Fried Rice With SPAM and Parboiled Rice ... & Migration Announcement

I have finally done it, migrated to my own URL....  Please follow this link to read more about my new Fried Rice Dish... See you at my new home! 

Fish Head Bee Hoon - 鱼头米粉

I cooked Fish Head Bee Hoon for dinner today. It tasted so good that I am beginning to believe that I can actually cook....

Food bloggers like us - we cook at home, we have cookbooks, we watch cooking programs and we attend cooking classes - everyone of us, I suppose, fancy ourselves as a bit of a cook. When we see our own cooking captured on film, it brings us a little closer to the wishful notion that we could perhaps be more than 'a bit of a cook'.... and do I even need to mention that we, food bloggers, have mastered the ethereal art of eating with our eyes?  I remember when I told my friends how we would visit each others' blogs leaving comments on the food - they had asked me, quite matter of factly, ' but they have not tasted your food, how do they comment on your food? '  To that, I replied sagely : we eat with our eyes.

Indeed, perhaps, one of these days, when we do get to taste each others' fare, we could be grossly disappointed and disillusioned but what is also true is that our knowledge of food has become more astute, we have become more aware and informed about the different tastes, ingredients and preparation of food - leading to higher expectation and appreciation of what would perhaps be just lunch or dinner.

When I had told L that I made this for dinner tonight and quite ignorantly asked if they have Fish Head Bee Hoon in KL, he had replied with an almost audible snort, ' of course we do, where do you think Singaporeans copy from? '. Absolutely futile to talk to him about food commonalities between Malaysia and Singapore.

I used the recipe from local celebrity chef, Sam Leong's 'A Taste Of Home'. Sam Leong, who hails from KL (eyes rolling)  is the Corporate Chef and Director of Kitchens for the Tung Lok Group, which own more than 20 world-class restaurants in Singapore, Indonesia, China, Japan and India. 'A Taste Of Home' is his third cookbook and is less stylistic and less intimidating than the first 2 books. The dishes featured in this book are very homely and unpretentious - totally relevant for home cooking for family and friends.
I don't suppose this is the best Fish Head Bee Hoon recipe as it does not really calls for fish bone stock but I had found a total of 3 different recipes, and all of them were using normal chicken stock. I suppose for home preparation, this would be easier to work with - it doesn't quite require one to tackle the possible fishy smell of the stock. What I have done a little differently, is to boil the stock with dried anchovies and impart some flavour of the sea to it.





I had bought a mixture of  fish (with bones) and fish fillet from the market. The fish I bought was Shengyu, also commonly known as Snakehead fish - not cheap. The $4 portion will probably only be good for 2 servings... sometimes, you wonder, what is the point of cooking it by yourself. I probably can get it cheaper at the hawker stall or the food court. These are seasoned with a little salt and deep fried until golden yellow.

I like my soup base with lots of pepper, a discernible hint of Chinese rice wine and the refreshing tang of the fresh tomatoes - all served with the ferocious cut chilli padi. I definitely will be making this again and I hope you will get to try it too.... it may also make you feel like more than a bit of a cook ;).



Recipe (from Sam Leong's A Taste Of Home)

Fresh thick rice vermecilli (Bee Hoon)           400g
Cooking oil for deep frying
Snake head fish, chopped into pieces            200g
Pickled Mustard Cabbage (Harm Choy)       200g (cut into strips)
Ginger                                                          5 pieces
Spring onion                                                 2 cut into short lengths
Tomatoes                                                     2 cut into wedges
Lettuce                                                        A few leaves

Stock
Chicken stock                                             800ml
Salt                                                            1/2 tsp
Sugar                                                         1/2 tsp
Salted plum                                                1 (I omitted this.)
Ground white pepper                                  Dash
Chinese cooking wine                                 Dash
Sesame Oil                                                 Dash
Evaporated milk                                          3 tbsp

Method
1. Bring a pot of water to the boil and blanch Bee Hoon until soft. Drain and set aside and divided into large serving bowls.
2. Heat oil for deep-frying over high heat. Season fish with a little salt. Deep fry until golden brown. Drain and set aside.
3. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a wok and add ingredients for stock,except milk.Bring it to the boil, then add fish, pickled mustard cabbage, ginger, spring onions , tomatoes and milk.
4. Allow stock to return to the boil, then ladle into bowl over noodles.  Garnish with lettuce and serve immediately with red chillies.

