#ChineseFoodiesofIG: Sasha Wang of Cina In Tavola

Sasha Wang of Cina In Tavola

This is part of an ongoing series of interviews I’m doing with my favourite Chinese foodies that I follow on Instagram. Come and follow the #ChineseFoodiesofIG hashtag on Instagram and leave a comment showing your support for these talented folk!

Where are you from? Where are you really from?

My hometown is the city named Shenyang, in Liaoning province. I usually just tell my foreign friends that I am from northern China. But if you want to have a more specific idea: it is Jilin province on its north and Bohai Sea on the south, Inner Mongolia on its west and North Korea on the east.

What does home taste like?

Growing up in a cold place, I found a hot soupy stew always gives me comfort. One of our traditional dishes is stew of pork meat and fermented cabbage in winter days.

Share a food memory:

When I started my first job in Hong Kong, I was living with two other friends in an apartment. Once my Mom was visiting, she insisted on making dumplings for me. That night after work while I was eating her homemade dumplings, she shared that she didn’t realize I had no rolling pin in the kitchen until she had prepared the dough and the filling. In the end she used the drumstick of one of my roommate’s. Luckily that pair of drumsticks were new! The next day my Mom bought me a rolling pin. That is exactly the same rolling pin I am still using. 

How did you learn to cook?

I began to help my Mom in the kitchen when I was nine years old. But I started serious cooking after moving to Hong Kong. Living independently from family forced me to cook. My roommates and I took turns to prepare everybody’s lunch boxes. Their satisfaction was a great encouragement.
At the same time, Hong Kong was a paradise for foodies. I encountered various yummy dishes of other regions and countries in Hong Kong, then started to search for recipes in order to replicate them. The time living in Hong Kong was the age of food Enlightenment for me.

The secret to Chinese cooking is:

To me, it is the right seasonings. And it is surprisingly straightforward. The top three magic weapons are: soy sauce, dark soy sauce and oyster sauce. You can already conquer many Chinese stir-fried dishes by having them in your kitchen. Then if you want to build more flavors, get sesame oil, Sichuan pepper powder and five-spice powder.

It is important to practice and figure out your preferred combination. Take others’ recipes as a reference and adapt them to your own.

Who's your Chinese food legend?

My grandmother! She mastered the preparations of dishes across regions. We lived together throughout my childhood and her food fed me. Thanks to her, I am used to eating all kinds of Chinese buns and bread. These are the food that have been written into my recipes (https://cinaintavola.com/category/pane/). If she were still alive, I am sure we would have lots of fun cooking great dishes together.

Top three Chinese cooking inspirations:

Flavorful Origins (documentary by Netflix)

A Bite of China (documentary by CCTV)

小高姐的 Magic Ingredients

Dream dinner party guests:

All my family and great friends are my dream guests. I believe cooking for somebody is the best way to show your love. So, an outdoor dinner party in a warm spring/ summer day with group of my beloved people would be such a great enjoyment for me.

Idea for a Chinese fusion dish:

Hand-pulled noodles with Italian meat ragù (Bolognese sauce).

What does Chinese food mean to you?

I once heard a saying: ‘you can change any of your habit but not the habit of your stomach’.

The food I was fed growing up made the person I am today. Although I haven’t return to my hometown for almost 10 years (and I have been living outside mainland China for 20 years), I remain the girl from north China, who craves a hot stew and the dumplings with pork and pickled cabbage filling.