Post #157

ok, I think its kinda about time for a western food post. tho I must admit that ive been rather slack nowadays I've really only been cooking chinese food for dinner. a stir fry is always quicker to whack up than anything else. love my chinese heritage. hehe.

this is not by any means any extravagant candle light western cuisine. i've stuck with the quick-to-whack-up theme and made pasta and salad. recently i found some lovely handmade fresh pasta selling at coles, and i couldn’t resist the temptation. i've always wanted to make my own pasta knowing that it would taste a million miles better than the dry packet ones. but the thought of investing another piece of kitchenware and the image of hubbys face when flour is dusted all over the kitchen pulled me back to crude reality. yes, to the extent that i would rather pick up the packet of expensive handmade fresh pasta and dump it in my shopping basket, with no regrets. this one leek and herbed spaghettini!!!

in order to bring out the pasta i kept the sauce as simple as can be. i've decided to cook it with fish, lemon and a touch of cream. so so simple but tasty!! to cook the sauce, i started the pan with finely chopped onion, leek and garlic, sautee and then add a splash of stock and some chopped chilli. place the piece of cod in the broth, then add seasoning, lemon zest and lemon juice. close the lid and let it simmer till the fish is just cooked. then add a dash of fresh cream in, let it bring to the boil again and the sauce is done. meanwhile, cook the pasta in a separate pot. great thing about fresh pasta is they only take 2 minutes to cook!! scoop the al dente pasta across to the sauce, add a sprinkle of chopped mint and toss to combine. DONE!!


-creamy lemon fresh spaghettini with cod-

fresh pasta has an indescribably lovely texture ~ much spring-ier (but not chewy) and velvet-ier than its dry counterparts!!! considering a plate of pasta served in a restaurant would cost more than $20 at the minimum and chances are they also use dry pasta, this is actually not bad for value, as one packet renders 2 servings!!

and to go with the pasta, I also made a salad - yes hell we are healthy!! hahaha… i picked up 2 pomegranates the other day because they were discounted. and i made a chopped cucumber, pomegranate, olive, almond and mint salad with a lemon and balsamic vinaigrette. pome bursts!!!!


-chopped cucumber, olive, almond + mint salad with pomegranate-

Post #156

when our friend suggested that we have hotpot at her place on the labour day public holiday, my mind for some bizarre reason wondered off to wonton and dumpling land. i never ever really had to make wontons or dumplings from scratch because my mum is literally a wonton/dumpling-machine *no kidding* and our fridge rarely falls short of wonton/dumpling supplies. i would only help mum out on the odd occasions, making a batch or two when mum's mass producing them. anyways, i'll save the wonton/dumplings for another post.

reason why i raised this topic is because i had to make wonton n dumplings, i had to buy some pork mince. and i have never bought any meat in any sort of large scale (and yes, 1kg of pure meat with no bone is considered large scale in my household). my method of "measuring" anything that uses the concept of grams or kilograms has always been descriptions of "numbers" (if the item can be counted, e.g. 8 prawns) or "handful" or "scoop" or "half" or "quarter" (if the item cannot be counted). so after i asked for 1 kg of pork mince and saw the huge pile of meat that got shoved into the plastic bag, i thought i should have stuck with 2 handfuls...

so what i'm trying to get at is that i had too much leftover mince, and hubby asked if i could make this well-known shanghai-nese dish called 獅子頭 (lion head meatballs). hubby for once came up with a sensible food idea!!


-獅子頭 *lion head meatballs*-

this was my first attempt. i found from googling that they come in 2 forms - in soup or braised in thick sauce. hubby prefers the latter. and there's this variation i found on the net that i particularly wanted to try with the mince mix -combining pork mince (i used 80% lean and 20% fatty), finely diced onion, chopped shallot, grated ginger, some tofu, corn flour, n the basic seasoning. then grab a small handful of mixture (about size of an egg) and dab it repeatedly from the palm of your right hand to the left - apparently this gets rid of the air in the meat mixture. pop them in the pan one after another to sear the outside till golden. you can achieve better looking balls with perfect round shape and golden coating by deep frying them. then pour in some water, cover the lid and let them bubble away for a few minutes. then surround the balls with bok choy and let it simmer for a bit more, adding seasoning and a bit of oyster sauce and soy sauce. when the balls are cooked through and the veg are cooked, round it off with some corn starch water to make a thick sauce and its done!!

the tofu adds a good softness to the balls. this helps especially when the there's protionately less fatty mince used. and best to chop the onions really small! great alternative to italian meatballs!! :)

Post #155

i've got these beautifully thick pork chop sitting in the freezer for long enough. only reason why they've been abandoned in there is because they're not the easiest piece of meat to play with. and they are so big and thick... it kinda puts you off. but once you're gutsy enough to take them out of the freezer, you dont really have a choice, but to deal with it... hehe.

and with some leftover dishes that need to be also consumed tonight, i couldnt just pan fry the big pieces of meat with a side salad and call it dinner. so i decided to chop them up into smaller pieces and asian-ise it!