1. Bring a pot of water to the boil and blanch Bee Hoon until soft. Drain and set aside and divided into large serving bowls.

2. Heat oil for deep-frying over high heat. Season fish with a little salt. Deep fry until golden brown. Drain and set aside.

3. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a wok and add ingredients for stock,except milk.Bring it to the boil, then add fish, pickled mustard cabbage, ginger, spring onions , tomatoes and milk.

4. Allow stock to return to the boil, then ladle into bowl over noodles. Garnish with lettuce and serve immediately with red chillies.

Black Glutinous Rice With Durian

Among the rice eating community here in Asia, the Japanese are possibly the ones who pays the most attention and dedication to the types and quality of rice they consume. The myriad of Japanese rice varieties available at the Japanese supermarkets fascinates me. A couple of months ago, I bought 3kg of Japanese short grain brown rice at the Japanese supermarket just so that I could use the rice polishing machine there. By turning the knob on the machine, I was able to select the different degree to which I would like my rice to be polished. Last month, during the Chinese dumpling Festival, someone was raving to me how the Japanese short grain glutinous rice makes really tasty sweet dumpling. During my last trip to Japan in April, my Taiwanese colleague had the gall to ask me to help him lug back the latest electric rice cooker that cost US$400! The latest model by Zojiroshi (the elephant brand) , it came with vaccumm and high pressure features that cook each rice grain to the core (including the harder brown rice) in a shorter time to yield a more fluffy and bouncy texture. I was intrigued, ...I was...but alas the voltage setting does not work in Singapore. Sigh, yes, almost all things made in Japan are good, (I hear protests over the recent Toyota debacle). Their dedication to and appreciation for quality and perfection are almost always reflected in the things produced in Japan.

2 weeks ago when I was on my business trip in China, I had the opportunity to spend 2 days in Hong Kong while I was running between southern China and Shanghai. One of my favourite haunts in Hong Kong is the City Super Fine Food super market. This time, I must have spent close to 45mins, lingering over the Rice and Grain Section, peering at the different types of Jasmine rice, Arboria rice, Taiwanese short grain rice (these are also becoming really good) and the huge selection of Japanese rice stored specially like good wine in a dedicated refrigerator. I was particularly drawn to the short grain white glutinous rice and black glutinous rice. The Japanese short grain glutinous rice grains were snow white with a lovely luminescence while the black glutinous rice were jet black, plump and looked more like black sesame than rice. I had really wanted to get both but that would add weight to my luggage and I still have more than a week's travel to manage. In the end I chose to only get the black glutinous rice and for the rest of trip, I was contemplating about what to do with them when I get home.

I am not very familiar with black glutinous rice recipes. The last black glutinous rice dish I had was 2 months ago in Taiwan when they served a black glutinous rice meat dumpling (紫米粽). It was really delicious (I think I still have 2 dumplings in my freezer!) and it did not make me feel bloated as normal glutinous rice would. Then there is the popular SE Asian dessert Pulut Hitam - which is Black Glutinous Porridge with Coconut Milk. It is a relatively simple dessert to prepare but is also rather uninteresting. It was only after poring over Forest Leong's Thai dessert, Mango sticky rice that I had my inspiration. Instead of water, I chose to cook the black glutinous rice in clear coconut juice. This imparts a refreshing, natural fragrant sweetness to the the porridge. When the rice was cooked, I stirred in minimal qty of coconut cream and served it with a dollop of seasonal durian pulp. As the durian season is at its peak, the fruit is very sweet and complimented the black glutinous rice rather well.

So, if you know of other black glutinous rice recipes, please do enlighten -I am looking forward to experiment with the rest of my short grain black glutinous rice.

