London chef Andrew Wong on how he made chicken feet more palatable to Western diners
The son of immigrants from Hong Kong, Andrew Wong didn’t want to work in the restaurant business. But fate had other plans and today he runs the upmarket restaurant A Wong, in London, where he serves modern Chinese cuisine
How did A Wong come about? “My wife and I opened it 4½ years ago in a part of town where gastronomy isn’t the focus. We sit on the site where my parents had a restaurant since 1985. It served traditional Cantonese food, indicative of Chinese immigrants – my mum is from Hong Kong, my father was a refugee from China who went to Hong Kong. We wanted to do a modern Chinese restaurant, representative of modern China, one where the sharing of dishes is not frowned upon, which is frankly a lot more fun. In Hong Kong I see a lot of restaurants that plate their food and that’s the opposite of what Chinese food is about: eating family style.”
What was your childhood like? “I studied extra hard to make sure I didn’t have to work in a restaurant. My sister and I worked at our parents’ restaurant every spare moment. I didn’t see the catering industry as a career – I always thought it was a pastime or a temporary occupation. But when I was 22 years old, at university, my father died of cancer, and I went back to help my mum. Growing up I had spent a lot of time in the kitchen, but didn’t learn how to cook dishes.”
How did you become interested in cooking? “I went to catering school and learned classical French cooking. I met people who aspired to be in the industry. I started thinking about using Chinese cuisine to do something and that’s when the passion started. Chinese cuisine isn’t just about food – it’s an extension of Chinese culture, well being, medicine and social interaction. Once you explore that, it’s a minefield.”
You learnt cooking in China. what was that like? “I have a lot of friends who are influential in big establishments in China. I told them what I wanted to do and learn, and the Sichuan Higher Institute of Cuisine, outside Chengdu, took me in about eight years ago. I didn’t know Mandarin, but cooking is visual. I learned the basics of Sichuanese food and their approach to food. Their style of cooking is incredibly clean for something that’s so oily, and it’s spicy but not spicy. People in the West have preconceptions that Sichuanese food has aggressive chilli, blowing your face off. It wasn’t like that at all.”
