This is my family favorite recipes for Chicken- Taiwanese Style (simplified version)
Ingredients: Chopped Chicken in pcs Thai sweet basil Chinese dark vinegar Ginger & shallots
Marinates Chicken: White pepper 2 tsp five spices 2 tbsp of soy sauces 1 tbsp of dark soy sauce a little sugar 1 tsp sesame oil 2 tsp Chinese wine
Method: 1) Marinate the chicken for at least half an hour to 2 hours in the refregirator. 2) Heat oil in the wok & fried ginger/shallots. 3) Pick up all the chicken from the marinates, retain the marinate juices. Add all the chicken into the wok now. 4) Let the meat brown a little bit for about 3-4 minutes. 5) Add about 4-6 tbsp of water mix with the marinate juices & add into the stir fried chicken. 6) Let the chicken simmers for a few minutes until it is cooked. 7) Add this point of time, you can add in the basil & the vinegar. 8) Stir fry for about a minute & serve.
Option: -You can also fry some basil leave in oil until it is crisp & sprinkle on top of the dish. It looks more presentable. - You can also add in one or two dried chili into this dish if you like something spicy.
Sambal is a very versatile sauces, you can cook seafood & vegetable with it. When you prepare the sambal sauces, you can double or triple the recipes. It keeps well in the fridge for at least 2 weeks. It is very handy when you need it. Please refer to the previous blog "Rice cook in coconut milk (Nasi Lemak) with Sambal" for the sambal recipes.
Spicy Sambal Prawn Recipies 3 tbsp of sambal sauces 2 tbsp some oil for frying garlic & ginger handful of prawn squids (optional) 2 red onion (sliced) salt & sugar to taste 1 chili (sliced) 3tbsp of water
Heat oil in wok, in the garlic & ginger, in the sambal, in the prawn & squid, then stir in the red onion & chili, add in the water, let it simmer until the seafood is cooked. Adjust with salt & sugar to your liking.
It is good to eat it with a bowl of white rice. You know what, if you replace the prawns with bitter bean ( it is called Petai) & cook with more red onion. You will have Sambal Petai. Petai is called "smelly bean" in Mandarin due to its strong smell. It has a bitter after taste. You will either like it or hate it. However, this beans is very common in Southeast Asia - Singapore, Malaysia & Indonesia. In fact, the bean is healthy & good for the kidney.
In this country, everyone love nasi lemak. You will love the aroma of the nasi lemak & it goes really well with sambal. Nasi Lemak in Malay language means the rice cooked in coconut milk. Sambal is a typical chili based sauces that use as a condiment, it could be very spicy. Both are very popular in Malaysia, Indonesia & Singapore.
A typical Nasi Lemak consists of:
Rice cooked in coconut milk
Sambal
Fried anchovies & peanuts
Cucumber
Hard boil egg
Curry Chicken (optional)
Nasi Lemak Recipes: 200g white rice 220-250ml coconut milk (Santan) 1 lemon grass pepper & salt 1 knob of ginger
How to cook nasi lemak:
Clean the rice. Cooked the rice with coconut milk, lemon grass, pepper, salt & ginger in the rice cooker.
Sambal Recipes: 2 tsp of dried anchovies (cleaned & fried) 4ea of small shallots/red onion 1 knob of ginger 6ea dried chilies (s0aked in hot water) 1ea lemon grass 1cm toasted belacan half cup of asam jawa juice 0.5 tsp of salt 0.5 tsp sugar 2 tsp of vegetable oil
How to prepare sambal:
Blend shallots, ginger, chilies, lemon grass into paste.
Heat oil in wok, fried the above paste in oil, add in asam jawa juice, salt & sugar. Let it simmer & reduce to a nice consistency.
Add the fried dried anchovies into the sambals.
Assemble the nasi lemak with sambal & etc....serve.
Actually, we had some relatives coming over for our nasi lemak dinner. We prepare lots of side dishes too.
Stir Fried Kimchi & rice is probably the easiest Korean dishes. It is really comforting to have a bowl of Kimchi fried rice when you do not know what to eat. I love cooking & it is fun. But sometimes, I do reach the bottleneck on "Hey,...what am I going to cook today....?". Then, my hubby will give me a standard reply; " I will eat whatever you cook.". I don't kinda like this reply though because he is not helping me to make decision.
Simple recipes: 2tbsp oil 1tsp chili powder (preferably Korean, can put more if you like spicy) Handful of kimchi (depends on your liking) 1 cup of sticky rice ( I use white rice cuz haven't replenish my inventory) half a green bell pepper (chopped) half a red bell pepper(optional) onion Prawn (optional) 1 tsp sesame oil
Spring onion, more kimchi, toasted sesame seeds, fried eggs for garnish
Method: 1) Mix the prawn with the chili powder.
2) Heat oil, in the prawn with chili powder,stir fry until the prawn is cooked. 3) Add cooked cooled rice, in the kimchi, all the bell pepper, sesame oil. stir fry for 5 mins. 4) Retain some of the kimchi juice & add into the fried rice- about 2 tbsp of the juice. 5) Garnish with spring onion, kimchi, toasted sesame seeds or shredded eggs.
p/s - since I am not using the sticky rice to make this fried rice, honestly, it looks like a Chinese version of Kimchi. If you really want an authentic Korean fried rice, pls stick to the original recipes.
I did not cooked a very spicy fried rice this time because my 6 years old can't take the spiciness too much.
I love to explode food from different country or culture. It is so amazing that food can connect human beings & help us to understand different culture. Living in Asia in the 21st century is great because we have access to lots of vibrant & amazing Asian food.
