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.

PENANG NYONYA GULAI TUMIS

PENANG NYONYA GULAI TUMIS

(Penang Nyonya Fish Curry)

This recipe is from my dear mother-in-law, Sucy Lee, who is more of a friend to me than my mother-in-law.  The credit should go to her.  After I was married and had my first child, I moved back to Kuala Lumpur to live with her and my father-in-law for number of years.  She taught me all I need to know about Nyonya cuisine.

 Gulai Tumis Curry Paste:

5 medium purple onions, peeled and cut into chunks

8 cloves garlic, peeled

2 lemon grass, slice thinly*

8 fresh chillies, seeded and sliced

2 tbspn dried chilli paste or sambal olek

3 knobs 1"length fresh turmeric*

2 square slices shrimp paste (belachan) of about 3mm thick each

1 cup cooking oil 

In a mortar and pestle, pound the turmeric and lemon grass until fine.  Alternatively you can use a food processor: with the motor running, put the sliced lemon grass through the feeder tube, followed by the turmeric root.

Add in the other fresh ingredients (onions, garlic and fresh chillies) into the food processor and grind until fine.  Lastly add  in shrimp paste and the dried chilli paste and grind until well combined.

Heat up oil in a wok and fry the paste in medium fire until oil separates.

Pack the cooked paste into clean glass bottles until read to use later. The paste can be kept frozen for up to 6 months.  Makes about 4 cups of paste.

Penang Nyonya Fish Curry

(Serves 2-3)

2 pieces 1/2"thick red snapper cutlets or threadfin cutlets or 1 medium whole white pomfret

4 tbspn Gulai Tumis Curry Paste

2 tbspn tamarind paste mixed with 1 cup water, strained

3-4 tspn sugar or to taste

5 sprigs polygynon leaves (Daun kesom), use leaves only

4-5 okra/ladies fingers, remove stalk but leave  whole

1 small length of brinjal/aubergine, cut into 2"length and quartered

salt to taste

In a pan, heat up the curry paste.  Add in the strained tamarind juice.  Bring to boil and add the vegetables.  When curry boils again, add in the fish and the herb leaves. Cover and let simmer for about 5 minutes.  Add sugar and salt to taste.  Remover from fire and serve immediately.

*Notes:  Its important to grind the lemon grass finely.  

When frying the paste, use medium fire and stir frequently to avoid burning or the curry will have a bitter taste.

Dried chilli paste or sambal olek can be store bought.  If you make your own, remove the stalks and seeds of the dried chillies using a pair of kitchen scissors. Snip them into short legnths and soak them in cold water overnight in the fridge.  Drain and grind the soaked chillies until fine.  Heat up some oil in a wok and fry the paste until the oil turns a deep red colour. Bottle the cooked paste until ready to use later. Paste can be frozen for up to 6 months.

You can substitute the fresh turmeric for powdered turmeric. Use about 3 heapful teaspoons of turmeric powder.

Shrimp paste or belachan in the Malay language can be store bought. They comes in rectangular blocks or in round flat cakes. Cut it up into slices with a dry knife and cutting board.  Keep them inside a bottle in the fridge.

Polygynon leaves is a herb.  In here they are used to flavour the curry and they are discarded after cooking. Alternatively you can grind the leaves together at the final step when  preparing the paste.  Save you the hassel to buy a batch of leaves every time you need to cook the curry. Use about 10 sprigs of the herbs for the 4 cups of paste.

The okra and the aubergine can be microwaved to cook and added in later just before serving.

  

Indonesian Soto Daging (Indonesian Beef noodles)

INDONESIAN BEEF NOODLES

(SOTO DAGING INDON)

500 g Beef Brisket or Shin
500 g Omasum tripe (Chinese: 牛百頁 / 牛柏葉) *
300 g Beef tendon
1 large piece leg bone with marrow
3 litre water
salt & pepper to taste

1 kg dried rice vermicelli, soake and blanch

For soup broth:
6-8 shallots
2 pips garlic
1" knob turmeric (kunyit/ 姜黄) or 1/2 tspn turmeric powder
1" knob fresh ginger, sliced
1" knob galangale (lengkuas/ 南薑),sliced
1 lemon grass,about 4" length (serai/ 香茅草),bruised

