how to make stupid food look and taste good!

Instant "Mama" Tom Yam Noodles.

2007-08-04T19:09:00.000+08:00

gosh, thousand apologies for the lack of updates here. to say the least, school has been kicking my ass so badly that i haven't had much time to spend in the kitchen. what little 'culinary experience' remains limited to vicarious examples from watching Top Chef. at best, it's me jazzing up a bowl of instant noodles...

but hey, you know what? if there's anything i need to share with people, it's that the best brand of instant tom yam noodles is this Thai brand called "MaMa", which is available at most asian grocers.

i remember my mother bringing them home from her trip to Bangkok more than a decade ago. back then, the noodles was a hard find, and we had to assuage our fix by driving out to singapore's Golden Mile Complex--what we called the Little Thailand of singapore--where she would make me lug two cartons of the noodles.

the dried noodles in the pack is amazingly fragrant, thanks to what i suspect to be a par-cook process, likely a quick-fry. so straight out of the pack, the noodles already taste great without the need of any heat-involved cooking. the tom yam seasoning includes a sachet containing chilli oil, and that i guess is its winning formula. not to forget the fact that its tom yam stock powder is nice and spicy.

all right, that's all the attention i'm allowing the noodles. i really don't want to encourage people to centre their dietary needs on instant noodles :) shall attempt to share some recipes soon. meanwhile, continue enjoying your food people!

Top Chef & Cook Books.

2007-07-29T20:05:00.000+08:00

sorry about the lack of updates, i swung from doing absolute jackshit during the june holidays to being piled with work when school came back this month. there were a couple of recipes i worked on in the last month that i thought i might blog about, but decided otherwise as they were honestly a tad subpar.

i decided then that i would get my hands on two cookbooks for ideas. truth be told, i've never been a fan of cookbooks because i'm b-a-d at following instructions. but like cook shows, we can learn so much--about technique, ingredients, flavours and plating--without actually following recipes. for me it's esentially about being inspired, seeing as how i often end up cooking something completely different from what i'm reading/ watching.

but a good point about testing or following recipes is summed up well by Laurence Fishburne's character, chef Edward Robinson, in the movie Bobby (2006). describing the importance of taking ownership of his food, Robinson says:

See, the first few times I tried to make this dessert, couldn't get it right. Too much sugar one time, not enough sugar the next time; couldn't find the balance. I realised I was forcing it; I'm trying to make it taste like my mama's and her mama's, but mine didn't have any poetry, didn't have any light. And then I realised, I was trying to force it to taste like my mother's, to taste like her mother's. See, it had to be Edward's creation. It had to come from me.

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anyway, to say the least, my cooking has been lived vicariously through the latest season of BravoTV's "Top Chef". for the uninitiated, this reality-tv programme features professional chefs competing for the title of, well, 'Top Chef' (entailed by prize money and other goodies). similar to its sister programme "Project Runway", the contestants have to cook to save themselves from being eliminated each episode. the first challenge--the "quick fire"--sees the chefs fighting to win elimination immunity, but the real fun comes in the elimination challenge. the loveliest thing about the show is that it almost always has a renown chef coming in as a guest judge for the challenges. the first from this season being Anthony Bourdain. next week, we're apparently going to see a very yummy Rocco DiSpirito guest judging.

can't wait!

(for aussie readers: although the show's not on free-to-air television--i'm not even sure if cable has it, it is readily downloadable.)

Shao Xing/ Rice Wine Chicken.

2007-05-28T00:34:00.000+08:00

i like how sometimes i psyche myself up bad to cook a particular dish, but see it take a completely different course half-way through the cooking process? yeah, i'm weird like that. anyway, i was going to prepare the usual honey-glazed chicken schtick, but when i got all the ingredients together, i decided to try something completely new instead.

Shao Xing (more often referred to as Chinese Rice/ Cooking Wine) Chicken is a dish i used to indulge in whenever i had the opportunity to visit Cantonese restaurants in singapore. i've never really gotten down to its true recipe--mostly because my family doesn't cook it, but from what i can tell, it's a lot about drowning your chicken in rice wine. drowning dead birds in alcohol, can't be that hard!

so this is NOT the authentic recipe, but it's nice enough to enjoy with my bowl of rice.

Ingredients.
2 pieces, chicken drumstick & thigh (i.e. 2 drumsticks, 2 thighs)
2 inch, ginger (finely sliced/ diced)
2-3 cloves, garlic (bruised and minced)
3 sprigs, spring onion (finely sliced)
1.5 cup, chinese rice/ cooking wine (dark variety)
1 tbsp, salt
1 tbsp, ground white pepper
1 tbsp, light soy sauce (which i find optional, but only because i'm weird)
1 tbsp, sesame oil

Serves.
2

Step 1: Marinating the Chicken.
combine all the ingredients into a bowl, and just massage the marinade into the chicken for about 5-10 minutes, before sealing the bowl up with some wrap, and leaving that to marinate for at least 3 hours (i like overnight because the marinade really gets into the meat).

Step 2: Double-Boil.
when ready, just transfer that bowl onto a steaming rack in a nice big pot. fill that with water until the water reaches about the centre of the bowl. put the lid on, switch your medium-flame on and let everything boil for at least half an hour; stop depending on how cooked you like your chicken. a full hour more or less guarantees well-cooked meat.

Removing & Adding Oil.
the fat from the chicken probably melted to give you a layer of oil on top of the gravy. if you're not a fat of that, which makes no difference to the taste for the dish, then slowly remove that layer of oil. after that, add the sesame oil in.

i know; the irony!

Final Serve.
simple dish, but pretty delightful results i thought. served well with some rice as a main, side or entree!

Simple Slow-Roast Kangeroo Fillet.

2007-05-24T11:38:00.000+08:00

my good friend, affectionately known as Cazzie Cumface--i'm Fiona Fisting to her, made the most splendid roast lambshank last friday. apparently, she was inspired by the slow-roast rosemary chicken i cooked for her one night, so she took part of the recipe for a ride.

what i was most enamoured with were the vegetable sides she had added to the roast. in her attempt, she simply cut some sweet potatoes, pumpkin and brown onions, and left them on the side of the roast. the vegetables not only added flavour to the gravy, but also soaked up the juices pretty well.

for last night's dinner, i decided to give this simple slow-roast recipe a test.

Ingredient.
the food.
3-4 pieces, kangeroo fillet (substitutable with any red meat)
6, baby carrots (washed and chopped into halves)
2, spanish/ red onions (you SHOULD use brown ones!!!)
2, green apples (granny smiths)
4, roma tomatoes

the marinade
2-3 sprigs, rosemary (just the leaves)
1 lime (juiced)
1 lemon (juiced)
2 tbsp, sherry
1 tsp, salt
1 tsp, ground black pepper

missing.
potatoes (recommend desirees; skinned if you don't like it)

Serving.
2

Step 1: Marinating.
throw all the marinade ingredients together. i like to have my rosemary thrown into the grinder so that they end up nice and fine. add the meat to the marinade, and let set for at least 3 hours (i prefer overnight marinate).

Step 2: Roasting.
in a nice big roasting pan, lay your meat in. around or beside it, lay the rest of the food (i.e. carrots, apples, onions, etc). cover it with a lid or with some foil, and set your fan-oven to 160-170degreeC. when the oven's ready, put the pan in.

Step 3: Deciding When to Remove.
now, here's the tricky part. in general, i've devised my own inch theory on slow-roasting. for every inch of meat, we leave it to roast for 1.5 hours. so the thinner it is, the less time you want it in the oven otherwise it will get a bit overcooked.

the vegetables, however, have to remain in there for at least 3 hours.

Final Serve.
when the vegetables are just about done (5 mins before the 3-hour mark), just pop the meat back into the oven to warm it. then you can have everything ready for serving.

be sure to serve the food with a generous supply of gravy. remember also that the gravy may be used for further roasting of other vegetables. just pop more vegetables in the gravy, and let them roast for the same duration.

i really recommend adding some carbo staple like potato for the roast. because i forgot, i'm going to serve mine with some bread.

ETA:
spanish onions turned out really weird; please use brown onions!

updates, or lackthereof.

2007-05-09T21:44:00.000+08:00

L. and i are busy applying to various new schools to further our studies. she's hoping to get into a good film school in london, and i'm hoping to get into law school in either sydney or melbourne.

other than that, school has been a factor for our blog being such a non-event, but we thank everyone who continues to visit. there're some recipes that i've been meaning to post but haven't had the time; watch out for them this month.

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our heartfelt gratitude to new linkages:

Anne Jovi
we were hoping you'd reveal exactly how you managed the paper-mâché issue. also, i have similar disdain towards jamie oliver's cooking for the same reasons you cited; glad to know i'm not alone in the world!

The Secret Foodie
really nice to see a fellow student on the hunt for good food! we're keeping an eye on your not-so-secret adventures for recommendations.

Where's The Beef?
where is the beef, indeed! gosh, okay, i was always no fan of not eating meat, but i'm really intrigued by the array of vegan food that looks soooo delicious! mmmmMMMmmmMMMM....

Stir-Fried Beef Salad.

2007-05-09T11:15:00.000+08:00

it's strange how i find myself cooking at the best of times and at the worst of times. when i'm happy i cook to please; when i'm depressed, however, i cook to relieve my mind of the looming unhappiness. from my experience, i can vouch that the old adage applies: love is an important ingredient for good food. clearly, i'm not meant to be a full-time chef.

today's recipe, sadly, stems from the sad side of life :(

anyway, enough of my bs. this recipe is a rehash of my housemate, linzi's. much credit goes to her then.

Ingredients.
500g of sliced beef (they sell in Asian Grocers for steamboats)
4-5 potatoes, skinned & diced (Desiree)
6-7 baby carrots, skinned & diced
2-3 onions, skinned and diced/ sliced (brown)
3-4 cloves, garlic (bruised and minced)
5tsp chinese rice wine
3tsp cooking oil (olive in my case)
3tsp honey
2tsp crushed basil leaves
2tsp chilli flakes
2tsp five spice powder

Serves.
3-4

Step 1: FRY! FRY!! FRY!!!.
before you start, start your oven to about 220degreee Cel.

heat your pot/ wok over a medium flame. when it's hot enough, fry the garlic and onion till brown. add the beef strips in, and before it cooks fully, add the condiments (i.e. wine, honey, basil leaves, chill flakes and five spice powder). stir-fry a little more, then add the vegetables.

fry everything till the vegetables are more or less cooked, remove from fire and transfer to an oven-safe ware.

the oven should be ready by now. cover the food with some foil and set the salad into the oven for about twenty to twenty-five minutes.

remove from oven, leave the foil on for at least ten minutes to trap some steam, before serving.

Final Serve.
good with some mash, rice or any other form of carbo. or eaten alone really.

Shelling A Hard Boiled Egg.

2007-04-02T14:35:00.001+08:00

i'm just completely impressed with this:

[via Queerclick's Sticky]

Simple Minty Couscous

2007-04-01T23:45:00.000+08:00

Couscous is probably the fastest thing to cook. ever.
Actually, you don't even need to cook it.
its like a strange conceptual cross between rice and pasta.

Its great as a side dish, or if you're like me, you have sides as a main for lunch ...

The ingredients *look* fancy, but i got them on special offer at the supermarket bargain bin.
the balsamic vinegar cost me one pound (i am suspicious of it's authenticity, but its still vinegar so i don't really mind).

I haven't been cooking as regularly as I'd like, due to several unforeseen circumstances (read: flooded kitchen) in addition to general laziness and the lack of well, heart.

You need love to cook.
(which means cooking when depressed, or stressed, is disastrous. for me at least)

Oh well, on to the recipe.

Ingredients.
1 cup couscous
2 tbs mint sauce
2 tbs balsamic vinegar
1 tbs mixed herbs
3 tbs olive oil
a little over a cup of water
salt and black pepper to taste

Extra Ingredients.
some lettuce or some other salad greens
(its like, the side to my side)

Special Equipment.
a microwave oven
microwavable container / bowl with a lid

Serves.
1 or 2 (depending on how hungry you are)

Step 1: Preparing the ingredients.
Grab a plate and dress it with some salad greens.
Measure out your cup of couscous and pour into your microwavable container.

Step 2: Adding taste.
Because couscous will suck up and expand in ANY liquid, we do the dry bits first.
Mix into your bowl of dry couscous, the herbs, a pinch of salt, a few twists of black pepper, then followed by the mint sauce and then the balsamic vinegar, and use a fork and mix it all up.
It should still be relatively dry at this point.

