Modern masterpieces
By combining contemporary plating skills with the artistry of trompe l'oeil, chef Yeung Wai-kit at the Michelin-starred restaurant, Fu Chun Ju, is helping to paint a new chapter in Cantonese cuisine, Li Yingxue reports.
"Because hot dishes in Chinese cuisine are usually cooked at much higher temperatures than dishes in Western cuisine, they are harder to keep at the optimum temperature," he says. "So, for plating, I put more effort into the presentation of the cold dishes if there's enough time."
Yeung's hot dishes are also impressive in terms of their presentation. He goes to great lengths to serve them in unusual ways. He thinks presentation is an important element of the modern dining experience as people usually photograph the dishes before eating.
His pan-fried phoenix-tailed prawns with Longjing tea and tea leaves are served in a tea pot and a dozen teacups. Each cup contains a prawn that the waiters pour tea over during serving.
Yeung is very strict about hygiene in the kitchen. If the soup of the day doesn't sell out, he would never consider serving it up to diners the following day.
"I've experienced this in some restaurants, so I decided to create seven soups for every day of the week to prove that we only serve fresh soup every day," Yeung says.
Each is freshly made every morning, from Monday's double-boiled pigeon soup with dates and wolfberries to Thursday's sea cucumber soup with matsutake mushrooms to Sunday's pork tendon soup with bamboo fungus.
