By Lily Nguyen
The 11 students in this cooking class are already seasoned cooks but they still crowd tightly around the teacher as she describes the basic ingredients they will work with that day.
Speaking in fluent Chinese, instructor Fae Chen holds aloft a bag of oats to explain what it is, what it is used for, and where it can be bought. English words like “Quaker,” “rolled oats” and “no-name” pepper her speech.
“I have to define everything,” says Chen, a nutrition educator with the Somerset West Community Health Centre. She created the menu, which teaches Chinese immigrants how to cook western-style foods.
Most of the students —nine women, two men — may be the main meal-providers for families that include children and grandchildren. But years of preparing sophisticated dishes from their native countries never introduced them to western cooking.
For these students that is changing. On the second Friday of every month, they learn how to make Canadian staples such as cabbage rolls, lasagne, salads, muffins, chocolate cakes and cookies.
Peter Lo, a clinic social worker, says he organized the class after a few Chinatown residents approached him to say they wanted to learn western-style cooking.
For $10 each, they attend six sessions. The fee covers cooking supplies, while the centre provides the kitchen facility and instruction.
“They would like something to help them integrate into Canadian society,” says Lo. “Because the children grow up in a Canadian environment, they want to taste more Canadian food.”
Student Lin-Kwan Yip agrees.
“We want to know how the Canadians live,” says the immigrant, who settled in Chinatown after coming to Canada 25-years-ago. “We want to compromise and live between two cultures.”
Yip says she decided to learn how to cook western-style after her 18-year-old daughter approached her for help with a North American cookbook. Yip couldn’t teach her how to make any of the recipes.
“Right now, she grow up, she says she wants to have both cultures,” says Yip, who was one of the first people to request the class.
“The kids inherit two cultures. Sometimes they mix up and they feel ignored and frustrated. This is very common.”
So far, the students have learned how to make spaghetti and garlic toast.
Student Diana Lo, who has two children, 15 and 10, says she’s made spaghetti before, but not the Canadian way. She had never heard of basil or oregano before she started the class.
“I don’t know them so I don’t know how to use them,” she says. “It makes (the spaghetti) taste really different.”
But not necessarily better. She took the recipe home with her, trying it out on her family. “It went so-so,” she says.
On this day, the menu includes Rice Krispie squares and oatmeal chocolate-chip cookies.
“I’ve never seen them before,” says Lo of the Rice Krispie squares, still warm and chewy from the stove.
And how do they taste?
“Yummy.”
The class doesn’t just bridge the cultural generation gap, says Chen. It also gives residents a chance to mingle with their neighbours. “It builds a real sense of community.”
Her claim is well-supported. As the cookies bake, students chatter among themselves, examining ingredients and trading cooking and shopping tips. Once the cookies come out of the oven hot and fresh — although not perfect (“too wet,” someone says of the flattened cookies) — everyone crowds around for a sample.
Washed down with Chinese tea, of course.