(Joyful music) (Audience applauding) - In China, entertaining friends is more than just a pass time.

It is a very important integral part of the culture.

Most kitchen in China are normally very small.

So people do a lot of the entertaining in the restaurant but if they do entertain and cook at home, a menu is usually very simple but satisfying.

Here is some wonderful delicious way to start a meal for your friends.

A Chinese seaweed soup with Tofu and a lot of different types of seaweed.

Look at this.

First I want to talk about a lot of the seaweed that you probably have never seen this before, because I have not seen it myself.

Here, everybody know what this is.

When you go to a Sushi bar, a Japanese restaurant a Sushi bar, you see this, this is the regular seaweed nice and thin piece of sheet.

They called Nori in Japanese cuisine.

And here, I have all kinds of things.

Most of these available in Korean Japanese or Chinese stores.

Here is shredded seaweed dry.

This is a little bit bigger.

And this is salted pickle, soft seaweed.

Okay.

And this is the bigger piece of se.. You normally put in dessert and casserole and stir fry dishes.

And also you have really small angel hair seaweed like this.

And this is the seaweed we're going to use for the soup today.

This is a whole seaweed.

Looks like a seaweed pancake.

And I'm going to break it up and soak this in water for approximately 15 minutes to 25 minutes and 36 seconds.

(Audience laughing) I'm going to break this up.

I always tell people whatever I tell you you should put this down.

Because everything I do, I follow exactly.

Break this up, break this up.

The great thing about doing this is by breaking this up, you use a lot of your energy.

Burn out a lot more calorie.

Look at it.

It was a lot of fun.

And then we break this up and soak that and it only takes a few minutes to soak.

Okay.

Look at that.

It doesn't take too long to soak.

They already break more up like this, see.

Very, very easy to do.

And let us sit there for a little while.

And I clean up my hand.

And in the meantime, I want to show you the other thing that I'm g.. First, I'm going to get ready.

Some nice, clear broth.

In the meantime, I'm going to cut up some of these.

I'll just put over here.

Cut up some halibut.

And I cut this in half, and then I go, one.

Cut it into pieces like this.

Set it aside.

Put it right here.

And then, I'm going to marinate th.. with a tiny bit of wine, a tiny of cornstarch and white pepper and salt.

Put it right here.

No soy sauce.

And then scallop, I'm going to cut the scallop into this believable Greek sea scallop.

Cut into three pieces, parallel cut, and then set it aside.

Okay.

Cut it at an angle.

An angle parallel to your cutting board.

And then you set it aside.

And then have some shrimp.

And as I said, to save time instead of doing a one by one, I'm going to do it all together.

like that.

See.

All done, in three pieces like that, like that.

And then you'll transfer over here.

And then of course, we're going to marinate this for a little while.

In the meantime, I always use a chopstick to do it.

The great thing about chopstick is, I don't know how many you know.

This is a very interesting story.

In ancient China, the people's fortune can be read by the way they hold the chopstick.

If you use two finger, you are very carefree.

If you holding the chopstick like that, you're very carefree.

If you use four chopstick, that means you have good fortune.

Means good fortune.

If you use five fingers, to hold the chopstick, that means you are destined for greatnes..

If you're holding the chopstick with all these finger, that means you really don't know what the heck you're doing with this chopstick.

(audience laughing) Let it boil.

The other thing that I would put in is of course the seaweed.

Look at that, the seaweed.

Talking about entertaining.

A lot of times when you go to Chinese restaurant, you order food.

Open a menu.

You don't know what's going on.

The best thing to do, my recommendation is, plan a very simple menu.

Under each category of chicken, seafood or beef, order one.

And also, all the variety of cooking technique.

Don't order three deep fried dishes.

Cut it up.

This is Tofu.

Set aside, and cut it up.

Set it aside.

This is all I need.

I saved this for tomorrow, and I cut it up.

Cut it up, cut it up and then cut it up into little cubes like this.

Put it over here.

Tofu food goes well with seafood is very very brand and it takes on the flavor of all the things.

So the only thing you have to do, is put some see I have some water sizzling.

You can take a look.

This is fresh water Chestnut.

And I'm gonna show you.

We have peel it and slice it up.

I'm going to put some water just to give it some texture and sweetness to it.