Step 3: Adding moisture.
Here's the fun bit. Very quickly, add water to your couscous till a point about 1.5 centimeters over the level of couscous, lightly cover with the lid and pop into the microwave oven at max for one minute.

You don't really need to put it in the microwave, because it will expand anyway in cold water over time (which is why all the dry bits went in first) but i like the little bit of heat and steam to 'cook' the stuff i put into the couscous, and to warm it.

Step 4: Fluff it.
Once the microwave dings, let it sit for about thirty seconds and be careful of the steam as you take it out. get your olive oil and drizzle it over your couscous and fluff everything up with your fork.

Have a taste and add more salt and black pepper and maybe olive oil if you'd like.

Final Serve.

Fluff the couscous onto your bed of greens and enjoy!

I actually usually do couscous Mediterranean style, but I finished my olives and tomatoes ... so ... next time then. :)

Chinese Rice Porridge/ Congee.

2007-03-25T17:48:00.000+08:00

my new housemate, linzi (read: lindsay), has a penchant for Cantonese-style rice porridge/ congee which i must admit--before i met her--i've never attempted cooking. as i've explained earlier, i'm hainanese and our congee is quite different from how the cantonese prepare theirs. mainly, the difference lies in the viscosity: of all the dialects, the cantonese congee is the most fluid, to the point where it gets mistaken as a soup by the uninitiated.

lucky for us, not only is L. Cantonese, but she also knows her congee recipe well. for the most part, therefore, this recipe will be credited to her!

because linzi and i are going to be terribly busy over the next few days, we're cooking a big pot of congee to last us till wednesday/ thursday.

Ingredients.
500g, jasmine rice (washed and drained)
4 cloves, garlic
1-2 inch, ginger
1 pc, chicken stock cube (or 1 cup, chicken stock, or whatever stock you prefer)
1 tbsp, ground white pepper
2 tbsp, sesame oil
A LOT OF WATER

substitutable ingredients.
6 pc, dried mushrooms
1 pc, chicken breast
2 stalk, continental parsley (garnishing)
some thai fish sauce (for flavour)

(because the congee is made quite separately, you might want to add prawns, duck meat, beef strips, etc instead. pretty free-form once the congee is done.)

Special Equipment.
food processor (preferably handheld)

Serves.
8

Step 1: Preparing the ingredients
bruise and dice the garlic and ginger.

set the dried mushrooms in boiling water, and let it soak till soft.

remove the mushroom and dice them. set the mushroom broth aside for cooking later.

dice the chicken breast into finer portions.

Step 2: Quick fry of the main ingredients.
set your nice big wok/ pot over a medium flame. pour the sesame oil in. when hot, throw the garlic and ginger in.

before they brown, add the rice in and stir fry everything for about five minutes.

Step 2: Adding Water and Broth.
pour the mushroom broth into the mixture; remember to keep stirring. add about 10 portions of water--the water to rice ratio for this recipe is roughly 10:1. let the rice cook, but remember to stir intermittently.

Step 3: Processing the Congee.
when the rice is more or less cooked, you'll notice that it's broken down quite a bit. however, the rice bits are still somewhat separated from the water. traditionally, the porridge is cooked over the stove for about an hour so that the rice breaks down naturally. thankfully i haven't the patience; we're going to break it down actively.

turn your flame off, stick your food processor into the pot and let it rip! you'll probably have to spin the stick processor around for at least ten minutes so that you get a beautiful liquid texture out of the congee.

when done, return pot to stove.

Step 4: Adding stuff.
this is where we may depart and differ. i'm adding the mushroom chicken in right now. also, i'm adding more water so that the congee becomes even more fluid. the aim is to keep the congee as fluid as possible. so whenever water evaporates over the stove, add a bit into the pot and stir the water in.

make sure you allow the congee to come to a boil if you added raw meat in.

Final Serve.
taste your congee and you might realise that while it has a nice soothing taste to it, it's not exactly the most flavourful dish. most restaurants prepare their congee in a similar fashion: cook the main congee, remove part of it to add specific ingredients according to your order.

I'm serving my congee with a tsp of Thai Fish Sauce, pinch of continental parsley and pepper. you may decide on some other sauce (e.g. soy sauce, chinese vinegar, etc) or to have none at all. really, it's up to you at this point.

Dark Sauce Pork.

2007-03-24T23:54:00.000+08:00

since we're all pressed for time thesedays, i'll share another fuss-free recipe handed down to me by my granny. the dish is quite a popular (or at least common) one that you can find at most ala carte cooked-food stalls back in singapore. as per normal, my granny does it slightly differently from the rest.

due to the fact that i lack some necessary ingredients for the full-blown recipe, i'll be delineating the differences between what my gran does and what i've done. this way, anyone attempting the full recipe might get a notional understanding of going about cooking it.

Ingredients.
500g, San Chen Rou (三辰肉)--literally, three-layer meat/ pork* (i'm using spare ribs instead because it was all i had in the freezer)
10-12 pieces, Chinese Dried Mushrooms (shitake's good)
4-5 cloves, garlic
2 inches, ginger
2 tbsp, Five Spice Powder
5 tbsp, Chinese Rice Wine
1.5 tbsp, ground white pepper
2 tbsp, light soy sauce
.5 cup, dark soy sauce
2 tbsp, sugar

Missing In My Attempt:
5-6, egg
200g, dried tofu

Serves.
4

Step 1: Preparing the meat and everything else.
chop the meat up into bite-size portions, and braise the pork with abt 1.5l of boiling water, and drain the water away. my grandma says it rids the pork of its overly pungent taste.

soak the mushrooms in boiling water until they're all soft. put the water aside to be used for the cooking later. slice the mushrooms.

bruise and dice the ginger and garlic.

full version:
slice the dried tofu into bite sizes.

hard boil the eggs, shell them and set aside for cooking later.

Step 2: The Cooking.
oil your pot or wok and set it on top of a medium flame. when hot enough, throw the garlic and ginger in and stir fry for a minute, making sure that you don't brown it too much.

throw the pork and mushrooms in. add the water in which the mushrooms were soaked as well. stir fry for a bit, before you throw everything else in: (in no particular order) light soy sauce, five spice powder, ground pepper, rice wine, dark soy sauce, and sugar.

bring the whole pot over to your smallest flame, put a lid on it. leave to simmer for about half an hour.

full version:
before you put the lid on, throw the eggs and tofu in. let them soak up the sauce and simmer with the rest of the ingredients.

Final Serve.
like i always say: best served with rice! (yes, i'm a proud yellow, rice-loving "smells a bit like soy sauce" chink.)

Additional Notes:
San Chen Rou. i'm quite sure this refers to streaky slab, seeing as how they both refer to the cut from the pig's belly. it's important to use this cut of the pork because this dish actually depends on the oil you'll get from the layers of fats for additional taste. and yes, it gets pretty oily after a while, so consume with discretion.

Recooking. my grandmother reboils the dish whenever we have a meal. the more you recook it, the nicer it gets. basically, it takes time for all the ingredients to infuse one another. so if you can, cook a whole pot of it and experience the wonders of this dish getting tastier by the day. you may also add new hard-boiled eggs whenever you run out.

Wounds & Dark Sauce. the chinese believe that people with wounds that are still healing should avoid eating dark-colored food, especially dark sauce. it causes the wound to heal with a dark tone; i've got brown patches on my legs from when i was young as evidence. seeing as how i just got inked at the nape, i really shouldn't be promoting this recipe right now. oops :(

I'm singing in the Kitchen.

2007-03-24T22:56:00.000+08:00

"Yes, I'm dreadfully sorry for the lack of updates ... but you see, my kitchen ... is flooded."

alright, thats not the REAL reason why there haven't been updates from me ... I just haven't had the time to cook anything remotely interesting recently.

but my kitchen, really is flooded.

fun times.

i'll be free by tuesday.

i promise something after.

:)

Much Less Digest.

2007-03-24T21:13:00.000+08:00

apologies for the want of updates. both L. and i have been so caught up with school that we hardly have time to ingest, much less digest or even cook anything. thesedays, my best meals are delivered to me by Classic Curry Company (03-93294040), which says more than it should about my recent dietary habits--my staple: butter chicken, tandoori chicken, plain naan, chapati, and mango lassi. (their lamb biryani's pretty good as well).

just a shout out to the various people with whom we've earned your mention or/ and linkage:

No Stupid Questions... Just Stupid People.
torby's so cute we could eat him!!! careful the womb raider doesn't come in and steal him away.

Totally Addicted To Taste.
there's nothing sexier than a cutie who loves his cooking; go you!

Smell & Taste.
we don't care what Steven thinks of your western food, we'll pay for your fail-proof chinese meals anyday.

What I Cooked Last Night.
you know what's really funny? we get a lot of hits from people googling "how to make cum taste good". we'll explore that inquiry right when cum appears in the quicky bag on Ready, Steady, Cook.

Noodles and Rice.
who ever knew that rock sugar has such a rich history!?

Everything You Needed to Know.
your partner and you really don't have to suffer the desserts in agony. why don't you send them over to me, and i'll (in low insinuating mafia tone) settle them for you.

Fuss-Free Steamed Salmon.

2007-02-12T17:29:00.000+08:00

i was tempted to call this the idiot's guide to steaming fish, but it occurred to me that it wasn't like i didn't learn it from observing my grandmother in the first place. nobody's that gifted.

the recipe is good for most fish, but i chose salmon over the others simply because it was on sale and i really do love the taste of these upstream-swimming fuckers.

Ingredients.
2, salmon fillet
1 inch, ginger
2, red chilli
1, tomato
4 tbsp, chinese (rice) cooking wine
1 tsp, salt
1 stalk, spring onion/ scallion (not included this round; i ran out)

Serves.
2

Step 1: Salt, Chop, and Splash.
my salmon fillets came nicely packed for cooking, so there's no real preparatory action needed before we start.

take a few stabs in the fillet with your knife, and salt the fillets.

chop the ginger, chilli and spring onion up, setting them all atop the fillets when you're done. slice the tomato into about 12 pieces, and line them along the side (skin up).

splash the cooking wine over, and set everything aside in the fridge for 10-15 minutes.

Step 2: Steaming.
while the fish is set aside, we can prepare the steamer. i'm using a wok and steaming rack. i boiled water with an electric kettle to save time, and then pour that into the wok over the fire.

when the water reboils in the wok, place the bowl on to the rack, and set the cover on. let it steam cook for 10 minutes.

take the lid off and see if the fish is cooked. it should flake off quite easily when it's ready.

Final Serve.
that's all for this fuss-free recipe. it can be taken as a main, or as a side with some steamed rice.

dee's kitchen.

2007-01-15T18:15:00.000+08:00

as an avid cook, one of the things i'm proudest of at home is my new kitchen. eventhough i moved in to this apartment only a month ago, i'm already very in love with the kitchen seeing as how it's almost twice the size of my last one. and because i'm so enamoured by it, much money has been pumped into kitchenware and electricals so that i might better enjoy the cooking and dining processes.

figured it's about time i show the world just where it is that all my recent and future cooking experiences take place.

top-down perspective of my kitchen from the lounge area, with the cabinet doors closed and opened. the apartment is a bit old, so everything looks a little eighties in it.

the one thing i hate is the fact that most grocery bags provided by the supermarts thesedays don't fit very well with the ikea bins. therefore i either have to live with hanging smaller bags in the bin, or buy Glad bin liners.

i'm really happy with the working and clear space provided by this kitchen. at my previous place, the clear space was half this size, so there could only be one effective cook in the kitchen.

the sink counter features a food disposal unit (sink on the left), which i don't use for its designed purpose because it makes way too much noise. this kitchen comes with a dish washer (bottom right), but it doesn't work so i'm reduced to washing everything by hand. which isn't a problem until i throw fancy dinner parties that require my full arsenal of kitchenware!

other than my Tefal wok, pots and pans are mainly cheap stuff that i got from various kitchenware stores. i don't care what people say about it, but i'm really proud of my lovely Maxwell & Williams dinnerware set, which was on sale at Matchbox.

as you can see, this is a relatively empty cabinet because i don't indulge in a lot of instant meals. the bottom right side of my cabinet boosts my various cheap tea collection. i'm not a fan of coffee.

the oils are kept directly above the kitchen hood. other than the olive oil, i really seldom use the other oils.

the top shelf is where i keep my garlic, ginger, onion and other dry but fresh food. alongside them are other dry food stuff like cinnamon, chinese herbs, etc. thanks to the combined powers of both my housemate and i, we now have a full shelf of condiments and spices. not exactly comprehensive, but more than enough for a variety of treats.

my sad stemware from ikea. these break very easily. honestly, they should be used only at big parties where you have to consider people breaking things. i'm waiting for most of them to break before i get myself a proper set of glasses.

my hard liquor collection is also very sad right now because i don't have the habit of making my own drinks. i find beer and champagne a way easier alternative for inebriation.

i recently acquired my Maxwell William Mondo cutlery set, as my previous housemate took over the terrible ikea set we had at the previous place. fiq often complains i'm using stainless steel instead of silverware like he does, but i am after all only a full-time student. so i'm more than happy enough to own this cutlery set.

my scissors and knives are Victorinox (the same people who give you the original swiss army knife), supposedly more commonly used by apprentice chefs.

okay, this is just a mess of my utensils! pardon the lack of organisation!

well, this concludes the pictorial-tour of my kitchen. hope to see how other people organise and run heir kitchens as well!

