Cooking like an American

Work has kept me crazy busy lately (working on weekends sucks! Especially when you're fielding calls from clients...I mean really! Don't they want to enjoy their Easter too?!?) so I've got some catching up to do with the blog. I haven't been able to cross anything off the list in awhile but I have some activities in process: #26 Join a kickball team (done and will fill in details soon), #20 Go to Vegas (hotel is booked, just got to get a good deal on a flight) and #27 Join the army (yikes stay tuned on that one). 

So in catching up, I thought I would start with a cooking class I did a couple of weeks ago with some friends at Kitchen on Fire in Berkeley. We signed up for the Art of the Wok class and since we made 'American' Chinese food, I figured I could talk about it here :-). It was sooo much fun and the food was delish! Seriously, I'm like a wok pro at this point. 

The class was run by Chef Chat Mingkwan who gave us some background into Asian cooking and some tips on what we would be working on. The best part was hearing the menu he had planned for the evening:

-Peppered Shrimp

-Beef and Broccoli

-Lemongrass Chicken

-Crown Jewel Fried Rice

-Chow Mein 

After listening to Chef Chat speak, you start with every group picking a station...actually we started by cracking open the first bottle of wine we brought...can't cook without wine right? Its like a rule or something. Anyways, they have all the stations set up with everything you need- you only have to do a bit of prep.

We picked the chow mein station and took stock of what we had to work with...who knew this is what jicama looks like? 

Then we took a look at the recipe...there were quite a few steps so I was glad both Kelda and Bonnie were able to remember them. When it comes to cooking something new, I check the recipe A LOT (not really possible when faced with a flaming stove like we had here). 

Prep was done, instructions read and now it was on to the actual cooking. Wok cooking is super fast so you have to be on top of it or things go downhill quickly. We each had a turn at the wok (frying and flipping <-- so fun) but also spent time lining up the ingredients and prepping for the person wok-ing...I also spent a lot of time drinking wine and taking pictures (obvi these were critical steps in the process ;-)). 

The finished product!!! Chow mein delishiousness!! Note the presentation...yea we were all over that one.

To be honest, I was way too busy stuffing my face with the food (second helping of course) to take pictures of the other dishes but just know it was some of the best Chinese food I have EVER had...so good. I highly recommend checking out Kitchen on Fire (us with the co-owner Chef Olivier below) if you want a fun night with good food...but don't be lame like the rest of our class and only drink the water provided...nope KOF totally supports brining wine and beer into class and you can't beat that.