Put some cilantro chopped cilantro, right here.

And then, of course, put a teeny tiny bit of Sesame seed oil and of course, salt and white pepper.

And then, when you use white pepper, do not breathe.

(audience laughing) (chef exhaling) I have total control.

And then, Get ready some egg white.

Shut off.

Put the egg white.

(Chef sneezes) (Audience laughing) That's to show you that I am real.

Oh, unbelievable.

I try to control myself, but I'm out of control.

And then right before you're ready, cut this up.

Chop some green onion.

Okay.

When this is all nice and ready you set it aside, and then get one of these.

And you're already to serve.

This is beautiful.

Beautiful.

Nice and nutritious.

And then you, of course, you garnish this with a tiny bit of chopped green o.. and you have a beautiful seafood Tofu soup.

(Audience clapping) Now, let's go from soup to nuts.

I'm going to show you a nutty salad to make with one oil and Candied Walnuts.

The first thing we'll get ready is the Walnut.

In fact, Candied Walnut, is getting very popular in a lot of Chinese restaurant.

Stir fry Prawn with candy Walnuts is one of the most popular Cantonese dish.

This a beautiful Walnut right here.

Pick this up, pick this up Walnut.

All I have to do is, this is already partially parboil nice and cooked, and I dried it up.

And I'm going to put this Walnut right in h.. to this light syrup, to make a little caramelize.

This, let it go for a little while.

And then, after you cook this all we have to do is take it to oil.

This is China's way to doing it.

You deep fried it.

I don't know how many of you know that Walnut are the oldest tree, food tree grown for mankind, stating back about 7,000 years BC.

Now, hold on to this.

I am going to put this over here and deep fry it.

Very easy to do.

And I'm deep frying a few already.

Let's look this.

It's deep frying, and deep frying until the golden Brown use low heat.

How many of you know that Walnut is also very very versatile, convenient as a no fast food.

That means you can use it in every single dish.

Any dish.

Salad, stir fry, all kinds of things.

It is just floated in.

It's as simple as that.

And also, a lot of people don't know that Walnut even though have some calorie, but they are also they are basically primarily, poly and saturated fat is good fat that keeps the blood cholesterol down.

So it's a good, healthy, fun eating things.

Stir.

Just use the chopstick stir.

The one that's already golden brown, you take it out, and pick it up like this.

See, use five chopstick.

Destined to be a great cook.

Of course, everybody can do that.

If you cannot do that, use a tong.

Or use a strainer to do it.

This way, I can pick the nice golden Brown o.. and put it right here.

Let it drain well.

Put right over here.

Paper towel.

When this is done, we set this aside and put this over here.

Here, I want to show everybody.

This particular one.

We want to make it very interesting and .. Use some Lotus root.

This is the whole piece of Lotus root.

Look at that.

Whole Lotus, Lotus flower, Lotus root.

When you use it, it's very simple.

All you have to do is use a peeler and peel it.

Look that.

Nice and clean.

And after you appeal it, you can dump it in boiling water, and parboil it a little bit.

And then, they will look like this.

Look at this.

It's beautiful.

I'm going to put this on the side and then I'm going to use a knife to cut it up.

Look at this is.

We've got a lot of hole.

Looks like a Swiss cheese.

Got a lot of holes here.

Sometimes they even use it to stuff rice.

Cut it up.

See, beautiful pieces like this.

We're going to use this to Garnish, our salad.

And all we have to do is we have some Enoki mushroom.

Look at that.

This is a little stem here.

You got to cut the stem off.

We build this thing up.

Nice.

Put this over here.

Mixed green.

Put it all.

Nice and colorful.

You can buy it in supermarket or you can grow in your garden.

And then cut this up.

The stem, you don't want it.

Then you put it beautiful right here.

Look at that, right in the middle.

And then you lay out a few of these.

Look at how interesting.

Very easy to do.

Very unique appetizer.

And then you put some Walnut around.

Look at how interesting.

This is something everybody can do at home.

And then of course, without salad dressing, that's not a salad.

So we're going to quickly, make a really interesting simple salad dressing with tiny bit of a Walnut oil, Sesame seed oil, Sesame seed oil, rice vinegar, brown rice, vinegar, a dash of crushed chili pepper, and some honey.

