{"id":178,"date":"2011-01-19T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-01-19T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-01-19T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-01-19T08:00:00","slug":"Straight119","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/Straight119\/","title":{"rendered":"Chinese Restaurant Awards signature dishes announced – Georgia Straight"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Michelle da Silva<\/a>, January 19, 2011<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\nIf
\nthere are a hundred ways to prepare a chicken, the HSBC Chinese
\nRestaurant Awards hope to inspire chefs to discover a hundred more.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\n“Every chef knows how to make all these different dishes, but usually
\nthey have some special insight into particular ones, and that’s what we
\nlook for,” Stephen Wong, founding chair of the CRA told the Straight<\/i>. “Then, it’s the same things that you look for: good presentation, smell, look, and taste.”<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\nWong led the judging panel for the CRA’s critics’ choice signature
\ndish awards, which highlight dishes at Metro Vancouver restaurants that
\nare deemed to be the best of their kind—for example, the best chicken
\ndish, prawn dish, or best appetizer.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\nThere were 25 dishes chosen this year, including executive chef Tony
\nLuk’s tea-infused Jade Smoked Grandpa’s Chicken from Jade Seafood
\nRestaurant (8511 Alexandra Road). It was named the best chicken dish of
\n2011 at an awards ceremony on January 18 at the River Rock Casino
\nResort. (Winners of the diners’ choice segment of the awards, which
\nconsisted of online voting in 15 categories, were announced last fall,
\nand Luk was declared Chinese Chef of the Year after an intense cook-off
\nin December.) <\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\nThe critics’ choice panel consisted of 11 judges, each of them chefs,
\nrestaurateurs, or food writers. The judges spent five months tasting
\nnearly 500 dishes, ranging from basics such as those based on chicken,
\nbeef, or pork, to favourites like dim sum, congee, and noodles, to more
\nexotic fare including geoduck, Alaska king crab, and squab. The judges
\nvoted by secret ballot to determine the winning dishes, and many of the
\nwinners turned out to be the dishes that showed the most originality.<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\n“There was one dish with B.C. wild rice and Dungeness crab,” judge and local food blogger Melody Fury told the Straight<\/i>,
\nreferring to Red Star Seafood Restaurant’s (8298 Granville Street,
\nVancouver, and 8181 Cambie Road, Richmond) dish that won the Most
\nInnovative award. “Wild rice isn’t traditionally used in Chinese
\ncooking, but the flavours are still very familiar. It’s eye opening.”<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\n“I want to encourage people to come up with new things,” Wong echoed. “That is the underlying purpose of the awards.”<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\nThe awards featured a new category this year, the Wine & Spirit
\nService Award, given to newcomer Bao Bei Chinese Brasserie (163 Keefer
\nStreet). <\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\n“I want to have a nice glass of wine, a good cocktail, but I feel
\nlike that’s often lacking in Chinese restaurants,” Fury said. “So props
\nto Bao Bei for incorporating cocktails into Chinese cuisine. I think
\nit’s a good move, and I hope to see more of that in Chinese
\nrestaurants.”<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\nFor Wong, the purpose of the CRA is simple—it is all about the
\npursuit of deliciously innovative food. “When you eat a good dish, you
\nwant more,” he said. “You put it in your mouth and you go, ‘Wow, this is
\nreally good!’ And that actually captures what we call wok hei or wok qi
\nin Chinese cooking. It’s that umami kind of coming-together goodness of
\nit, and it’s kind of elusive.”<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\nView the videos taken by Michelle <\/a>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Michelle da Silva, January 19, 2011 If there are a hundred ways to prepare a chicken, the HSBC Chinese Restaurant Awards hope to inspire chefs to discover a hundred more. “Every chef knows how to make all these different dishes, but usually they have some special insight into particular ones, and that’s what we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-cra-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chineserestaurantawards.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}