Flavour profile: Jimmy Lee – celebrity chef and owner of Lychee Oriental
Discover Jimmy’s store cupboard staples and first food memory What’s your favourite ingredient? It’d have to be soy sauce, as the umami flavour can make everything taste amazing. I’d say it’s my number one store cupboard stable.
Do you have a guilty food pleasure?
I love a sausage roll (from a very well known brand) and have even been known to have one for my breakfast.
Tell us about your first food memory?
I remember the first time my mum made me a Chinese beef curry. We would usually eat bland and healthy food when I was a child, so when she made this for me, when I was just five years old, I thought it was the most incredible dish I'd ever tasted in my life.
What’s your favourite Scottish restaurant, deli or cafe? Haylynn Canteen is an amazing new cafe. It has just opened in Whiteinch Glasgow and is owned by chef Robbie Morrow.
What would be your last supper?
It’d have to be a dish of lobster with ginger and onion on a bed of crispy noodles. It’s so divine.
Starter or pudding?
I’d always choose pudding over a starter, as I have a sweet tooth.
Do you have any food you hate?
I’m not a fan of celery - what's that all about!
What starters, main and dessert would be served at your dream dinner party and who would you invite?
For starters we’d have abalone in oyster sauce. The main course would be a Macanese chicken curry, and for dessert, we’d have the
Japanese mochi, Little Moons (any flavour will do). I'd invite Jacinda Ardern (New Zealand’s Prime Minister) so that we could talk about her year. I imagine her stories would be fascinating.
What's your favourite geographical foodie destination?
Morocco. From tagine to fish chermoula, the food there is amazing.
Jimmy Lee’s new Hong Kong street food pop-up, Salt & Chilli Oriental, is open from Thursday, March 25, at 911 Dumbarton Road, Glasgow. It will be serving food Tuesdays to Sundays, 4pm until 9pm. For more information and to view the menu, see www.salt-chilli.co.uk