(Joyful music) (energetic music) (audience applauding) - Today, let us consider the oldest argument in the .. What came first, the chicken or the eggs?

The answer is, huh?

Who cares?

(audience laughing) As long as there's chicken every wok, I am happy, you are happy.

Some people prefer food for thought, and I prefer thoughts on food.

Every night, I dream of chicken, I dream of beef, I dream of everything.

I'm gonna show you a very interesting dish.

This particular dish, if you have ever been in Southeast Asia, you have seen this.

There's no one culture in the world does not have a great recipe for chicken soup.

In Thai restaurant, this is a hot and spicy chicken soup.

Here, I am going to bring this pot of broth to a boil.

Okay, high heat.

And I am going to add a few slice of ginger.

One, two, three.

If you want more, you cut more.

One, two, three.

And you set it aside and you transfer it and you put over here.

And also, we're going to use some lemongrass.

This is a herb, a fresh herb, and I grow it at home myself.

You can also buy in the store.

When you use this, this is quite woody and fibrous, so you do not use this part.

And you do not use this part.

And you use this part, okay?

And you can cut it up like this.

One, two.

And then you, all you have to do is press this a little bit and then get the flavor out.

Press this and get the flavor out.

Sometimes, some of the dishes, you also slice it like this.

One, two, three, four, five.

One of those days, I'm going to sit around and watch my grass grow when I retire.

Now put them all over here, get the flavor out.

This is step number one, okay?

Now, this particular dish, also of course use a piece of chicken here.

But I wanna show you very quickly how fast you can get the chicken out after I put this in, okay?

Look at this.

One, cut this off first.

And then after finish this, I'll show you how you can get the chicken out.

Two, cut into slice.

Stack them all up, stack them up, to see how you fast you can cut it, okay?

One, two, three, four, five.

Show you how fast you can transfer food from here to here, okay?

(knife clattering) Once again, here to here.

(knife clattering) (audience applauding) When this bring to boil, we'll put the chicken in because we already get all the nice flavor out.

So we put that in.

This how you do it, that's why you have a good knife, because the knife, a Chinese chef knife, have this nice wide blade.

So use as a spatula, you can put it in.

And use your chopstick to stir a little bit, to break it up.

Otherwise, you gonna end up having a gigantic chicken ball.

Okay?

Now you break this up, and then the next thing I wanna show you is, we also put the remaining ingredient.

We have some straw mushroom.

Can you see the straw mushroom?

This is straw mushroom.

We put a few of these straw mushroom in it.

And also, for hot and spiciness, this is what we're gonna do.

We're gonna put a tiny bit of serrano or jalapeno.

One.

Whenever you touch this, you should always make sure after you finish, wash your finger before you touch anywhere sensitive.

Your lips, your eyes, and your skin, okay?

Otherwise, you will be jumping all over for five hours.

Put them all together, get some hot and spicy taste into your soup.

And also, since I know many of you like hot and spicy food, so we use small.

How many of you in the audience, or you at home, like hot and spicy food?

Raise your hand.

Everybody.

You at home forget to raise your hand.

(audience laughing) You put it right over here.

And then, also about quarter of a cup of lime juice.

This is lime juice, fresh lime juice.

Bring it to a boil, okay?

And when it's almost ready, you put some coconut milk.

Put it right here.

Now one of those days, for the diet-conscious, they gonna up with skim coconut milk.

You notice that I just add some lime into this soup.

I'm putting lime in the coconut.

(audience laughing) Now.

Straw mushroom, put it right here, so you have a beautiful.

Straw mushroom, but not a whole jalapeno.

It's not cut, this is not cut, don't put it in there.

When this is almost ready, right before you serve, you can also put some Thai basil to put around.

But I wanna show you.

Normally, you buy coconut in a can like this, okay?

You can actually buy coconut, look at this, you can see this coconut.

This coconut milk, you can buy them in a can.

Here, I wanna show everybody how fast and how easy it is to get your chicken breast out.