Recipe :

100g  Black Glutinous Rice, washed

3 Cups Coconut Juice
Sugar  To taste.
Salt     Pinch
2 Pandanus Leaves, knotted

20ml Coconut cream

Method :

1. Soak black glutinous rice over night and wash until water is clear. (water will purple in colour but should be clear)
2. In a pot place drained black glutinous rice, coconut juice, pinch of salt and sugar (I did not add sugar as I was happy with the natural sweetness of coconut juice) and pandan leaves. Bring to boil, lower heat to medium and continue simmer for 45 mins. I did this without covering the pot. If the water dries up, add more coconut juice or water.
3. When rice is cooked, (I cooked to soften with an al dante bite - some may prefer this to be more 'mushy') stir in coconut cream at low heat. Bring to low simmer for 2 mins. Remove from heat and cool down a little if preferred and serve with a dollop of durian pulp.

Soon Kueh - Turnip Dumpling / Bamboo Shoots Dumpling 笋粿

One of the highlights of my recent vacation trip in Taiwan was to visit the morning wet market. As we wandered down the single street market at Shuanglian (双莲市场) I felt like a little girl who has just wandered into a candy shop... I could feel my eyes glinting at the wide spread of fresh vegetables, fruits and seafood. At that moment, I honestly wished that I was residing in Taipei so that I could bring back all these fresh goodies and cook up a storm!




Among the jumbo peanuts, luscious mangoes, giant water melon and arching fish, the one item that fascinated me most was the bamboo shoots. Spring bamboo shoots are in season now and I have never seen so many fresh, plump bamboo shoots in my life. We don't normally get bamboo shoots here in Singapore. Most of the time they come already cooked and packed in vacuum packs. I was lucky that during one of the dinners with my customer (yes, I still met my customer for dinner on sunday), he had insisted that we order the bamboo salad. 90% of fresh bamboo shoot is actually water, hence the crunch is really refreshing and fresh bamboo shoot does not have the unpleasant smell that I am not too fond of in cooked bamboo shoots.

It was after this bamboo shoots siege in Taiwan that I was reminded of a Teochew Style snack which we normally have for breakfast in Singapore. Known as Soon Kueh, they literally mean Bamboo Shoots Dumpling... only irony is, the Soon Kueh we get in Singapore is filled with turnip instead of bamboo shoots. I have asked a few friends why this is so and we've arrived at 2 main conclusions :
1.  Bamboo shoots are more expensive and not readily available ;
2.  Cooked bamboo shoots has a pungent smell which may not agree with most people here.

So, with this spark of inspiration, I decided to embark on this seemingly crazy feat of making Soon Kueh. Crazy because they are readily available in the market - friends and fellow colleagues just cannot understand why I would want to go through the hassle of cooking my own turnip filling and kneading my own dumpling dough. Well, they don't cook and they don't blog -so they will never be able to understand.



Soon Kueh is a fist sized dumpling filled with shredded turnip cooked with bean paste and dried prawns. The ingredients can be varied by adding mushrooms, bamboo shoots and even fresh prawns. The wrapping of the dumpling can either be made with a blend of Tapioca flour and rice flour or in my case, I have chosen to work with wheat starch (tang flour, 澄面粉) . The wheat starch gives the wrapping a transparent and chewy consistency - not unlike the dim sum Harkow (shrimp dumpling) skin.

I am not very dexterous with my hands and took a while to get a dumpling that resembles the Soon Kueh.
I tried to roll out the dough into the thinnest resilient thickness I could manage and make sure that I don't get too greedy when I pile on the filling. I am happy with the results of this first attempt. The snack is especially tasty when served with fragrant fried shallots oil.



Recipe :
Wrapping (Adapted from AsianEasyRecipe)

375 g Tang Mein (Wheat Starch)
180 g Tapioca flour
450 ml Boiling water
3 tbsp Shortening/oil
Oil for greasing

Filling (Adapted from Madam Neo's 家常好菜)

455g   Turnip
3 tbsp  Oil
1 tbsp  Minced garlic
1 tbsp  Soybean paste (Tauchio)
1 tsp    Sugar
1 tsp    Salt
115g    Water
55g      Dried shrimps

Method :

Filling
1. Peel turnip and cut into strips and soak in water. Drain and set aside.
2. Add oil to a heated wok. Fry garlic until fragrant and brown. Add bean paste, sugar, salt and fry for a 3 mins.
3. Add dried shrimps and fry for another min. Add water and heat to boil.
4. Add turnip and cook until liquid almost dries up.
5. Cool down and set aside.

