Post #39 - mum's day

its mummy's day today!! this year, mum prefered to stay at home rather than to eat out, which means that sis and i had to cook. we've been scratching our heads as to what to cook for mum. its so easy when it comes to cooking for dad, cos we'd know right away that seafood/sashimi/steak would please him. mum on the other hand eats anything but doesnt like anything in particular... well, other than bread anyway... but we cant really serve bread on mummy's day!

so we've decided on 2 v diff dishes but both perfect for a cold winters day - seafood soup and korean bibimbap :)

the seafood soup recipe is from the gourmet traveller magazine - currently my favourite food magazine!! a lot of yummy seafood in one pot of soup - scampi, bream fillet, redfish fillet + mussels! a bit expensive but fabulous for special occasion.


-Mediterranean seafood soup-

super tasty and sweet soup, but the flavour wasnt strong at all because of the veg goodness - onion, fennel, celery, cherry tomato, potato and a little pinch of saffron!!

sis' korean bibimbap - i helped with preparing the spinach, the chinese mushrooms and the bean sprouts! :)


-Korean bibimbap-

with the korean side dishes:


hope mummy had a happy mummy's day~ :)

Post #38

i have a soft spot for rice noodles. absolutely love it in all the diff asian cuisines. vietnamese pho - the silky smooth rice noodles in clear beef broth. cantonese stir fried rice noodles - with beef + bitter melon in a thick glossy black bean sauce. singaporean/malay char kway teow - the chilli and the wok heat. thai pad thai - the slightly chewy texture of the rice noodles as contrasted with the crunchy bean sprouts + chopped peanuts. LOVE all that!

i think we take advantage of these cheap eats. when it comes to cooking with rice noodles, its actually not that easy. i find it an absolute struggle to stir fry rice noodles and always end up with a plate of gluey stuff all stuck together =.=

hehe, so i've kinda given up on stir frying rice noodles, but a diff version thats so much easier to cook is to stir fry cheong fun (the rolled rice noodles)! the ones you see at yum cha:


-Stir fried cheong fun with beef + chinese cabbage-

because the rice noodles are rolled up, its so much easier to stir them around in the wok without breaking them. add dark soy to give it that nice dark colouring and plenty of soy sauce and salt for seasoning! in the end, stir in an egg and a large spoonful of xo sauce. YUM~!

Post #37

we have 2 ppl in the household both love sausages and potato mash. i'm not a big fan, but hey cooking is all about making the ppl you care about happy!! hehe, getting the goosebumps?! ;p

pan fried beef + cameralised onion sausages, potato + pea mash, onion sauce and a drizzle of black truffle oil:


-Bangers and mash-

Post #36

winter comfort food. one of my favourites is chinese radish or daikon because of its clean sweetness. perfect in hotpot and braised dishes, and in radish steamed cake as well of course!

a while ago i was looking for some radish in a korean grocery shop and all i could find were massive-sized green radish. and i thought... thats not daikon, thats green radish, the ones we use in red carrot and green radish soup! just that its... massive?! so i went to another grocery shop, also a korean one, but found the same thing =.= then i thought, thats not right. koreans eat loads of daikon!! pickled and in hotpot. so i bought one home, only to find that it IS a daikon! hehe, apparently the skins of the korean ones are green whilst the chinese ones are white :) taste wise, i think they are pretty much the same.


-Pork rib and chinese radish with black bean sauce-

Post #35

its been so so long since my last dessert post. you know... desserts arent the day-to-day absolute necessity :) *excuse excuse*

this is actually masterchef poh's recipe. well, partly anyway. i couldnt be bothered with the pretty chocolate ganache and the hazelnut topping.


-Orange chiffon cake with chantilly cream-

but at least i attempted to slice it up into 3 layers and applied the chantilly cream!! hehe, not v even layers tho....



and just whilst i was posting this, i revisited poh's recipe and oops... apparently i should have inverted the cake when it's still in the tin =.= err, i took the cake out right after it was baked and rested it on the rack to cool. he, no wonder it was a bit deflated... hm...

Post #34

there arent many variables to cooking veg chinese style. most often they are stir fried with garlic, which is nice and simple especially when you have the more flavoursome veg to work with, like gai lan, spinach, chinese mustard green (gai choy).

unlike some stronger flavoured veg, baby bok choy has a v subtle sweet flavour, and unless we have some really fresh and sweet produce (which we dont seem to find in an average asian grocery here), stir frying it with garlic is quite bland so i attempted to cook it with a little twist.


-Baby bok choy with ham in garlic milk broth-

Post #33

beetroot. an ingredient i only really started using recently. my past experience of tasting beetroot has been limited to the pickled canned beetroot that you find in burgers. and i used to have this horrible misconception about beetroot, even before i ever tasted it, and that is its shocking red wine juice would stain your skin forever... as i still have this vivid memory of my year 7 teacher showing up to class with bloody red stains on her fingers. and that was the first time i heard of beetroot.

actually, these earthy looking veg arent exactly unfriendly to work with. yes they do stain your fingers, but the stain normally comes off after a few scrub or a night of dishwashing (which makes me wonder how my year 7 teacher got her stains for so long... must have been LOTS of beetroots that she had to work with the night before...) they last v long in the fridge and apparently are rich in the nutrient betaine, which is important for cardiovascular health (in layman terms, its good for your heart and blood vessels).


-Pan fried lamb cutlets with beetroot, spinach + ricotta in a beetroot + balsamic glaze-

colours a bit shocking, but it was tasty, served with a sprinkle of mixed nuts to give it some crunch :)



if you've been following my posts, a bunch of beetroot (with 4 medium sized roots) was enough to make the veg risoni soup, the beetroot risotto and this lamb cutlets dish.