(knife clattering) (audience applauding) One, everybody look.

Now you, I want you at home particularly, pay absolute attention and concentrate in complete silence, please.

Breast bone.

This is the breast bone.

Wish bone.

I'm gonna one cut over here.

And one cut over here.

And I turn upside down.

In split seconds.

And I cut right at the back, but try not to cause any damage to the most delicate portion of the chicken.

We're gonna make chicken surprise with this.

Three, two, one.

Gonna show you how fast you can get the chicken breast out.

One out.

This is the chicken thigh, one out.

This is the filet, one out.

Turn it to the other side.

Make sure the whole chicken breast come out.

Thigh.

Come out.

The filet, come out.

The whole this is done.

(audience applauding) You can see that.

One, two, three.

See how fast it is?

The whole thing comes out.

This is how easy it is to get the chicken breast out of the whole chicken.

Why we are doing this and check our soup?

We are going to look it up and make sure this is okay and ready right before we are going to get some basil.

Make sure you can even put a couple of these inside or julienne this when it's nice and done.

You are going to get this hot and spicy with a lemongrass flavor, hot and spicy chicken soup.

(audience applauding) Marvelous!

The coconut has many nutty faces and forms.

And here are few interesting examples.

Everybody knows this is a whole coconut with the whole shell on.

When you open it up, you see the coconut flesh like this.

You can use some coconut to make candy coconut like this or shredded coconut.

You can also buy coconut jam in the store in a can like this, very popular in Thai cuisine, Vietnamese cu.. You can have coconut milk.

See, looks like milk.

And then also have some shredded coconut with sugar, like a candy, sweet coconut shredded.

This is you know what this is, this is coconut vinegar.

Very interesting.

Aside from this, a lot of Chinese restaurant, when they make a elegant dessert called tapioca.

Honeydew melon, like this.

Inside there, right before they serve this, put in a tiny, tiny bit of coconut milk.

It give that nice flavor.

You go to classic Chinese restaurant, classic banquet, they also serve you Chinese, this is very, very interesting.

(speaking Chinese) This is bird's nest, cooked with rock sugar in a coconut shell.

The flavor from coconut permeate into the bird's nest.

This is very, very elegant.

Now coconuts.

This why they always say, "Don't stand under the coconut tree!"

(coconut slamming into table) Not even with me!

(audience laughing) You can have this coconut hit the this c.. so make sure never, never stand underneath a coconut tree.

The next dish I wanna show you is very interesting.

Thai barbecue chicken.

Is nice and spicy.

Not too hot, but nice and spicy.

Many, many times I've been to visit Thailand and I try this on the streets of Bangkok.

The vendors, street vendor who sell this, as snack or as a main dish.

I'm gonna put all this seasoning for the barbecue chicken right in here in this food processor.

I have some garlic, I have about two to three tablespoon of garlic, I put the garlic in here.

And I have some cilantro.

A lot of cilantro, I love cilantro.

And then also some curry powder, turmeric and curry powder, okay?

Dry powder.

And also some black pepper.

And also, of course, sugar.

And fish sauce.

Two to three tablespoon fish sauce.

And then we will blend this, okay?

Make it into a nice liquid, seasoning liquid.

If you don't have time to make this on your own, you can always buy some curry powder or curry paste so you can do it yourself, but this is much more fresh, much more interesting.

When this is done, you take this out.

(yelping) (audience laughing) Put it right over here.

Almost got me into trouble.

(audience laughing) Modern technology!

And you put it right over here and set this aside and you put the whole thing, look at this.

Put the whole thing in there, because you don't want to leave your chicken marin.. at room temperature, so put in this bag.

And you shake, shake, shake.

Turn on your music, cha cha cha.

(audience laughing) (audience laughing) Nice and done, and put it in the fridge, okay?

After you put in the fridge, look at this we gonna put in the fridge.

Let it sit there for a little while.