Spices Ingredients:
4 tbspn coriander (ketumbar) seeds
2 whole star anise (bunga lawang)
4 cardamon seed pods (buah pelaga)
1" cinnamon stick (kayu manis)
1 tspn Cumin seeds (jintan putih)
1 tspn fennel seeds (jintan manis)
1 nutmeg (buah pala), shell removed and crush seed

For garnishing:
500 g beansprouts,blanced
1 medium cucumber, julienne
150 g chinese celery, sliced
200 g browned shallot crisps
5 limes or calamansi, halved
some birds chillies
Tobasco Sauce*

1.  Prepare a stockpot and put to boil 4 litres of water.

2.  In a food processor or mortar & pestle, grind the shallots, garlic and turmeric root to form a paste.

3.  Heat up 3 tbspn cooking oilin a pan and fry the grounded shallots in (2) until fragrant. Transfer to boiling water. Add the sliced ginger and galangale into the water.

4.  In a pan, fry the spices in medium fire until fragrant. Put to grind or pound coarsely. Put these into a muslin bag or a large-enough stainless-steel tea leaves infuser (see photo below). Add this to the boiling pot of water.

5.  When water comes to a boil again, add the meat, omasum, tendon and bone.  Simmer until meat is soft. The omasum and tendon will take longer to soften. Remove from stock and keep covered until ready to eat.

6.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

7.  Slice the cooked beef meat,omasum and tendon into bite size pieces.

8.  To serve, put a handful of rice vermicelli into a medium bowl. Add some sliced meat, omasum or tendon, julienne of cucumber and blanced beansprouts. Ladle in the stock broth and garnish with brown shallot crisps and chinese celery.

9.  To be eaten with a squeeze of lime/calamansi juice and cut birds chillis or Tobasco sauce as a dip.

* Notes: Omasum tripe is also called leaf tripe. See photo below:

Hakka Glutinous Rice Dumplings

HAKKA GLUTINOUS RICE DUMPLINGS

The 5th moon festival falls on the 5th day and 5th month (double 5)of the lunar calendar and its also called the Dragon Boat Festival and is a national holiday in China. People in China eats zongzhi , drink realgar ( xionghuang 雄黃) wine and race dragon boats. The dragon boat is celebrated to commemorate the attempt to rescue Qu Yuan, a famous chinese poet and scholar in the 278 BC who committed suicide by drowning himself.The zongzhi were initially made and thrown into the river to prevent the fish from eating Qu Yuan's body.

The shape for this recipe of zhongzhi is pillow-shaped. Both end of the bamboo leaves have to be trimmed and allow 3 leaves per dumpling and dried grass reeds (comes together with your bunch of dried bamboo leaves) for strings for tying.

Ingredients:

2 kg glutinous rice

2 bunches of dried bamboo leaves

1 kg belly pork + 1 kg shoulder pork without skin or 2 kg boneless chicken whole leg without skin

2 tspn 5-spice powder for meat + 2 tspn extra for rice

20 dried black mushrooms, soaked overnight in fridge

300 g dried black-eyed peas or fresh Berlotti beans and/or dried peanuts, soaked overnight

45 pcs dried oysters, soaked overnight in fridge

200 g dried chestnuts (buah berangan), soaked overnight in fridge

20 salted duck egg yolks, steamed and halved

salt and sugar  to taste

dark soy sauce for colour

6 shallots, chopped

2 whole pods garlic, chopped

cooking oil

1. Soak rice in a basin of water overnight. Drain. Stir in 2 teaspoons of 5-spice powder and 4 teaspoons of salt or to taste

2.  Squeeze out water from soaked mushrooms. Slice mushrooms.

3.  Marinate pork pieces and sliced mushrooms with 2 tablespoons of thick, dark soy sauce and 2 teaspoons of 5-spice powder and 2 tablespoons light soy sauce.

4. Heat up 1/2 cup of cooking oil in a large wok and fry the drained rice and toss with a ladle until oil seeps into rice grain and becomes translucent. Stir in about 2 tablespoons of dark, thick soy sauce for colour.  Dish out onto a basin.