Stone Soup sans Stone (aka Beef Stew).

2007-01-13T16:42:00.000+08:00

Background.
one of the most popular children's stories is perhaps that of the stone soup. lest you've never heard of it (and just where have you been?), a hobo chances upon a village and convinces its people that he has magic stone capable of making the best soup ever. the only problem is that his magic stone required the help of some garnishing, which he didn't have.

impressed and eager to savour the wonders of that magic stone, each village household contributed something from their kitchen. from celery, to potatoes, to meat, every item was added to the pot as an exchange for a portion of that magically tasty soup. with that many ingredients added to the pot (with the stone in it), the soup naturally turned out amazingly delicious.

Wikipedia would have you believe that the moral of the story lies in the virtues of co-operation, but i like to see this as simply good marketing. at most, it's an ingenuity for cooking leftover ingredients. this story has inspired so many people that it has come to a point where some people are actually taking the recipe as illustrated in the story quite seriously...

anyway, a fortnight ago when i was desperately trying to rid my then soon-to-be-rotting vegetables and expired scotch fillets, i thought i'd give this Stone Soup--sans stone and storyline recipe--idea a try, and it actually was quite lovely.

i realise that this recipe might sound a lot like a beef stew.

ack.

beef stew. d's stone soup. po-tah-to. po-teh-to.

Ingredients.
2 pieces, beef steak (i'm using t-bones for their marrows)
2, carrot
3-4, potato
2, mustroom (i'm using cups)
2, tomato
2 sticks, celery
1, onion
3-4 cloves, garlic
2-3, red chilli (depending on how spicy you like the soup)
1, lemon
2 stalks, spring onion/ scallion
1 bunch, parsley (abt 5 stems worth)
1 tbsp, black pepper
4 tbsp, butter (optional; see Step 2)
1 cup, flour (optional; see Step 2)
2 tbsp, red wine (optional; see step 3)
4 tbsp, honey (optional; see step 3)

(missing in picture: onion, garlic, spring onion)

Serves.
4-5

Step 1: Chopping, Slicing and Dicing!
chop, slice, dice the steaks and vegetables, then have all of them thrown into a pot. add enough water to drown all the ingredients and start your fire. i recommend a small to medium flame, on which you allow the soup to cook very, very slowly.

when the soup comes to a boil, add the pepper and lemon juice in and allow everything to simmer till it reduces to about 4/5 to 3/4 of the original amount. stir intermittently.

after at least half an hour, you can taste the soup and see if you're happy with the results so far. if you are, *ta-da*, you're done and can skip the next two steps.

Step 2: Thickening the Soup.
if you'd prefer a slightly thicker soup (stew-like), you'd have to thicken the mix.

first, melt the butter in a bowl, and stir in the flour slowly until you've got all the flour mixed with the butter. coating the flour with butter prevents the flour from clumping up when you add it into the soup.

slowly stir the buttered flour into the simmering soup, and let everything boil for another 5 to 10 minutes, or until the soup thickens.

(taste it, and if you're happy so far, skip the next step.)

Step 3: Adding Extra Unimportant Clear-Before-They-Expire Things.
i'm simply adding what's left of my red wine and honey into the soup, then let simmer for another five minutes.

(see additional notes below on use of slow crockery pot cooker.)

Final Serve.
the versatile stone soup can be enjoyed as a main (accompanied by bread or steamed rice), or as an appetiser or a side.

i like mine with rice!

everyone should try to make hir version of the stone soup out of the odds and ends lying in your kitchen. as my friend, fiq, likes to say: just throw them all in and hope for the best!

;)

Additional Notes.
1. Use of Crock Pot. i'm leaving everything in a slow crockery cooker overnight. additionally, slow cooking it allows the meat to get really very tender. you needn't go to such a drastic measure, because direct heat works just fine. just be sure to be slightly patient to allow the soup to boil in due time.

2. Recooking. the remainder can be reboiled whenever you decide to have some. the more you boil, the thicker and tastier it gets really.

3. Not Stew-like. i used .5 cup of flour instead of the recommend 1 cup as described above. this is just a personal preference of not wanting the soup to end up stew-like.

Channel 7's New Cookery Show.

2007-01-05T17:34:00.000+08:00

all aussie cook bloggers! Channel 7's looking for people to participate in a new cookery show featuring Matt Moran!

as the great gwen stefani would say: what 'cha waiting for?

blog maintenance.

2006-12-30T03:04:00.000+08:00

because not only have i just gotten back online, but also that we've switched to the new version of blogger, i'd be running some maintenance tasks in terms of site formatting, etc.

bear with us if it gets a bit messy.

ETA: 02 0027 Jan 2007 Tues.
i have more or less finished adding the tags to the last few entries, etc. tags are not provided by blogger, so del.icio.us will now only be used as a comprehensive index for the recipes we're sharing.

hope everyone's having a better new year than i'm having so far.

Pork Rib & Lotus Root Soup.

2006-12-30T02:57:00.000+08:00

it's now ascertained that moving house is nothing if not a bitch. after what seems like forever, i've finally got myself more or less settled into the new place in the city. plus, i bought me some new kitchenware to celebrate the move; am now a proud owner of (among other things) a handheld food processor and the loveliest TEFAL wok! not to mention i'm absolutely in love with the new kitchen, pity the dishwasher doesn't really work.

anyway, back to today's dish!

personal history.
this is one of my favourite recipes, something passed down to me from my grandmother. it's arguably one of the few dishes of hers that i enjoy over-eating since i was a kid.

in general, the dish is quite a common sight in chinese families. however, what i've learnt from many of my friends is that most of their families and in fact hawkers leave the soup in its 'natural' flavour. my grandmother swears by a bit of rock sugar, and for that i think she rawks!

Ingredients.
500g, pork ribs (much of the flavour comes from the bones)
200g, lotus root (washed and sliced)
1.5 cup, dried red dates
1.5-2 cup, raw peanuts
1.5 cup, chinese lycium
1 cup, rock sugar
a few cups, hot water (enough to drown all the ingredients)

Additional Notes On Ingredients
1) my grandmother says that fresh young lotus roots give the best taste; i'm resorting to freeze-pack ones from the local asian grocer's because i can't find lotus roots around here.

2) sometimes my grandmother adds dried longan as well. if you're a fan of the taste of longan, halve the amount of dates and replace that half with longan.

Special Crockery
i'm using an electric crockery pot for this dish because it takes time for all the ingredients to break down. give it at least twelve hours in the crock pot, although i normally go for twenty-four.

Serves
3-4

Step 1-and-only-1: Toss it all in!
too simple! drop the porb ribs to the bottom of the pot, then followed by the rest of the ingredients, try to leave the roots for last. pour the hot water into the pot, cover and let it cook on high for at least twelve hours. when it's ready, the aroma of the soup will naturally fill the room.

when it's done cooking, you'd see that the soup and most of its ingredients turns a dark umber. the peanuts and dates normally continue to float in the soup.

Final Serve.
the dish is best served alongside some steamed rice. because there's meat in the soup, there's really not much of a need for additional sides to go with.

More Notes
if you're not a fan of rock sugar, you might want to taste the soup before adding any rock sugar to the mixture. this is best done at the half-way mark (i.e. twelve hours, in my case), so that you give the sugar some time to infuse with the other ingredients, and vice versa. alternatively, you can omit the rock sugar altogether because the lycium, dates and longan are all by right natural sweeteners.

Rawker's Lasagna

2006-12-17T01:20:00.000+08:00

For the Rawk stars.

In celebration of finally recieving my care package from home (some of it at least), I made Lasagna (its one of the toughest words i've ever had to spell).

Its very simple to make and very yummy.

Took about 45 mins in the oven.

Actually, I made it because I had too many peppers, potatoes and cans of tomato in the kitchen.
We could/should call this series of posts "What to do with canned Tomato, green peppers and onions". or "same ingredients many dishes".

You make sauce and roll with it.

Ingredients.
3 sheets of lasagna pasta (i used the pre-cooked kind)
1 large white onion
1 large green bell pepper (capsicum)
1 can of plum/chopped tomatoes in tomato juice
25g of butter (about 1 cm of the stick)
250g minced beef
Worcestershire sauce
Tomato Ketchup
Salt & black pepper to taste.
a dash of italian herbs
1 block of cheddar cheese (this is imprecise. its more like, as much cheese as you'd like)

optional side dishes:
9 really small potatoes (3 per person)
3 portions of french beans

Serves.
3.

Step 1: Pre-heat your oven
200 degrees celcius. just turn it on.

Step 2: Prepare the vegetables &amp; meat & cheese
Wash and chop up the onion, and green pepper into little cube sizes/squares.

Marinate your beef with a liberal sprinkling of herbs and salt and a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce and mix evenly. leave aside.

Slice your black olives into little "O"s and leave aside.

Shred your cheese. as much as you'd like. you'll be using this to stick everything together!

Step 3: the Sauce
This is kind of like making a pasta sauce.
melt the butter in your pan, and saute your onions and green peppers till tender, then throw in the beef and stir it around till the beef seperates in to mince and browns, then pour in your can of chopped tomato and sauce.
stir in some tomato ketchup, enough to cut the sour of the tomato juice in the pan. (taste it)
add salt and pepper to taste.
let the sauce simmer and then take it off the heat.
It should still have liquid.

Step 4: Layer!
I used a bread tin.
pour in a layer of the liquid (just the liquid) from your sauce into the bottom of the tin.
this is to prevent sticking.
then place a piece of pasta over the liquid.
now add a layer the beef and vege. and a layer of cheese.
and so on.
you might need to gauge how much to layer visually.
just remember you're making 3 layers and the top most layer will be cheese. not pasta.

now, on the top most layer of beef and vege, layer on the black olives.

it should look like this:

Please note that the last layer of cheese only goes on in the last 15 mins of baking.

Step 5: Bake!
Your tin should be filled and ready to bake, sans the last top layer of cheese.
put it in your preheated oven for about 30 mins.

and after 30 mins, take it out, top off with cheese to melt and brown on top.

it should look ike this:

Optional Side dishes:
throw the potatoes in the oven and bake them along with your lasagna.
boil and drain your french beans in water and a sprinkle of salt. (for health)

Final Serve.
Getting the lasagna out of the pan is ... tricky.
cut 3 even portions and use a spatula to lift the lasagna out of the tin.

plate and serve with your sides of choice.

hurrah!

