Info: Recently, I've became slightly adventurous in the kitchen. Must be one of those desperate housewife hormones. Haha. So I'm just sharing my bit of recipes of the food I've cooked, only the ingredient part. I'm not a chef but I just like experimenting. So far it does taste decent. But I would love to share and discuss about cooking. Haha. I'm not really precise on my tsp and tbsp cause I just follow intuition. And most of these recipe is prepare for a batch of 7 people cause I have two siblings with big appetite in the family. Btw, Google is your best friend.
1. The Curry Mee Ingredients
Description: The curry mee like in my picture is actually an overnight left over curry chicken cooked for brunch the following day with yellow noodles. So, the recipe breaks into two.
Curry Chicken: 8-9 garlic clove, 8-9 shallot, 3-4 lemon grass, 5-8 potatoes, 1 whole chicken, Some curry leaves, Chili paste [ready made], some oil, some curry powder, salt, soy sauce, 2 star anise, 1 cinnamon, yard long beans
Comment: I think that's all about it. The key point to make a good curry gravy is using "loose" potatoes. With enough heat, it melts faster than ordinary potatoes. Holland potatoes seems to give this effect. The curry paste I used was made by my aunt's friend. It's her secret ingredient that makes the curry so spicy and nice! The more spices you add into the curry the nicer it becomes but don't over do it. Curry powders are normally used to marinade only. Garlic and shallots are to be banged not diced. It's so the juices gives a great aroma to the curry.
Mee: Yellow noddles, spring onions, black sauce, soy sauce, bean sprouts, fried shallot oil
Comment: Simple, just soak the noodles for some time and boil it over hot water. Not too long though! When soaking bean sprouts don't soak and boil it for too long or you'll get a horrible after taste. If you are storing bean sprouts overnight inside a plastic, make sure to avoid it from touching the side of the fridge. Mom says it's cause it'll spoil the freshness. I'm not so sure about this but it has been good so far. You can place the black sauce, soy sauce and fried shallot oil into a bowl and then mix all the content together with the noodles. Decorate with bean sprouts before pouring the curry on top with thick gravy. Top it with chopped spring onions. And you have it, a sinful delicious curry mee worth lots of calories!
2. Chicken Chop Set Ingredients
Description: This recipe comes with mushroom sauce, baked chicken chop, mash potatoes, and salad. All are prepared western style and over ingredients found lying around the house. The order of my recipe also represents the time chronology of how I prepared my ingredients.
Baked Chicken Chop: Chicken thigh, freshly grounded black pepper, sesame oil, Worchetershire sauce, oyster sauce, ginger juice, salt, tapioca flour, egg white, egg yolk
Comment: Unless you got a great sauce, you might want to make your chicken chop tasty enough to be loved by those who love eating it alone. Make sure to separate the egg white and beat it a little before pouring into the marinade chicken. Avoid excess water. You can actually tender the meat with a bit of water first and mixed it until it soaks up the water like a sponge. The chicken marinade must be left for at least an hour but the longer the better. During baking process, you can run the droplets of oil from the chicken over the top of the skin for a glossy effect. Top it with beaten egg yolk. Since my oven is small, I had my Chicken Chops baked over 180C for the first 30 minutes and then 210C for the next 20 minutes. I know Chicken Chops are mostly fried but I dislike the idea of adding oil into a Chicken thigh as it's unhealthy. So I preferred mine baked. And it still taste great!
Salad: Soaked cabbage, 1 carrot, 3 tomatoes, mayonnaise
Comment: Like any other vegetables, cabbages are also exposed to potential pesticides or other chemical residue. I would soak each leaf one by one. Make sure your cabbages are fresh from the wet market for a great taste! You can choose to avoid mayonnaise for health conscious cause I love mine natural. My family loves it with mayonnaise so majority always wins. As soon as you're finish with this, put it inside the fridge. The colder the better.
Mash Potatoes: 7-8 Potatoes, 1/2 a carrot, freshly grounded black pepper, Worchetershire sauce, butter, salt
Comment: My biggest mistake here is the salt. The base was perfect but the salt was too little that it became tasteless. Simple and effective. I actually added macaroni inside mine, some left over given by my University friend.
Mushroom Sauce: 1 can of button mushroom, Worchestershire sauce, butter, 1 onion, 4 garlic cloves, 1 can of Campbell Mushroom Soup, salt, freshly grounded pepper, tapioca flour
Comment: This was my random experiment which I haven't quite mastered. Dad loved it though, he devoured more than half of it. Brother loved it too. But I still don't! When I cooked it, the colour had a disgusting grey, I dared not even try it. But it was indeed nice. And this is coming from a girl who stresses on eating with your eyes. Make sure both onion and garlic cloves are diced so small you can practically swallow them without biting. I suggest melting the Campbell Mushroom Soup first with hot water and add in salt, flour, pepper, Worchestershire sauce in a bowl before mixing into the fried butter, mushroom, garlic and onion.
