Xiao Loong Bao (Shanghai Soup Dumplings)

These little juicy pieces of dumplings can scorch your tongue if you are not careful. But the pain is all worth it because it is not everyday you get to eat yummy rich broth trickling down a carefully crimped dumpling with a very tasty morsel of filling. Xiao Loong Bao, Siu Loong Pao, or known as Shanghai Soup dumpling is a culinary experience that has created a gastronomical frenzy amongst the Chinese outside, well, China. And crazy me, being Chinese and a passionate foodie, I_had_to_try_to_make_my_own.

**heads up: this recipe requires at least 1 day of preparation ahead of time - mostly because I made my own aspic.

I had my little soup dumpling back in Malaysia for the first time with my parents at Dragon-I restaurant in Cititel Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. I was intrigued by the concept of having a dumpling filled with a rich Shandong broth, that can easily cause 2nd degree burns to your tongue and squirt on your favorite blouse. But the trick is to eat it slowly and not popping it directly into your mouth; i.e. first by breaking the dumpling skin and sipping the broth before eating it with ginger and vinegar dipping sauce.

If you love wanton dumplings or gyozas, you are going to love this even more because the filling is essentially the same but steamed with a piece of aspic, slowly melting into a nice pool of broth contained in a crimpled dumpling skin. And here is my attempt at making xiao loong bao because I just had to - the verdict was a good bursting dumpling that is flavorful :)

For the skin:
1 cup all purpose flour (but if you have high gluten flour, please use that)
a pinch of salt
1/2 cup water, more for dusting


Method:
Combine all the ingredients together and knead until the surface of the dough becomes really smooth. This will take about 10 minutes of kneading. Let the dough rest for at least 20 minutes before using.
*I would suggest using a high gluten flour because it holds better than the normal all purpose flour but it was all that I had and it worked just as well.

Filling:
350grams pork loin, minced
2 tbsp of ginger, grated, with juice
2 tbsp of soy sauce
1 tsp of sesame oil
2 tsp sugar
6 tbsp of water
1 stalk of green onions (or scallions, or spring onions depending on which country you're from)
a pinch of pepper
1/2 tsp of salt
1/3 cup of aspic (recipe below)

Method:

Combine all the ingredient in a bowl and mix well.

Not the prettiest sight when combined but, you don't have to see it after it gets wrapped up :)

Aspic (prepare ahead of time):
I used low salt chicken broth for this because I did not have the time to boil 1kg of pork bones and cured Jin Hua ham to make the broth. But if you have the time to boil pork bones for 3hours or more, do it because you will be well rewarded. You won't need to use any congealing agent if you do this because the pork bones and cartilege creates its own gelatin when you cool it in the fridge overnight.

1 cup low salt chicken broth
2 teaspoon of agar powder/gelatinMethod:
Bring chicken broth to a boil and add agar/gelatin powder. Stir until the powder is dissolved and let it set firm in the fridge. Once set, chop the aspic up and set aside to combine with the filling.


Assembly:
Get your steamer ready and line it with some chinese cabbage leaves.

Roll the dough out into a snake, approximately 1 inch thick and cut it into sections, about 1 inch in length.
Take a piece of the dough, roll it into a ball and flatten with a roller until it is about 2.5 inches in diameter.
Take a teaspoon full of the filling and fill it into the dumpling skin you've just created and crimp the skin upwards to create a little ball. Traditionally, in Shanghai, xiao loong baos have to be crimped 18 times to create 18 pleats because it is suppose to resemble a chrysanthemum flower. At this point, with my extremely undextered fingers, I could only do 8 or 9 pleats. My aim was to get the dumpling to close properly so the precious broth do not run out during the steaming process. Take a look at this video here on how to pleat xiao loong bao properly.
Repeat steps until all dough is used up.

Steam your dumplings on a steamer for 15 minutes and when it is ready, don't pop it into your mouth too soon because it will hurt.

As you can see, I prefer eating the skin first and then leave the best bit for last!

Do it like a pro by first nibbling a hole on the dumpling to release all it's juicy goodness and sip it. Then eat up the rest as civilly as you possibly can with a nice dipping of fresh ginger and vinegar sauce. :)

Eating Xiao Loong Bao is not exactly about finesse, all that slurping and chewing on the dumpling skin with potential spillage is accounted for from experience and skill. It is a lot of work making approximately 20 dumplings, but was it worth it? Definitely.