Money Issues

2006-12-16T19:47:00.000+08:00

d. said i should mention how much i spend when i cook. because, apparently, i do it for really cheap and it looks ... not so cheap.

hm. go figure.

well, on average, i spend a little over or under 1 pound to feed 3.5 people (out of four, one's a small eater.)

here's some cost breakdowns:

a can of peeled tomatoes with sauce - 15 pence
a can sweet corn - 13 pence
5kg of potatoes - 1 pound
1.5kg of onions - 60 pence
1kg rice - 1 pound
1 packet of wholewheat pasta - 23 pence
1 box of mushrooms - 1 pound
1 packet of frozen french beans (or frozen vegetables in general) - 80 pence to 1 pound
1 can of black olives - 50 pence
400g minced beef - 75 pence
1 tray of 8 chicken whole thighs (thigh+drumstick attached. big) - 5 pounds
1 tray of 12 cuts of pork - 5 pounds

the meat is cheaply bought at the wet market. they sell them as a whole tray and are generally, not the best cuts of the meat (as in , the pork comes with a big piece of bone attached) and i figure, meat is meat is meat. its what you do with it that counts.

so we make bak kut teh with the bones.
and cut the rest of the meat in chunks or slices.

i have to de-fat the (fatty) chicken myself and seperate it from the thigh and that bit of leg that they left behind after chopping the feet off and lop off the 'bishops nose' (chicken butt).

basically i have to do a bit of knife work.
but it all turns out fine.

don't use a lot.
don't over cook.
less is more.
quality over quantity.

etcetra.

i also shop at england's Wal-mart alternative, ASDA ... cheap food in general.

house brand type food with no picture on the label.
just the words.

i know it sounds gross, i thought so to and refused to touch the stuff for a while.

but i've actually tried the stuff with and without labels.
SOME stuff is gross. THOSE you avoid like the plague.

but in general, its the same. you basically save money, because they don't spend on packaging and fancy color printing. is all.

well.

'cheap' is relative.

i think i'm doing moderately well with the money. sometimes i feel i might be overspending.

*shrugs*

go figure.

Tangy Oven Baked Salad with Steamed Chicken

2006-12-11T11:25:00.000+08:00

We've been trying to eat healthy.

This is ... somewhat healthy. I have a little butter in it.
It could be taken out or substituted. (actually, this dish requires no oil whatsoever. the butter was put in for ... flavor. but I'm sure it'll do just fine without.)

Ingredients.
1 large white onion
1 large red pepper (capsicum)
5-8 small white mushrooms
2 cups of french beans
1/2 can cream of chicken soup
1 lemon
15g of butter
3 chicken breasts (or thighs)

black pepper to taste.

Serves.
3.

Step 1: Pre-heat your oven
Switch on your conventionial oven and pre-heat it at 190-200 degrees celcius for about 15-20 minutes. or however long you'd take to prepare all the other ingredients.
(no science here, you really justwant your food to cook. so don't worry about it. just turn it on.)

Step 2: Prepare the vegetables
Wash and chop up the onion, capsicum and mushrooms, then throw them into a deep oven safe
pan (i used a bread tin), along with your beans and mix the vegetables up evenly.

Step 3: the Sauce
The resulting sauce of this dish is made up of the vegetable's own liquid as well, which will appear when they are cooked. so don't worry if it looks a little dry now.
pour in the 1/2 can of soup, letting it flow through the gaps, as well as the juice of the lemon (there is no need to mix it now, just make sure the liquids you have at this point are evenly spread over the top and flow though the gaps. we'll mix it later.)
and finally, slice the butter and lay over your vegetables.

Step 4: Bake!
Cover your vegetables with a piece of foil and shove it in the middle of the oven to bake for 30-40 minutes.

Step 5: Steam Chicken
For simplicity and health, i just washed the chicken, put it in a metal plate on a rack over a pot of water and steamed it with no marinate whatsoever. this will take about 20 minutes or so to cook (poke it to check it. the juices should run clear when its done.)

Step 6: Shred Chicken
Let your chicken cool and tear the chicken into lovely shreds to lay on top of your warm salad.

Final Serve.
The vegetables should be cooked and soft by now. Stir it up in the baking tin and add pepper to taste.

Serve warm on a plate and top off with chicken shreds.
I had some baked potatoes and just added that in as well.

Voila.

warm food ... great in the winter :)

hiatus.

2006-11-30T15:06:00.000+08:00

i'm back in melbourne but also in the process of moving to a new apartment. while utensils are put away, i find great delight in visiting--for lunch--Ken Zan (GPO), Degraves Expresso, Blufish (Central Pl), Supper Inn (chinatown, off Lt Bourke), Mekong (Swanston), Mr Tulk (La Trobe/ Swanston), and--for dinner, lunch or just drinks--Cookie (Swanston) and Hairy Canary (Lt Collins).

Sautéed Eggplant and Mushroom with Mint Vinaigrette

2006-11-16T04:51:00.000+08:00

I made this for lunch on my birthday, but i didn't expect it to be any good.
turns out, eggplant, mintsauce and mushrooms go really well with pasta.

hm.

and i've developed a special liking to wholewheat pasta. :) it just tastes better.

as for the mint sauce, i just had that lying around in the kitchen.
(i'll tell you how to make mint sauce from scratch near christmas time)

here we go.

Ingredients.
1 serving of wholewheat spaghetti
1 eggplant / brinjal
8-10 white small mushrooms
3 cloves garlic
1 small onion
25g butter (or 1cm of the stick)
2 tbsp ready made mint sauce
mixed herbs + salt + pepper to taste

optional:
some olives. if you like them.

Serves.
1.

Step 1: Make pasta
you know the drill.
bring a pot of water to a boil, throw in some salt and some pasta.
cook till soft or if you like, al dente (read: chewy)
meddle with everything else while this is happening.

Step 2: Preparing the vegetables
slice the eggpant at a 30 degree angle, making each slice no more than 1cm thich. (thiis so the eggplant gets nice and soft and sweet more quickly.)
slice the mushrooms and chop up the onion and garlic, then set everything aside.

Step 3: Saute the vegetables
heat up a pan and melt your butter in it. throw in half of the chopped garlic and all of the onion and fry till fragrant.
now, throw in the eggplant and let the butter and heat soften it. halfway through, throw in the mushrooms as well.

now, you may find that the pan is getting a little dry. no fear. its time to put in the mint sauce.

the vinegar from the mint sauce adds moisture to the vegetables (which should now be letting out some juices of their own) and thus, you have a sauce.

add salt, pepper and mixed herbs to taste.
(watch the salt, remember, your butter is already salted.)

Step 4: Toss it in the pan
fish out your pasta and toss it in the pan (which should now be on med-low heat so as not to overcook the vegetables while tossing)

also, throw in the reminder garlic.
(i always do this, because fresh garlic is what makes pasta smell so nice.)

Final Serve.
plate your pasta and garnish with more mixed herbs and olives, if you have them. :)

ta-da!
happy birthday me.
.

it's l's birthday!

2006-11-14T18:01:00.000+08:00

happy, happy birthday, Ms L!

<3

Cottage Pie.

2006-11-05T05:40:00.000+08:00

History.
according to Food Timeline's entry on Shepherd's Pie, this English dish has its origins in the late Middle Ages (i.e. mid-16th Century AD). what began as meat served in pastry "coffyns" (coffins?) was only very late in the 19th Century cooked with mashed potatoes; the latter was a New World produce. Supposedly popular in the Northern regions of England and Scotland where sheep were in abundance (hence cooked with mutton and the name Shepherd's Pie), the pie became the people's answer to asian fried rice i.e. a creative way to rehash leftovers.

Shepherd's Pie = cooked with mutton
Cottage Pie = cooked with beef
Fisherman's Pie = cooked with fish

thesedays, it is but a relatively fuss-free dish for if/when you need to feed either an army of people or a ryce.

Ingredients.
(for meat base)
500g beef mince
3-4 clove, garlic
5-6 cup mushrooms
2-3 sticks, celery
4-5 baby carrots
1 onion (using brown)
2-3 tomatoes (using roma)
1 can, cream of mushroom (not in pic; using campbell's)

(for mash)
3-4 potatoes (using brown)
4-5 bunch, parsley
2-3 tbsp, fresh milk
1-2 tbsp, butter

(for cheese topping)
Pizza Mix (cheddar, parmesan, mozzarella)

you will also need a baking pan of substantial depth, subject to how thick you want your pie to be.

Serves.
3-4.

Step 1: Preparing Meat Mix!
finely chop up all your vegetables, separating the garlic and onion individually from the rest.

oil and heat up a sizable pan over a medium flame. when hot, throw your onions and beef mince into the pot and keep stirring. depending on how strong you like your garlic, you can either throw it in at this stage, or together with the rest of the vegetables later.

let it cook for 4-5 minutes before you throw the rest of the chopped up vegetables into the pan. don't forget to stir! while the vegetables are still cooking, add the cream of mushroom into the mixture. turn the heat down to a smaller flame, let it slowly simmer to a boil, and continue to boil for a while (3-4 minutes).

when that's done, pour the mixture into your baking pan and set it aside to cool for 0.5-1 hour. if you don't let it cool properly, the mash isn't going to sit well on your meat mixture. at this point, some people are known to put the meat mix into either the fridge or freezer even.

Making Mash Potato.
skin the potato before you put them in a pot of water to boil. add some salt into the water and let the potato boil for about 10 minutes or until it feels soft enough to mash.

meanwhile, mince or finely chop the parsley up.

when done, remove the pot from the fire and drain the water away. you may begin mashing the potatoes in the pot, adding the parsley, milk and butter in at this stage. mash and blend well until you get a relatively consistent and smooth mash.

Baking the First Two Layers.
set your oven to preheat at 200 degree C.

apply the mash potato on top of the meat mix which by now should have cooled in the baking pan. when you have the meat mix nicely covered with mash, score the layer of mash with a fork.

when ready, put the whole baking pan into your oven and let it cook for 15-20 minutes. remove the pan from the oven after. apply the cheese on top of the mash, ensuring that you've got all the mash more or less covered.

return the pan into the oven for another 15-20 minutes, until your cheese turns a lovely golden brown!

Final Serve.

ryce and i both enjoyed it quite a bit. though this version of the cottage pie is a little shallow on the mash potato. so if you're a fan of mash potato, you might have to up the number of potatoes in your attempt.

also, i realised that the meat mixture was a bit too wet for me. but this is more of a problem if you're gunning for presentation points like i do. to ease the problem, you can always drain some gravy from the meat mix before you apply the mash on top.

...
..
.

ETA: 25 1615 November 2006 Saturday.
my friend fiq made a mince beef mix last week by frying the mince beef with tomato ketchup, black pepper and i think a bit of soy sauce. it tasted great! so ketchup might be an easy and inexpensive substitute for the cream of mushroom.

Rosemary Chicken with Vegetable Side.

2006-11-03T05:27:00.000+08:00

obviously, i haven't been updating. the reason is that doing nothing can be an absolutely major preoccupation when you're back home in singapore for a holiday. there're so many ways to loaf, how does one even begin?

i know, i know, i know, woe is me.

what is most refreshing, however, is the fact that i'm again back to being looked after by my dear family (aka mom and grandma). it's been a while since someone else made sure that meals are decided and prepared without my active input--if i had any input it would be a specification on what i want to eat. as much as i aspire to be the bitch of the kitchen who decides what is and isn't cooking, i have to say i could very well get used to the life of being served.

on a cooking note, there're a couple of family recipes that i intend to learn while i'm back. among the mean dishes that my grandma is capable of producing, i'm particularly interested in mastering her Dark Sauce Pork, Lotus Root & Pork Rib Soup, and Hainanese Fried Vegetables. highly doubt i'd have the chance to figure out seasonal dishes like Longan Ginkgo Nut Soup, and rice dumplings this time around, but we'd see how things go.

until i learn those precious family recipes, i'd instead be clearing the backlog of recipes attempted back at ryce's place a month ago, beginning with a recipe introduced to me by my very good sydney-sider friend, fiq.

(because fiq remains skeptical towards both my cooking and fledgling relationship with the oven, i'd disclaim that the recipe has been reworked to my liking, and should therefore not reflect on him in any way--especially not on his mastery over his own kitchen and food.)

Ingredients. (See below for update.)
(for the chicken)
1 whole chicken (small)
2 onions (brown for us)
5-6 clove, garlic
5 inch, ginger
.25 cup, rosemary
2 lemons
3 tbsp, honey
2 tbsp, olive oil
2 tsp, salt
.5 cup, dry white wine (i'm using a semillon chardonnay instead)

(for the vegetables)
5-6 baby carrots
.5 bunch, cauliflower
2 lemon leftover, from the chicken prep.
4-5 potatoes (missing in this round because we didn't have them)
(ignore the leek-like vegetable in my photo)

Serves.
3-4

Step 1: Preparing the chicken!
dice and even mince as fine as you can the onions, garlic, ginger and rosemary. mix them together and juice the lemons in. this is going to be the stuffing for your chicken.

rub the salt, honey and olive oil onto the chicken, remembering that you need to get some of it under the skin. when done, stuff the chicken with the mixture. i like to stuff some of it under the skin as well.

leave the stuffed-up chicken in a pot, and let it marinate in wine for at least 2 hours.

