Madame Chu's Chinese Cooking School

by Unknown and Grace Zia Chu

Book Overview

Chinese cuisine and the art of Chinese cooking This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671242091
• Release Date: April 1978
• Publisher: Fireside
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.

Customer Reviews

The best basic Chinese cooking book there is

This book was published in 1978 and is long out of print. That's your good fortune, cookie. You can pick up a used copy of this excellent book for a song (that's a joke--"song" is a common sound in Chinese). The writing is concise and clear and the recipes are basic, good everyday Chinese fare. Especially recommended are the simple recipes for vegetables--her Suchow-style string beans and her braised broccoli are staples in my line-up. If you want to get fancy, try her pressed duck with almonds. It takes two days to make, but well worth it. When I first got the book in 1980, I thought her patronizing quips about naive American food tastes were condescending; now I just see them as quaint. Grace Zai-Chu was born in Shanghai, but educated in American Christian schools in China, then at Wellesley. She returned to China as a teacher, but fled the mainland with her husband, a Nationalist army officer in 1950. She died in Columbus Ohio in 1999 at the age of 99. Her food lives on, and on. Thanks, Madame Chu.