HONG KONG (UCAN) -- Some priests in Hong Kong have gone into the kitchen to share their lives and faith with the people.

An audio-visual program on a CD features Father Gervais E. Baudry (left photo on CD) cooking "Carne a la Masa" (beefcake) and Father Ferdinand Bouckhout (right) cooking "Rata" (coffee pork chops).

Foreign and local priests are starring in a DVD series titled "Fr. Chef" that the Hong Kong Diocesan Audio-Visual Centre (DAVC) is producing.

The first DVD, featuring two missionary priests, was released on Oct. 26 in all parishes. They share their faith lives while cooking dishes from their home countries.

"Sharing with you the teaching of zyu," reads the subtitle of the series in Chinese. In the Cantonese dialect, the pronunciation "zyu" corresponds to both the verb "cook" and the word for "God." While the program is in Cantonese, the DVDs come with Chinese and English subtitles.

DAVC director Dominic Yung Yeuk-yu told UCA News on Oct. 23 that the center had spent a year planning and preparing for the series. He described it as a lively means to bring the Catholic faith to society, since the Chinese regard eating as an important cultural activity.

The first DVD, lasting 50 minutes, contains two episodes. One features Argentine Father Gervais E. Baudry of the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the other features Belgian Father Ferdinand Bouckhout of the Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

Father Baudry, parish priest of Sts. Peter and Paul Church, showed how he makes carne a la masa (baked beef cake) while Father Bouckhout, former parish priest of St. Jerome's Church, made rata, pork chops prepared with coffee). Both parishes are in the northwestern part of Hong Kong.

While cooking, Father Baudry recalled how he came to serve in Hong Kong. He noted the difficulty in learning Cantonese. After learning Cantonese for two years and serving in the parish four years, he recalled, a layperson came to him one day and said, "Father, I finally understood your homily today."

When the food was ready, Coadjutor Bishop John Tong Hon of Hong Kong appeared on camera as a special guest invited to try the priest's cooking. He gave the dish a score of "90-plus."

In the other episode, Father Bouckhout explained his mother had once won second prize in a cooking contest for her rata, a traditional Belgian dish. He also told the program host that one ingredient, laurel leaf, was not available in Hong Kong, so he asked his nephew to send him some for the show, from the tree outside his home back in Belgium.

The Belgian missioner, who has been in Hong Kong since 1969, shared that for Catholics, eating and celebrating the Eucharist are both occasions for family gathering and sharing.

According to Yung, the DAVC received positive responses, especially from missioners, when it was looking for "priest-chefs" for the series. Future programs in the series will star French and Italian missioners. Also, Father Paul Kam Po-wai, a local priest who has served in Africa, will cook an African dish in one episode, Yung said.

"We do not prepare a script for the priests or limit what they talk about. We let them share whatever they think of under the guidance of the Holy Spirit," Yung said.

Bishop Tong told UCA News on Oct. 23 that he used to cook for his family when he was young, but has not cooked since he entered the seminary. "So I will not cook during the program, but only taste the food," he joked.

The bishop also said he hopes the series will effectively convey Christian values. He stressed that the Church should not aggressively sell the Catholic faith but assimilate with local culture to instill Catholic values in the people.

The DAVC has planned 13 episodes. It produced 8,000 copies of the first two-episode disc. Although the DVDs are distributed free in parishes, donations are welcomed.

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