Roland Trettl meets top chef Sam Leong

Roland Trettl meets Sam Leong

The father of wasabi shrimps

It’s all happening in China’s kitchens – hectic, always noisy, and always perfect. The master is Sam Leong, who’s coming to “Ikarus” in January. Roland Trettl met up with him in Singapore.

Of course cookery is an art form. But it’s equally obvious that cookery is a business. Colleagues such as Jamie Oliver or Ferran Adrià take every opportunity to make millions from their reputation, from merchandising, from advertising and from consultancy agreements.

I thought I’d seen it all, but Singapore proved me wrong. I wanted to visit top Oriental chef Sam Leong from the legendary “My Humble House”. Instead I made the acquaintance of Sam Leong, member of the Board of a major corporation, a company that is well and truly traded on the Stock Exchange, and whose shares are, in the words of the stock market experts, highly volatile. The company in question is Tung Lok Restaurants Ltd. It employs more than 600 people in 24 restaurants in Singapore, Indonesia, China, India and Japan. Sam Leong, former chef de cuisine at the Singapore Hyatt, is a member of the nine-man Board. Even better, he’s the only one there who can actually cook – when he has time. When we met in Singapore, he had postponed what, to my mind, was a typical Leong trip. He originally planned to visit Beijing, Tokyo and New Delhi. What is even more incredible is Sam’s appearance: despite his 42 years he looks more like a young lad, simply dressed in a white T-shirt and trainers, topped off by a bling-bling diamond in his left ear.

The first time I entered “My Humble House”, I immediately thought, “Hey, I’ve been here before!” Chairs with massive backs, an extremely large table, super-stylish crockery and cutlery. And indeed, it betrays the handiwork of style consultant Jin-R, from Beijing, who I visited 18 months ago (“essen & trinken” 10/06). Which answered another question – who actually invented wonderful wasabi shrimps? I had eaten them at Jin-R’s, and at Jeremy Leung’s in Shanghai. Now I knew – Sam invented them. Fantastic flavour and impact; very simple to make. Toss the deep-fried shrimps in mayonnaise with ground wasabi, then roll in crushed cornflakes, and serve with marinated mango or similar. Little wonder that the recipe has spread so quickly.

Sam Leong is synonymous with the ultimate in contemporary Chinese cuisine. Spinach soup with dumplings, chicken soup with lobster won-tons or prawn tofu balls, the latter made from a prawn and tofu paste, stuffed with cheese, then deep-fried, served with a hot and sour sauce. All great eating. Just like Sam’s desserts – usually a problem area in Chinese cuisine. Pan-fried pears, Chinese plums, mango with sesame dumplings, or lemongrass jelly with grapefruit and lime sorbet are wonderful. What always bowls me over is the speed and precision with which the chefs work in the hectic, noisy atmosphere of Asian kitchens, which ring with shouts and yells. Jet burners, rightly banned in Austria, with their roaring, cutting torch-like flames, right next to the open cans of oil, which are in turn right next to cold, running water – if we worked in these conditions, the kitchen would go up in flames every day.

Sam’s pork dumplings were worth running this risk, though, because they were the best I have eaten in recent years. Combine minced pork with egg, water chestnuts and mushrooms, add cornflour, dredge in egg white and deep fry. At the same time prepare pak choi in a chicken broth with oyster sauce and soy sauce, simmer the dumplings, thicken the sauce with cornflour, and add the crab meat – simply perfect.

I realise that this is the starting point for the discussion about monosodium glutamate, in which one practically drowns in Asia. So let’s use as little as possible and, when in Salzburg, I’ll try to persuade Sam that if we’re going to cook his fabulous recipes with the very best ingredients, we just won’t need flavour enhancers.

recorded by Christoph Schulte • Photos: Red Bull Photofiles / Lin Züyi