Thai Salad Dressing

This simple delicious main course salad is full of flavor & it can be done without using any oil. My kid love this salad so much.  This is a salad that is guaranteed to become a family favorite. It is a perfect side dishes to any seafood- cooked prawn, cooked squid (sotong), grilled fish.

Dressing:

2 cloves garlic

1 bird eye chilies or 1 long big red chilies

1 knob of ginger

2 -3 limes (6 tbsp lime juices)

2 shallots

2 tbsp fish sauces

1 tbsp brown sugar

1tsp peanut oil (optional)

Handful of chopped Coriander

Some chopped Spring Onion

Salads (cleaned, wash & spin dry):

Lettuce, tomato, cucumber, cherry tomato, any salad vegetables

Optional:

Some cooked prawn

Some cooked squid

1) Mix fish sauces with sugar, stir to melt the sugar, squeeze the limes, pick out the seed of the limes. 

2) Grind the ginger, garlic into fine paste.Add in to the salad dressing. The colour of the mixture will change slightly after add in the ginger and garlic paste.

3) Add in all these ingredients that need to be chopped finely- tomatoes, shallots, chilies (hot- bird eye) or big chilies (mild). Mix all these into the salad dressing.
4) The best method to mix the salads well is by using both hand.
5) Pour all these well mixed chopped salad on the green lettuces.
6) Serve Immediately or chill in the refrigerator.

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Dry Curry (Malaysia Style)

The infamous Malaysia style curry has TWO version- Dry & Soupy. Sometimes, I cook the dry curry for its intense flavors. I don't know why sometimes I crave for spicier food. Perhaps it is already in the blood, my siblings love spicy food. I am at the medium spicy meter. I bought this brand of curry chicken sauce as my kid can take the heat (medium spicy).

Today the I cook the curry with more vegetables because it just taste good with potatoes, okra & long bean.Be creative to add in your favorite vegetable in the curry- cabbage, brinjal (egg plant), tofu pok (fried tofu).

Method:
1) Mix the store bought curry sauces with onion & stir fry over medium heat.  The sauces itself is very oily, so you do not need to add vegetable oil for stir fry. Just follow the cooking instructions. However, I will show you the general procedures for cooking curry.
For home make curry sauces, pls refer to
http://fabulouscake.blogspot.com/2015/08/traditional-chicken-curry-malaysia-style.html

 

2) Add in potatoes & meat, continue stir fry.

 

3) Add in water enough to cover all the ingredients. Cover with lid to simmers.

 

4) Last in the vegetables as it needs lesser time to cook through. Add in the coconut milk at the final stage to thicken the sauces.

 

5) Super easy & fast. Serve hot with white rice or nasi lemak.

Delicious~

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Traditional Chicken Curry (Malaysia Style)

Traditional Chicken Curry - is a all time favorite for Malaysian & tourists. If you ever visit Malaysia, you must buy packets of the prepared curry paste as souvenir for your friends, family, colleagues or yourself. A lots Malaysia overseas student who study abroad will ask their friends or parent to even courier the curry paste to them. Of course you can also make it from scratch & it takes more time. Curry chicken is match made in heaven with nasi lemak. When I was a teenager, I can eat 2 bowls of rice with curry chicken. Those good old memories.

Check out the nasi lemak link:
http://fabulouscake.blogspot.com/2015/01/nasi-lemak-malaysia-style.html

As promised to my Korean friends, I will post some simple instructions in my blog to guide them through to cook the curry chicken the Malaysia way.  Super easy. Prepare the ingredients as per the packet instructions:

1 Packet of Curry Paste (see curry paste from scratch at the bottom of this post)
Chicken  ( prefer chicken thigh if  I am not using the whole chicken)
Potatoes
Coconut milk (Santan- store bought)
Water
Fresh Curry Leaves (optional)

Delicious ingredients for curry chicken

Check out how to prepare fresh coconut milk from scratch:

http://fabulouscake.blogspot.com/2015/01/nasi-lemak-malaysia-style.html

1) Lightly fry the curry paste, I like to use a medium size pot.

2) Fry the chicken with the curry paste.

3) Add in the potatoes, curry leaves, water to simmer for about 20 mins. Do not cut the potato too small. Otherwise, it will "melt" & become too soft. Always use Holland potato- or any hard type of potato that is suitable for roast or boil.

4) Pour in the coconut milk & let it boil for 5-10 mins.