Dough
1. Put Tang Mien, tapioca flour into a mixing bowl, pour in boiling water and mix quickly with ladle or big spoon. Cover and leave aside for 15 minutes.

2. Add in shortening/oil and knead into a pliable dough. Roll out in a cylinder 4 cm /1 1/2 in, in diameter. Cut with a sharp knife into 2 cm/3/4 in slices. Dab a little oil on both sides of the slice and roll out gently into thin round shapes.
3. Place 2 teaspoons filling in the centre of each slice of dough and fold in half. Seal the edges by pressing together. Cut the edge with a pair of scissors for a neater edge.

Grease steaming trays with 1 1/2 teaspoons vegetable or cooking oil and steam Soon Kueh for 15-20 minutes. Remove and then brush with oil.

Serve hot with fried shallots oil, sweet soya sauce and chilli .

Notes :
When making the dough/skin, you must use boiling water to mix with "tang mien". this is to ensure "tang mien" is cooked and skin will not crack easily during wrapping.
When wrapping, try to press out all the air so that it is compact.

Chwee Kueh - Steamed Rice Cake With Preserved Radish 水粿

This is my second time postng on Chwee Kueh. The first time was way back in July last year when I first started blogging - when I was struggling with my compact camera and agonising over finding a voice. I don't know if anyone ever read that post but till this day, I have not gotten any comments for it... those were the days.

I decide to revisit this because a 'Chwee Kueh Expert' friend of mine kept asking me if my chai po (preserved radish) has any Heibi Hiam (fried dried shrimps) in it. Unsure if Chwee Kueh is available across the straits in Malaysia but this is a popular breakfast snack in Singapore. Among my friends, there are already a couple of die-hard fans for this and most of them swear by the Chwee Kueh from Tiong Bahru market. That's how this insistence on Heibi Hiam came about - one of them claims that the Tiong Bahru Chwee Kueh has Heibi Hiam in the Chai Po.

Second reason for me to redo this is because I have finally got my DSLR camera. Quite coincidentally, both Ju and myself got the camera at about the same time after playing with a DSLR camera loaned from a friend. After alot of griping about how expensive the DSLR is, we still ended up buying.... almost the same model! But Ju is more fortunate, she got it as a birthday present - I had to dig into my own pocket for it - hence the slightly older model Canon EOS 500D I've had my eyes on this camera for a while, like the way they call it the 'Rebel' in the US. So Trissa, yes, I have finally bought it and like you had adviced earlier, I have no regrets about it - yet. Having a DSLR camera does not automatically guarantee great photos. I still feel that 'the eye' is the most important element in photo taking, the camera is just a medium, a tool to let people see what you see... and there are still many times when I can't see beauty. What the DSLR affords though, is better control over how the photos are captured. I like the fact that I can choose to control what I want to focus on and what I want to de-emphasis. I have been shooting with my new camera for the last three or 4 posts and I must say, the results are starting to become less frustrating compared to the days I was shooting with my compact camera....

Back to Chwee Kueh - for those who have never had this snack before, this is simply a steamed rice cake made from rice flour. The preserved radish is the important accompaniment that gives it flavour and for me, it is the reason to eat Chwee Kueh. For those who have watched the  Chwee Kueh vendor work, you would have noticed how the preserved radish is always kept simmering in a copious pot of oil.  The beauty of preparing such dishes by yourself is that it allows you to make adjustments and for me I had chosen to cut back the amount of oil used to fry the preserved radish and yes, I did add dried shrimp to it this time and in addition to that, I also added toasted sesame seed for extra flavour. I truly feel I have got a winning Chwee Kueh dish this time - the kueh was extremely tender and the Chai Po is bursting with flavours.