I reckon it would taste even better if I made proper aspic with that Shandong broth by boiling pork bones and cured ham myself but the chicken broth did give the dumplings a certain lightness where you feel like you could eat 10 dumplings and not feel overwhelmed. I am especially proud that the skin held itself very well during the steaming process and only one dumpling lost its juices to a chopstick casualty!

You're my cuppy cake!

You're my Honeybunch, Sugarplum

Pumpy-umpy-umpkin, You're my Sweetie Pie
You're my Cuppycake, Gumdrop
Snoogums-Boogums, You're
the Apple of my Eye

I've recently discovered the cupcakes have supernatural powers. They have the power to bring cheer in just about any situation - think dull and rainy days. There's something just so cheerful about them, so therapeutic you just want to bake them all day and give 'em way to the homeless people on the streets. I didn't manage to give any because P ate them all in 3 days.

And as I was making them, I thought of my friend back in Malaysia who made excellent cupcakes that she sold in the Sunday flea market to a loyal following :)

So, I was hooked on these cuppy cakes that I made two batches - a Chocolate Ganache Vanilla Cupcake and a Lemon Spread Cherry Marble Cupcake.

They are all long names because I keep complicating my recipes - I can't help it, vanilla cakes are great but they're boring. Since I do not really have the time to post two recipes, I will post what really matters in this case. And they are the chocolate ganache topping and the Cherry Marble Cupcake - reason being the cherry marble cupcakes are to die for. I love, love, love the surprise in the center, which is a whole pitted cherry sweet and just bursting with juice. These cupcakes were the apple of my eye for the whole time they were around. :P

For the Chocolate Ganache:
250grams of semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 tablespoon butter
3/4 cup cream

Method:
1. Heat cream and butter until the butter dissolves and the mixture starts to boil. Turn off heat immediately and pour the cream into large bowl filled with chocolate chips.
2. Mix until you get a smooth chocolate ganache.
3. Let it cool down until it becomes spreadable.


Cherry Marble Cake:
1.5 cup all purpose flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1/4 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup of milk
1/4 cups of chocolate ganache (take from the recipe above)
1 teaspoon of real vanilla essence (or use one whole pod of vanilla, if you're feeling decadent - to which I did)
18-24 canned cherries (depending on if you're doing "quality control" on the cherries...ahem, you might need more cherries.)

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Combine all the dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl.
3. In a different mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add in eggs, one at a time.
4. Add your vanilla, and combine well.
5. Now, alternately, add 1/3 of your flour and some milk into the butter/eggs mixture until all flour and milk is used up.
6. Halve the batter into another bowl, add the chocolate ganache and stir it in until well combine - do not over mix, just count to 10 folds with your spatula. Or maybe 13 folds at most. Now you have two sets of batter, a chocolate and a plain vanilla.
7. Line your muffin/cupcake tray with cupcake liners and put in 1 tablespoon of batter from each batter and push a cherry into the center.
8 Repeat step 7 until all batter is used up. Bake for 20-25 minutes.

Once your cupcakes are cool, spread your favorite topping or use the Chocolate Ganache topping - it would work extremely well. I sprinkled a little rainbow rounds on top of each cupcakes to give it an extra sunshine ;)

My Summer Spring Rolls

Sometimes its better to make your own *nods*

Every Chinese restaurant in Canada serves up Spring Rolls as an "integral" part of their menu. Oh and not to mention, fortune cookies too. Pfftt...seriously, all this are just MIA (i.e. Made In America) additions. However, I am not saying that spring rolls are not part of Chinese food...it belongs to the Dim Sum part mostly and is not usually eaten as part of our main meal. Usually.

However things are different here of course. Over here where I am, they serve spring rolls with your soupy noodles, fried rice, white rice, fried noodles, wanton soup, general tsao chicken (I dunno who general tsao is but the name for this chicken dish seems to change everytime you go to a different asian restaurant, like a thai restaurant would call it General Thai and a Vietnamese restaurant would call it General Nguyen and what not...:P ), everything! I can understand if spring rolls was served as part of a banquet. A dish called Four Seasons have got 4 different types of snack food served up as an opening to the other main courses, it's sort of like an amuse bouche. And spring rolls are one of the four items served usually. But to eat spring rolls with rice and noodles and soup is just...bleh.. I don't know. Spring rolls are like the link to Chinese food. Just say "Spring Rolls" automatically, a westerner would know you're talking about Chinese food.

