British twins of Chinese ethnicity, Lisa and Helen Tse, owners of Chinese restaurant Sweet Mandarin in Manchester, cooked lunch for Premier Li Keqiang and British Prime Minister David Cameron when Li visited Cameron at his official residence in London on June 17.

"When I first saw Premier Li, I was so nervous as the whole experience was so surreal," Lisa says of the No 10, Downing Street event. She adds that Li was very friendly and spoke to them in English.

"He was proud of us and said we were a great example of a Chinese success story and congratulated us on our excellent cooking and sauces. He hoped that we could open restaurants in China so that the Chinese people could also try our unique cuisine."

Cooking lunch for Li and Cameron was a great honor, Lisa says, and adds that it was one of the proudest moments in her career. "They both really enjoyed the food and their plates came back empty which is always a good sign."

Lisa was part of a delegation that had accompanied Cameron on his visit to China last November.

"When Cameron went to China, Premier Li treated him to a sumptuous Chinese banquet," Lisa says, adding that the British prime minister wanted to return the favor by giving Li "the best of Britain". That was how the twins were invited to cook for the Chinese premier.

During trial runs, the Tse twins gave Cameron three main courses and three desserts to choose from. He chose the Mabel's clay pot chicken, homemade side condiment of sriracha hot chilli sauce and chilli oil, five-treasures egg fried rice and mango pudding soaked in chrysanthemum tea.

"He said he wanted something unique for Premier Li," Lisa says.

Mabel's clay pot chicken, a dish named after the sisters' mother, won Sweet Mandarin the title of Best Local Chinese Restaurant in the UK on the television show, Gordon Ramsay's F Word. Their dishes are family recipes that have been handed down from generations, she says.

Part of the meal also featured their homemade sriracha sauce, one of their best-selling sauces which have become so popular that Lisa has secured a deal to sell them directly in China.

However, cooking for Cameron was not all smooth sailing. "When we first arrived at 10 Downing Street we could not get in as we were not on the guest list and eventually Cameron's aide had to let us in," Lisa recalls. And then, the kitchen stove needed to be fixed as it wasn't working. After all that Lisa says, "I imagined I was back at Sweet Mandarin and cooked my heart out".

Lisa finds China "an amazing and a very diverse place which is steeped in culture, history and beauty and is a treasure trove of opportunities". The twins love China, Lisa says. They hope to have a TV show in China someday when they can show Chinese people where to visit and eat in Britain.

Lisa and Helen are from the fourth generation of a family that has been cooking Chinese food and making sauces. "We grew up in a family firm that was built on decades of hard-earned experience, and we were expected to give up our evenings and weekends to help out behind the counter or in the kitchen," Helen says.

While Helen trained to be a lawyer and Lisa a financier, they ultimately followed on the family's path and together launched Sweet Mandarin in 2004.

Helen's book - Sweet Mandarin - published by top British publisher Random House in 2007, and distributed across 33 countries, documents how Chinese people emigrated from China to the UK.

Zhou Heran contributed to this story.

zhangchunyan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 06/24/2014 page20)