- You know, the wok is the workhorse of all the Chinese kitchen.

But today I don't feel like wok-ing at all.

I rather take it easy and try a little slow cooking with skillets, pots, and some of my pans, and of course the steamer.

My first dish is my mom's favorite dish, it's pork-filled, or meat-filled, bitter melon and fuzzy squash.

My mom cooked this all the time.

It is also the favor of many, many Chinese.

Here, I wanna show you a couple of things.

This is bitter melon, okay.

Actually, there's only one word in China.

There's no word for a squash, everything is melon.

So this is bitter squash, but they call it bitter melon, "k#gua."

And this, you know what this is?

This long thing is the fuzzy squash.

You can see the fuzz, the hair around here.

Can you see that?

You can go to buy all of these and normally most of these are available, several months during summer in most Asian store, nowadays is also available in supermarkets, many supermarkets.

Now, I'm gonna pick up this one and I'm also gonna pick up this one, and I'm gonna also pick up this one.

I'm gonna show you how to prepare this, okay?

It's very, very easy to do.

This, I am gonna cut it in into a ring like this, cut it up.

Look at that, it's red inside.

Can you see that?

Look at that, it's very interesting, the seed.

This is a pretty ripe, pretty ripe bitter melon.

I cut into little three rings like this, three rings.

And then I will use this to scoop out the seed, scoop out the seed, okay.

Scoop out the seed, scoop out the seed.

Look at that, scoop out the seed.

You don't want the seed.

The seed is pretty bitter.

That's why they call it bitter melon.

It is so bitter that sometimes you can not stand it, but people love it because, simply because it's bitter just like cocoa.

Look at that, show you another one.

If you cut it like this, you see the seed like that.

Look at that, this is a pretty ripe, normally the seed is green, but this is red.

That means this is a nice, ripe one.

Normally, the young, bitter melon, is, this is all red!

I don't wanna, it's supposed to be green!

How come as red?

I have no idea.

Anyway, let me clean this up.

And then how are you gonna take care of the fuzzy melon?

It's very easy.

All you have to do is use this to peel it, like this, you see this?

After you peel this, see, this is how you use it.

You can use this to stir fry, to make soup, to do also stuffing, let me show you.

You can cut this up, cut this up, cut this up into rings, like this, don't roll.

And then, you use a spoon to scoop out the seed like this.

See this?

This is how you do it, you scoop out the seed, and you can also u..

So you can use all kinds of things to stuff.

Now, after you do this, you would water blanch this.

If you don't like this bitterness, you water blanch this a little bit in water to get rid of some of the bitterness, but I love the bitterness, so my mother too, so we do not want to bother.

And then the next thing you do is get the fillings ready.

Now, this is what you're gonna do.

Let me turn this down and make sure to get the filling.

I have some ground up chicken or turkey, I'm gonna put it here.

And I also have some chopped up water chestnut, I put it over here, and I also have some green onion and also have some pepper, salt, and corn starch.

Now, if you wanna make it more interesting, you can also use some, black mushroom, mógu.

Set it aside, put it here.

Set it aside, put it here, okay?

And then, put a tiny bit of egg, tiny bit of egg, okay.

Look at this, tiny bit of egg.

Make some more up, very, you can use pork, you can use turkey, you can use chicken, you can use beef, you can use fish, you can use shrimp, anything, okay.

Now, to make it even more interesting, you can use a tiny, tiny bit of this dong choy, okay.

Dong choy, salted, fermented, pickled cabbage, to get the intensity of the flavor, just a tiny bit, okay?

This is very good, very popular.

When this is nice and ready, you stuff it.

This is how easy it is.

You marinate it with a tiny bit of sesame seed oil.

And if you want, a tiny bit of sugar and wine.

When it's all nice and ready, a tiny bit more egg, beaten egg.

So this way, it give that, now you have corn starch, you have everything.

And then, you put this over here, and you put this over here, look at this.