And then you gonna bake them at 350 degrees for about 35 to 40 minutes, and will look like this.

And I wanna show you how to make the dish looks interesting.

Look, quickly, here is a little tomato half.

Cut it up at an angle of exactly 45 degree.

Not 44, not 46, but exactly 45.

Okay, look at this.

And then cut a piece on the side, cut a piece on the side, and then you can also go like this.

Put it back, get another piece, parallel cut.

Go back, now, now you can see.

One.

Two.

Three.

You have a beautiful Thai barbecue chicken!

(audience applauding) I wanna show you, today, I'm gonna show how to do two dishes.

The next dish I'm gonna show you is another dish I call big chicken with something inside.

What are you gonna put inside?

It doesn't make any difference.

Whatever you feel like it, you put it inside.

First, you should do is get a piece of chicken.

Butterfly this.

How do you butterfly chicken?

Very, very simple.

Put this over here, can you see that?

Today, we really, really talking about what we're talking in the very beginning.

A chicken in every wok, but we also have a chicken in the oven today, because I'm gonna cook this in the oven by baking it.

Look at this.

I open it up like this, can you see that?

Open it up.

And then, I am gonna marinate this chicken with the following ingredient.

I have two tablespoon of soy sauce, and I have a tiny, tiny bit, two tablespoon dry sherry.

Tiny bit of white pepper, pinch of white pepper.

Some sugar, a half a teaspoon of sugar.

Some corn starch.

Oh, this is what makes interesting.

A tiny bit of five-spice powder, a mixture of star anise, clove, cinnamon, and Sichuan peppercorn, and sometime, they even put a tiny bit of fennel.

Marinate it for a little while.

In the mean time, while you marinate this, you are going to set it aside and cut up all the other things for marinate.

I have some zucchini, I am going to cut it up into julienne pieces.

Zucchini, one, two, three, four, five.

Now I cut up five pieces, but it's only four over here, because I really only need four.

I don't need this, forget it.

I only need four.

We'll line them up.

Some of these slice carrot.

We line them all up also, some shiitake mushroom.

Dong gu.

Everybody at home should learn how to say it.

Dong gu, means Chinese black mushroom.

(knife cutting) (audience applauding) Set it aside, put it right here.

Carrot.

(knife cutting) Set aside, put it right here.

And then you also cut up a tiny bit of mushroom, which has been soaked for approximately half an hour, okay?

Make sure you soak them for at least half an hour over warm or cold water.

And then also have some water chestnut, okay?

When this is nice and done.

Also, we have two eggs.

Look at this, have you ever seen this before?

This is not the regular egg.

This is not the egg from a dieting chicken.

These are quail eggs.

If you use the regular egg, the egg would not stay, it will come out.

Everybody know.

Like I earlier ask, whether the eggs come out from the chicken, the chicken comes out from the egg, huh.

I am totally confused, I don't know about you.

And we'll put them all over here and we put some water chestnut, some carrot, some zucchini, and mushroom, okay?

Mushroom.

And then we put the quail egg on the s.. and we roll it up in the meantime.

Let's set it aside because I wanna mix them all up.

Everybody look at this.

I roll this up, roll this up, roll this up, roll this up like this, okay?

And then after you roll it up, you tie it down with a green onion, or Chinese chive.

Set the chicken right here, tie a knot.

Now we're tying a knot, okay?

You can tie a knot and make it very interesting, like this.

Okay, and then, you put this over here and you bake this at 350 degree for another 30 to 40 minutes.

Make sure we take this over here and we will, I have earlier bake one right here.

Wow, this is so hot.

I cannot believe it myself.

And you take out one, this is a really nice-looking one.

And we serve the other one right over here.

One piece, another piece, another piece.

Okay, and then, I am going to slice this and show you how beautiful this can be.

Okay, cut this off.

Cut this off.

One.

Two.

Three.

And then, you lay them all out.

One.

Two.

Three.

I am telling you, this is extraordinary interesting.