Anyway, this being said, if the spring rolls served were any good to begin with, I might not be ranting this much really. Most of the spring rolls I've had are not nearly mediocre. They have thick skin and too little filling. Some are tasteless, some tastes like salt. Some just tastes like .... crap. :(

Because of the lack of good spring rolls around, I've decided to make my own. Spring rolls are usually meatless anyway so I've decided to add my favorite veggies! I used leftover dumpling skin because I really couldn't be arsed to make my own skin from scratch :P Anyhow, the filling's the one that makes everything good :)

Here's how it goes...

My Summer Spring Rolls:

Ingredients for Filling:
1/2 medium sized Jicama bean or Yam Bean, shredded
1 medium sized carrot, shredded
1 small bamboo shoot, julienned (use canned ones so you don't have to deal with the smell)
1/2 cup of garlic chives or Ku Chai, chopped
2 stalks of spring onions, chopped
1 tablespoon chinese wine
1 teaspoon sesame oil
2 tablespoon soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon teaspoon salt
pepper to taste
1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon vegetarian oyster sauce
1 tablespoon corn flour
2 tablespoon oil
2 cloves of minced garlic

Method:
1. Heat pan with oil under medium heat and saute garlic until it turns opaque.
2. Add your vegetables in, first with the shredded jicama, carrots, bamboo shoots and then garlic chives. Saute each addition for 1 minute before adding the next ingredient.
3. After that, it's time to add your seasoning; add chinese wine, sesame oil, salt, pepper, sugar, vegetarian oyster sauce, corn floud in. Saute until the vegetables are well cooked and mixed thoroughly (about 5-8minutes)
4. Add your chopping spring onions at the end and turn off the heat. Mix well and scoop the filling out into a bowl to let it cool.

After your filling's cooled off, you can roll it up using left over dumpling skin into little rolls :) Deep fry it until golden brown and sprinkle some salt over the crispy spring roll skin. This treat is awfully good with parties or as a snack.

Serve it with your favorite sauce. I ate mine with plum sauce :)

Eating Tomatoes

Tomatoes are best enjoyed eaten raw, in my humble opinion. I loove fresh tomatoes eaten with a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper. Look at how simple and delicious it is to the eye. Believe me if i say they taste as good as it looks.

I used:
1 ripe red brandywine tomato
1 russian persimmon tomato
1 tablespoon olive oi
salt and cracked black pepper to taste

Chocolate Chip and Peanut Butter Cookies

I'm on a baking streak again. This was spurred by the fact that chocolate chip cookies are so darn expensive in stores. I know how some people would rather buy than go through the trouble of baking the cookies themselves but I love the trouble of baking my own because 1) I love making food 2) I get to control what's in the cookies 3) I get to pick the bits off the cookie dough :P

Sinful but good to pick on

This chocolate chip cookie with peanuts recipe is an adaptation of the chocolate anise biscotti. I did some changes to it by adding roasted peanuts, brown sugar, increasing the amount of flour and taking a portion of the baking powder away. The result is a very nice textured cookie that's a little chewy and crunchy where it matters. It's crunchy around the sides and bits that juts out here and there while retaining layer of chewiness in the center. It's absolutely lovely with milk.

Here's the recipe for my Chocolate Chip and Peanut Butter Cookie:
1 cup butter
2 large eggs
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar (pressed down the sugar until you get 3/4 cup)
2 teaspoon vanilla essence
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chip (approx. 270grams)
3/4 cup roasted peanuts, skinless (use macadamia or walnuts or pecans if you want)


Method:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

1. Cream butter with a whisk (to build baking muscles in your arms) or with an electric beater until its color becomes a pale yellow. After that, add both brown sugar and white sugar, beat for another 2 more minutes until the mixture is fluffy.

2. Change to a spatula, add one egg at a time, mix well each time. Then, pour in your vanilla essence and mix well again.


If you can, please use REAL vanilla extract. Of course, you can always use the cheaper kind but i like real vanilla extract because it gives a certain depth to your baking goods. They are more expensive but it's well worth it. I would go to the extend of making my own vanilla extract with vodka and vanilla beans but I'll leave that for another day.

