Kylie Kwong

I was really happy to have found a new cooking show on TV that entertains and is also instructional. Actually, I found an entirely new channel (new to me anyway) -- Discovery Home. Kylie Kwong is a 4th generation Chinese Australian and is quite a famous chef over there. I like her show because her food always looks scrumptious and her cooking instructions clear, simple, and concise. I also like her because she bears an uncanny resemblance to my friend Yvonne. I think her show is the only Chinese food cooking show on TV at this moment since I haven't seen Yan Can Cook (annoying host, supposedly fake accent, and not very educational overall) for a while, and East Meets West has also disappeared (Ming is also slightly overbearing with his jock-ish manners; and the show is fusion style and poorly adaptable to home cooking). Kylie's food is mostly simplified Chinese recipes, with occasional fusion twists. But she just seems so approachable and pleasant. Each show is stylishly edited, with surprisingly small percentage of time spent in the kitchen.

The recipe I tried is her poached chicken with soy and ginger sauce. It is quite clever -- the chicken is poached for a very short amount of time on the stove, and left in the hot broth for over 3 hours off the flame. During this time the meat is gently cooked, but the highly seasoned broth, full of ginger, rice wine, and scallion flavors, slowly infuses all its goodness into the tender flesh. The overall time is about 4 hours from beginning to finish, but the active time probably amounts to no more than 20 minutes. It is indeed one of the best soy and ginger chicken I've tasted.