(soft music) (audience clapping) - Before we begin our show on Chinese family style cooking, I want to introduce my favorite family style cook.

She has come all the way from China to join us today, my mom.

(audience clapping) If you ever wonder why it is that Yan can cook, the lovely lady is the reason.

They call her the Julia Child of China.

She has been cooking for me all my life.

And today I just want her to sit back and relax, while I cook for her.

Now the first dish, what I'll do is one of her favorite and the greatest hit in her life.

The chicken with sausage and mushroom.

When I was growing up, she always fixed me.

This is very, very easy to do and also very easy to keep with the left over.

So everybody should learn how to do this.

I didn't wanna show you the basic ingredient first because it's very interesting.

And all of these can be purchased.

Here this is the Chinese sausage.

They always come in pairs like that.

If they come in one, don't buy it.

(audience laughing) Always make sure they come in pairs.. Then you slice it.

And then you'll have fresh water Chestnut.

You peel it, after you peel it, you slice it You use fresh water Chestnut, some Tiger Lily bud, golden lily bud.

You soak them in water and after you soak them, You have to tie them up like this.

So when you steam them, when you steam fry when you put them in soup, they won't fall apart, okay?

You tied them up like this.

And of course, besides this, we also have dark cloud ear, This is cloud ear.

Before they soak, they look like this.

They're also called Black fungus.

And of course everybody knows this shiitake mushroom, dry when they soak, they look like this, okay.

All we have to do is, take all these ingredient and put all these ingredient together.

Tiger Lily bud, Mushroom, Water Chestnut, and China's sausage and put all of these together.

And we don't need the rest because we have plenty.

So we don't need that.

Now we set this aside and the next thing you do is, you're gonna have some chicken.

We're gonna have some chicken right here already cut it into chunks, okay.

Put it up into chunks, and depends on how many people you serve.

At home it's just me, my brother and me, wowow.

So this is enough, this is for me, for my brother, and this for me, ah, the whole thing for both of us.

(audience laughing) And then you'll marinate it with a tiny b.. rice wine, kind of a soy sauce, regular soy sauce and also a tiny bit of black soy.

Give that rich looking color.

And then also a tiny bit of cornstarch to suey in the juice.

And that dish, when they steam, they won't be so watery or runny Chinese White Pepper or any White Pepper will be fine.

I called it Chinese because I bought it in an Asian store.

And then, (audience laughing) some julienne ginger.

And also tiny bit of minced garlic.

And of course teeny tiny bit of sugar, optional.

Mix them all up.

Now after you mix them all up, I hope I'm doing exactly what my mother have taught me how to do.

Mix them up, let it marinate for a little while.

And then you simply put the whole thing in here.

If you want, you can also use a tiny bit of green onion.

In the last minute, when this is all done, I wanna show you how easy it is.

When it's all done, all you have to do is, move the whole thing right here.

Very easy to do.

If you want, you can even to put a teeny tiny bit of whole mix soup stock because you have cornstarch.

So when the cornstarch mix with the whole mix-up stock they create a nice thick sauce.

When this is all nice and ready, and you transfer this and you put this in this Bamboo steamer, and you're going to steam this for 18 to 20 minutes, over medium heat until they are nice and done.

And I'm gonna move (utensils clinking) these away because we need a lot of space today.

When that is ready, 18 to 20 minutes, 17, 18 minutes, it's done.

When it's done.

(Bamboo steamer lid tingling) (laughs) Right here.

(audience laughing) And then you can remove this, we shut this off first.

Oh, look at this, shut this off.

Make sure you shut this off and remove these very, very hot.

Make sure to remove the whole thing so everybody can see what we're doing here.

And then all you have to do is transfer this (utensils clinking) into a bowl of rice, and you can serve, this is beautiful.

(utensils clinking) Put it right over here and it's very simple to do, all the Chinese sausage give flavor to our dish.

And this is as simple as this, very delicious.

(audience clapping) Now our next dish is Maple Tofu which is supposedly to have been created by an elderly freckled face lady in (indistinct) province called Maple.

That's why they call it, Maple Tofu, Ma-ple To-fu(laughs) (audience laugh) And this particular dish is very good because you know why?

You use only a tiny bit of meat a lot of vegetable protein derived from tofu.

So that's the reason why I wanna show you how easy it is to do this.

Here, I have all of these ingredients; I have Tofu, I have pork, you can grind the pork by lean ground pork or you can chop it up yourself.

And then I have some green onion, some chili pepper crushed chili pepper dry, Charlotte, ginger and garlic and some soy sauce and sesame (indistinct) And the first thing I'm gonna do to show you is, let's cut up the tofu like this, let's put this over here.

Let's cut this up like that into little cubes see th.. And then you cut this up (knife clinking) into little cubes like this.

(knife clinking) So far my mother has been very, very quiet.

That means I am doing a reasonably good job.

(audience laughs) She is so impressed.

She is speechless.

(audience laughs) We'll put it right here in the meantime let's get some ground pork.

