Home Made Mee Hoon Kueh

Our first attempt at making Mee Hoon Kueh came out pretty decent, although we still have not perfected the stock... perhaps it is the type of ikan bilis (anchovies) we use, or maybe we just don't use enough of them that the stock doesn't seem rich enough; or maybe we should add in the mushroom stocks which I have been saving for the longest time for our next attempt. Not rich enough but still delicious.

I'm not sure about the entire recipe of the soup, but I will let Satellite handle that. Here's the recipe for making the dough, this dough will get chewier depending on how long you knead it.

250 g plain flour
1 egg
100 ml water
pinch of salt
1 tbsp cooking oil

Make the dough by placing all the ingredients together and knead for about 30 minutes. Create a ball with the dough and place it in a bowl, cover with a wet cloth and let it rest for 1 hour. There after you are ready to peel the little pieces off and throw it in the pot of broth whilst cooking your other ingredients.

After making this, I realized that down South, they have something similar to this but in cream soup. It's called chicken dumplings. Check out some Southern Chicken Dumpling recipes courtesy of About.com

Vietnamese Food

During my time at RIT, I grew to love eating Vietnamese food, especially in the winter time. Having a hot bowl of pho was what we were always looking for when the wind chill was ridiculous. For a person that usually waits for her food to get lukewarm, I used to wallop my pho within minutes of it reaching the table. Oh how I miss those days.

I was at Takashimaya with a colleague looking for things to buy for the destitute that we would visit that week in a home for our corporate responsibility program and we ran out of time to actually catch a good meal, since we started at the Daiso in ION. Further adding to that, having a meal at the ION foodcourt isn't the cheapest thing in the world; we also couldn't find what we were looking for at that Daiso (still prefer the IMM and Plaza Singapura Daiso as they have more variety) so with a hop and a skip we went over to Art Friend in Taka. Having not taken breakfast, after we finished up at Art Friend, I pestered my colleague to grab some food with me at the new food court (maybe not so new... I think about 1/2 year old).


The place is no longer as cluttered as before, but just as difficult to grab a seat. I saw Pho Hoa and I had been craving Vietnamese food for months ... so I went ahead and got me a bowl of Phở Chín, Nạm, Gầu, Gân, Vè Dòn and Chả Giò. The pho came in a big bowl and was nice, although I've had nicer around town, but I can't complain. The accompanying garnishing was on the stingy side. The disappointment that I had was that they did not give the sweet sauce or the proper chilli sauce to go with the Pho, nor was there a selection of it at the stall itself; so I helped myself to some chilli padi. The Chả Giò wasn't as nice as I expected it to be... a bit on the soft side.

For a nice Chả Giò recipe see Rasa Malaysia's Vietnamese Spring Roll recipe. You can also check out this Vietnamese Beef noodle soup recipe.

Chả Giò - A kind of spring roll (sometimes referred to as egg roll) – deep fried flour rolls filled with pork, yam, crab, shrimp, rice vermicelli, mushrooms ("wood ear" variety) and other ingredients. The spring roll goes by many names - as many people actually use (falsely) the word "spring roll" while referring to the fresh transparent rice paper rolls (discussed below as "Summer Rolls"), where the rice paper is dipped into water to soften and then rolled up with various ingredients. Traditionally these rolls are made with a rice paper wrapper but in recent years Vietnamese chefs outside of Vietnam have changed the recipe to use a wheat-flour-based wrapper.

Phở Chín, Nạm, Gầu, Gân, Vè Dòn - Noodle soup with brisket, flank, tendon, fatty, and crunchy flank.

Ah, I just remembered before my experience at Pho Hoa, I did have vietnamese pho in a bowl. I don't exactly remember where I found this instant noodle, but it was a pretty good quick fix. Some may find this a bit on the salty side, but it warmed my tummy up on a cold rainy day in the office!

Economy Rice @ Home

Recently I've been having fun cooking dishes and making it into an economy rice plate.

Just last night I cooked steamed chicken and steamed eggs (of which blur and hungry me forgot to put in some corn flour to make the egg a bit stiff). This meal takes only 45 minutes to make inclusive of cooking the rice. Check out how pathetic the plate looks, I should have placed the other 2 pieces of chicken on the plate!

Dinner in 45 Minutes!

First you: make rice and then start boiling water for whatever you are using to steam your food.