Step 2: Preparing the Vegetables.
other than the lemons, chop everything else up, and line the bottom of your baking tray with the vegetables. throw the lemon remains in as well. as the chicken cooks, the juices from the chicken will fall in with the vegetables to give you an interesting gravel.

Step 3: Roasting!
preheat your oven to 150 degrees C. place the chicken on top of the vegetables, and pour the rest of the marinade into the tray. set the tray in when ready.

every .5 hour, you'd need to baste the chicken with the marinade/ gravy in the tray. make sure to flip the chicken as well.

the chicken should cook for at least 1.5 hours, until it turns a nice golden brown or when the juices run clear.

remove from oven when done.

Step 4: Remove Stuffing.
pretty self-explanatory, use a spoon to remove the stuffing from your chicken, and have it mixed into your vegetables.

Final Serve.
check your vegetables for taste, and throw some pepper in for taste.

you can either serve the chicken whole like me, or chop it up into more decent looking proportions :)

Additional Notes.
fiq recommends that the ingredients for the stuffing from Step 1 be blended into a liquid, or at least into a thick paste. his version of this chicken is left in this marinate overnight. also, he recommends some soy sauce (abt 2 tbsp), although he doesn't use any wine in his recipe.

(look out for my attempt at a Cottage Pie, and a Chocolate Fudge Cake topped with Chocolate Mousse over the next few days...)

ETA: 4 1422 April 2007, Wednesday
after several attempts, i've come to the conclusion that:
(A) there's no need for honey,
(B) Semillon Sauvignon Blanc (mine's always a Wolf Blass) is a good dry white,
(C) there needs to be enough wine to reasonably submerge the chicken--no worries, you won't inebriate, at least 3cups therefore.
(D) you should replace brown with red/ spanish onions,
(E) it's good to let your chicken marinate for 24 hours, and
(F) there's no need for soy sauce.

Lemon Caper Pasta with Minced Beef

2006-10-22T20:14:00.000+08:00

I woke up this morning, a little later than usual and so, I decided to make brunch.

And Pasta is a hungry student's best friend.

Now, this dish was put together on the fly, so I don't have pictures, but I'm posting it up because I think its cool what you can do with a little creativeness in the kitchen.

It tasted amazing.
You'll just have to try it to beieve it.

Especially if you like tangy flavors.

I just finished eating it.

So.

All I had in my fridge was:
Minced beef, a lemon, a bottle of capers, butter, some leftover sweet sauce (from the roast duck we had the other day), worechestier (sp?) sauce, sesame seed oil, some herbs, a small bit of butter, onions and garlic. oh and spaghetti.

Sounds like a recipie, but looks a mess in the fridge.

I'm having tropical fruit yoghurt for desert. That's in the fridge as well. :)

---------------------------------------------------------

Ingredients.
Minced beef (about a handful)
1/2 Lemon
Spaghetti (portion for 1)
1/2 medium sized Onion
3 cloves of Garlic
1 spoonful of Capers (or however much you fancy)
2 tbsp sweet sauce (i'm pretty sure you can substitute this with sugar or mango chutney)
4 tbsp water (to dilute the sweet sauce)
worechiester sauce
sesame seed oil
salt
pepper
butter
mixed dried herbs

Serves.
1

Step 1: Marinate the Beef
Take a bowl, put in the beef, a few dashes of worechestier sauce, a dash or seseme seed oil and a small sprinkle of salt and pepper. Mix it up and set aside.

Step 2: Boil your pasta
Boil a pot of hot water, throw your pasta in with some salt.

Step 3: Other ingredients
Dice your onion and garlic and set aside.
Take some hot water from your still boiling pasta to melt/dilute the sweet sauce.
Ready your lemon, capers and butter and herbs.

Step 4: Quick tossing in the pan
Your pasta should be cooked by now.
drain it and put it on a plate. right next to all your other ingredients.

Melt some butter in the pan.
throw in the onion and garlic and fry to bring out some fragrance.
throw in your beef and fry, making sure it seperates.
throw in your pasta.
throw in your capers.
squeeze in the lemon juice.
pour in the sweet sauce.
add a dash of pepper and salt to taste.
sprinkle with herbs.

Toss this in a medium heat in your pan and you'll start smelling the beautiful aroma of warm lemon.

Final Serve.
Plate your pasta and sprinkle with a bit more herbs if you like.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

the reason why this dish works is -

Sweet curbs sour.
so a balance between sweet and sour is the key.

cheers :)

...
..
.

ETA (24 0212 Oct 2006 Tuesday):
it's worecestershire sauce -- d

Vegetable Stir-Fry with Sweetsavoury Sauce

2006-10-19T04:41:00.000+08:00

hoookay.

here's an uber simple, basic stir fry dish that you can make with almost any combination of vegetables.

-------------------------------------------------

Vegetable Stir-Fry with Sweetsavoury Sauce

This is kind of my own invention (the sauce).

I've had the older people (the parents) advise me in the past, to not put sugar with vegetables, but i plain disagreed and did it anyway.

They love the sauce.

And I've been making it this way ever since. :)

note: green leafy vegetables will shrink to half the portion after its been cooked. so keep that in mind when trying to figure out how much vege to cook.

Ingredients.
Any Vegetable for 4, cut up to bite size
(here I've used British spring green, tomatoes and radish)
3 cloves garlic, sliced
1/2 onion, medium sized, diced
1 tbsp cooking oil

Optional ingredient:
8 crab sticks, cut into bite size

For the sauce:
2 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp white sugar
1 tbsp corn starch (for thickening)
1/2 rice bowl of hot water
salt & pepper to taste

Serves.
4-5

Step 1: Cut everything up
It should look somewhat like this.

Step 2: Boil the radish
This is useful information.
Radish is generally hard and tasteless when its not very cooked.
When you boil it, it goes soft and juicy and sweet.
You'll know its done when it turns semi-transluscent.

Step 3: Make the sauce
Get a bowl and put in all the ingredients for the sauce and mix it up.
The reason why we use hot water, is to dissolve everything.
It will look cloudy and brown now, but when you cook it, corn starch goes clear.
Leave this aside.

Step 3: Stir-Fry!
Heat up the oil in the Wok.
When the oil is hot, throw in the onion and garlic and fry till its fragrant.
(essential in most chinese cooking.)

Now, by order of cooking time (or vegetable hardness), throw the remaining into the wok.

Pour in the sauce all around the vege and continue frying till the vegetables cook.
Use the wok's cover to trap the steam to speed cooking up and to keep the juices in.

Final Serve.
We were lucky. Someone bought us some duck to go with our vege!
It was sweet and savoury and oh so good.
Everything goes really well with steamed white rice.

I'm getting hungry just typing this.
Someone needs to teach me how to make roast duck.

:)

Savoury Steamed Egg & Mince

2006-10-16T14:12:00.000+08:00

Hello all.

I'm terribly sorry for the long absence ... but I haven't had the time nor the resources to whip up anything remotely exciting in the last couple of weeks and here's the reason why:

The people in my flat are adverse to trying new things AND they also have meat preferences, which means i'm generally stuck cooking everyday, homecooked chinese meals.

1 meat dish (pork or chicken only) and 1 vegetable dish.

I'll endeavour to create some exciting weekend lunches tho'.

Just for me and you. :)

With that said, here's a simple homecooked cantonese dish that everyone can make and is very traditional and delicious!
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Savoury Steamed Egg & Mince

My grandmother used to make this for lunch. It brings back loads of memories. You can generally find this in authentic cantonese homestyle cooked restaurants!

There are several versions of this dish, one with salted fish, one with tofu and one with just egg.
I generally prefer just egg or with tofu, because it's more soothing and smooth to eat.

note: you will need some sort of steaming rack and plate.

Ingredients.
300g minced pork
2 eggs
1 tbsp, sesame seed oil
3 tbsp, light soy sauce
1 tsp, white sugar
3 tbsp, garlic granula
2 dashes of black/white pepper
(*optional: 1/2 block of silken tofu)

Serves.
4-5

Step 1: Marinate the Minced Meat
Wash your hands and use them.
Put the minced meat in a bowl and add the pepper, salt, sugar, sesame seed oil and light soy sauce, and mix it all up evenly with your fingers.
Leave aside for at least 10 mins. (longer if you're not pressed for time.)

Step 2: More mixing
Crack your 2 eegs into the bowl and mix evenly (break the yolk)

*as an option, you can also mix in the tofu. just be careful not to mash it up too much. you still want a bit of texture.

Step 3: Steam away!
Place your egg'n'mince into a dish suitable for steaming.
(I used a metal plate. good heat distribution)
And just Steam for about 20mins :) easy.

Final Serve.
You can opt to keep it in the same dish (for a home feel) or dress it up by plating it. just tip it out of the cooking dish along with the savory juices into a clean dish and serve steaming :)

[sorry i don't have a picture of the final product ... it smelt so good that day we slurped everything up!]

try it!

oopsie daisies: cup measurements.

2006-10-14T22:00:00.000+08:00

you know, i always knew there was something wrong with the measurements of ingredients i publish. the truth is, i don't use them chef tools, so when i say "cup", i mean something like 150ml instead of 273ml simply because i use my drinking cup....

oopsie daisies!

so please take note of cup measurements in past entries. i have approximated the tablespoons and teaspoons according to conventional cooking measurements, so you needn't worry too much about that. will endeavour to be more precise with my cup measurements.

:x

Crispy Noodle Salad.

2006-10-12T23:42:00.000+08:00

sometime ago, i attempted this dish at ryce's place to no avail. since getting flour for the crepes, however, i finally have the necessary ingredient to ensure that the noodles turn out the way they should when fried.

Ingredients.
2 slab, instant noodle
3 slice, smoke ham
3-4 bunch, parsley or coriander/ cilantro
3 tbsp, cream cheese
1 cup, coconut cream
1-2 cup, flour
3 tbsp, garlic granula
some cooking oil (for deep-frying)
*black pepper to taste

Serves.
2-3.

Step 1: Cook your noodles.
simple: boil the noodle in a pot of water until it's cooked. as i seldom attempt instant noodles in its simplest fashion, i only learnt from ryce that instant noodle's really only cooked when the strands have separated themselves and are soft to a bite.

when cooked, drain the water away.

Step 2: Coat noodles with flour.
coat the noodle with flour, ensuring that the noodle's sufficiently floured up. the flour helps to absorb excess water and allows the noodle to stay separate in the frying process.

Step 3: Prepare your sauce.
Mince the parsley and ham up. Over a medium flame, pour the coconut cream into the pot . add the cheese, parsley and ham into the solution. allow it to come to a boil and simmer for about 5 minutes.

Step 4: Fry the noodle.
while you're awaiting the sauce to boil, pour about half a cup full of cooking oil into a wok/ pan over a high flame. when the oil is hot, throw a handful of the floured noodle into the pan and let it fry. it should take 5-7 minutes for the noodle to fry. if you do not have enough oil for actual deep-frying, ensure that you stir the noodle constantly.

fry until golden brown.

repeat the process until you've fried all the noodle. you might have to change the oil and clean the wok/ pan at some point if it gets too dirty.

Final Serve.
in each bowl of crispy noodle, pour the sauce on top before sprinkling the garlic granula and pepper.

while this attempt was far better than the last, the sauce ended up a bit too thick. i would suggest adding 1 cup of fresh milk or just some water into the sauce-cooking process at Step 3 to thin the solution. not too much of that, otherwise you might lose the coconut flavour of the sauce :)

One-Step Whitebread Pizza.

2006-10-11T23:28:00.000+08:00

remember the loaf of bread that was lying in ryce's fridge? well, other than toasting your bread, or making french toast out of it, we can use it as base for your favourite pizza toppings!

Ingredients.
6 slice, whitebread
3 roma tomatoes
4, cup mushroom
3 piece, smoked ham (or your favourite meat, e.g. smoke salmon, left over chicken)
3 tbsp, sour cream (you can use other sauce base like bolognese)
some cheese (the usual suspects like mozzarella, parmesan, etc)

*missing: 1 capsicum (ryce doesn't do capsicums -sigh-)

Serves.
3

Step 1: All at Once!
dice the tomatoes, mushrooms and ham into fine pieces. coat the bread with a generous layer of sour cream, then apply the tomato, ham and mushroom on it. top that with a good cover of cheese.

preheat your oven to about 150 degrees, and pop your pizza in for 5-10 minutes. basically until your cheese melts and browns a little at the edges.

Viola!