You, you do it with a dinner knife, you stuff it, fill it like this, look it up, really big.

And then you dip this in a lot, a tiny bit of cornstarch, and then you will set this aside, look at that.

Okay, so this way you can brown it.

Let's do another one.

Let's do a couple so everybody can learn how to do it, okay.

Do another one.

Very easy to do.

Put it right here, and doing last one, okay.

You can do all of this way ahead of time, you don't have to do in the last minute, look at that.

Okay, last minute, set it aside.

And then, we will set everything aside.

Always learn to clean up, very good habit.

Okay, and then we are ready to cook.

Very easy to do.

We'll set this aside and we put this over here.

Put a tiny, tiny bit.

Now, talking about wok-less.

Actually, I started, speaking of wok-less cooking, I actually make my TV debut without a wok.

One time, I was in Canada doing a show, somebody asked me to get on a show, and I locked my car my wok in the trunk, which is about minus 30 degree.

And I couldn't open my trunk, so I couldn't get my wok out.

And I end up using a little baby frying pan to finish the whole meal.

And that is the beginning of my wok-less career.

(scattered laughter) You turn around, look at that, very simple.

You're brown on one side, and then you turn it to the other side, very easy to brown, okay.

Once it's brown on one side, you turn it to the other side.

Look at this, very easy to brown.

And then you turn it to the other side, and then you put tiny bit of chicken broth.

Cover this up.

Okay, in the meantime, this is done.

And then we're gonna make a sauce.

We'll make the sauce by putting some more chicken broth here.

If you have time, you can always make your own black bean sauce.

You don't have time, you can go to the store and buy some black bean sauce already in a jar, okay.

This is how you do it, mix it well with tiny bit extra broth.

And then, you can actually make a sauce with cornstarch.

Whenever you have cornstarch solution, always make sure you thicken it and stir it because they tend to precipitate and sink to the bottom.

When it's done, you turn them around, and you have a beautiful dish that you can do, okay?

Turn them around, this way, the whole thing is done.

When it's done, you put the whole thing right here, and this is gonna be a delicious dish.

You can use squash, you can use bitter melon, you can use fuzzy melon.

And all you have to do is put the sauce right on top.

Beautiful and delicious.

(applause) Now, for another wok-less wonder, I like to make Indian type of curry with coconut.

And do you know that you can actually cook and prepare the whole thing in this one whole coconut?

Nowadays, coconut is available in most supermarkets.

You can tell whether they're younger or more mature coconut.

This is a lighter color, this is a younger coconut.

And this is darker, deeper color, it's a more mature coconut.

And there's a lot of coconut liquid juice right inside.

And in Asia, they actually drink this for the summer.

Now, I wanna show you how easy it is to get this out.

This is how you cut up the coconut.

You use a cleaver, okay, and you go like that.

You just, very, nobody under the age of, look at this, make sure you put the, wow, look at that.

You can actually open the whole coconut like that, see that?

Now, how do you remove the coconut?

You can easily do this later on.

I will show you, very easy.

Keep the juice and you drink it.

It's wonderful, I love it.

I've been, every time I go to Southeast Asia, go to Singapore, Bangkok, I drink the juice because it's very refreshing.

Very, very sweet, very cool, very light.

Now we've got to remove this naturally sweet, okay?

Now, the next thing I want to show you is how to get everything ready.

This is the juice coming out from the coconut, look at that, a lot of juice.

We want to save the juice in our bowl too, so we don't waste anything, look at that.

The juice, look at that.

I'm gonna save it for myself to drink.

Not for anybody else, but for myself.

Now, we're gonna get this coconut ready.

And then we're going to get all the other ingredient ready for this wonderful curry, Indian curry shrimp.

Here, I have some shallot, and jalapeno, and you'll cut this up.

And you go like that.

Very, very hard to hold onto something small but as long as you are careful, you'll be okay.

I have this, and I have some shrimp.