3. Pumpkin Pau Ingredients
Description: The recipe here is about making Pumpkin Pau without any fillings. It's just the dough which is sweet enough to be enjoyed over a bowl of Chicken Rendang. This recipe was taught by my aunt, over my 1 year holidays.
Dough: 1 kg of pau flour [Readily packed], 100g of oil, 160g of sugar, 3 tablespoon of tapioca flour, 1 small packet of yeast, 1 small cup of hot warm water, half a pumpkin
Comment: The process of making is the difficult part. Prepare the pumpkin removing skin, dice into cubes and steam it for over 20 minutes. When it's soft enough, blend it. Smashing it is insufficient from my experience. Prepare the pau flour onto an open clean table [messy], put in the tapioca flour. Get a bowl, and pour in yeast, sugar and warm water inside and mix well. The lesser the water during the initial process, the better. Make a hole in the middle and pour in the oil. Mix well with your hands. The make another set of hole in the middle and pour in your bowl of content and mix well again. Slowly mix in the blended pumpkin, at first adding 5 spoons, then decreasing to 2-3 spoons every time you mix the dough well enough. You don't really need to finish half of a pumpkin to make a 1 kg dough pau. The aim here is to get the dough soft enough but yet not sticky. The sticky part happens because of water from both the pumpkin and the bowl of content. If you got yourself in a sticky situation, pour in some tapioca flour. If your dough is too hard, slowly wet your hand little by little and remake the dough. Dough should be mix for 15 minutes. Once your dough is soft, left it for 20-30 minutes to expand. While waiting, prepare your steamer with cloths and cut some mahjong papers to put under your pau. After 20-30 minutes later, roll back your dough and make it in a cylinder shape. Separate them into pieces and start rolling them into a nice ball and place it on top of a mahjong paper. Leave your work for 45 minutes to expand the yeast again and you can start steaming for 15 minutes per round. 1 kg can make up to 40 paus if you make them small enough. And you're done, told ya the process is hard.
4. Tuna Sandwich Ingredients
Description: The recipe is just a tidbit special. Makes the flavour more nutty and has a classic touch to it. And it's a healthy meal to prepare.
Sandwich: 2 slice of wholemeal bread, butter, tuna coated with olive oil, half a fresh tomato, peanut butter
Comment: Just prepare it that way. It's better if you have a good peanut butter which has a nuttier and coarser texture/flavour. It's the only sandwich I know which I can always prepare on the go and without a frigde [especially in my University]
5. ABC Soup Ingredients
Description: Nothing out of ordinary, just something I've been brewing in my University while surviving through my hectic life. Used a rice cooker to cook this.
Soup: chicken stock/chicken stock seasoning/pork, 3 potatoes, 2 onions, 1 carrot, 2 fresh tomatoes, 2 teaspoon of salt, 1 teaspoon of black pepper
Comment: It's so easy. Grab a pot, fill in with water, boil water. Pour pork if you're using pork. If you're like me living in the University fridgeless then pour in the tomatoes and onions first, and let it boil again. Then pour in the rest of the ingredients. Boil it for 1 hour or 2, until the potatoes are soft enough.
6. Onion Egg Ingredients
Description: Nothing out of ordinary again. Just used a rice cooker to cook this. I like mine more onions than the egg.
Onion Egg: 2 teaspoon of peanut oil, 3 onions, 2 eggs beaten, 1 teaspoon of soy sauce, 1/2 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper
Comment: Since I'm using a rice cooker to cook this, it won't turn out like my mom's one but the taste is the same. Add some oil and let it warm. Add in the onions and add in a little bit of water after that. Add in soy sauce [the main ingredient why all Onion Eggs taste like Chinese Onion Eggs!], salt and pepper and let it cook for a while until the onions softens. Pour in the beaten eggs over it. Cook until eggs coagulated then off the rice cooker.
7. Steam Oyster Sauce Okra Ingredients
Description: Simplest thing ever created. Used a rice cooker to cook this too.
Steam Okra: 10 okras, Oyster sauce of the best quality [always get the best oyster sauce for better taste], fried onion oil
Comment: Water inside the pot and steam okra over a bowl inside the the rice cooker. Steam until it softens and take it out onto a plate. Grab a fork and stab it and run it through along the body [I don't really know how to explain this]. Pour in oyster sauce and some fried onion oil over it. Mix it and you're done. You need to be clever in selecting okras here. It can be tricky. Always get the green and young looking ones that are almost ripe because this dish involves soft flesh of the okra.
8. Steam Century Egg Ingredients
Description: My Penang roommates taught me this. Again with a rice cooker.
Steam Century Egg: 2 diced cube shaped century eggs, 5 beaten chicken eggs, 1 teaspoon of chicken stock seasoning, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon pepper
Comment: Mix in all the ingredients except the century eggs together in a bowl. Add in the century eggs, and some water into the solution. Put it in a bowl and steam it over water in a rice cooker. Time taken depends on how much you made. You can always check whether it's done by poking a fork into the steam egg. You know it's cook when there's no fluid flowing out of the holes you poked.