The best part of it is, it is actually extremely easy to make. So here's encore to the recipe with a tweak to the Chai Po...



Recipe :

Kueh
Rice Flour 150g
Corn Flour 20g
Water 300ml
Oil 2tsp
Salt 1/2 tsp
Water 800ml

Method :
1. Place rice flour, corn flour in a mixing bowl and add 300ml of room temperature water. Stir well until there are no lumps of flour.
2. In a heavy saucepan, add the 800ml water, oil and salt. Heat the content until it just begin to boil.
3. Pour the flour mixture slowly into the saucepan and stir continuously with a wooden spatula to prevent lumping. The mixture will thicken to a gluey consistency. Turn off the heat and continue to stir.
4. Spoon the gluey paste into individual Chwee Kueh molds (available from Phoon Huat). Steam over boiling water for 15mins.

Chai Po (Dried Radish)
Oil 200g
Garlic(chopped) 50g
Chai Po 300g
Dried Shrimps 30g (pounded or flossed in food processer)
Sugar 3tbsp
Salt 1tsp
Dark Soya Sauce 1tsp
Toasted white sesame  1 tbsp (grounded coarsely)

Method :
1. Heat oil in a heavy sauce pan. Fry Chai Po, dried shrimp and minced garlic until fragrant. Add sugar, salt and dark soya sauce for seasoning.
2. Add toasted white sesame.

Seafood Congee

With the festive period of Christmas and Chinese New Year behind us, business gets serious. No more excuses of slow activities due to the holidays. First quarter budget has to be reviewed, new projects need to be commercialised. Hence, the relentless pursuit of sales can only become more grueling... which means blogging will have to be relegated a lesser priority. I had wishfully planned to keep up with regular postings, having pictures all taken before I hit the road last weekend - thinking that I can write while I am on the flight or when I snuggle up in bed after work. However, I didn't count on being totally blocked out of Blogger,Facebook, Flickr etc.. in China. I knew that they do that and I admit it was an oversight on my part. So now you know why we never get to see blog visitors from China....

This was my last meal at home last weekend. I had seen some clams on sale at the market and had remembered the sweetness clams had imparted to miso soup and the spicy korean tofu soup - hence was inspired to use them for congee - the ultimate comfort food, in my opinion.

However, I have to admit that I probably had bought the wrong clam species to begin with. The variety that is usually used for soup are the smaller species - what the Japanese refer to as Asari.  These bigger ones, I realise would be more suited for frying with garlic and chilli. The congee turned out most satisfying anyway, thanks to the sweetness from the tiny prawns and the smooth mushy texture of the porridge which I had cooked with a combination of glutinous rice and Thai fragrant rice. Pairing this with preserved/pickled Olive Vegetables (榄菜) , black salty fibrous leaves in glass bottles, I succumbed to multiple refills....  ok, got to go. Midsomer Murders is showing on TV and a murder is just about to take place....


Recipe :

300g             Clams (soaked in salt water for 30mins)
300g             Prawns
100g             Thai fragrant rice
50g               Glutinous rice
2.5 liters        Water / chicken stock (I use water here)

Method :

1. Wash rice with water until water runs clear.
2. Bring water / stock and washed rice to vigoros boil. Allow to boil until rice splits
3. Add clams and continue to boil over medium heat until porridge is cooked and attain a gluey texture. Add more hot water if the mixture becomes too thick.
4. Add prawns and boil over low heat for a few minutes until prawns are cooked. Season with salt to taste.
5. Serve garnished with spring onions and preserved Olive vegetables. (I under season the congee with salt as the Olive vegetables will be salty)

Char Kuay Teow - Fried Rice Noodle With Cockles

Blogging motivates one to contemplate strange things. I can honestly say that if not for blogging, I would probably never ever think of making Char Kuay Teow by myself. For readers who are not living in Singapore or Malaysia, Char Kuay Teow is one of those iconic local street dish that practically everyone who has been away from home craves for. Possibly one of the most oily, unhealthy local street dishes which we can find in this part of the world, it is also one of those dishes that would set our saliva ducts active at its mere thought. Here in Singapore, we are always sussing out every possible Char Kuay Teow stores we can find and rank them according to taste and preference. Crazy is the one who contemplates to make it at home.. and here I am succumbing to the madness. Yes, blogging very often evokes madness in the blogger - I guess it stems from the urge to share something different,something suprising and when you see fellow bloggers such as Pig Pigs Corner who has recently made her own Bak Kwa(!!) (barbequed pork) , the feverish excitement rubs off on you... so really, frying your own Char Kuay Teow is really mild in comparison

