Introducing The Best Chef Yanpeng Huang

 

Currently serving as the executive chef of Shanghai Alley Gourmet, Yanpeng Huang is skilled in many cuisines, including Chinese and Western, with a decade's worth of cooking experience, making him exceptionally good at creating new dishes. He is a serial winner of “The Best Chef” title conferred by Asia Star TV in 2022 and 2023 thanks to his outstanding and unique cooking talents, especially his ingenuity to combine traditional Chinese food with modern western flavors.

 

1. What do your parents do for a living? Do they have a big influence on your life?

 

My father works in the mobile communication industry and my mother is a pediatrician. Because of their busy schedules, I often had to have my lunches at local food stalls during my childhood. That experience also provoked my interest in food, which can be regarded as a catalyst for my pursuit of the catering career afterwards.

 

2. We all know cooking is a laborious job, why did you choose it?

 

I believe that food is the passport that brings people together, and it is satisfying for cooks to bring food to them. Of course, the job also requires much hard work but you can make it with perseverance.

 

3. Could you please share the highlights of your overseas studies? What skills did you acquired? And how did them help your career?

 

I took a two-year PCK course which involved cuisines from many countries. The training was tightly arranged and very challenging in terms of hands-on skills because it involves many segmented areas like the constant set, soup and sauce making, meat cutting and desserts. I am now focusing on passing some of my experience to the entire team. For example, many team members may not have a stable skill set of stir frying, which is the major technique for Chinese cuisine, so I help them set proportions of ingredients, such as the protein ratio of a dish, accurate to grams and even milligrams to ensure production stability.

 

4. What kind of cuisine are you best at? Please share some of your signature dishes.

 

I am equally good at the Chinese, Vietnam, Thai, Japanese and French cuisines. Charred Cabbage-Typhoon Shelter Style is one of my signature dishes. Considering the local eating habits, I classify this invention into the fried and grilled category. First, cut the Chinese cabbage into steak-shaped pieces and fry until slightly browned, followed by grilling. Then drizzle with the coconut curry sauce that we develop, followed by dressing it with the original Ocean Bay fried garlic, dried scallion and pepper. The result is a combination of spiciness, slight sweetness of coconut curry and the smoke flavor of grilled Chinese cabbage that is highly popular among diners. Another one of my signature dishes is the Tai Chi Fried Rice. First, fry some egg white and set aside, fry the rice and yolk until golden, followed by putting in black truffles and steamed crabs, and then put egg white back into the wok. The dish visually presents a Tai Chi effect, which is very unique.

 

5. As the chef of Shanghai Alley Gourmet, are you satisfied with your present conditions? Can you share with us your career plan for the future?

 

I am quite satisfied because the entire team is good, and apart from regular customers, we also attract many new diners on a yearly basis.

We are opening a new restaurant next summer and after that, we will establish the menu and team for it. My future plan is to make our restaurants better!

 

6. As a Chinese who has studied in a western culinary academy, how do you understand the Chinese and western cuisine cultures? What are their similarities and differences? Can they be compatible to each other? If so, how?

 

I don’t think there are major differences in terms of food itself, and the only difference is people's processing method of food and eating habit. For example, simple cooking techniques are favored in western cooking because the ingredients are good enough; while in Chinese cooking, chefs like to make regular ingredients more interesting through their techniques. The key to the integration between Chinese and western cuisine integration lies in learning from each other. This requires chefs to open their mindset and get familiar with the characteristics and practices of the two systems in order to reconstruct and integrate them.