The main reasons I enjoyed Korean food are: - Healthy (e.g. you can wrap the below dish with better head, lettuce or iceberg) - Less oily - Pack with flavors
Let's start with the marinade: 2 cloves of Garlic 1 cm Ginger 2 tbsp Gochujang 1 tbsp Mirin 1tsp sesame oil salt a little corn starch Spring onion (chopped finely) a little pepper & corn starch
Method: I find it is better to grind all the material above into fine paste to avoid burn. I didn't because I am too lazy to wash the blender but I did grind the garlic clove manually using the little plate. Don't be like me ;P
In the sliced meat, I use pork. You can cut any meat in to cube or slices. Since I am in a rush & hungry, I sliced it. It cooks faster. Marinate for 20 mins while cooking the rice.
Lightly coat a frying pan, grill it until it is cooked. Garnish with some spring onion or toasted sesame seeds for nice presentation.
We used to dislike black promphet because it smells fishy. But not anymore. Once I started explore into eating fish as our main staple ( we will have fish at least 4 times a week for our dinners). I have learned a lot about fish- what type of fish is best with which cooking style & also what is their names. Haha......It sound funny though. I used to think all fish looks similar especially if they are from the same family - e.g. carps, grouper.....etc......
Black promphet is a pretty misunderstood fish. If they smell like the sea, it tastes just great. If you are staying in Malaysia, I don't deny that to get fish direct from the fisherman is a challenge. However, I am very pleased that both local grocers (Jy Grocer & V Grocer) managed to sell direct from the fisherman to the local market with slightly premium price. It worth paying the premium.
Another tips is, buying medium size fish is much cheaper than buying big size fish like what you served in the restaurant. Bigger size fish look more presentable in a restaurant setting. It does save a little for the medium size fish without scarifying the quality. To me, fresh is good regardless of the size.
It is easy to prepare this dish:
1) Clean the fish, cut a few lines on the body, make sure the cut is deep almost until the bone. 2) Rub salt on the fish body ( it looks like rub salt into the wound) so that it is seasoned properly. 3) Deep fried the fish in vegetable oil. Medium high heat 2.5-3.5mins depends on the size. You can even eat the fin & the tail like a cracker.
Sauces: 2 tbsp of soya sauce mix with 2 tbsp of water a little sesame oil a little sugar
1) Just mix all the above together => sauces mixture 2) Heat the wok with oil, throw in some ginger & garlic, fried until fragrance. 3) Pick up some of the fried garlic & ginger for garnishing later 4) Just pour in the mixture into the wok, let it bubbling for 1 mins. 5) Pour on the fish immediately.
Lastly, garnish the fish with fried ginger or garlic & some chopped spring onion.
For the uninitiated, BKT in general sense is Malaysian Chinese pork stewed in medicinal winter herbs (ironicaly, there is no winter in Malaysia, but in the early days, i.e. before global warming, getting stuck indoor during the monsoon season is a pretty cold affair).
To prepare Bak Kut Teh (BKT) is actually a very simple process, the complicated process is actually in the cleaning and preparing the pig gut and intestine, which needs to be cleaned thoroughly.
To prepare a good BKT, you will need, a. pre-packed herbs, any brands will do, but my personal favourite is in the featured image. If by chance, if there is a good Chinese drug store in your neighbourhood who knows what is BKT, they will be able to prepare the herbal mixture
b. Garlic, it works best with the smoked type (i.e. the ones with the black peels)
c. Pig gut (tripe), which is cleaned throughly, (we will talk about this later), BKT is not BKT without this
d. Other very welcomed ingredients (classical ones are served without, but tasty ones are served with), including, mushroom and fried tofu
e. Coriander (no BKT is garnished without this, again,.... it ain't a BKT untill it is garnished with coriander)
How to cook this dish?, just follow the following steps,
a. Put the herb, garlic, pig gut (add intestines too for the full authenticity), lean pork (or flower pork, if you prefer some extend of fat, which actually adds to the taste)
b. Add water, and cook to boil with medium heat
c. Upon boiling, let it simmer in low-medium heat for 1 hour (at least), this will ensure the flavour of the herbs will be infused into the pork and the other ingredients. Watch the water level, a good benchmark will be, the water level to be exactly the same with the ingredients.
d. Before serving, add some chopped coriander to the stew, and you are all done
e. If by chance you have access to some Chinese fried oil stick (commonly known as Yow Char Kuay - in Cantonese), that will definitely deliver the killer blow!
The end result, How to prepare the pig gut (or pig tripe), the goal is to remove a layer of film on the tripe which somewhat acts as a skin, a. Trim out the fat on the gut using a pair of scisors, rinse through water once it is done (somewhat within 5 minutes) b. Rub the inner surface (turn it inside out) and outer surface with coarse salt and rinse, do this twice. (somewhat done within 5 minutes too) c. Rub with corn starch then with cooking oil thoroughly and rinse (pretty fast) d. Scald with ginger, spring onion, and 1 table spoon of white vinegar for 3 minutes e. And now, with a knife, scrape of the layer of film on the pork tripe (done somewhat within 10 minutes) f. Cook it in the BKT mix!
My friend bought us some flower crabs. These are local caught flower crab. You can only harvest 30% meat from these crab. They had less meat...
About
What can I say, all it took was passion and interest (not to mention some pretty cool ingredients too!) and here are my cakes,... some sold to friends , some are gifts, and all I can say, all inquiries are welcomed!
A working mum who love to cook and bake. I was a hobby baker, and now, almost a pro-baker. My husband loves cooking too. Both of us would like to share our hobbies in cooking & baking with friends. To contact us, please call 6012-3813896.
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