3. Mix your flour, baking powder and salt throughly first so that it is evenly distributed. Then, add half of it into the mixture earlier, mix and then add your chocolate chips and nuts in and mix again.

4. Once mixed well, add remaining flour in and mix again until your cookie dough is done. Please refrain from picking on the bits...i'm just covering my behind in case you get salmonella poisoning but I am not really concern about that. Salmonella usually stays on the shell of the egg ...it's only if you're really unlucky that you get an infected egg. I'll take my chances really, cookie doughs are soooo yummy! This one is out of this world.

5. If your cookie dough is too sticky, pop it in the fridge for about 30 minutes. Then, scoop up a ball about the size of a golf ball and plonk it on the baking tray.

they're about the size of golf balls

Make sure you have about 1.5 inch space in between each dough ball. Bake for 15 minutes and then let them cool on a tray before you store them in an air tight container.

Fresh out of the oven

Now, this will be a treat for all the cookie monsters out there! :)

Har Gow or Shrimp Dumpling

My oblongish Har Gows

What happens when you put me infront of a tv programme about dim sum? Cooking happens, that's what. I made Har Gow or shrimp dumplings tonight for dinner. It was well worth the effort...ahh..

Har gow has to be my favorite dimsum of all time. The translucent skin and the sweetness of the shrimps that bursts in your mouth is just indescribable. It's SO delicious. So I thought to myself that I MUST make some so that I could satisfy the cravings. Of course, i could technically go and buy myself some har gow for $3.50 per set of 3 large dumplings but what's the fun in that? Food tastes better when you put some heart and soul into it, just like how your mother's fried rice, bak kut teh, pan noodles tastes so much better that any others.

Anyway, I got the recipe from my 4th granduncle who died 7-8 years ago at the age of 90. He was a chef from China before he fled to Malaya. His Siu Mai and Har Gow recipes are definitely out of this world. We will focus on har gow for now :D The key to making the perfect har gow lies in the correlation of its skin and filling. The skin must not be too thick, other wise the filling will be overcooked before the skin turns translucent. The filling must be in the right amount so that it cooks properly. It's details like these that makes a whole of a difference because "dim sum" simply means "touch heart" in direct translation from Chinese anyway. So you got to put some heart into the details to make it good to eat. :)

In all it's glistening glory

Recipe for Har Gow/ Shrimp Dumpling:

Skin:
3/4 cup wheat starch
1/4 cup tapioca starch
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1/2 cup (approx.) boiling hot water

Method:
Combine starches and salt together in one bowl, stir to mix well. Add hot water in and with a wooden spoon, stir until it reaches a doughy texture. Pour the contents out from the bowl into a working surface and work the dough..if it's too floury, add more water by the tablespoons until you get a workable dough. Knead for 2 minutes and no more before letting it sit for 20 minutes on the counter until it is ready to use. Cover with damp cloth.

Har Gow filling:
200 grams shrimp, cleaned and shelled
2 tablespoon of bamboo shoot, minced finely
1 stalk of spring onion, chopped finely
2 slices of ginger, minced finely
1 small garlic, minced finely
1 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon of pepper
3/4 tablespoon of chinese cooking wine
1/4 teaspoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 egg white, slightly beaten

Method:
1. If you're using medium sized shrimps (36/40 shrimps per pound), halve them width wise. If you're using bigger shrimps or prawns, you might want to cut them into chunks. Don't, never ever, pinch on your shrimps. You want them chunky and meaty and bursting when you bite into them.
2. Combine the chopped up shrimps with the rest of the ingredients. Mix well and keep in the fridge for 20 minutes-1 hour, until it is ready to use.

Apart from having a thinner skin in the future, I think it tastes quite good :)

Assembly and cooking:
1. Take your dough and pinch a ball the size of a pingpong ball out. Flatten it using the back of a heavy pot. You want it as flat as possible so that your skin will be thin and wonderfully soft.
2. Add your filling, i suggest using your measuring spoons, use 1 teaspoon at a time.
3. Fold it upwards and primp it like a "pau" OR you can just fold it like how you would fold your potstickers. Here's an example of shape you can try wrapping your har gow into. I folded it like how i would a potsticker so my har gow has an oblong shape..:P
4. Repeat procedure 1,2,3 until you used up all your filling.
5. Steam your har gow for no more than 13 minutes on a bamboo steamer or an electric one. Just make sure you oil the base well so they don't stick. If you are using bigger shrimps, steam for 15 minutes and no more. You want your har gow to remain succulent and juicy.