Delicious curry chicken served with Sambal & Nasi Lemak.

Simple Curry Chicken Paste:

1 kg of Whole Chicken (chopped into pcs)

500g Potato

200g Coconut Milk

(B) Blend into Paste:

100g Garlic

200- 250g Shallots

2ea Candlesnut (Buah Keras)

1 inches Tumeric (Kunyit) - optional if you don't have

(C)

3-4 tbsp of Meat Curry Powder

2 tbsp Chili Boh (Chili Paste)

1-2 tbsp Sugar

0.5 tsp Coriander Powder

3 Stalks Lemongrass (Serai- smash it)

3 Stalks Curry Leaves

Salt to taste

0.5 cup water (or slightly more to cover all the ingredient in  the pot) 

Method:

1) Heat 4-5 tbsp of oil, add in B & C . Stir fry until fragrant.

2) Add in chicken & potato, slightly stir fry & cover all ingredients with water, boil with high heat.

3) Reduce to medium heat & let it simmer until cook.

4) Stir in coconut milk & salt. Serve hot with white rice or Nasi Lemak.

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Mocha Ganache or Chocolate Ganace (with Coffee)

Discover one super delicious icing for simple chocolate cake. Let us present the crowd pleasing Mocha Ganache.  I use this to ice one of my favorite Eggless Chocolate Cakes (8" round cake). It turns out great. This is so simple, you just need a spoon to ice the cake on  the plate



Simple Ingredients:
6 oz Dark Chocolate (chopped into small pcs)
Half cup of Double Cream
1 tbsp of Kahlua
1 tsp of Hot water mix with 1tbsp espresso powder  ( or any coffee powder)
 


 Method:
1) Place chocolate in a bowl.
2) Heat double cream on medium fire with the hot water mixture of coffee powder, make sure the coffee powder melt nicely with the double cream.
3) When the double cream come to boil, the side of the pot with the cream will simmer slightly.
4) Quickly pour in the boiled double cream into the chocolate, stir until the chocolate melted & glossy.
5) Let the ganache cool down completely. The longer it sets, the thicker it gets.
6) I let the ganache cool at room temperature & then put it in the refrigerator chilled for another half an hour.
7) Then, I took it out & whipped with a fork to let it slightly thicker so that it can hold the shape when I apply the ganache by using the back of the spoon. [Yes, I admit I love to cook & bake but not washing...]
8) Apply the ganache all over the cake. It is better to let it set slightly in the refrigerator for another half an hour before serve.

Tips: You can use a hand held whisk to whip the ganache to incorperate more air in order to have thicker icing. Make sure the ganache mixture if set up further in the fridge for 45 mins - 1 hour.

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Simple Delicious Daikon Soup (with Konbu)

As usual on one sunny Sunday I was doing my round of groceries shopping in a mall. For those who live in this region (Souteast Asia), the weather is hot & humid. We love to visit the shopping mall during the weekend.You may not believe how this recipes was created. It was inspired by the soup served  on Japanese events.

Whenever I see other people cooking delicious stuffs,  I will automatically ask them: " This is nice,  how do you cook it?".  From here, I learned the combination of raw material that make this soup delicious.

This soup is so clear & delicious. Simple ingredients & it can be made vegan or non-vegan. The "umami" or the pleasant savory taste shines in this soup.

Ingredients for 3 paxs:

1 medium size Daikon (White Radish)

10-15g of dried konbu (Kelp- normal come in square shape, use a damn cloth wipe the konbu)

1 corn

1200 ml water

Method (using pressure cooker):

1) Put all the ingredients in a deep pressure cooker.

2) Cook for 15 mins & let it simmer in the pressure cooker until it cooled. Serve warm.

or

Method (using normal deep pot)

1) Put all the ingredients in deep pot & cook with medium fire until boiling. You may add extra 300-500ml water as the liquid will reduced after 30 mins of boiling with small fire.

2) Let it simmer for 30 mins (mins). Serve warm.

Tips: For those who prefer to add some ribs or lean chicken meat in this soup, pls do so. It tastes equally good. But the soup base will not be so clear after adding the meat.

The secret of success for this soup is the konbu or sea tangle. It is very "umami" & full of fibers. We love to eat the sea konbu & it is great for detox. This soup is super cooling for this HOT summer. 

There are lot of vegetables in this soup, I just need to stir fry one dish & dinner can be served right away. This is a two in one dish- soup & vegetables.

