Sep 10: Cultural Immersion #4

Then we went off to Sichuan cooking class. So fun. First, we watched the beginning students. It was out of the karate kid. . . instead of wax on, wax off, they have to spend 3 hours every morning for 20 days shaking dirt around in a wok, to get the exact right wrist motion. Then they graduate to slicing daikon radish for 20 days. After Eleni and I attempted to copy them--to no one's surprise we were lousy at both -- we then went up to the intermediate class. We made fiery tofu with carp (including the heads, but who's noticing?), spicy prawns that were live before the chef twisted their little heads off, sweet and sour pork, and deep fried mushroom dumplings. It was truly fantastic, and semi-vegetarian Eleni ate not only the recently killed shrimp-- shells and all -- but a bite of the pork when the students in the class wouldn't let her get away with a simple "I don't eat meat."