DOUBLE-BOILED FISH ESSENCE

 DOUBLE-BOILED FISH ESSENCE

If you have to look after an elderly person at home or you have been weak in body after a bout of sickness, make a portion of fish essence to drink. Today’s poultry and other meat farmers tend to use hormone in their feed to induce faster growth which makes them unsuitable to take knowing that much of cancer of the reproductive organs (cervical, ovarian, breast, prostate) are hormone-causing cancers.

1kg fresh Senangin/Threadfin fish

3 red dates, stone removed

1 slice ginger

1. Scale, gut and trim off fins of fish. Fillet the fish and cut each piece into 3 or 4 slices including the bone.

2. Place dates n ginger slices at botton of double-boiler ceramic pot. Place the sive/ceramic strainer over it.

3. Arrange the fish slices with meat facing down on the strainer.

4. Cover and put to double-boil for 5 hours.

5. The fish essence will drop to the bottom n mixed with ginger n red dates slices.

6. Drink the essence while still hot or warm.

CHICKEN IN BBQ SAUCE

 CHICKEN IN BBQ SAUCE MARINADE

1x 1.6 kg whole fresh Broiler chicken, butterflied OR chicken drumstick, thigh or wing pieces

Marinade ingredients:

3 tbsp light soy sauce

1/2 cup tomato sauce

3 tbsp honey

1.5 tbsp brown sugar

3 tbsp apple cider vinegar

2 tspn grated fresh ginger

4 cloves garlic, grated

1/2 hot cup water

Mix all marinade ingredients together. Pour on butterflied whole chicken. Roast on preheated oven 180 deg C for 1 hr, basting every 15-20 minutes.

KUEH KETAYAP (Pandanus Pancakes wraps with grated coconut with palm sugar)

 KUEH KETAYAP aka KUEH DADAR

Batter Ingredients:

230 gm flour

1/2 tsp salt

2 eggs

4-6 Screwpine leaves (Pandanus leaves), blended with 200 ml water, strain

400 ml water

Cooking oil

Filling ingredients:

250 gm palm sugar

2 tbsp coarse sugar

60 ml water

1 coconut, grated

1 tspn salt

2 tbsp butter

See video for instructions.

BRAISED CHINESE CABBAGE with DRIED SCALLOPS

 BRAISED CHINESE CABBAGE WITH DRIED SCALLOPS

1 medium size chinese cabbage, quartered

2 dried scallops, soak, shredded and retain water after soaking

1” ginger for juice

3 tbsp meddler seeds

2 tspn Maggi Chicken stock concentrate

3 cups water

Salt to taste

1 tbsp tapioca starch mixed with 1/4 cup water

1) Measure water into a pan. Add the shredded scallops ginger juice and the scallop soaking water. Bring to boil and simmer for 1/2 hour.

2) Just before serving add the cabbage, meddler seeds and chicken stock to the broth.

3) Bring to boil and simmer for about 15 minutes or until cabbage is just soft.

4) Remove the cabbage onto a serving plate carefully.

5) Increase heat and boil to reduce broth to just about 1.5 cups of liquid. Thicken broth with tapioca starch mixed with water. Add salt to taste.

6) Pour gravy on cabbage and serve hot.

WHAT IS 'WOK HEI' IN CHINESE COOKING?

 WHAT IS ‘WOK-HEI’?

'Wok-hei' is the flavour of burnt oil in your food, achieved by letting your food get caught by the fire for a brief moment.

It can be quite dangerous to do this in a home cooking hob because of the danger of your cooker hood catching fire especially if yr cooker hood is the old type that uses a gauze filter.

But you can still achieve it safely by using a smaller n shallow cooking utensil (like a frying pan) and turning on the fire to the maximum to let it come up to the edge of your utensil and then letting the fire get caught into yr food.

An alternative way to achieving the 'wok-hei' flavour in your quick/flash stirfrying food is to use a cast-iron wok. They retain heat well and maintains the required high temperature to quickly stirfry your food in just seconds, mainly in Cantonese style cooking.

Best trying this outside your kitchen for safety.

ABOUT THE AUTOMATED ELECTRIC RICE-COOKER

 ABOUT THE USE OF RICE COOKER

The Rice Cooker is one of the best ingenious cooking gadget ever invented based on the simple knowledge that water boils at 100 deg C/212 deg F.

Rule of thumb in cooking rice is that water has to be 2 times the amount of your rice. Once water has been fully absorbed by the rice, temperature will rise beyond 100 deg C and thats when the rice cooker will automatically switches off.

Based on this knowledge about the rice cooker, there are a few exceptions to the rule to how to ‘cheat’ the rice cooker to cook other type of rice dishes other than just plain white rice:

1) Nasi Lemak rice, Briyani Rice, Chicken Rice

All of these rice pilaf dishes contains oil and oil will cause the temperature of yr rice cooker to rise rapidly even before the rice grains are cooked. So the trick to cheat the rice cooker is do not use too much oil/santan in the rice but stir in a tablespoon or 2 of the santan/ghee/chic fat after the rice cooker has switched

off and let the rice stand for 10 minutes before eating.