The idea to fry Char Kuay Teow occurred to me when I saw cockles at the market this morning. It is not everyday that these are available. Cockles is easily the soul of Char Kuay Teow. To me,without this integral ingredient, Char Kuay Teow is just not the same. I bought a dollar worth of cockles and used a quarter of it for my Char Kuay Teow.


So how did my Char Kuay Teow turn out? Not impressive, I would say  - it was not oily enough and lacks the fragrance of lard, but I got my kick out of it and I think considering it is home made, it will still be able to elicit some appreciative gushing from supportive friends  

Recipe :

Water                      6 tbsp
salt                          1tsp
Lard/ Oil                 8 tbsp (I used less)
Garlic                      2 tsp minced
Bean Sprouts          310g
Flat Rice Noodle     310g
Dark Soya Sauce    2 tbsp
Egg                         4 beaten
Chilli Paste              1 tsp (I used sambal belachan)
Chinese Sausage      2, sliced and pan fried
Fish Cake                50g sliced.
Cockles                   115g
Prawns                     100g
Dark Sweet Sauce   1-2 tbsp

Method :

1. Mix water and salt together and set aside.
2. Heat wok still smoking hot. Add 4 tbsp of oil and add minced garlic. Fry quickly to light brown and add bean sprouts, Rice Noodle (Kuay Teow) and (1) and Soya Sauce. Fry quickly over high heat for 1 min.
3. Push Kuay Teow to one side of the wok, add the remaining 4 tbsp of oil, add the beaten egg and fry quickly. Fry Kuay Teow with egg.
4. Add chilli sauce to taste.
5. Add Chinese sausage, fish cake, prawns and fry for another 1 min.
6. Spread out Kuay Teow in wok and add cockles*, cover the cockles with the noodles. Add dark sweet sauce and fry for 1/2 min after homogenous. Dish out and serve.

* I soaked the cockles in salted water for 30mins. The salted water is drained off and boiling hot water is added to the cockles. Drain off hot water immediately. The cockles can now be pried open easily. Deshell and use the clam morsel for frying.

Good Luck , Good Wealth With Huat Kuey - Steamed Rice Cake

Happy Chinese New Year and may the year of Tiger bring lots of good wealth, good health, good food to one and all!

A quick one before I scuttle off for New Year Lunch. I choose to make a traditional steamed rice cake today. Known as Huat Kueh (发糕), these dense little cake are more symbolic than tasty. The Chinese pronounciation of the name of this cake is akin  to the meaning of to rise higher and prosper. Hence, it is a firm favourite during celebratory religious rituals. I do remember hearing stories from my aunties and older relatives relating the superstition connected to the making of this cake. Kids were always told to shut up when the cake is being steamed, for fear that if something offensive is said, the kitchen god/ cake fairy may become angry and the cake will not rise. A flopped Huat Kuey, to the superstitious, signifies a full year of bad luck.

Hence it was with a little trepidation that I made this today. Of course, I kept mum throughout the whole process and restrained from giving in to my impatience of lifting the lid to peek at the cake . I was really really pleased with the results. Perhaps this success would signify good luck for me in the year of the Tiger?... I am keeping my fingers crossed. :)

Recipe :

180g           Sugar
180ml         water
200g           cake flour
50g             rice flour
2 tsp           baking powder
food colouring

Method :

1. Boil sugar in water until dissolved. Set aside to cool.
2. Sift cake flour, rice flour and baking powder together. Combine with sugar syrup. Mix well to combine.
3. Add colouring.
4. Portion into paper cups. Steam over high heat for 20mins.