I love to use pressure cooker because it is so fast & we can enjoy soup on a busy weekdays. Kids just love soup. 

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Classic Banana Cake (made with Yogurt)

I have been looking for a classic banana cakes recipies. Guess what? I found one. Everyone can bake it without fail. The classic banana cakes has be to firm instead of spongy. That's my personal liking. One good thing about the banana cake is we can use less sugar. These are good for Saturday & Sunday tea time. Surprisingly, such simple cake is always a hit among the crowd every time. It tastes so good even without icing. Besides, you must use the local fruits (banana or pisang emas) to make this cakes. It just tastes superb.

Ingredients I: Mix & Set asides

210g Mashed ripe bananas by fork

1 tsp Lemon Juice

Ingredients II:

85g Butter

Pinch of Salt

180g  Fine Sugar

1 Egg (L)

1 Egg Yolk

1 tsp Vanilla Extract

1.5 cup of Yogurt (original flavor- no sugar added)

188g AP flour

3/4 tsp Baking Soda

* Tips: You can also replace the Yogurt with Buttermilk. Buttermilk will give fluffier texture banana cakes.

I bake this cake in a 8" inch round tin. Always coat the inner of the round tin with butter or cut a round wax paper at the bottom of the tin for easy remover.

Method:

1) Mashed banana & lemon juice - set aside.

2) Mix AP flour & baking soda- set aside.

3) Mix yogurt/ butter milk with vanilla extract- set aside.

4) Cream butter , sugar, salt until fluffy for about 3-4 minutes.

5) Beat in one eggs each time until well mix.

6) Add in the flour mixture & alternately it with yogurt mixture. Fold in the mashed banana mixture. Remember not to over mix.

7) Bake in a preheated oven at 175'C from 45 minutes to 1 hour until a toothpick inserted come out clean. 

The baking time need to be calibrated for different oven. Enjoy.

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Korean Japchae (Stir Fried Korean Glass Noodles with Vegetables 杂菜炒)

We had Japchae for the 1st time during our trip to Korea. We thought that was very good. As usual we will try to figure out how to cook it at home.  We miss the Korean glass noodles which is very different from the Chinese glass noodles. It was made with potato starch. My hubby loves the texture of these noodles so much. As the Korean wave is very strong in Malaysia & Singapore,  we have these noodles import into this region with reasonable price. It is actually quite easy to cook. This noodles are great for partis as it tastes good even when it served cold. It has a lots of vegetables in it. For the vegetarian versions, just skip the meat & it tastes just as great.

The infamous Korean Glass noodles made from potato starch.

The Ingredients (3 - 4 servings):
350g Dried Korean Glass noodles
6-8 cloves of minced garlic
Light soya sauces
2-3 eggs
Cooking oil
Some water
Salt & Pepper
Sesame oil

Cut everything below in strips: to
Fresh mushrooms
Onion
Carrots
French beans
Green bell pepper
Spring onions
Black wood fungus  (fresh)
300g Meat strips marinated with 1tsp of oyster sauces
Garnish with cucumber strips & sesame seeds (toasted)

Tips: You can throw in any kind of vegetables. Any amounts. As long as it is well season with soya sauces. It  will taste great.
Tips: You can use the Korean soya sauces which will it even more authentic.

I

1) Separated the eggs yolk and eggs white. Fry with vegetable oil, let it cold, cut into strips, set aside.

 

2) Heat oil with mince garlic & fry the french beans & carrots. Season with salt & pepper. Set aside.

 

3) Put a big deep pot with lots of water over the noodles & cook according to the instruction on the packaging. I noticed that different glass noodles with slightly different size has different cooking time. The rule of thumbs, always pick up one noodles from the pots & eat it. This classic grandma method work perfectly well.

4) Drain the cooked noodles & put in into a big bowl, pour some light soya sauces to flavor it. The noodles is very long. Need to cut it with a scissors. I use stainless steel bowl. Mix the noodles with clean hand.

i

5) Heat oil with mince garlic, cook the onion with green bell pepper, season with soya sauces. Just put all the cooked vegetables on top of the noodles.

 

6) Heat oil with mince garlic, cook the meat strips with mushroom & black fungus. Cook this last as it will stain the wok. You don't really wash the wok pan every time when you cook.

 

7) Finally mix in the fresh cucumber. Use clean hand to mix is the fastest way. Season with sesame oil or additional soya sauces if needed.

Serve immediately.

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