2) Cooking unpolished rice

Unpolished rice is not desirable to eat because they are hard and chewy. These type of rice require 3 times the amount of water of your rice. What happen is that the grains will be boiled for a longer time until the grains breaks and rice cooker will switch off after d liquid has dried up. Adding more water does not mean that this type of rice absorbs more water but instead it allows d rice grains to be boiled longer to soften so that you get fluffier and less chewy rice.

The newer model of the electric rice cooker now comes with Congee/porridge model too and with a steaming tray accessory and an extra inner pot.

For a more durable rice cooker, look to buy that comes with a stainless steel inner pot instead of one with a non-stick surface or aluminium inner pot.

ABOUT NON-STICK COOKWARES

 ABOUT NON-STICK SURFACES ON COOKWARE

Tefal came up with the first types of non-stick cookwares. The non-stick surface is called Teflon.

Do not wash these cookwares while they are still hot. Let the cookware cool before washing.

If u need to clean the surface while it is still hot and because u need to use it again to cook the next dish, just wipe the surface with a kitchen towel.

These cookwares are not suitable to cook hard food like frying fish, meat with bones and seafood with shells because they will scratch the surface and so thats how the Teflon surface will wear-off over time and your cookware will have to be thrown away.

Nowadays manufacturers have come up with new technology on non-stick surfaces with scratch-proof. Not sure how good they are but only time will tell after a few years of use.

CREAM CHEESE BUTTER CAKE with PASSIONFRUIT ICING

 CREAM CHEESE BUTTER CAKE

100 g Cream Cheese

120 g Soft Brown sugar

150 g Cold unsalted Butter, diced

3 large eggs

220 g Self-raising flour, sifted

7” square cake pan, line bottom with parchment paper and grease n flour sides of pan

Passionfruit Cream Cheese Frosting: 170 g Cream Cheese, 170 g cold butter, 160 g sifted icing sugar, pulp of 1 passionfruit

1) Beat cream cheese and cold butter until light and fluffy.

2) Beat in eggs one at a time until just combined.

3) Fold in flour using a spatula

4) Pour into cake pan, level and smoothen top with spatula.

5) Bake in preheated oven at moderate temperature (180 deg C) for 50 minutes.

6) Turn out cake to cool on wire rack after cooking before applying frosting.

Passionfruit Cream Cheese Frosting:

1) Beat cream cheese and butter until just white. Beat in icing sugar until just combined. Stir in half the passionfruit pulp. Reserve the other half of pulp for decoration at the top of cake.

Spread mixture on cake using a spatula and top with the remaining passionfruit pulp.

PENANG LORBAK (PORK ROLL IN BEANCURD SHEETS)

 PENANG LORBAK

(5-spice pork strips wrapped in beancurd skin)

600g shoulder pork OR Boneless Chicken wholelegs, sliced into thin strips of abt 1cm thickness x 15cm length

1 large Bombay onion, cut into thin wedges

1 sheet beancurd skin, cut into 10 pcs

3-4 water chestnuts, chopped

Pork Seasoning: 1 tspn 5-spice powder, 1/2 tspn white pepper powder, 1 tbsp light soy sauce, 1 egg, 1 tspn salt, 2 tspn sugar, 1 tbsp corn flour

1) Marinade pork strips with seasoning overnight in fridge.

Stir in chopped water chestnut just before wrapping with beancurd skin

2) Place a sheet of beancurd skin on a clean n dry cutting board. Wipe beancurd skin with a damp tea towel.

3) Arrange pork strips on one end of d beancurd skin, lengthways. Arrange a few thin onion wedges on top of pork. Roll up tightly and seal with a little cornstarch water on the edges.

4) Repeat Step 3 until finish.

5) Heat up some oil on a frying pan for shallow frying.

6) Fry Lorbak in batches in medium fire, turning once to brown evenly and pork is cooked inside.

7) Slice cooked in a slant Lorbak into 1” length pieces.

8 ) Serve warm with chilli sauce dip.

Sauce Dip:

2 tbsp plum sauce, 50 ml rice vinegar, 1 tbsp chilli-garlic sauce, 2 tbsp sugar, pinch of salt, 1 tbsp toasted sesame seeds

HOW TO BUTTERFLY FISH FOR STEAMING AND DEEP-FRYING

 

 SZECHUAN STYLE FRENCH BEANS

300g French beans, topped & tailed

3 tbsp minced pork/chicken

1 tbsp dried prawns, chopped

1 tbsp minced garlic

1/4 cup water mixed with 1 tspn corn flour

1 stalk spring onions, chopped

Oil for deep frying

Sauce ingredients: 2 tspn malted, black rice vinegar, 1 tbsp sugar, 1 tbspn light soy sauce, 1 tspn black soy sauce, salt to taste, 1/2 cup water

1) Heat up oil for deep frying until smoking. Very quickly deep-fry french beans until skin blisters, about 1 minute. Remove and drain.