Eat Eat Eat!

You just keep popping them into your mouth!

P.S. Even though your har gow may look like a play-doh version of a 3 year old's attempt of constructing a triceratop, you'll be pleased to know that the har gows actually come out presentable in the end :) Oh...if only I had the pictures to show you of my har gow's before i brought them to the steamer.... *blush* hehe

Thai Wanton Pockets

Pockets of Yummy-ness

Instead of the usual wanton filling, i felt like something different. I wanted to make a chinese-thai fusion of the usual wonton by using what I have in my pantry. To do that, I added chopped up rehydrated cellophane noodled or glass noodles into my mashed up tofu (non-vegetarians use pork or whatever mince meat you fancy). I also added loads of spring onions and some garlic and ginger. To round up the flavors, I added some soy sauce (about 3 tablespoons), sesame oil (1 teaspoon), 2 thinly sliced kafir lime leaves, some dark brown sugar (1teaspoon) and some black pepper. I also grated 1 small carrot and 4 huge chinese cabbage leaves for crunch and color. To make sure that they mend together well, i added 1 tablespoon full of corn flour.


In the end, I used egg-less wonton wrappers to wrap my vegetarian fillings up.



I cooked it using the gyoza way, which is pan frying it until the bottoms are slightly browned and then i add some water to it, it worked out pretty well. Really well, actually. The kafir lime leaves gave it that thai flavor I craved. I think it'd work better with meat ;) I made some broth to go with it, to make it a really warm meal. The broth is just a simple vegetable broth, from powdered buillion.

I'm going to have to leave you guys to your imagination how it looks like when it's cooked because in the midst of starvation, I forgot to take pictures ...I only remembered after I stared at my empty bowl :P

Otak-otak finally!

My very own otak-otak!

After seeing many of my food blogging peers making otak-otak in their respective foreign countries and salivating profusely, i've decided to use the cod in my freezer to make myself some otak-otak for dinner. After all, I still remember vaguelyhow my grandma in Penang went about making her otak-otak in her kitchen for us when we visit. Since she has passed on when I was 15, we haven't had much otak-otak save for the ones sold outside the hawker centers in Penang. I'll always remember the big bamboo steamer filled with otak-otak wrapped in banana leaves in my grandma's kitchen...it was just huge and the aroma just attacks your senses as soon as you enter the house.

Anyway, I had some of the essential herbs that makes otak-otak taste what it is - the kafir lime leaves as well as some lemongrass. So away i went, experimenting :)

First, I cook my otak-otak base, a type of spicy chutney to which I will mix my fish and egg whites into later. I had some left over curry base in the fridge; a blend of onions, garlic, ginger and galangal. I sauteed that in my frying pan along with the lemongrass and sliced kafir lime leaves until fragrant (1-2 mins) and added some tumeric powder in it. I also add some Maggi Belacan powder about 1/4 tsp in, some chili flakes and continued saute-ing my way until everything is amalgamated into a nice yellow paste. It takes about 5-8 minutes of sauteing at the end. So i scoop my otak-otak base out, chop my one fillet of cod into chunks, throw it into the base, add an egg white and stir. You'll have a sticky, mushy mixture to which you will pour them out into banana leaves if you have some or in aluminium foils. Close them nicely, tightly shut and steam them on your rice cooker until they're done (about 10-12 minutes)

EAT~! :D Otak-otak is delicious with rice.

My otak-otak tastes pretty passable. I mean, I don't have that herb in which they use to cook the otak-otak with that makes it have that really unique taste...in hokkien it sound something like OonKaLong or close to that. I remember seeing these leaves growing wild at the back of my grandparents' house. Now that the house is torn down for development, it's quite a pity that those lovely herbs had to go with it too. In some recipes online, they even suggested substituting that herb with mint leaves. I didn't have either but the otak-otak tasted alright anyway. I'm happy that i got to satisfy this craving :)

Torta Spaghetti with Sundried Tomatoes and Zucchini

The word frittata came into mind when I thought of this recipe, which is actually cooked spaghetti in eggs with some sundried tomatoes and zucchini. It's a very simple dish but absolute delicious because of the cheeses used. You can use any cheese but a popular one would be parmesan and mozarella combo. If you want to be a bit adventurous, you can try Fontina cheese with some aged cheddar. Basically anything goes here as it's really a clean-your-fridge-up recipe :)