Take a 2 - 4 pieces of chicken, marinate for 10 minutes in 1/2 tbsp brandy, 1 tbsp each of light and dark soya sauce, a drop of seasme oil (optional). During this 10 minutes cut your ginger and spring onions into strips, after you finish cutting the ginger and spring onions (oh, and it's up to you how much you want to put into it). Steaming time is about 15 - 20 minutes.

When you see the water is boiled in your steaming mechanism, place your plate of chicken in the steamer.

For the egg, it's pretty simple, beat 2 eggs into chicken stock add some white pepper and then a tea spoon of corn flour. Put into a container and steam ... Some people like to add spring onions after the egg is steamed ... steaming time is about 8 minutes. You can also add century egg and salted egg to this dish as well.

There was another time I also made steamed herbal prawns, pork with ekoni mushrooms, lap cheong, stewed oyster sauce chicken with chinese mushroom, lap cheong and dao miu. Check out the pics! Oh, I had 2 other people eating with me that's why there was so much more food ... and I had eventually thought that I would dabao to Satellite's work place so she can be fed some real "healthy" home cooked food.

Bon Bon Chicken

spicy bon bon chicken

this is a great way to make use of chicken left over from making soup. simply shred them and add sliced cucumbers and jellyfish. then chill. pour over sauce before serving.

sauce for bon bon chicken

• sesame paste of smooth peanut butter
• rice vinegar
• sugar
• worcestershire sauce
• light soya sauce
• chilli sauce
• chilli oil
• ground sechuan peppercorn
• sesame oil
• sesame seeds
• chopped spring onion and cilantro

mix everything together in a bowl.

carbonara n roasted veg

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  Mmmm yummy Jian and Satellite made some roasted veg and cabonara the other night ... somewhere last week I think! But there was a twist to it ... so I guess someone else can write up the recipe for the Carbonara.
  
  Here's some beautiful pics for ya.
  
  Here's Lynx beautiful platter of food that she made somewhere last week as well! Yes it was another party we had.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Jian's Spaghetti Carbonara Recipe
  
  Carbonara for 5:
• Boiled Spaghetti (I used macaroni cuz we didn't have spaghetti)
• Chopped Garlic
• 4 Whole Eggs Beaten
• 15 rashers of Bacon (I used a mixture of Proscuitto and smokey bacon)
• Half Glass White Wine
• 3 Tablespoons of Cream (Traditional carbonara does not use cream though)
• 3 Tablespoons of Olive Oil
• Grated Parmesan
• Freshly Ground Black Pepper
• Salt
• Chopped Parsley (Optional)

In a pot, heat olive oil and fry garlic and bacon together until garlic browns and bacon fat has been released. Deglaze the pot with white wine to liberate the flavours stuck at the bottom of the pot. Add cream, black pepper and some pasta water until sauce is reduced.

Add chopped parsley (for colour), grated parmasan and pasta into pot. Toss until pasta is hot, add beaten eggs and turn off heat immediately. Mix well, the beaten egg will cook in the remaining heat. Add salt to taste.

Plate and serve warm topped with more parmesan.

Penne With Tuna In Creamy Black Pepper Sauce

i made this for dinner last nite. it's really easy and convenient. even though i used tuna out of a can and ready-to-use black pepper sauce that comes in a jar or bottle, it still taste delicious. below is the recipe. i'm not very sure about the exact quantity or amount of the ingredients i used becos basically i juz used my instinct and common sense. you go figure.


penne with tuna in creamy black pepper sauce (2-3 servings)

ingredients-

cooked penne
2 chopped small red onions
2 cloves minced garlic (more if you like)
1 knob of butter
abit of olive oil
1 can of tuna
a few lugs or tablepoonfuls of black pepper sauce (i recommend singlong brand, but lee kum kee is fine too)
one big spoonful of tomato paste
1 cup of water (or to your own estimation depending how thick or smooth u want the sauce to be.)
whipping cream or cream
diced tomatoes to garnish (optional)

saute onions and garlic in olive oil and butter till fragrant. add black pepper sauce and tomato paste. stir till blended. add water slowly and stir till you get a thinner consistency. add canned tuna. then blend in the cream. test taste and adjust accordingly. pour sauce over cooked penne and garnish with diced tomatoes and serve. bellisimo!