What you see is a big stuffed chicken breast.

(audience applauding) Next, I'm gonna show you a very exciting luscious lemon chicken.

One of the most popular French dish in French restaurant is orange duck.

In Chinese restaurant is a luscious lemon chicken.

I love them both.

All I have here is one whole chicken breast, okay?

I'm gonna cut this up and cut into thin slices.

You can do it one by one, like this.

One, two, three.

Or you can do it two by two.

Sometimes, if you have more, you can do it two by four.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

Marinate this for a little while, let's put it over here and let us marinate this.

We are going to use one tablespoon of soy sauce and one tablespoon of dry sherry and also use a tiny blob corn starch, okay?

Marinate them.

Anywhere from half and hour to about two hours, okay?

This is nice and... Also if you want, you can also use a tiny bit of ginger and garlic, but this is simple enough.

Let us set aside.

After this is half an hour, 25 minutes, you chop up some walnut, okay?

See, this is how easy it is to chop walnut.

First, you smash the heck out of it, and then you chop them all up.

Otherwise, it takes forever to do it.

You roast some walnut first.

Then, you are going to coat this, mix this up a little bit, mix a tiny bit of corn starch and walnut together.

You coat this right over here.

Coat it, see?

You can see that you coat it like this.

One piece, two pieces, the more people, the more pieces.

I think average, you should have two to four pieces per person.

You do not have to have too many.

In the meantime, I'm heat up some oil in my very unique electric wok here.

When this is nice and done, let's clean up my fingers so we can get going.

Let's set this aside, let's set this aside, and we will deep fry.

When you deep fry, always make sure you have all this ..

Cooking chopstick, strainer, and then some paper towel or napkin, okay?

Get ready so you are all ready.

We'll deep fry this.

How can you tell when the oil is hot enough?

As usual, once again, can you see the bubble coming out?

This is what you call bubble coming out.

Vigorously, that means oil is hot enough.

We'll carefully put this in, one.

Wow, look at this.

My electric wok.

Deep fry all of these gradually.

You can put about 20 slices in at one time until they're nice and golden brown.

When it floats, take it out.

In the meantime, we turn this on, we are going to make a tiny, tiny bit of lemon sauce.

All you have to do, is one third a cup of broth, one third a cup of lemon juice, fresh lemon juice.

A tiny bit of sugar, and also to add some perfume of the Chinese kitchen in our sauce, ginger, we put a tiny bit of ginger.

If you want more perfume, more ginger.

(knife chopping rhythmically) (audience applauding) More ginger.

When this is done, put a tiny bit of lemon zest right in here.

Lemon zest, okay?

And then, when it thickens, when it bring to a boil, that means the sugar is all nice and ready.

You thicken it up, very simple dish to thicken it up.

It doesn't take too long at all.

Can you see how easy it is?

When this is nice and golden brown, you take it out.

Now everybody know, from Canton to Kentucky, we love our fried chicken.

Look at this.

When this is nice and done, you put it over this to drain the oil.

In the meantime, the sauce should be nice and ready.

You don't wanna add too much food coloring because it's too yellow, okay?

And if you want, you can also use a tiny, tiny bit more lemon zest because it gives a nice flavor to your dish.

Look at this, very, very small, very small julienne, set it aside.

In the meantime, my sauce is ready.

Make sure your corn starch is thicken.

This way, you have a very, very good consistency.

Otherwise, it'll be too light or too thick.

When this is done, you lay them all out like this.

Lay them all out, lay them all out.

This look very interesting and is also very easy to do.

Lemon chicken with walnut.

This is so easy to do.

Nobody can mix it up.

Always stir this, when it's done, you shut it off, and this is a simple lemon sauce to make.

And I guarantee you, you will love this dish.

Luscious lemon chicken.

(audience applauding) I wish you all good eating, good health, good fortune, and a chicken in every single wok!

Until next time, if Yan can cook, so can you!

“Goodbye!” (##!)

(audience applauding)