Shao Xing/ Rice Wine Chicken.

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!

Stir-Fried Beef Salad.

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.

Chinese Rice Porridge/ Congee.

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.

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 :(

Pork Rib & Lotus Root Soup.

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.