Master Chef Duong Huy Khai has worked in many world fame restaurants. Back to Nha Trang, he is still attracted by local cuisines and hopes to introduce Nha Trang food to diners aboard...
Master Chef Duong Huy Khai has worked in many world-famous restaurants. Back to Nha Trang, he is still attracted by local cuisines and hopes to introduce Nha Trang food to diners aboard.
Local food promoted
Duong Huy Khai, a Vietnamese American chef, has been honored at the World Culinary Academy and on Cordon Bleu Boulevard in France.
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| Master Chef Duong Huy Khai |
He beat 200 other leading chefs from 30 countries and territories to win a gold medal for his salangane’s nest soup (the swallow’s nest brought from his hometown in the central province of Khanh Hoa) at International Beijing Culinary Competition in June 2012.
Duong Huy Khai was born and grew up in Nha Trang City. He immigrated to the USA with his family at the age of 13 in 1975. “My childhood was with Vietnamese food. Rice noodles such as banh canh, bun ca as well as Nha Trang bread are still on my mind and inspire my determination to come back to bring local dishes to the world," he said.
Graduated from Cordon Bleu (France), he began his career in some 4 and 5-star restaurants. Then he opened a Vietnamese restaurant named Le Colonial in Beveley Hill and made this place to become a rendezvous of superstars and famous US people.
His Ana Mandara restaurant in San Francisco is another success. Nha Trang dishes are also served in his high-grade Vietnamese restaurant chain.
The question is how to make local rustic food to become more appealing for not only local residents but also foreigners.
Chefs’ creativeness is very important and can make a change. Local dishes such as "banh canh" and "bun ca" can be made more attractive and delicious thanks to skillful cooks. They can use their talents and imagination to create tasty masterpieces and to improve existing recipes.
9 dishes made from salangane’s nest
According to Duong Huy Khai, to make a delicious salangane’s nest dish, it is important that we must know well about bird’s nest or salangane’s nest.
Khanh Hoa salangane’s nest is a high-grade nutritious specialty. However, it seems that it is popular just in Asia, especially in South-east Asia. Not many Western and American people know about this kind of food.
Therefore, to bring the food to 5-star restaurants in foreign countries is an art. The full and rich flavor of salangane's nest has been enhanced.
Besides the prize-winning soup, his other special dishes include ice cream, spring rolls, salad, etc made from salangane’s nest.
All the dishes are his skill and effort to offer variety to suit all palates, to make local cuisines more well-known to the world.
He says he will try his best to promote the quintessence of local dishes abroad.
N.T