Sakura Ebi Fried Rice

The easiest way that we commonly use to polish off left over white rice is to turn them into fried rice. Simple as it may sound, it is not easy to churn out a good dish of fried rice. I have heard more than once that one of the ways to gauge the standard of a Chinese Restuarant is to check out their fried rice. A colleague of mine (he doesn't cook) used to test our culilnary knowledge by asking us if we knew the procedure to fry rice. He used to tell us with an obvious smugness that one should fry the egg separately before frying the rice because the egg would get cooked too much if we were to fry them together. I didn't believe him and just rolled my eyes...

I have concluded, after reading many recipes, watching numerous cooking programs and eating even more numerous plates of fried rice, that a good plate of fried rice for me,should encompass the following characteristics :

1. Rice should be loose and  well separated - grain by grain. It should not be clumped together.
2. I like my fried rice to be evenly coated with the egg. What the Chinese like to call 'wrapping silver with gold' - the gold being the eggs and the silver refers to the white rice grains.
3. That elusive 'Wok Hei' - the fragrance of the Wok - really separates the good from the celestial.

I decided to pack fried rice for lunch today. The ingredients I have in the fridge include bacon bits (left over from Christmas) and I have stashed away, 2 packets of Japanese Sakura Ebi (Dried Sakura shrimps). 

I had first tasted Sakura Shrimps a few years back when it was in season in Taiwan. The Japanese restaurant was serving fried rice in a heated stone bowl. The Sakura Ebi, something of a delicacy was mixed at the table and stirred quickly in the stone bowl. It was simple but amazingly delicious.

For those who are new to the Sakura Ebi, these are very small shrimps that are caught twice a year in Shizuoka Prefecture in Japan. However, these are also now bred in Taiwan. These little crustaceans are really crunchy and fragrant, perfect as a garnish, in flour battered fritters and as the Japanese vendor told me, best in チャハン (chahan : Fried Rice).

Here's my version of Sakura Ebi Fried Rice.

Recipe :

1 bowl          White Rice (Thai Jasmine Rice)
2 stocks        Green Spring Onions diced.
2 Tbsp          Bacon bits
1/2 bowl       Dried Sakura Ebi
2                  Eggs, beaten
2 cloves       Garlic, smashed with the back of a knife
generous dash  pepper
Salt to taste
1/2 tsp         Light soya sauce

Method:

1. Heat the wok to very hot. Add 2 tsp of oil. Stir fry spring onions and Sakura Ebi quickly and dish out.
2. In the same wok, add 1tbsp of oil, heat to smoking hot. Add smashed garlic and fry quickly to bring out garlic fragrance. Remove garlic cloves from wok. Add bacon bits and stir fry quickly to prevent burning.

3. Add beaten egg and rice. Stir fry rice quickly to coat rice grain with egg. You should fry with a very hot wok, so that the cooking time is kept very short. Add light soya sauce and a very generous dash of pepper. Add salt to taste. Add in (1) and fry quickly. Turn off fire.

Fried Hor Fun - Fried Flat Rice Noodle

I wish I am starting the New Year with a more celebratory post. Instead, this turns out to be quite..as L said, plain. While I usually post about my baking, I would really like to try my hand at posting about my cooking and am also curious to understand how it feels like to post every day like some admirable fellow bloggers. Will it give me a high or will I get sick and tired of blogging?

Fried Hor Fun (Hor Fun is actually broad flat rice noodle) is one of the most common fast food we get in Malaysia or Singapore at the good old Tze Char stores ( Translated literally to mean Cook and Fry) that are omni present in every neighbourhood coffee shop. Most of us would have been familiar with packing these home in the Tze Char square boxes and while waiting, would have stood at the store, watched the cook fire up the wok and stir fry deftly with their scoop ladle, making alot of noise as the ladle knocked against the wok.

I know it would be difficult to replicate the taste of the Tze Char store because our domestic stoves will never be strong enough to generate the level of heat to yield that special nuance of 'Wok Hei' ( literally means the smell of the wok - but it really means taking the cooking to the brim of burning but not quite - the taste of fire!)

A simple dish but daunting at the same time- depending on how fussy the taste buds are.