If you will have time, you can grind it up yourself.

You just chop it up.

This is how you do it.

We'll save these.

Get rid of the fat, fat is not good for your body and yo..

Remove the fat.

And then I cut this up into a thin piece and cut it up another thin piece.

Once again, by parallel cutting technique.

And I stick them all up into a little strip.

This is how Chinese chefs mince.

And then you cut into little cubes dice and then you use two knife.

Look at that.

(knife clattering) (audience laughing) this is how you do it.

It doesn't take too long.

(knife clattering) Chinese ground pork and it is done.

You do not want to chop it too much because you want to create some extra texture.

When this is done, you set it aside.

You can marinate this.

Now you've got to marinate to make the dish look wonderful.

So we marinate the pork, okay, we marinate the pork with soy sauce, cornstarch and a tiny, tiny bit of wine.

If as I said repeatedly if you cannot take wine, you don't like wine.

Don't use wine, okay?

Stir, stir this.

And the whole thing is almost ready.

Now, when this is done, you set it aside and you are going to cook this famous classical dish.

All I have to do is get ready and work put a tiny, tiny bit of oil (oil sizzling) and garlic and ginger.

Garlic and ginger.

and then put our pork in.

(oil sizzling) Put our pork in.

You can have more pork if you want.

You wanna make it nice and hot.

Make sure you move, you walk around as much as possible.

(pan clattering) I hope through all this smoke and steam.

My mother can still see what I'm doing.

(audience laughs)(oil sizzling)(speaks in foreign language) I'm asking my mother, "Is that correct?"

(pan scraping) (audience laughs) Put a tiny bit of crushed chili, shallot, green onion.

Oh, and then when it's almost ready put the tofu and flavor it a little bit.

Whole mix-up soup stock, soy sauce, some black soy sauce.

It'll give it a rich color.

If you want in the last minute, put a tiny bit of extra wine (oil sizzling) My mom is getting excited.

(audience laughs) Oh, when it's done (claps) the whole thing is done.

When this is done, I'll put this back here and we'll serve these mapo tofu.

Oh, look at this nice and hot serve two dishes at the same time.

(audience clapping) Now it is time to let the catfish out of the bag.

I'm gonna show you another very traditional Chinese family dish called Pan-fried catfish with black vinegar sauce.

You can use any vinegar.

I just use a Chinese style vinegar.

And here is the fish fillet.

You can use Catfish.

You can use any white fish.

You can use the Red Snapper cod or you can even use halibut.

It doesn't make any difference.

And all you have to do is sprinkle a tiny, tiny bit of white pepper and a tiny bit of salt.

I use chopstick to do everything including this and it drives me nuts.

(audience laughs) It's very hard to teach people to pick up salt with chopsticks.

Don't do it.

(audience laughs) And then all I have to do is sprinkle a tiny bit of cornstarch, sprinkle a tiny bit of cornstarch on both sides because I'm going to put, this is Chinese chive.

We don't need the Chinese chive.

And then I put it in beaten whole egg.

This way I can once again put it over here and coat it, look at that.

I coat the whole thing so it looks like this.

And then I do it one more time.

This way we'll have two pieces of fish, one here one here, and these are very easy to do.

Everybody can do it.

And this is the same thing you can do with a lot of things.

Let's move all these away we don't need this.

And then of course you got to (water whooshing) wash your hands.

And then the next thing I want do is because the plate is not that big, So I'm going to cut this and cut this and cut this and cut this, trim this and set it aside and save it for another dish.

Now we are ready to pan fry it right here.

(knife bumping) When this, this is a fish pan, look at that.

(audience laughs) So you can do two fish and put a teeny tiny bit of oil.

Not much move them around, always move things around and make sure this is also right here.

(audience laughs) Look at that.

(oil sizzling) Put this right here.

Put this right here.

And then you can brown this.

When you have a wonderful... Oh, I'll show you another cleaning technique.

Everybody look okay, you see this?

I have some flour and this is very hard and messy to do it.

So you use the tip of your knife.

Look at that, everybody look.

You go like this one, see this two, three.

This is how you clean up the whole thing.

And it's very easy to do.

Look at that, you just clean it up.

And the whole thing is clean.

And in no time.

This is how easy it is to clean.

Now of course, once again you can actually turn this (pan rasping) with your chopstick.

Now, I don't know about you.

A lot of the time (pan rasping)in ancient China there's a very interesting custom.

If a childless couple could change actually change their luck by stealing a pair of chop sticks from a couple with lots of children.

And for twins, you have to steal two pairs of chopsticks.

If you wanna have a big family you steal two woks, a spatula and a set of Bamboo steamer (audience laughs) and all the chopsticks you see in sight.

Then you're gonna have big families.

(pan rasping) Make sure to turn down and have so.. (pan rasping) stove top barbecue Make sure.

Now fish has a lot of significant meaning in China.

I don't know, you probably don't know.

In a Chinese banquet or around Chinese new year, they always serve fish because the word fish is the same sound as "Abundance you".