I'm gonna put some shrimp up over here, some shrimp, okay.

And also, I have some shallot, okay.

Make sure you mince your shallot, mince your shallot.

Set it aside, put it over here.

And then the next thing you do is a tiny bit of turmeric to give that nice, yellowish color, and a tiny, tiny bit of sugar, okay.

And a tiny bit of curry powder, oh, wonderful.

And then a tiny bit extra shallot.

And of course, I have some fish sauce.

Okay, not much, just enough.

And also, put a tiny bit of coconut milk.

Okay, if you want, you can even put some extra coconut juice to get that moisture going.

Put a tiny bit of coconut juice right here.

Okay, not much.

And then, you know what you're gonna do.

You're gonna do, put the whole thing, this is going to be so delicious, it's unreal!

Whether you believe it or not, you gotta try it, okay?

When this is done, we're gonna put this whole thing, look at that, we just dump the whole thing in here.

And cook the whole thing in its own natural juice.

It's gonna be beautiful, delicious.

And I am telling you, I can eat four of these just by myself!

Now, look at this.

I'm gonna cover this up with aluminum foil.

Very, very easy.

Then, cover the whole thing up with the original, okay.

Make sure the right direction, okay?

Put them all together.

Now, the best part of this particular thing is, when it's done, you can eat it right out of here.

That is no pot to wash.

So you can just say, when you finish you can just say, "Honey, I ate the dishes!"

(scattered laughter) Put this over here, put this whole .. And then, take the one that have been just baked.

Now, when you bake that in the oven, normally, it takes a little bit longer to bake, so you might have to be a little more patient.

And if you do it, if you don't have to cook all night you know what you can do, you can actually, simply, do it right in a pot with the same seasoning.

It would be a lot faster when it takes about five to 10 minutes to do the whole thing.

When it's hot, you remove these, look at that, take this whole thing out, this beautiful, will take this whole thing out, look at that.

Ooh, the whole thing.

Even the coconut meat comes out because it's so great.

And then, you'll take this out, remove these.

And we are gonna serve these Indian curry, coconut shrimp served hot and on the whole coconut.

And it's beautiful how wonder!

(applause) Getting to the meat of a coconut isn't easy, because you have to go through three different layers, the husk, and then the shell, and then the skin.

Let me show you how coconut is clean and prepare in Asia.

In Singapore, you can still find people who prefer to shell a coconut the old-fashioned way, by hand!

Coconut is used all the time in Singapore dishes, from hot and cold appetizer to main dishes, and of course, desserts.

Even drinks are made with coconuts.

First, they removed the last of the stem.

Then they trimmed the size.

Wow, this reminds me of my last haircut!

I wonder how sharp his cleaver is.

See how he punctured the side of the coconut to drain of the, very delicious coconut milk.

He uses this tool to remove the outer skin.

Using the shaving method, he is scrape the coconut clean.

This guy has the fastest hand in Singapore!

Did I mention he also runs the barber shop on right next door?

Once the coconut meat has been broken into pieces, it is dropped to this machine to be shredded.

I showed them my cleaver and they just laugh.

They said, "Haven't you heard of automation?"

(applause) How do you enjoy my trip to Asia?

Do you know that a coconut tree produced thousands of coconuts, and in fact, one coconut can produce up to four cups of shredded coconut.

Let me show you how easy it is.

When I was in Asia, I actually bought one of these coconut shredder, just like a serrated, ah, this is serrated, okay, just like a saw.

I just step on it like this, and I am holding onto this coconut and I just scraped it.

You see that?

Very, very easy.

Can you all see all this coconut being shred?

Shred it, whole bunch.

And I'm gonna use some of these in our dish.

I'm gonna make this and put this right over here, and take it over here and use it for the next dish.

I'm gonna use this to make this wonderful, shredded coconut in a like, steam sponge cake, okay.

I'm gonna put all this over here.