Torta Spaghetti with Sundried Tomatoes and Zucchini

Recipe:-
2 cups of cooked Spaghetti, al dente
10 pieces of oil soaked sundried tomatoes, drained and chopped coarsely
1 zucchini, using a peeler, makes thin shaves length wise
1/4 cup grated Parmesan*
1/4 cup grated Chedder*
1/4 cup mozarella*
A bit of salt and pepper to taste
2 tablespoon olive oil
3 eggs

Method:
1. Crack eggs into a big bowl and add the cheeses in. Mix well with a fork until there are no lumps.
2. Add your chopped up sundried tomatoes into your still hot spaghetti and mix well. Let the pasta cool for a little bit before adding into the egg mixture.
3. Combine the spaghetti and tomatoes mix into the egg mixture and combine well. Add zucchini and mix well too.
4. Heat a non-stick pan with the olive oil under medium heat. When pan is hot, pour the entire mixture into the pan. Let it cook on each side for about 5-8 minutes before you flip them over with the pan :)
5. If you're not a professional flipper, just use two spatula and slowly flip them to the otherside.
6. Once they're done, cut and serve them warm.

They're really yummy!

* these cheese are my pick, you can use a combination of any cheese you want except cream cheeses.

Appetizers: Sushi Roll

This picture is tied to the Appetizers of Creating a Dinner Menu post. This is my appetizer for the dinner menu i created yesterday - Sushi roll. I wanted to make temakis but I didn't make enough rice for both kinds. Anyway, this sushi is rather light and has a very flavorful combo. The grapevine leaves gives it a bit of a sharp taste while the artichoke hearts is slightly sourish with a rich aftertone, add up the sweetness and smokiness of the sweet potato in sesame tempura, we have a round up of wonderful flavors. MMh! This is our dinner tonight :)

I just came back from town at about 5pm today and I thought, "hmm...i should grab a bunch of stuff like heart of palm artichoke hearts and grapevine leaves and make that appetizer i was talking about. And so I did. I decided artichoke hearts would give a more flavorful taste than heart of palm. I also bought ingredients for the beef carpaccio on a bed of mesclun. You can expect to see pix of that soon! :)

p.s: I couldn't find oysters so I couldn't make the shooters today :P

Pan grilled polenta

This is my first time making polenta. Polenta is basically ground cornmeal and it comes in many textures; fine, coarse and gigantic. I used fine polenta for this meal although i think a coarse grind would have made it hold better. The flavor in polenta is a very, very mild and nutty, which is why it's absolute crucial to season it well. It will take on whatever flavoring you add to it.

Cornmeal- fine

So today, i made grilled polenta cake for dinner. I also made a side of zucchini salad, which i shred into long thin shaves and season with EVOO, salt, pepper and a squeeze of lemon. I had left over mash potatoes so I added that as part of my side dish too. The zucchini salad is very tasty because it soaks up the marinate, which gives it a lot of flavor and since i kept it raw, it has a little bite to it. It's absolutely delicious.

For the grilled polenta, you'll need:

1 cup polenta
3 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup corn kernels
1 small onion diced
1/2 carrot diced finely
1 clove of garlic
1/2 teaspoon of rosemary
1 tablespoon olive oil or any cooking oil you have.

Method:

1. Saute your onions, garlic and rosemary until the onions become translucent. Add your corn kernels and carrot, saute for about 5 mins until carrots are tender. Turn off heat and let it sit while you prepare your polenta.
2. Let 2 cups of water and salt come to a boil in a pot. Mix 1 cup of water with 1 cup of polenta and mix well.
3. Once water is boiling, add the polenta mixture in slowly while whisking constantly with a fork or a whisk. This is to ensure that there are no lumps.
4. When your polenta is well mixed and cooking, turn the heat off. You should have a thick, gruel like texture. Add the corn kernel, carrot and onion mixture in. Mix well.
5. Pour the mixture onto a bread pan or a 8inch cake pan and let it cool. The polenta mixture will cake up when cool and you can cut into whatever chunky shapes you want.
6. Heat up a grilling pan until it is really hot to the touch. Oil the polenta cutlets a little and grill each side until they're brown to your satisfaction.
7. Serve it up hot with a side of zucchini salad and maybe some mashed potatoes if you have some left over. I also added a bit of tomato salsa on the side..:)

Clam hunting and lemongrass chicken

Baked Lemongrass Chicken

When I was in New Zealand, I had a friend, named Leonie, who made me and my then flatmate, Tien, this really awesome lemongrass chicken. The ingredients were so simple and yet SO tasty. And the marinate is done in a bag!