-lemon pork chop-

i've never tried this sauce on pork chop... it has always been a friend of chicken wings, but it worked wonderfully well with pork chop too :) and i must say, producing less fat in the sauce as well!! i was a bit worried that the pork will turn out tough as they're so thick! but afterall, they ARE beautiful pieces of meat, they were still tender and juicy.

will definitely make again.

Post #154

its been a few months since my last post, and in all seriousness it was due to diff things that happened - theres good news and also bad news, but be it good or bad, i feel that we've grown to be that little stronger.

and life goes on. so does the cooking.

i'm not sure why, but chinese food seems to be dominating our home dinner menu lately. thing with chinese food is, they are so easy and quick to whack up, fantastical!!


-hoi tong tofu *海棠豆腐*-

my take of this dish which can be found in menus of all chinese restaurants!! steamed egg white custard topped with a bed of diced tofu, prawn, crab sticks and sugar snap peas in a light xo glossy thick sauce. feels like having 2 dishes combined in one, but absolutely delish~!

see the 2 layers! tho it was kinda like topping overload...

Post #153

hubby's mum gave us some beautiful beef steaks. i'm not sure what cut it is, but its got a great beefy flavour and despite overcooking it slightly *my bad :(* it was still v tender n delicious! now, this must be good beef!! hahaha. *whack on the head for overcooking again!!*

but i cooked some lovely veg and made a beee-u-tiful salsa verde *see i watch too much masterchef..* so hope i'm forgiven for overcooking the beef...


-Beef steak with kipfler potatoes, carrots, asparagus + parsley salsa verde-

the potatoes and carrots i simply boiled them with salt. after pan frying the steak with the asparagus, i whacked in the potatoes and carrots so that the veg could scrap off the oily steak juices, whilst the meat is resting - this picks up great flavours and cleans the pan for you at the same time!! ;p

with the salsa verde, i used parsley. and it was the most refreshing sauce you could get!

along with the steak, i also cooked a quick butter bean soup.


-Butter bean soup-

Post #152

is it me or what? this year's winter has been sooo cold, and by far colder than last year *although i tend to complain about the cold when its cold, and about the heat when its hot* when its hot, i'd say its probably better to be cold... at least you can put more layers on. but the reality is. no matter how many layers you put on, theres always flesh here and there thats exposed to the cold air. im yet waiting for some genius to invent a fashionable headwear that covers the entire face but without making the wearer looks like a bank robber...

now back to food. it goes without saying that it must be something that brings warmth and heartiness to the freezing soul. thank you to my wonderful wonderful mum. she saves me the worlds trouble for preparing this ingredient that i always love. chestnut. somehow i associate it with winter. a big pot of braised meat with chestnut, its just a v homely thing to me. let alone a whole box of big fresh ones peeled and ready!! the frozen stuff just cant compare. luv u mum!!


-Braised chicken wings with chestnut + chinese mushrooms-

the cooking part is effortless compared to peeling those chestnut. hehe, simply brown the wings, then chuck in some spanish onions, then the chestnuts and the chinese mushrooms, and let it braise. dead simple but soooo delicious.

Post #151

just came back from our little holiday break. am currently battling against the 180 degrees change from sweat. heat. humidity. to freezi-cold. rain. dark cloud. miserableness. brrrrrrrr....

was going to post what i cooked tonight - a quick fix "braised" dish perfect for a chilling cold rainy winter weeknight. but i'll save that for the next post.

as promised, the belated dessert for mums day.


-Serradura-



this is a classic portuguese dessert i first tried in macau. serradura's more widely known as sawdust pudding because of the grounded biscuits that go between the layers of cream. this is one dessert for which i have a love-hate relationship with *if you could have any form of relationship with a dessert, that is...* with the world's simplest ingredients, being pretty much just condensed milk, cream and grounded biscuits, this dessert is the worst layering nightmare! why?! because cream does not stick to a powdered biscuit surface. so understandably, the versions commonly seen have v thick layers of cream. but being a bit of a layer freak, i ended up with quite a number of layers *which took about 2 hours of intense layering* with continuous curses and jinxes flying out every few seconds.

as painful as it is, this is undoubtedly a lovely dessert. lovely in its simpicity in taste. and not a bad way to express my thank u to the mums!