If you look at this, I have this copper bowl.

And I have mix, an egg mixture, egg yolk mixture, with sugar, and also egg white mixture.

And I fold it, and had been folding it for approximately 15 minutes.

Okay, with the flour and after I have this nice, smooth consistency, folded in the flour, the egg white mixture, an egg yolk mixture, I'm gonna put it in this springform pan, okay, spring.

Put it right here.

Put it right here.

How do you call this?

Make sure to have about one-third or so, okay.

Look at that, look at that.

I, this is my prized possession, a nice copper bowl.

And this, we were gonna put this over here and we're gonna steam the whole thing.

Okay, and put it right here, we're gonna steam.

Okay, very simple, instead of bake it, we steam in this bamboo steamer for approximately 30 minutes.

And after that, you let it sit for about 45 minutes to an hour before you do it, okay.

That's it for a while, and we'll take this out.

We'll take this, remove these, because I don't need this anymore.

And now, release this, look at that, release this the whole thing comes out like that.

And then I was removed the whole thing because look at that.

I have a little wax paper right in here and I am gonna hold onto this, I'm gonna cut it in three.

Look at that, while I'm steaming that.

Hold onto this very, very nicely.

Look at this, huh?

Cut!

Pa-lo-lo, cut!

Another one.

Pa-lo-lo cut!

This is the first time that I never, I did not use my knife.

When it's done, you put this one over here, you put one over here, you put one over here, look at that.

And then, we are gonna use my whipped cream, I have some whipped cream right over here, light whipped cream.

Put it right over here.

And then, oh, you know what?

This is wonderful.

I'll use this spatula, and I put this whipped cream right here.

Very simple.

Okay, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, okay.

Now if you'd like, you can use a little bit more.

This is a specially light whipped cream that I have made for myself.

And then I just build it in, this is how fast you can do it.

One, two, three, use a whole bunch first, one, two, three.

Make sure you do it with absolute attention.

Right?

Sorry!

Make a mistake.

You never, never have to do the top like this.

And then when it's done, we'll clean this up, set this aside.

We're gonna build this with our chopped pickle fruit, ok.. All right on the plate so it's easier to serve, right on the plate.

We have some papaya, papaya, and you can use papaya and mango together, okay.

And then later on, you can top it with our tiny bit of extra tropical fruit like jackfruit and lychees and all kinds of stuff.

Continue to do this and make sure you do it fast, particularly when you are having guests coming in three minutes or less, okay?

And then you put the second one.

Wow, look at this, this is looking good.

Do you think it looks good?

- [Audience] Yes.

- Oh, amazing.

(applause) Okay, look at that, very simple, very simple, done.

Take the time, slow down and smell the roses, and don't rush.

And then you put the first thing right on top.

And if you want, you know what, you can have more whipped cream, look at that.

This is amazing for the diet conscious, you should do that.

And then, put this right in here and then you use a little cup like this, and sprinkle coconut on top.

But before you do that, you can even put a tiny bit more of this on top if you want, okay.

But it's not necessary because you wanna make sure the coconut actually stay, okay, the shredded coconut.

Oh, look at that.

And then when it's done, you put this in a little cup here.

You put the toasted coconut around.

Very simple.

Okay, look at that.

And then you garnish it with, extra fruit.

We have some jackfruit.

We have some kiwi, kiwi is actually from China.

They call the Sichuan wild gooseberry, okay.

You look at that, very simple.

And then finally, we will garnish it with flowers, edible flower.

The Chinese have been using edible flower for hundreds and thousands of years, in Western part of China.

And this is my last one, and I put it right over here.

Look at how beautiful this sponge cake!

(applause) Well, now that you have seen a few wonderful dishes that can be make and prepared without wok.

And I hope you will be inspired to get a little bit wacky and go wok-less.

Till next time, run, don't "wok'!

And remember, If Yan can cook, so can you.

“Goodbye!” (##!)

(applause)