We just got back from clam hunting with her and her then bf and was hungry from mucking around in the low tides looking for clams. They took us to this secluded beach nearby Dunedin ( I really dont' remember where anymore) and the place was just FILLED with clams! It was my first time hunting for clams and oh boy, did I have fun! You just need to put your hands into the shallow sandy waters and you can feel them...like millions of them! Time to roll up our sleeves and pants and get down and dirty digging for clams! They were HUGE - we found some baby clams but we didn't take them. We just threw them back into the water so that these clams can have a future generation :P We brought three buckets to collect the clams and when we were done we had two buckets full. I ...uhm...lost the 3rd bucket...i let it float too far into the deep end of the waters and neither of us wanted to get our clothes wet swimming there (3 of us couldn't swim, the onlyboy could but didn't want to) I had 1/3 of the buckets full in there! Good for the gulls, i guess but we have 2 buckets full anyway!!

We baked it, we made clam chowder with it and we even steamed it till the clams are succulently cooked...it was a clam feast! The flesh of these clams were just bursting with juices. Awh..if you have never had clams, please go out and buy some when they're in season. Add them to your pasta (or whatever) and you won't need to season it ever again because these little buggers are SO flavorful! But a little dish stood out and it was Leonie's baked lemongrass chicken. She made it for us as filler food while we wash and wait for our clams to be done but we finished the chicken SO quickly I was amazed we still had space for the clams :)

So this is post commemorates my first ever clam hunting trip with my friends...oh what a great time we had!

Baked Lemongrass Chicken

The ingredients:-

The ingredients

600g -800g of chicken wings, drummets and wings separated
2 large stalks of lemongrass, peeled, cleaned and chopped
1 teaspoon turmeric powder
1 onion and 2 cloves of garlic minced finely
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon salt
2 tablespoons any kind of cooking oil

1 large Ziplock Bag

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

ALL IN!

2. Put chicken pieces into the ziplock bag and add ALL of the ingredients in.
3. Zip the bag shut and squish it. It's quite relaxing to be squishing...i think it's de-stresses. Play with the bag until you're most certainly sure the chicken wings are well coated.

The product of your squishing

4. Let it sit for about 15-30 minutes on the counter. If you want, you can also do this the day before you need it and you'll have more flavors absorbed into the wings.
5. Unzip bag, pour ALL the content out into a baking pan/dish. Spread the wings out so they cook evenly and make sure no pieces are over lapping each other.
6. Bake for 30-45mins, depending on how powerful your oven is.

Serve.

SERVE it when you want to reminisce on clam hunting trips or as part of your dinner with rice or as munchies for a ballgame/football/hockey on TV with a nice cold beer or soda. YUMZ.

Vegetarian Cucur Udang

Vegetarian cucur udang

Cucur Udang or shrimp/prawn fritters is a type of malay/indian street food. Batter made out of flour, onions and other spices topped with shrimps and then deep fried is best eaten with pasembur, a type of salad tossed in peanut sauce. But I made a vegetarian version, using tofu instead of flour and I must say the results were pretty good, tastewise! I didn't put in any shrimps, though, just onions and spices. It looks almost like a cucur udang too...passable-lah :) This vegetarian cucur udang was inpired by the malaysian version of cucur and the Japanese Ganmodoki a type of vegetable tofu fritter. Anyway, here's my recipe:

Vegetarian Cucur Udang

Ingredients:

1 block of medium firm tofu
1 egg white
1 teaspoon salt
2 stalks spring onions, chopped
1 medium size green onion, sliced finely
5 rehydrated shitake mushrooms, chopped
1 small potato grated
1 tablespoon cornstarch
pepper

Optional ingredients:
green peas, gingko nuts, prawns, other types of mushroom like enoki, portobellos, shredded nori seaweed etc.