Look at that.

Some honey.

And then a touch of salt, pepper and lemon zest.

Mixed them all up.

When it's done, all you have to do is put it right over here and drizzle it in, and you have a beautiful salad.

(Audience applauding) I just taste the dressing for the salad.

It's unbelievable.

I am going to save it for myself.

And in the meantime, let's do a little cleanup.

So everybody know that we have a lot of space to work with.

Now, here everybody know the next dish I'm going to do is Artichoke.

Artichoke, are probably the perfect vegeta.. for entertaining.

Because it's easy to prepare.

Elegant to serve, and also fun to eat.

Why not give them a refreshing dip with a wonderful Asian flavoring.

Here, I have all of these artichoke.

Look at that.

It's beautiful.

And of course we are going to make a pesto sauce with lime and cilantro, and a tiny bit of garlic and lime juice.

Is wonderful to do and everybody can do this.

I don't know about you.

Artichoke looks very strange to me.

In fact, the first guy that eat artichoke must be very hungry.

(audience laughing) But all this year I've been trying .. You see, this is how you do it.

You snap this off.

Use this to snap this off.

First, you got to cut this out first.

If you want, you can cut this out.

Because it's faster to put when you cut this off.

You use a little scissor to cut this up.

Cut this up, cut this up.

The great thing about artichoke is it is fun to eat because you have to pull it one by one and it's a little, I call it a fun, slow food meant to be savored slowly.

Go up with your loved ones, your boyfriend, your girlfriend, your grandmother, and just sit there and have a good time, and take the time to enjoy.

When you choose artichoke, look at this.

I have a lot of great artichoke he..

When you choose artichoke, make sure that a plump, every plump big and also very compact and heavy.

Has a consistent green color That means it's good, fresh artichoke.

They come into different size and different shape.

Different, sometimes they're bigger, sometimes they're smaller.

You can even cut this up like that.

Nice.

Very good.

Now, when you make artichoke, you can allow to make a little mess.

Nobody cares.

You're doing in your own kitchen, w.. And then when this is done, I even opened this up a little bit.

Guess when you open this up, you allow the steel to come a little bit faster.

You cook things faster.

And then after this is ready, you can actually take it to let boil.

You can steam.

You can microwave.

You can do a lot of things.

In fact, practically all the artichoke is from California.

They even have the baby California artichoke.

You heard about the artichoke capital of the world, Castroville.

And I live only about 6 miles from that place.

Oh no.

60 miles.

Sorry.

(Audience laughing) You can boil like this or you can steam it l..

Since we're boiling it, we'll just go like that.

And normally it takes about 25 minutes to 30 minutes after 35 minutes to do because it depends on how big the artichoke is.

The thing is, artichoke is also versatile because they are not nutritious, They're very low in calorie and very, very high in fiber.

They have a lot of vitamin Cs, folic acid.

Very low in sodium, but a lot of magnesium.

So it's great for you.

Now here, I'm going to make my pesto sauce.

This pesto sauce is very easy to do.

First.

I have all of these ingredients.

Sesame seed oil, a tiny bit of Walnut oil, or salad oil.

A tiny, tiny bit of so sauce, not much.

And then sugar, lemon peel or lime peel, lemon juice or lime juice.

This is lime juice.

If you don't have lime juice, you can use .. A tiny bit of garlic.

If you need garlic or more garlic, all you have to do is cut this up.

And then you just say, done.

More garlic right here.

And then put them, are you ready?

Let's put more garlic, done.

More garlic, love garlic.

And then I put a tiny, tiny bit of mayonnaise, not much.

Tiny bit of mayonnaise.

and then, mix into this wonderful pesto sauce.

This is going to be beautiful, when it's done.

Look at that.

We're going to remove these so eve.. and enjoy and look at that.

I cannot believe this.

I am going to show you how beautiful this is.

This has been cooked for 25 minutes.

We cut this in half.

This is so beautiful.

And we'll use a knife and cut this up.

Look at that.

We scoop this out.

This is, scoop right in the middle.

Out okay.

Scoop out this.

You know what you have?

You have a beautiful concave pocket right here, and all you have to do and use some sauce and fill this up.

Look at that, fill this up.