Final Serve.
easy to prepare, tastes good, and helps rid of surplus without having to either dump them away or promote fungus growth!

Grilled Stuffed Pear with Pawpaw.

2006-10-10T22:06:00.000+08:00

following our dinner, i decided to try to brush up on my dessert-making skills. admittedly, i'm terribly bad at getting my desserts done right.

there's quite a bit of pawpaw left over from our last dessert exercise, and we got these brown pears from the supermarket. this dessert's a simple one that i actually like to serve with ice-cream.

Ingredients.
1 pear
1 slice, pawpaw
1 lemon

Serve.
2

Step 1: Digging your pear!
slice your pear in two (length-wise), and start digging the flesh out without breaking the skin. we're using the pear skin as a recepticle for our stuffing.

Step 2: Preparing the stuffing.
dice the pear flesh dug out earlier with the pawpaw and toss them together nicely. add lemon juice to the mixture.

when done, stuff the pear skins with the mixture.

Step 3: Grilling the pear.
preheat your oven to about 100 degrees, set the pears to grill for at least 10 minutes (i stopped at about 15 minutes). this would allow the pear to grill nicely without actually drying up.

Final Serve.
this dish is normally prepared by mixing some melted chocolate into the fruit salad, and (at serving time) a scoop of vanilla icecream. without the chocolate and icecream, the only redeeming quality was the lemon juice that gave it that required balance.

Grilled Fish with Parsley Ham Sauce, Steamed Vegetables & Steak Strips.

2006-10-10T22:02:00.000+08:00

ryce and i did a bit of grocery shopping last saturday for this week's meals. during our headless-chicken scouring of the aisles, ryce insisted that we grab some fish because she's not had those in a while, so we did. Barramundis were the specials on sale at the deli, so we got a good big slab of that.

today, ryce decided to ask her best friend, Jac, and the latter's boyfriend over for some "gourmet food" (my claim). i figured i'd cook the slab of fish before it rots, and do it in a fashion similar to what i did a couple of months ago. the idea here is to keep the fish as simple as possible, but topped with a sauce that contains some other kind of meat. in my earlier attempt, it was a parsley crab sauce.

Ingredients.
(the fish and its marinade)
Fish, enough for 4 people
2 inch, ginger
4-5 clove, garlic
.5, onion (brown in this case)
1, lemon
1 cup, white wine (dry)

(for accompanying sauce)
1 cup, milk
2 tbsp, cream cheese
2 tbsp, butter
3-4 stalk, parsley
2-3 slice, smoked ham (i normally use other seafood)

(for vegetable side)
.5 whole, cauliflower
4 baby carrots

NOTE:

1) we'd be using the fish marinade as dressing for the vegetables.

2) i'm not explaining the process for the beef strips. basically, i'm using one piece of scotch fillet which will be sealed in a pan, then left in the oven at abt 150 degrees for another 10 minutes. it'd be coated with a pesto quite alike what i did for the coriander pan-fried lambchop, only this time i'm using parsley instead of coriander/ cilantro.

Serves.
4

Step 1: Marinating & cooking the fish.
Mince the garlic, ginger and onion up before tossing them together in a big bowl. Squeeze the juice out of your lemons into the bowl, then grate the skin for some zest. Pour the wine in, then place your fish steaks into the mixture. leave it to marinate for at least half an hour.

just before you cook the fish, preheat your oven at 175 degrees. then place your fish steaks (skin at the bottom first) into the oven to grill for about 15 minutes. mid-way, flip it over to cook on the side of the skin.

(this would be a good time to place your beef steak into the oven for about 5 minutes after you've sealed it in the pan.)

Step 2: Preparing the vegetables.
while waiting for your fish to marinate/ cook, dice your cauliflower and carrots up. Toss them together and prepare to steam them for a good 10-15 minutes. remove from heat when done.

Step 3: Preparing the sauce & marinade sauce.
while the fish is cooking, mince the parsley and dice the ham up into finer pieces. over a medium-small flame, pour the milk into a small pot. add the cheese, butter and ham into the milk. when it simmers to a slow boil, add the parsley in and let it simmer for another 5-6 minutes. keep stirring to prevent any overburn.

concurrently, over a medium flame, pour the remaining fish marinade into a pot. let the mixture reduce by about half.

remember to take your beef steak out from the oven when it's ready. slice it into thin slices as a side.

Final Serve.
it was only after i had finished cooking everything that i remembered that my earlier attempt at this was done with nothing but wine and rosemary for the fish's marinade. the garlic and ginger turned out to be slightly over-powering this time round, and i'd gladly reduce the ginger to about an inch, and garlic to 1 or 2 cloves.

i did however really enjoy the reduced marinade as a dressing for the steamed vegetables. likewise, the parsley ham sauce tasted well, only i still think fish should be matched only with another seafood-based sauce. i would have gone with either crab or prawn.

French Toast Sandwich & Cheesed Cauliflower.

2006-10-09T02:17:00.000+08:00

you know there's something special between food and i when the dreams that herald my waking up are of meal preparations. sunday morning, i woke to one of such dreams; in it, i saw myself in front of a nice steaming pot of cauliflower laced with parsley and cheese.

hhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm....

cheeeeeese with cauliflooooooower......

*rudemoans*

but of course, ryce being ryce--bless that girl bestowed a name meant to remind her constantly of food, she simply couldn't leave the first meal of the day limited to a single dish. instead, she asked to clear as much of the loaf of bread she's kept in the fridge as i can possibly muster before it turns into breeding ground for unpleasant culture. to put a cap on the number of ingredients involved for this meal, french toast seemed an easy option.

Ingredients.
(for steamed cauliflower with cheese)
1 quarter to 1 half, cauliflower
1 tbsp, black pepper
1 tbsp, butter
2-3 tbsp, cheese (i'm using cheddar)
3 bunch, coriander/ cilantro

(for french toast sandwich)
4 slice, white bread
2 eggs
1 tbsp, butter
2 tbsp, milk
2 pc, cheddar cheese
1 tbsp, oil (olive for me; meant for cooking)
(optional: deli ham, roast beef, smoked salmon, etc)

Serves.
2-3

Step 1: Preparing the cauliflower.
mince up the cheddar and coriander together or not, and put them aside for later. i kept them separate because i like to mix the cheddar with the cauliflower before the cheese comes in.

chop the cauliflower up into manageable pieces (aka you can fit it into your mouth without looking rude) and toss them into a bowl. steam those for about 10-15 minutes until cooked; i did it by placing the bowl on a stand in a covered pot of water--water should however not touch your bowl cause we want the vegetable cooked with steam, not latent heat from your bowling water.

Step 2: Prepare french toasts.
while your cauliflower is cooking, mix your eggs, butter and milk together, before soaking each slice of bread into the mixture. heat your pan over a small-medium flame. oil your pan with a bit of oil.

Step 3: Finishing with your cauliflower.
when ready, remove the cauliflower from the heat, and drain the excess juices from the bowl. before the vegetable cools, stir the coriander in, mix well, before you do the same for the cheese. add butter and pepper for taste.

Step 4: Finishing with your french toasts.
when the pan's hot enough, fry your french toast. cook one side till it browns nicely, before you flip it over to cook only for a quick second or two so that the egg more or less is sealed off.

remove from flame, and do the same for another piece. with the first piece that you cooked, place your cheese and--if you intend to add them--ham/ salmon/ beef on the nicely browned surface. when the second toast is ready, place its browner surface on top of the cheese-ham mix.

effectively, you'd have the lighter sides on the outside now. place that french toast sandwich back onto the pan to melt the cheese, as well as to cook the remaining two surfaces of your sandwich.

when both sides are browned, you're ready to serve!

Final Serve.

this is a recipe of a reason to why gluttony is a sin. i usually don't have both dishes for a single meal, seeing as how it's an obvious cheese overload.

because of the butter and cheese in the cauliflower, this vegetable side is meant to balance whatever light entree you intend for your meal. to be quite honest, however, i normally take this dish alone--it's terribly filling!

the french toast sandwich is a simple solution to fancy-ing up your regular french toast. better for a brunch menu.

Roasted Honey-Glaze Chicken & Potato Tuna Salad.

2006-10-05T23:33:00.000+08:00

sio, ryce and i returned more than an hour ago from an easy night of beer. there's something about a night of alcohol and supper, somehow one inevitably leads to the other. as if the beer or champagne we consume doesn't contain enough carbohydrate to set us back a few grammes.

anyway, there was meat thawing in the sink, left out initially for dinner. i guess it's about time we tried another one of them fuss-free recipes. admittedly though, fuss-free doesn't necessarily mean low calorie count, so i'm just going to avoid eating for the next few days to compensate.

Anna, Billy and i = BFF!

Ingredients.
(for the chicken)
4 pc, chicken thigh (part of chicken negotiable)
4 tbsp, soya sauce
4 tbsp, honey
4 tbsp, chinese rice wine
2 tbsp, black pepper
4 bunch, parsley

(for the salad)
3 potatoes (nude for me)
1 onion (i'm using brown)
1 can, tuna (with olive oil)
1 lemon
4 inch, ginger
3 bunch, spring onion/ scallion
2 tbsp, black pepper (i'm a fan)
1 tp, salt

Serves.
4

Step 1: Marinating the chicken.
mince the parsley into a fine grain, and mix it together with the rest of the marinade ingredients. rub the marinade into the chicken, making sure that you get some marinade (especially the parsley) under the skin. leave the chicken and marinade to soak for at least half an hour.

Step 2: Preparing the salad.
dice the potato, and braise it in boiling water for about 5 minutes with the salt; drain water after. mince the ginger and dice the onion, then mix them all with the potato and tuna. stir the black pepper in and we're ready for the roast.

Step 3: Cooking everything.
set your oven to preheat at about 180degrees for 10 minutes. when ready, put the salad and chicken in. make sure you take both dishes out for a stir (the salad) and flip (the chicken) 15 minutes into the roasting. another 20 minutes and we're ready to remove both from the oven.

Step 4: Finishing the salad.
when the salad's done roasting, mix chopped spring onions in and juice the lemon into the salad.

Final Serve.
the potato would seem a little crunchy till you bite into it--it's far softer than you'd imagine. if you decide not to use tuna infused in olive oil, just up the amount of ginger and lemon you're adding to the salad. flavouring for the salad should be kept as natural as you can possibly muster. (alternatively, use some of the chicken's marinade left behind by the roast.)

the recipe for the chicken is good also for steaks, and prepared in the grill, on the pan, or at your barbecue.

Beef Steak in Port & Camembert Cheese.

2006-10-04T20:55:00.000+08:00

the other day at Safeway (Melbourne's answer to Woolworth's), ryce and i picked up--amongst other things--a bottle of Tawny Port, a pack of "special sale" camembert and some "special sale" beef steak. now using whatever's available to us, we thought it would be good to revisit one of my older steak recipes.

along with the steak, we're going to have a simple side of grilled vegetables and a few pieces of Woolworth's cheesy sausages. i'd also explain the vegetables, but not the sausages...

Ingredients.
(for the steak)
2 beef steaks (again i'm using scotch fillet)
1 cup, Port wine
3 tbsp, camembert (i usually use blue cheese)
1 tbsp, black pepper
4 bunch, coriander (i normally use parsley for this dish)
1 tbsp, olive oil (for the pan-fry)

(for the vegetable side)
2 tomatoes
1 carrot
4 asparagus
1 lime
1 tbsp, salt
2 tbsp, sesame oil

(optional)
6 sausages (abt 2" each)

Serves.
2

Step 1: Marinating the beef.
easy: place steaks in bowl, add port, black pepper and minced coriander. stir it about a bit to ensure you've got everything mixed well, and leave it to soak for at least half an hour.

cut the cheese up and mash it up a little so that it's nicely pasty.

Step 2: Prepare vegetables.

chop the carrot and asparagus up. (by the way, i hope everyone is familiar with the whole rid-the-bitter-end-of-your-asparagus routine.) add them to a bowl, and pour some boiling water into the bowl. add a tbsp of salt and leave everything to soak for about 5-10 minutes. drain water after.

while soaking, dice your tomatoes, and slice the lime into reasonable pieces for easy juicing later.

mix all your vegetables together in preparation for the grill. preheat your oven for about 10 minutes, then set it to about 200 degrees, before setting the vegetables in for about 20 minutes.

when it's done, add the sesame oil to the mixture, and we're more or less done.