Enough oil for deep frying

Method:

Heat your oil until it sizzles at a little bit of batter.
1. Mash the tofu into a thick pulp and add the rest of the other ingredients in.
2. Using a tablespoon, scoop a dollop and deep fry until golden brown.
3. Serve hot with a squeeze of lemon and some chili sauce :)

Craving for Vadai

Vadai

I loooooove Indian food and I love the vadai sold at the corner stall between the Telawi Streets of Bangsar. Even my partner loves Vadai; the occassional times of biting into a hot, green chili hasn't deterred his caucasian tongue one bit. Such is his love for them and only the ones in Bangsar. Since we came back to Canada, we have been craving for things like roti canai, vadai, idli, dhall, coconut chutney.....So last week, in the midst of craziness, I made Vadai, Dhall and Coconut Chutney! I'll probably post about the Dhall and Coconut Chutney another day but today...today is all about the Vadai!

The recipe calls for Urad Dhall. Now, urad dhall is naturally a black bean like lentil with a creamy white interior. Buy the white peeled urad dhall. Don't make the mistake of buying the black unpeeled urad dhall like me. My vadai as you can see in the picture is darker than the usual vadai because I used unpeeled urad dhall. The taste is not compromised however, thankfully!

So I got my vadai recipe from Recipezaar.

Ingredients:

1	cup Urad Dal (See!! they didn't mention whether I should buy the peeled or unpeeled!)
3	chopped green chilies
1	teaspoon whole black peppercorns
1	teaspoon salt
1-2	sprig curry leaves
	oil (for frying)

1 Onion, finely sliced


Method:

1. Soak 1 cup urud dal in sufficient amount of water for 2-4 hours (or 4 hours + if you bought unpeeled urad dhal) and grind into a thick fine flour. I used my blender, it was hell, i wish i had a kitchenaid food processer :(
   
2. Add 1 tsp salt, 2-3 chopped green chillies, 1 tsp whole black peppers, onions, the curry leaves and mix well.
3. Wet your hands and take a ball of thick paste (it should be a cross between play dough and mud) and shape it into a donut of about 6-7 cm diameter wide.
   
4. Deep fry this in oil and turn over until the vadai turns golden brown.

It's pretty simple actually, the hardest part for me was the blending. But it was alllllll worth it in the end!

every bite was slathered with dhall and coconut chutney!

Coconut Fudge Brownies

Coconut Fudge Brownie

I was feeling rather bored yesterday night and craving cake. The snow storm's rather blitzy and it would take a nutter to go out to just get cake in that weather. So, to entertain myself and my cravings, I looked up for a recipe online and found Coconut Fudge Brownies.

Plateful....


...and more

The only ingredient I didn't have is almond extract. It's alright, i'm already using vanilla beans i suppose I'll just leave it at that. The recipe called for 1.5 ounces of chocolate. That is a VERY lame amount of chocolate in my humble opinion so what i do is I UP the chocolate needed of course!

Sticky Coconut Center

You can use the recipe in the link, but here's my re-modified recipe.

Coconut Fudge Brownies

INGREDIENTS:

• 2/3 cup all-purpose flour - sift before measuring
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1/3 cup flaked coconut
• 1/2 vanilla pod with its beans scrapped out
• 1/2 squares unsweetened chocolate, melted (1 1/2 ounces)1 cup of semi sweet chocolate, melted

PREPARATION:

Sift flour with baking powder and salt. Add the vanilla bean in to the flour mixture and stir a little. In a mixing bowl, beat eggs with electric mixer, gradually adding sugar. Stir in melted butter, then flour mixture, blending well. Into small bowl, pour about 1/4 of the batter; blend in coconut. Into remaining portion of batter, blend melted chocolate.

Spread chocolate batter into a greased and floured 8-inch square pan; spoon coconut batter evenly over the chocolate later then spread carefully to form an even layer. Bake 30 to 35 minutes at 350°. Cool in pan on a rack, then cut into squares or bars.
Makes about 16 to 20 brownies.

Dots of black vanilla beans :)

More Biscuity Delights

And this time I added raisins into my biscuits. I posted a recipe on North American biscuits previously, you can check it out by clicking on that link there.

So this post is all about pictures. I made smaller biscuits this time and I added raisins to it. It gives a nice suprising sweetness at every bite. I think it makes the biscuits less plain too.

Here's the before picture of the biscuits I had for breakfast earlier:



And here's after!

:D