I recently purchased “Simple Chinese Cooking” by Kylie Kwong and tested out some recipes. As a point of reference, I also own and use “Fragrant Harbor Taste” by Ken Hom, “Chinese Cuisine” by Huang Su-Huei (Wei-Chuan Cookbook) and Chinese Cooking at the Academy by the California Culinary Academy.

1. Visually Stunning. “Simple Chinese Cooking” is a visually stunning masterpiece that features gorgeous photos of the finished dishes. These really inspired me to cook and try out her recipes.
2. Step-by-Step. Kylie Kwong’s cookbook includes step-by-step photos for some recipes—a helpful if you are a novice in the kitchen and can’t quite parse the language of cookbooks.
3. New Ingredients. To test out some of her recipes, I had to visit the local Asian grocery store. I keep a well-stocked kitchen, but she called for some ingredients not found in my other cookbooks, such as ketjap manis, fish sauce, and malt vinegar. The ketjap manis and fish sauce may come from a pan-Asian influence. Not sure about the malt vinegar. Actually, I had to find the malt vinegar at a specialty food store. My local Asian grocery store didn’t carry it, and I haven’t come across many Chinese recipes that call for vinegar except for sweet and sour sauces.
4. Chinese Salad. The book is expansive in its reach and is divided into the following categories: stocks, soups, beef, pork, chicken, duck, seafood, eggs, tofu, vegetables, salads, rice, noodles and wontons, and side dishes and pickles. When I saw the salad listing, I had to see what dishes she had in mind. By salads, she means cold vegetable dishes, such as bean sprout salad, chilled cucumber salad, and tofu, black cloud ear fungus, Asian herb and sesame salad.
5. A Good Second Cookbook. If you are looking for 10 ways to cook beef, this isn’t your cookbook. Just five beef recipes. And four pork recipes. By way of comparison, the Wei-Chuan had 39 beef and pork recipes and Fragrant Harbor Taste has 24 meat recipes. In other words, “Simple Chinese Cooking” is not an exhaustive compilation of Chinese recipes. However, if you already own one of those encyclopedias of Chinese cooking, “Simple Chinese Cooking” is a good second cookbook to add to your collection.
6. Stir-Fried Hokkien Noodles with Prawns, Chili and Bean Spouts. I couldn’t find Hokkien noodles at the market, so I substituted Shanghai noodles instead. I think any thick Chinese noodles will do. I also used red peppers instead of red chilis since I am not a fan of spicy foods. The dish came out well and received good reviews. Oh, the other thing I noticed is that a lot of recipes in this cookbook call for red onions. My other cookbooks usually list brown onions instead.
7. Sweet and Sour Tomatoes. Listed under Side Dishes and Pickles, this is really a simple tomato salad. Tasty, even with raw red onions.
8. Steamed Silken Tofu with Stir-Fried Spinach. I loved this dish. Used regular salt instead of sea salt. Also, used baby spinach instead of the standard bunch. Really easy to make, if you have a steamer.
9. Steamed Fish Fillets with Ginger and Spring Onions. Unlike every other recipe for steamed fish that I’ve previously tried, this one calls for pouring a 1/3 cup of water over the fish before steaming. I guess the net effect is that the fish is steamed and poached at the same time. The fish did cook faster than I expected. Will need to test this recipe again with a different type of fish.
10. A-. Hopefully, I’ll be able to test a few recipes each week and eat my way around the cookbook. Although some recipes call for non-standard ingredients, overall, the cookbook does offer a simple recipes to delicious Chinese dishes. I do wish that she would have included Chinese names to all her dishes so that I can tell what each dish aspires to be. Otherwise, every author can translate their dishes differently.

P.S. I rarely set foot inside a bookstore these days. So, if you are a cookbook author, create a website that lists all dishes included in your cookbook. Before I buy a cookbook, I want to know what new dishes I can prepare. This will really help me decide whether or not I want to buy your cookbook.