Side: Something about sausages.
on today's Huey's Cooking Adventures, Huey brings up a tip on cooking sausages. apparently, before you set it in your pan to fry, you should braise the sausages with warm (not boiling) water for about 5 minutes. if the sausage skin breaks open, you know the water's too hot.

NOTE: i can't quite remember the exact type of sausages, or the rationale behind this move, but we got the gist and in Huey i trust.

Step 3: Cooking the steaks!
over a big flame, pour your oil into the pan and let the pan heat up. when it's hot, place your steaks into the pan and let it cook for about 2-3 minutes on both sides (if you're into medium-rare like me).

if you're particular about sealing the meat, you'd have to continuously flip your steaks every 20 seconds until both sides brown.

once cooked, move the steaks off the flame and place them on your serving plates. lower your flame to medium, and pour the rest of the marinade in. let it simmer until it's reduced to about half.

while waiting for the marinade, apply a generous amount of cheese on the top side of the steaks. try to even it out as much as you can.

when the marinade has been reduced, pour that onto the steaks.

Final Serve.
i've served the lime slices together with the vegetables to allow the guest (ryce) free reign in how sour she wants her vegetables to be. the sesame oil will provide some fragrance and taste, but what really gives the punch will be the lime juice.

as much as possible, the steaks should be served right after the marinade is poured. wait too long and you might only have a thin film of cheese left on your steaks since everything else melted away. don't worry that your steaks will be too sweet from all that port, with the cheese, parsley/ coriander and pepper, it will be a really interesting mouthful of beef.

enjoy!

Crepe with Chunky Pawpaw Puree.

2006-10-04T11:52:00.000+08:00

my weekly detox exercise comprises of refuging at ryce's place in Brunswick, which happens to be in one of them boho-type suburbs. a perfect setting for respite, considering the low buildings, not terribly bad traffic, paced serenity and easy stream of cute lads. as repayment for the peace and quiet, i've made myself in-charge of preparing wholesome meals with whatever ryce has in her kitchen. it isn't too difficult for compared to mine, her kitchen naturally comes with a much healthier rating.

if only i could prevent her from over-snacking now...

:p

our chicken rice from the other night provided us with enough leftover for two rounds of fried rice. with both our lunch and dinner covered, the only logical thing to do is dessert!

Ingredients.
(for crepes)
2 eggs
1.5 cup, fresh milk
1 cup, flour
1 tsp, salt
2 tsp, sugar
2 tsp, butter
2 lemons

(for puree)
3 slice, pawpaw
1 orange
.5 cup, sugar
.5 cup, port wine

Serves.
7-8

Step 1: Preparing the crepe batter.

too simple; mix everything!

my process: beat eggs, add sugar, salt, flour and then milk. slice the lemon, add lemon juice to the mixture, and grate some lemon zest into the mix.

set aside in the refrigerator for about 1 hour.

NOTE: most people like to add 1 tbsp of vanilla extract into their batter. personally, i like to keep it fruity. my general rule is to balance tastes, therefore in this case, my puree is largely sugary, so the batter gets a hint of citrusy instead.

Step 2: Preparing the puree.

dice the pawpaw into smaller-than-bitesize pieces and add that into a pot.

skin your orange, and very carefully extract the pulp without juicing it. we want to keep the juice in it.

over a small-medium flame, add sugar into the pawpaw and keep stirring. when the mixture caramelises (it browns), add the port in and let the whole thing come to a slow boil--that should take 5-7 minutes. once it boils, remove from flame and leave it to cool.

throw the orange pulp in once it has cooled.

NOTE:

1) purees are normally processed to a fine grain. i like mine slightly coarse for dessert because i always have something smoother to match. when you stir the puree over the flame, you'd notice that the bits eventually break into smaller parts, so no worries about over-chunkiness.

2) my usual puree comprises strawberries (sweet) and kiwis (sour). you can basically use any fruit to make puree, so try it with your favourites!

Step 3: Cooking the crepes.

pan. medium flame. some oil.

oil your pan before you start on any crepe. abt 1 tsp is more than enough for a good wok--ryce has a Tefal wok-pan.

i add 2 rice-scoop (roughly 2 tbsp) worth of batter into the pan, and let it set and cook for about 3 minutes. the edges will brown, and when it's more or less cooked, you'd realise that they slip off the pan quite easily. lift it with a spatula to check that it's nicely browned on the underside, before you flip it over to cook for another 2 minutes.

when you're all done, you'd have a short pile of 7-8 crepes!

Final Serve.
to make it fun, let your friends roll their own crepe. as ryce will demonstrate:

1) spread puree sauce over the crepe. pour some puree bits enough to cover slightly less than the bottom half of the crepe, from which you'd start rolling.

2) keep it tight, and slightly let the puree flow to the side and keep rolling till you get a nice roll that wouldn't flip open.

3) EEEEEET!

good with some french vanilla ice cream or whipped cream! of course, completely sinful so go. very. easy.

Bon Appétit!

Lemon-Mango Chutney Chicken

2006-10-04T03:51:00.000+08:00

Ah. Strangely familiar-sounding isn't it? =)

This dish was a little bit of an experiment.

I was in the supermarket earlier and bought a lemon for 15pence.

We had chicken thighs in the freezer and some really good but cheap mango chutney from a supermarket special (i'd bought it not knowing what to do with it and so it was just sitting in the fridge).

So I figured, why not make some Lemon Chicken?

I know it's sweet, and sour and crispy.
So, my dear partner in the kitchen, Chef Wai, and I decided to give it a whirl.

Mind you, we don't actually know what goes into making real Lemon Chicken, but we both remember it's taste and texture and look.

And it seems, we made it happen! Thumbs up from the whole house! Woohoo!!!

Successful experiment. Very Simple too ... try it!

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Lemon-Mango Chutney Chicken
(serves 5)

Ingredients:

2 Chicken Thighs
1/2 Lemon
4 tbs Mango Chutney
1 tbs Sugar
1 ts Corn flour (for thickening)
spring onion (for garnishing)

Step 1: Preparing the Chicken

defrost, wash and debone the chicken thighs.

then give the chicken a massage with the back of a knife or a pounder to tenderise the meat and flatten it out to create a bigger surface area. (frankly, it really just feeds more people for less.)

Step 2: Preparing ingredients for the Sauce

slice your lemon in half and make 4-5 thin slices for garnishing (you leave that aside).
take the remaining lemon and squeeze out the juice andsome pulp into a bowl.

Step 3: Fry the Chicken

what it says -fry the chicken till its golden brown.

try not to be afraid of the oil. it WILL splatter. so be careful. and don't panic. this is hot oil we're talking about.

it takes about 8 minutes or so to totally cook one piece of chicken on both sides. so while you're doing this, you can meddle with the sauce simultaneously.

Step 4: Cook the Sauce

take a frying pan or saucepan and gently simmer the mango chutney and lemon juice till it mixes nicely. add in the sugar to soften the sour bite.

the sauce will be a little watery at this point, so mix the corn flour with water and slowly stir it into the sauce.

it should now be the color and consistency of liquid warm caramel.

Step 5: Cut the Chicken

your chicken should be done by now. so drain it of the excess oil and cut it into bite sized strips and place it nicely in a dish.

be careful! its hot!

Step 6: Sauce, Garnish & Serve!

pour the sauce over the chicken, place lemon slices on top everything and to add a little pizzaz, you can add an artfully sliced sprig of spring onion on top of that.

the final product ...

WOOHOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooo!!!

nice. *burp*

till next time!

Hainanese Chicken Rice.

2006-10-03T00:48:00.000+08:00

(hainanese pronunciation in italics: Hai Nam Ko'ei Pu'wee.)

to my Ah Mah (though it should be Ah Por) back in Singapore, and my Ah Kong's carefree spirit in Tien Swee.

this particular dish comes with a certain history that is extremely close to my heart. for the uninitiated, i come from a pure hainanese family in which my grandparents (both paternal and maternal) were immigrants from the sunny island of Hainan--they moved from one tropical island to another mid-20th century. while i'd like to claim to know the perfect recipe for the chicken rice attributed to my heritage, it might come as a surprise that the popular variety that everyone's familiar with is not exactly the way it's prepared in hainan. this was observed in a trip i made with my father and grandma to Hainan, in order to return my grandfather's ashes to his home village.

the recipe is famed to have originated from the city of Wenchang (Boon Sio Kwai), which happens to be the city closest to my father's home village, (literally translated) New Village (Tien Swee), just about half-an-hour drive away. the funny thing is that over there, this dish--at its most esteemed and only on very special occasions--is often prepared with a young rooster instead of a hen. the meat is supposedly tastier but chewy. hainanese families in singapore who sell the dish are often from either similar neighbouring villages or Wenchang itself. in fact, many of such immigrant families ended up settling in Purvis and its neighbouring streets, where they started eatery businesses; that's the reason you have so many chicken rice stalls on a single street. other than chicken rice, hainanese families were also involved in other food businesses like coffeeshops and western food stalls.

when i was young, i remember my grandparents being very particular about the proprietors of chicken rice stalls. till this day, my grandma makes it a point to know if the vendors behind these "Hainese Chicken Rice" stalls in the neighbourhood were indeed hainanese, although my favourite stall happens to be run by a hokkien family. having been a boat-chef in his earlier days, my grandfather retired to become the house-chef in my family. chicken rice was more or less a staple for sundays. as a big fan of the dish, i would help my grandfather set up the chopping board and stool, in eager anticipation for him to chop the meat up. as he hammered away with the chopper, i would be squatting by him like a hungry vulture, feeding on the bits and pieces that slipped off his blade.

like many other dishes (e.g. Peking Roast Duck) that move beyond their place of origin, the popular version of hainanese chicken rice is largely a local update of the original recipe. what i'm sharing today is, therefore, a hybrid of what my family has shared with me, and what i've learnt about the popular version you get from eateries.

Ingredients.
(the chicken)
1 whole chicken (Small)
6 clove, garlic
2 inch, ginger
1 carrot
4 bunch, spring onion/ scallion (which i'm missing)
1-2 tbsp, salt
1 tbsp, chicken stock
4 tbsp, sesame oil

(the rice)
3 cup, rice (i like thai jasmine)
1 onion
4 clove, garlic
broth from the chicken

(chilli sauce)
5 red chilli (i like to add 3-4 chilli padis)
2 clove, garlic
3 bunch, coriander
1 tbsp, sesame oil
4 tbsp, fresh lime juice
broth from the chicken

(optional vegetable)
2-4 bunch, choy sum or bak choy.

Serves.
3-4

Step 1: Prepare the chicken, base and rice.
chop the carrots and the ginger, bruise the garlics and tie the scallions into a knot. throw all those into a sizeable pot filled with enough water to drown the chicken. add the chicken stock and bring to boil.

meanwhile, rub salt all over the chicken.

chop the onion and garlic for the rice. wash the rice, and let it set in water for about half an hour, then drain the water away.

Step 2: Cooking the chicken.
when the base comes to a boil, lower the chicken in, breast-down. put a lid on your pot, lower the flame and let it cook for about 15-20 minutes, and then flip it over for another 15-20 minutes.

immediately after, bring the chicken out and drown in a ice-cold water for a few seconds. this arrests the cooking so that your meat doesn't overcook. quickly take that out, and spread sesame oil all over the chicken before the skin turns a shade of dark.

chop the chicken up into appropriate sizes.

(p/s: in this attempt, i've chopped the chicken up so that i can fit it into the biggest available crockery.)

Step 3: Cooking the rice.
scoop the layer of oil from the broth and pour it into a wok over a medium flame. when the wok is hot, throw the garlic and onions in and stir till it starts to brown a little. pour the rice in and fry the rice until it too turns a shade of translucent brown. transfer all that into your ricecooker, and pour as much broth as it normally takes for you to steam rice with water. set to cook.

Step 4: Chilli sauce!
mince the chilli, garlic and coriander up. pour the sesame, 2 tbsp of broth and the lime juice into the mixture.

Step 5: Vegetable soup.
chop the vegetables up, throw them into the soup and bring the soup to a boil.

Final Serve.
traditionally, one of the dips is a garlic one made up mainly of minced garlic mixed with some broth. the hainanese still use that dip more than they do chilli, but i've gotten used to eating my dips extra hot.

i love broth from cooking this dish. you can always depend on it to provide a fabulous base for your green vegetables.

also traditionally, my grandma would roll the rice into hand-sized balls. i believe this came from making it easier to hold the rice for lunch out in the plantation fields. i didn't roll them this time, but below's an example of what i did some time ago.