5.  In the  same wok, heat up 4 tablespoons of cooking oil and brown the chopped shallots and garlic.

6.  Add in the marinated pork and mushrooms and toss until pork is cooked. 

7.  Add in the drained oysters, chestnuts and peanuts.  Stir to coat with the dark soy sauce and gravy.

To assemble:
1. Take a leaf and add 2 tablespoons of rice onto it and spreading it out, holding it on your left palm.
2.  Add 1 piece of belly and shoulder pork each, a few slices of mushrooms, some peanuts/beans,1 piece of oyster, half an egg yolk, 1 piece of chestnut and a spoonful of gravy. Top with 1 tablespoon of rice.
3.  Fold over both end, overlapping each other to cover.
4. Holding one end of the exposed side upright with your left hand, take another leaf to close up the other side and folding over by bringing it over to the back and front on both ends of the leaf.
5. Do the same for the other exposed side with another leaf.
6.  Tie securely with a reed as string.
7.., Repeat until finished.
8. Meanwhile, get ready a deep stock pot. Arrange the zhongzhi in the pot neatly, leaving about 3" to 4" of space  from the top.
9.  Fill it up with water to cover. Add 4 tablespoons of salt into the water.
9. Bring to boil and simmer for about 4 to 5 hours or alternatively, use a pressure cooker to cook in 1 hour.

Fiddle-head ferns

Pucuk Paku

Matured Midin (Stenochlaena palustris)

MIDIN Shoots

Jungle ferns are naturally organic and they are free (if you pick them yourselves, that is). Originate from the local natives of Malaysia and Asean countries, they are also found in the United States of America! They are eaten stir-fried with a spicy mixture of shrimp paste, chillies, shallots and garlic or just blanch them and then tossed in a salad dressing in Western or Malaysian style. The Westerners calls them fiddle-head ferns of 'pucuk paku' in Malay language. There are other varieties which are red in colour when young which is called 'midin' and another variety which has a hairy texture and both are mainly eaten by Sabahans or Sarawakians (in the island of Borneo).

Here is a simple dish of strir-fried fiddle-head ferns (Midin) with just ginger, garlic and a dash of rice wine:

300 g fiddle-head ferns (Midin), shoots only
2 pips garlic,sliced
5 slices of young ginger
cooking oil
a dash of chinese rice wine
salt to taste

1.  Heat a wok with 3 talespoons of cooking oil.

2.  Fry garlic until brown with a teaspoon of salt in the oil. 

3.  Add in the Midin and ginger slices. Toss and stir with ladle for 2 seconds or until vegetables turn a dark green. Add a dash of rice wine.  Dish out and serve hot.

Banana & Peach Crumble

Here is a quick and simple dessert that you can make using the food processor. The crumble topping is not your usual crumble mixture but rather a cookie mixture which makes its 'shorter' than the usual and more decadent. Serve with your favourite ice-cream. I like the old-fashioned, plain, vanilla ice-cream.

Banana & Peach Crumble

1 large canned peaches in slices, about 480g drained weight

4 large bananas

juice from 1/2 lemon

zest from 1 lemon

pinch of cinnamon powder

For the crumble:

80 g salted butter

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

3/4 cup soft brown sugar

1 cup almond slivers

Vanilla Ice Cream

Method:

1. Empty a can of drained peach slices onto a 8" oven proof dish.

2. Skin and slice bananas into 1/2" thickness and put them on top of the peaches.

3. Grate the zest of the lemon and sprinkle it over the bananas and peaches. Squeeze the juice of half a lemon over the mixture. Add a few dash of cinnamon powder lightly over the fruits.

4. To prepare the crumble, slice the cold butter into about 2mm thickness and put them into the food processor.

5. Measure the flour and add this into the butter.

6. Process until mixture turns to breadcrumbs (about 1 minute).

7. Empty mixture onto a mixing bowl and stir in brown sugar.

8. Spoon mixture onto the fruits.

9. Bake in preheated oven at 180 degree Celsius for about 40 minutes.

10. Sprinkle almond slivers and bake on a further 10 minutes or until nuts turn brown.

11. Spoon mixture onto dessert bowls, cutting down each servings with a large spoon.

12. Serve with vanilla ice-cream at the side.