And this is going to be so easy to do.

So wonderful.

You cannot believe this.

And then, you can do serving of these at the same time.

And when you eat this, you just simply stir this in.

(Audience laughing) You have to use the same.

It's very important about this particular recipe.

Same spoon is very important.

All the flavor is coming out from the spoon and get into your artichoke.

And then once again, use the same, use the same spoon.

(Audience laughing) I am getting so excited.

I'm totally confused.

(Audience laughing) Oh, look at that.

Look at this.

And of course, have this one ask your guests to do it themselves and put more sauce.

This is a beautiful pesto with cilantro lime.

And it's a beautiful dish for everybody.

( Audience applauding) Now.

By now, your guests are ready for .. Roast chicken.

Let me show you an incredible black rice stuffing that I discover when I visited Bangkok, Thailand.

This is a wonderful dish to do for entertainment because it's very interesting, very easy.

Here, I have some cooked black glutinous rice from Thailand.

When it's raw, it looks like this.

I show you some time ago and it can be stored indefinitely.

You cook them until they nice and firm.

And then you're going to put all the other ingredient.

I have Charlotte, chop water chestnut Chinese sausage, green onion, black mushroom shiitake black, Chestnut already soaked and also have some quail egg.

Look at that little baby egg and also Medjool dates, fresh dates.

I'm going to stir fry all of these first.

Very simple to do.

Everybody can do it.

There's a couple of steps.

Put a tiny bit of oil.

Put Charlotte.

Nice and hot.

Stir.

Chinese sausage right here.

A tiny of mushrooms.

Green onions, chestnut.

Toss, toss.

Great exercise.

Toss.

As I said, always, when you stir fry, don't just stand there and stare.

Okay?

Stare, fire will burn everything.

So make sure you stir first.

Make make sure stir And then when it's almost ready, you put the quail egg and the Medjool dates.

So this way, the whole stuffing is almost ready.

And then mix with black glutinous rice.

And then put a tiny bit of pepper, tiny bit of salt.

And after you do this, let it cool down for a little while because you want to make sure they are cooled down before you use it.

Because the rice is already cooked.

Then we're going to remove these.

And we're going to show you how easy it is to stuff your chicken.

Here, I have a chicken.

It's totally relaxed.

(Audience laughing) And then I put this over here.

The first thing you do is use a tiny bit of salt, tiny bit of five spice powder, and a tiny bit of white pepper.

And I rubbed this around, I rub this around.

(Audience laughing) Done.

We check everything.

And then we stuff this in.

Make sure you stuff this in, put this in, open this up and stuff it in.

Now when you have time, you can stuff the whole thing.

I hope everybody can see this.

This is very easy to do.

Just in case you miss, you can always turn on the television and look at it slow motion.

Let me show you slow motion.

(Audience laughing) And then you put them all together.

Now, of course, you do not have to put, you don't necessary have enough space to put the whole thing in there.

When it's done, you close it with a bamboo skewer.

Hold onto it like that, and hold onto this and you just push it in.

Then you brush it with a tiny tiny bit of soy sauce and Sesame seed oil.

Brush it.

This way it will give you that nice shiny glaze.

Crispy glaze.

Because the tiny bit of caramel, when it's done.

Of course you can also use some walnut in there.

When it's done, you take it over there and you put this in right on this.

You can not bake this right here.

You can put this right here.

Hold on to it, and boom, done.

(Audience laughing) And then you're going over there I'm going to race it over there.

Oh, look at that.

Put it over here.

And of course, we always, when we entertain guests, we always cook twice as much.

(Audience laughing) This is so hot.

And then I'm going to take this out.

Remove these, remove these.

Come out.

And then we're gonna transfer these.

And I want to show you how easy it is.

You hold onto this because it's pretty hot.

You open this, you open this and then I want to show you, this is very, very easy to do.

You open this up, you see this whole thing comes out and I want to show you.

You can actually have a lot of, of these come out.

And all you have to do, is put some extra roast Walnut right here, and you have a beautiful roasted chicken.

(Audience applauding) well, this all our menu for entertaining friends today.

Now, all you need are some entertaining friends to serve it to Till next time, keep good company.

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

“Goodbye!” (##!)

(Audience applauding)