That means if you serve fish in a special occasion, that means you are serving abundance of happiness good health and good fortune.

(pan scrapping) That's why fish is always served.

While I'm browning this, I'm gonna make a black vinegar sauce.

All we have to do is put a tiny, tiny bit of oil here.

Put a tiny bit of garlic and ginger.

And make sure you do not burn yourself.

Make sure you have clean towel (pan scrapping) and then put a tiny bit of chili sauce.

Oh, this is what it will give you a perm for four months (audience laughs) and then black vinegar, black vinegar.

You can use xiang jing vinegar, soy sauce and a tiny bit of wine and of course a tiny bit of pepper and salt and sugar.

And then you can thicken this whole thing up.

I(murmurs) If you want to make a little bit heavier or more sauce all you have to do is use a tiny bit of extra chicken broth and I'm gonna turn it on so everybody can see they are thickened.

And when they are thickened, we are going to get ready to serve.

Fish served over fish plate, twin fish plate.

And to make it more exciting, you need somebody know what to do with... Oh the sauce is ready.

We need to go with a fisherman.

(audience laughs) look at that.

Unbelievably exciting.

And then you'll put the fish right in here and you'll put the fish, you browned on both sides right in here and make sure the sauce is perfect.

Put it right in the middle, beautiful sauce.

And of course, after that, you say goodbye to the fisherman because the fisherman is gonna get another fish sprinkled with a tiny bit of extra green onion.

You know what?

You'll have a beautiful pan-fried fish.

(audience clapping) Do you know that tapioca is probably, the most popular dessert ingredient in Asia, all over Asia.

In our family, we used to top it with fresh mango and coconut.

When I was a little baby, I loved the stuff, mango with coconut with tapioca pudding and I loved it.

And I don't know how many of you have ever seen this.

You have heard of tapioca starch.

This is the pearl of tapioca.

There are big pearls like this.

And there are small Pearls like this.

All you have to do is put in water and let it soak for about 30 minutes until they are softened.

And then you put in boiling water and you cook it for about 10 minutes until they're translucent.

And the next thing you're gonna do is you boil it.

You boil it with some sugar, evaporated milk or condensed milk and attainable coconut milk and let it cook over low heat.

And you come with this nice interesting translucent consistency like this pudding, tapioca pudding, very popular.

And I wanna show you how easy it is to get everything ready.

And then of course, without mango you cannot have mango pudding with tapioca.

So you've gotta have mango.

You see, we cut, I'll show you this.

And I also will show you this.

We'll peel this with my puree knife.

(audience laughs) And I learned this from my mother.

I always remember all the things that I learned from my mother.

You see, set it aside and then you cut this up.

Cause I'm going to show you how to dice mango.

Very simply.

When this is nice and ready, we set this aside and we will cut this up and we'll go like dat.

(knife flopping) And then we will dice this, look at this, dice mango very easy to do or dice.

We set this aside.

We'll put it right here.

And then if you love mango, you have leftover mango.

All you have to do is go like this.

You cut an angle like this one, do you see this two, three.

You cut it at an angle like this, and then you go one, two, three.

Do not cut through the skin.

And then after it's done, you open it up like that, do you see this?

(audience exclaims) Then you can eat mango very easily.

Very easy.

And then I'm going to show you how easy it is to assemble this.

I put some extra warm coconut milk right here and I put some puree mango right here, puree mango to get a very nice, interesting color.

And then after this is done, you will put everything right here.

Very easy to do.

And then you sprinkle some extra mango right on top.

And if you want, you can do a tiny, tiny bit of mint and then serve with extra mango.

(spoon clattering) (audience claps) Now, I need somebody to share this with, after all it takes two to mango.

I know this is the perfect time to bring on my second family suprise.

The latest addition to the family of Yan, my new twins Collin and Devin right here, (audience claps) Devin, (speaks in Mandarin) Collin, (speaks in Mandarin).

Smile in front of all of these millions of people you know that this is how I rock them to sleep.

And I call this a "wokker".

Which one is which?

Will Collin raise his hand?

How about Devin?

Collin, (speaks in Mandarin) That means "smile".

Don't get excited, smile.

(audience laughs) (speaks in Mandarin) And you know what?

Every day I feed them a special Chinese diet hot and sour soup, pot sticker is amazing.

And in fact, they love pudding.

Just like I do when I was a little kid.

This is for you.

(audience laughs) So good they said, "wow", you like that?

Ooh, he said, "This so good, I cannot believe it".

This is so wonderful.

Everybody know that.

Now these two, little twins are getting on a wonderful tiny dot.

In fact, I am taking them into work.

They are quick walk.

If they're gonna start to walk.

And this is the wonderful addition, Collin and Devin.

Oh, Devin and Collin.

(audience laughs) I have no idea Well, I hope you have enjoyed meet.. and sharing some of our favorite dishes till next time.

Remember if Yan and Yan and Yan can cook, So can you.

(speaks in foreign language) (audience claps)