2) Cut fried beans into two. Leave aside.

3) Leave about 2 tbspn oil in the wok. Fry minced garlic and prawns until garlic is lightly brown.m n dried prawns are fragrant.

4) Add in sauce ingredients, cover and let it simmer for about 1-2?minutes or water has reduced by half.

5) Stir in cornflour mixture n let sauce thickens.

6) Add in fried french beans n spring onions.

7) Toss to mix well; remove and place on serving plate.

SWEET & SOUR PORK/CHICKEN

 SWEET & SOUR PORK/CHICKEN

300g pork shoulder or boneless chic whole leg

1 tbspn oyster sauce

1tspn sugar

1 egg white

4 tbspn all-purpose wheat flour

1 tbspn minced garlic

Oil for deep-frying

1/3 length of a medium cucumber, seeded and cubed

1 wedge pineapple (optional), diced

1/2 an onion, cut into wedges

1/2 a tomato, quartered

Sauce ingredients: 2 tbspn plum sauce, 1 tbspn rice vinegar, 1 tbspn tomato sauce,

1 tspn sugar

1 tbspn tapioca flour mixed with 1/2 cup water

1) Cut pork/chicken into 1/2” cubes. Marinate meat with oyster sauce for 4 hrs or overnight in fridge.

2) Add in lightly beaten egg white and mix well. Sprinkle in d wheat flour onto meat n coat.

3) Heat up oil in wok for deepfrying until oil is hot. Fry meat in 2 batches until brown.

4) Remove from oil and drain.

5) Leave about 2 tablespoons of oil in wok and fry minced garlic until just brown.

6)Add in onions and saute lightly. Add in pineapple, tomatoes and sauce ingredients. Bring to boil, stirring in medium heat.

7) Stir in tapioca and water mixture and add in cucumber cubes. Bring to boil and let sauce thickens.

8 ) Add back d fried meat and toss to coat meat with the sauce.

9) Dish out and serve.

Variation: If using fish fillet pieces, use Garoupa fish. Slice fish at a slant about 3mm thick. Toss in flour and deep fry til crispy and use accordingly.

 PORK CURRY WITH YOGURT

1/2 kg Pork Trotter or shin without skin and

1/2 kg pork neck bones, chopped into 1” pieces

1/2 cup yogurt

4 tbsp cooking oil

150g shallots, diced

1 medium Bombay onion, diced

10 cloves garlic, sliced

50g Meat Curry Powder (Baba or Alaggapa brand)

1 tbsp roasted coriander powder

1 tbsp roasted cumin powder

1” cinnamon stick

2 star anise

5 cloves

1.5” old ginger, sliced

4 sprigs Curry Leaves (karipillay)

2 tomatoes, diced

Salt to taste

1. Cut meat into 1” chunks. Marinate meat and bones with yogurt. Leave aside.

2. Heat oil in a pot and fry shallots with whole spices until lightly brown. Add in garlic and fry until shallots are brown in medium heat.

3. Add in Curry leaves, coriander, cumin powder and curry powder. Fry until fragrant.

4. Add in meat and bones and stir fry to seal in juices. Add a little water if curry powder sticks to pot.

5. Add ginger, tomatoes and enough water to cover meat.

6. Bring to boil and simmer, covered until meat is tender, about 40 minutes.

7. Add salt to taste.

8. Serve hot with rice or roti/naan.

STRAWBERRY YOGURT CAKE WITH STREUSEL TOPPING

 

STRAWBERRY-YOGURT CAKE

.1. Preheat oven to 180 deg C. Use a 7”-square cake pan, oiled and line bottom with parchment

paper. Flour the sides.

2. For the Streusel: 35g All Purpose flour, 55g light brown sugar, 1/2 tsp cinnamon powder, 42g butter soften; mix with finger to form coarse crumbs; leave aside.

3. 190g AP flour, 225g frozen stawberries (add a little flour, abt 3 tbsp, from the 225g to coat stawberries and leave aside).

4. Dry ingredients:

Add 1 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp BC Soda and 1/2 tsp salt to the flour. Mix with whisk and leave aside.

5. Wet ingredients:

2 large eggs (of abt 110g with shell), whisked; 1 tsp vanilla extract, 1/2 cup veg oil, 3/4 cups full fat Greek yogurt. Mix together with whisk until combined. Add 1 cup (200g) granulated sugar and continue mixing with a wire whisk.

6. Make a well in the flour mixture and pour in wet ingredients mixture. Fold lightly with a spatula. Add in floured stawberries and mix well.

7. Pour batter into cake pan.

8. Smooth out top of cake with spatula. Sprinkle streusel on top.

9. Bake for 60-65 minutes or test with skewer and skewer comes out clean.

10. Can be served cold or at room temperature.