Grilled Beef & Asparagus.

2006-10-01T20:16:00.000+08:00

i learnt of this simple but rather delicious steak recipe from a friend of mine, Rico Stanley. he actually introduced me to my current favourite cut of beef, scotch fillet, which he marinated with the recipe i'm about to share. the recipe is good for grill, barbecue and pan-fry.

as a mid-afternoon snack, i'm serving this up to ryce and sio with just a bit of asparagus and onions.

Ingredients.
(for the steak)
3 cut, steak (scotch fillet in my case)
6 tbsp, oyster sauce
4 tbsp, soya sauce
3 tbsp, olive oil
6 tbsp, chinese rice wine
2 tbsp, black pepper
1, onion (optional)

(for the asparagus side)
6 stick, asparagus
1 tbsp, salt
1 tbsp, pepper

Serves.
3

Step 1: Preparing the steaks.
very simple, mix all the ingredients (except the onions) together, and leave the meat to marinate for about twenty minutes.

chop the onions up and spread them on a plate as a base for the steaks to sit on in the oven.

Step 2: Asparagusing.
cut the asparagus and erm... that's it. i've been told that you can give the asparagus a salt bath (soak them in water and salt for about ten minutes), but i like to keep the taste of asparagus as untainted as possible. so i generally don't like the salt bath.

Step 3: Grilling everything.
here's the slightly tricky part because we all like our steaks cooked differently. this round, i'm doing medium-rare. i've set the steaks and the marinade on the bed of onions so that onions will grill nicely in the marinade.

preheat the oven at 250degrees for 5 minutes, and i leave the whole plate in for about 5-10 minutes, before flipping the beef over for the same amount of time. just be careful not to overdo your steaks.

if you like it fully cooked, you can just leave the steaks in for a slightly longer period of time. simple.

i left the asparagus inside to cook for the whole 20 minutes.

Final Serve.
sprinkle pepper and salt on the asparagus for added taste. take the onions out and serve them as a side as well.

Verdict.
we like it, but only because we're such suckers for marinade. i've prepared this for another friend before, and he wasn't a fan of strong marinades--he liked his beef tasting only of beef.

if you like the recipe, but want to taste your beef still, i suggest a thicker cut of beef. this would help tremendously.

the asparagus was juicy and a little crunchy. tasted well on its own, but i did sprinkle salt and pepper on it. thought it was a nice balance to the marinated meat and onion.

Grilled Fish with Asparagus Rice.

2006-09-30T02:00:00.000+08:00

seeing as how i will be without a computer for a while, i thought i experiment with another person's recipe. completely stunned by how beautiful lara's recipe looked, i decided to adapt it to whatever's available in my kitchen.

Ingredients.
(for the grilled fish)
4 cut, fish (i'm using trout)
1 tbsp, salt
1 cup, rice wine
1 inch, ginger
1 tbsp, black pepper

(for the asparagus rice)
4 stalk, asparagus
1, onion
3 clove, garlic
3 cup, rice
4 tbsp, butter
4 tbsp, black pepper
4 cup, fresh milk

(optional side of salad)
5 leave, lettuce (iceberg)
1 capsicum
4 tbsp, balsamic vinegar

Serves.
4

Step 1: Preparing the Rice.

dice the asparagus, onion and garlic. wash the rice, and leave it to soak in water for about half an hour. drain the water after.

Step 2: Preparing the Fish.

chop the ginger up, then toss it into a bowl with the fish inside. rub the black pepper and salt into the fish as well, then pour the rice wine in. leave the fish to marinate for about 20-30 minutes.

Step 3: Cooking the Rice.
fry the garlic, asparagus and onion with the butter in a wok over a small flame. this lasts for about five to ten minutes till everything's nicely cooked. then throw the rice in and fry it for a while before you pour the milk in. put a lid on and leave the rice to cook for about 20 minutes.

Step 4: Grilling the Fish.
Preheat the oven at about 150degrees for about 5 minutes, then set the fish to grill at that temperature for about 15 minutes.

Final Serve.
after setting the rice, i sprinkled black pepper on it. i'm serving the fish and rice with a side of capsicum and lettuce, doused in balsamic vinegar.

Verdict.
the fish was quite nice, but the rice turned out to be really bland! i recommend some cream cheese to be added to the rice in Step 3 if anyone were to try my recipe. all in all, dinner turned out to be beautiful but not too exciting taste-wise.

stick to lara's recipe.

p/s: there will be no updates from me till i get a new laptop.

===
ETA: 1 2250 Oct 2006, Sunday
i better add that i only just realised that i had burnt the wok i cooked the rice in. because of this, i suggest people either a) keep stirring, or b) transfer the mixture into a rice cooker instead.

argh.

effortless ABC Soup for the busy student

2006-09-28T03:51:00.000+08:00

Right.

I'm supposed to be writing a paper right now, and i didn't have the time to take any pictures of tonight's meal, so we're going to have to use a little bit of our ... IMAGINATION.

this meal is by no means imaginary, it is rather economical and very delicious when you have no time or variety of ingredients to cook for 4 people.

and you serve it as is.
no fuss, no frills, minimal washing up.
one pot, one person's problem.

so here goes, a recipe for what some people call: ABC SOUP

--------------------------------------------
Ingredients (serves 4)

4 carrots (regular sized)
4 potatoes (medium sized)
4 onions (medium sized)
1/3 chicken cube
1 slab of lean pork (wholly optional add only if u want some meat. can be substituted by any other meat really. just be aware of how to prepare the meat beforehand.)
salt & pepper to taste

step 1
peel and wash the A-carrot, B-potatoes and C-onions.

step 2
cut everything into bite-sized chunks and dump into the pot.

(Optional step)
cut up pork into bite sized cubes and marinate with soy sauce for about 10 minutes. then throw it in the pot with everything else.

step 3
fill the pot with water to reach about 2 litres of water (or a little more if u want more soup), throw in the 1/3 chicken cube and let the pot cook till al the ingredients cook through and the soup becomes infused by the sweetness of the now tender carrots, onions and potatoes. add salt and pepper to taste.

-----------------------------------------

this dish should take about 30 minutes to cook itself. just rememeber to check on it on occasion, so your kitchen doesn't burn down by accident.

safety first :) we actually had to run out of the building for 10 minutes beacuse of a badly timed firedrill. you can always turn your cooker off and come back to it later. its so simple a recipe that even that works.

so, with our IMAGINATION,

visualise a piping hot pot of tender vegetables in a sweet and savoury broth with succulent chunks of meat ...

best served with steamed rice and chilli padi in soysauce dip.

and thats ABC soup.

back to paper writing! try it!

Roast Salad with Parsley Butter.

2006-09-27T20:22:00.000+08:00

my housemate-cum-regular-dinner buddy, sio, requested to have some chicken tonight. we bought ourselves Woolworth's Herb & Mustard Marinade last night and figured to try that out, so my contribution for today is a side dish instead.

Ingredients.
1 capsicum (red, for color)
1 pear
2 baby carrot
3 clove, garlic
8 button mushroom (i normally prefer cup mushrooms)
1 onion (i prefer spanish, but i only have brown)
3 bunch, parsley
1 inch, butter (sorry, don't know how to measure this properly)
3 tbsp, black pepper
2 bunch, spring onion/ scallion

Serves.
3

Step 1: Choppity-Chop-Chop the Salad.
dice capsicum, carrots, pears, mushrooms and onions. toss them together to get a nicely colored salad.

Step 2: Parsley Butter Sauce.
mince the parsley and garlic together into a fine grain.

melt the butter in your microwave for abt 10 seconds, and stir that into the parsley and garlic mixture.

pour all of this into the salad and toss well to get an even coat of sauce on the salad.

Step 3: Prepare your main.
this will be a good time to prepare your main dish because the salad will roast quite quickly. our main for tonight is chicken thigh in an off-the-shelf herb & mustard marinade. three pieces of chicken thighs marinaded and left to soak in the flavour for about 20 minutes. Roasted at about 180 degrees for about half an hour (but i'm really bad at roast/ grills in the oven, so please check your meat yourself).

(sio wanted to have some roasted garlic, so she threw those in with the chicken.)

Step 4: Roasting the Salad and Final Serve.
into the last 15 minutes of roasting my main, i set the salad into the oven at 180 degrees for about 15 minutes. the salad should look nicely browned.

when the roasting is complete, bring the salad out and mix the black pepper in. chances are, the salad is going to taste very sweet, what with the butter and pear. so you'd want to adjust the amount of pepper accordingly. i topped it with the spring onions for added flavour.

Verdict.
we like it! but it really is quite a sweet salad so make sure your main appropriately balances that out.

Coriander Pan-Fried Lambchop.

2006-09-26T20:22:00.000+08:00

this is actually an alteration of what EDible suggested, however i've replaced chicken with lambchop, and cilantro with coriander.

don't ask.

Ingredients.
3 clove, garlic
1 inch, ginger
2 lambchops
3 tsp, black pepper
2 tbsp, olive oil
2 tsp, salt
6 bunch, Coriander
*some* chinese rice wine

Serves.
2

Step 1: Preparing the Lambchops.
rub salt and 2 tsp of black pepper onto lambchops. normally, this would do, but i love chinese rice wine with my red meat. so i splashed about 4 tbsp of rice wine onto the lambchops.

set aside for about half an hour.

Step 2: Preparing Coriander.

MINCE!

if like me, you don't have a mincer/ food processor, cut your coriander into a cup and start cutting it up in the cup. (i stole that food processing idea from learning how to mince some inedible leaves for erm... other purposes.)

ANYWAY.

chop the garlic and ginger up, and throw those into the cup and mince along. then throw the rest of the black pepper and olive oil into the mixture.

heat up a small pan over a small flame, and throw the mixture into the pan for a slow simmer. (Edible's instructions for the Cilantro doesn't require this, but i like to release added fragrances with some heat.)

heat for about a minute or two, then remove from flame.

Step 3: The Rest.

pan-fry the lambchops to whatever degree you like it. over a medium flame would be good, anything bigger would cause it to burn before it even cooks in the middle.

serve on plate, and coat top of lambchop with the coriander mixture.

for this dinner, i'm throwing some edam cheese and oysters!

Verdict.
my housemate, sio, says she "really like(s) it".

i thought coriander might have been a good substitue for mint and parsley, but clearly i was wrong because coriander just doesn't have strong enough a flavour. the garlic seemed to overpower the mixture a little, so if you're a fan of coriander like i am, perhaps you'd like to try less garlic.

Honey Mustard Roasted Chicken

2006-09-25T17:30:00.000+08:00

YaY!

Here's something i never knew i could make ...

only the video ... because the pictures look crappy ... no sunlight la. twas dinnertime.

enjoy:

(Serves 2 hungry students in 1 hr.)

here's the recipie:

2 chicken thighs
4 large white mushrooms
1 large white onion
2 red tomatoes
1/2 a brocolli
6 tbs honey mustard sauce
salt & pepper

step 1.
defrost and rinse chicken thighs. then spread honey mustard sauce liberally over chicken thighs. leave aside. turn on oven roaster to a reletively high heat just to get it going.

step 2.
slice mushrooms and lay them at the bottom of the roasting pan. sprinkle with a pinch of salt and a dash of pepper.

step 3.
cut up tomatoes and slice onion into rings. leave aside.

step 4.
place chicked thighs and whatever remaining sauce onto bed of sliced mushrooms and spread tomatoes and onions around and onto chicken in the roasting pan. place into oven and turn the heat down to a modest semi-high for 30 mins. (check on chicken at 15 mins to see that its sizzling.)

step 5.
after 30 mins, start blanching brocolli. you will add this to the roast later. (if you add it in any sooner without blanching/boiling) first, its gets all hard and rock-like.)

step 6.
check on the chicken, it should be turning a nice yellowy brown ... if you want, you can glaze the chicken wih more honey mustard to keep it moist. now, take your brocolli and place them in the remaining crevices it in the roast pan around your chicken. close the oven door and cook for another 15 minutes or till the chicken skin is a crisp golden brown. its ok if its slightly charred in some areas ... that happens.

step 7.
serve if your chicken looks done!
(if not .... eat the cooked parts then throw it back in the oven to cook again.)

its really very nice ....
kelvin gave the thumbs up.
just the mushrooms alone .... wah lao eh.

plus, i sound terrible in this video. must endeavor to speak like, nigella lawson.

yes must.