agricultural and food industries. For anyone who has read Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma,  or Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation, many of the issues, and even the characters, will be familiar – Pollan and Schlosser both appear in the film – but that doesn’t make it any less chilling. Most shocking was its account of the bullying tactics used by big agro-food corporations to silence their critics, and of the cosy relationship they have with those in power. Continue reading…

At the wine and food congress

I was in Singapore, for the first time, in October, as a panellist at the International Congress of Chinese Cuisine and Wine (ICCCW). I’ll be writing more about the trip later, but I just wanted to mention a small but thought-provoking incident. A young Singaporean Chinese woman came up to me during one of the conference dinners and complimented me on my use of chopsticks, saying that she was unable to use them so proficiently herself. ‘My parents never taught me how to eat with chopsticks,’ she said, ‘because they didn’t feel it was important these days. Actually this is common among my generation. Now some of the local clan associations are so concerned about this that they are running classes for the younger generation in how to use chopsticks, as well as language classes in various Chinese dialects.’ Continue reading…

I’m finally back in London after a crazy month’s travelling: first to Sydney for its International Food Festival, then to Singapore for a food and wine conference, then to Hong Kong and, at the end, Barcelona!

The Sydney food festival was a gathering of chefs and food-writers from all over Australia, Asia, and further afield, including Tetsuya Wakuda, Peter Gordon, David Thomson, Kylie Kwong, Neil Perry and Alvin Leung. The photograph on the left, taken at the opening night of the World Chef’s Showcase, was taken by Marco del Grande of the Sydney Morning Herald. Continue reading…

There’s an article about me today in the Sydney Morning Herald in Australia! (I’ll be talking at the Sydney Food Festival in October.)

I’m in Manchester for the weekend for the end of the International Festival, and in particular for Sunday’s Festival Feast. I was invited to contribute a recipe for this feeding-of-two-thousand event, and offered the recipe for Zhong dumplings from Sichuan Cookery, which is being made up by the well-known local restaurant Yang Sing. I think I’ll be saying a few words as people sit down to eat.

Great fun to be here, anyway. I manage to catch a Bach cello concert at lunchtime in the Zaha Hadid pavilion, and have just got back to the hotel after seeing Laurie Anderson and Lou Reed at the Palace Theatre – amazing!

Quite a few people have been emailing me to ask if I do any cooking classes, so I wanted to let any readers of this website know that I will be doing at least one at the Divertimenti Cooking School in central London in November.

In October, I’ll also be appearing at the Sydney International Food Festival in Australia.  I’ll be doing a demonstration of Sichuanese homestyle dishes myself, and a presentation with my friend Yu Bo, who is one of the most talented chefs I’ve met in more than a decade of eating in China. (He is featured in the ‘Rubber Factor’ chapter of my book ‘Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper’. )

On Monday night I went to the awards ceremony for Restaurant magazine’s annual survey of the ‘World’s Fifty Best Restaurants’. Predictably, and I think deservedly, El Bulli took the top spot for the fourth year running, and Ferran Adria and his brother Albert were there to receive the award. But once again the only Chinese restaurant on the list was Hakkasan – in London! I’m a great fan of the dim sum at Hakkasan, and I love the design, but the best Chinese restaurant in the world?! Come on…

I’ll be giving a lecture over a dinner inspired by my books at the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts in Norwich, on Wednesday 25th March. It’s part of their China China China!!! season.

For details, click here.

Thanks to Andi Sapey for the photograph.

I’ll be speaking at various events in China next month as part of the Bookworm Literary Festival. One of the highlights will be a lunch at one of my favourite Chengdu restaurants, Yu’s Family Kitchen (there is a chapter about Chef Yu Bo and his cooking in Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper). Click on the links for each city for more information.

These are my plans so far:

CHENGDU

Friday 6th March 7:30pm Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper, talk

Saturday 7th March 1pm Talk over a sumptuous lunch at my friend Yu Bo’s restaurant, yu jia chu fang

SUZHOU

Sunday 9th March 7.30pm: Savoring Sichuan, talk

Tuesday 11th March 8pm: Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A discussion on memoir writing with Fuchsia Dunlop and MC Marika de Vienne

BEIJING

Friday 13th March 12.30pm: Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper, talk

Saturday 14th March 2pm (at The Yin Yang Centre): Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper, talk

Yu Bo's vegetarian appetisers, 2004