The challenge, I now realise, of photographing a hot dish like this is the need to work very quickly. I was in a frenzy to take the photos quickly so that I could eat my lunch while it was still hot. In all the frenzy, I failed to pay attention to the way the garnishes were arranged on the noodle. It was only when I started to download the photos for editing that I realised my pictures looked like a plate of pig fodder. (for those of you who are old enough to remember, the word, Poon So Tang came into my mind)  I had to get L to look at the photos. When he feedback that they did not look like pig fodder, I felt a little more comfortable about using them as fodder for my blog... :)

Recipe :
300g         Hor Fun (broad flat rice noodle)
1tbsp        Light Soya Sauce
1tbsp        Dark Soya Sauce
1tbsp        Oil

200g         Prawns
100g         Pork, sliced thinly
50g           Fish Cake
3 stocks    Mustard Green or Chy Sim

3 cloves    Garlic
1 cup        Chicken Stock
1 cup        Water
2 tbsp       Oyster sauce
1 tbsp       Soya sauce
Pinch        Sugar
To Taste   Salt & Pepper

Method :
1. Heat up Oil in a hot wok, Stir fry Hor Fun quickly and add the dark and light soya sauce. Continue to stir fry for about 5 minutes until the rice noodle gives out a burnt rice fragrance.

2. Remove noodle from wok.
3. Add one tbsp oil into wok and fry minced garlilc. When garlic turns fragrant, add prawns, pork and fish cake and stir fry quickly. Add chicken stock and water. When the stock starts to boil, add in rest of seasoning and the greens.

4. When greens start to wilt, thicken the gravy with corn starch. Dish out gravy onto fried Hor Fun and serve immediately.

Ondeh Ondeh Kosong - Sweet Potato Balls

A few weeks ago, when my colleague from the US was here for a customer call, I had taken him to True Blue Cuisine, a Nonya (Straits Chinese) restaurant. The ambience was breathtaking and showcased the vibrancy of the Peranankan Culture in a most splendid way. I have taken bold liberty to paste 2 photos from their website to make up for the inadequacy of my description of the restaurant.



We ordered the signature Nonya dishes (Ayam Buah Keluak, Nonya Chap Chye, Beef Rendang, Ngoh Hiang) - they did not disappoint but to be honest, I had tasted better Nonya Cuisine along Katong Upper East Coast Road. There was one dish, however, that left an impression and that was the Kosong Ondeh Ondeh. This was Ondeh Ondeh (boiled sweet potato ball rolled in grated coconut) without the Gula Melaka (palm sugar) filling. I was struck by the softness and the simple taste and have kept dreaming about going back just for the Ondeh Ondeh.
Coincidentally, earlier this week, when I was shopping at a Japanese Supermarket in town, they were promoting their air flown sweet potato from Japan. Unwittingly, I picked 2 tubers after tasting the samples offered to me by the sales promoter. I so regreted it as they were quite expensive. I ended up feeling rather stupid to have paid that kind of money for 2 pieces of  'poor man's food' . (And no, I am not disclosing how much I paid for them, too embarrassing)

To put them to some good use, I decided to try my hand at replicating what I ate at True Blue Cuisine. I googled for a recipe and found the post by Baking Mum with the most fitting description to what I am trying to achieve.

I used 1/2 of a tuber for this initial experiment. I must say that the sweet potato tasted really good on its own after steaming. Encouraged, I went ahead to work with Baking Mum's recipe. The end result was not as soft as I had wanted - possibly for 2 reasons :
1. Mine did not have any filling. I believe the juiciness of the Gula Melaka filling would have yielded a softer texture.
2. I probably did not master the right amount of water to be added to the dough.

As a result of which, I felt my Ondeh Ondeh was a little on the chewy side. To repeat this again, I would :

1. Reduce the ratio of Tapioca flour to Sweet Potato ( probably just 10% of Tapioca flour to bind)
2. Add more water to get a softer dough.

Anybody else out there who has better experience with this, please do advice. I would greatly appreciate it for I still have one-and-a-half sweet potato to play with....;-)