Stirred Fry Cassava Leaves with Silver Fish

I made the almost the same dish before with anchovies, so this is the rather healthier version of it. Healthier in the sense of less sodium used and I change the recipe slightly.

What you need:
100gr Cassava leaves - blanched for 5-6 minute and sliced
150gr silver fish
5 cloves garlic
5 cloves shallot
1 green chili - seeded, thinly sliced
2 tsp chili oil

How to:
1. On a chopper, add in garlic and shallot and chop until they form into paste
2. On a wok, saute the chopped garlic and shallot with chili oil until fragrant
3. Add on Cassava leaves and cook it until the leaves become softer, add water necessarily
4. Add on silver fish and cook until fish well done
5. Add on salt to your taste

Enjoy!

Another Version of Bistik

No doubt Bistik is one of my fave home cooked dishes in any forms. This time I sort of combine the pork chop recipe and my regular bistik. And this is the result, yey!

What you need:
350 gr lean meat, sliced about 3mm thin - I use pork but you can also use lean beef
3 small potatoes - cut cubes
1 pack sweet peas - slit the sides
Sauce: 
1 onion - thinly sliced
1 red chili - seeded and thinly sliced
Seasoning: sweet soy sauce (kecap bango), chili oil, Worchestire sauce, sake, soy sauce, pepper

How to:
1. 1 day before, marinate the sliced meat with sweet soy sauce, worchestire sauce and pepper
2. On a wok, put bit of oil and pan fry the potatoes until the sides browned, then add some water, close the lid for about 3-5 minutes. Then add sweet peas and bit more water, close the lid again until sweet peas are soft enough.
3. Cook the meat just like you cook the meat for yakiniku. The meat is thin enough so that it can be cooked fast. Once done, don't throw the marinate sauce because we're going to use it for making the sauce.
3. To make the sauce, on a wok, saute onion and red chili with chili oil. Once onion and chili are soft, add on  the marinate sauce and the rest of the ingredients. Cook until the sauce slightly thickened.

Well, I also made my own chili oil, very easy to make and cheap too.

What you need:
1 pack of chili padi, cut the tip
6 tbsp oil (I use grapeseed oil) -- You can add more oil, but I like the cooked chili more than the oil, and the lesser you put, the more concentrated it taste, so you don't need to use a lot in future.

How to:
1. Put the chili into chopper and chop away until the chili breakdown to really small pieces (I like it to be as smooth as possible)
2. On a wok, heat up oil and cook the chili until the chili fragrant is out. By now you should see the oil turn into red color.
3. Keep the chili oil in a jar. I'd prefer to store this in the fridge so that it can last longer.

Enjoy!

Mun Tahu... My Version

I've never made Mun Tahu before, it's always Mapo Tofu (with House's ready to use sauce), so I resolve to the Internet for the recipes... and boy how disappointing the recipes are. As far as I'm concerned, Mun Tahu is sort of the white color version of Mapo Tofu, so why I find recipes with oyster sauce in it? And I'd expect to find recipe which actually uses pork, but that didn't even come close, the whitest meat they use is chicken... ... ... OK, scrap all of them, I'm making my own version, which at least close to what I'd imagine...

What you need:
300 gr minced pork
1 pack silken tofu (I use organic tofu, easier to eat)
1 red chili, seeded and thinly sliced (optional, I use it just for the color)
5 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 small pc ginger, finely chopped
1/4 leek, julienned
100ml stock (I use dashi stock, chicken stock is OK too)
seasoning: mirin, salt, pepper

How to:
1. On a wok, saute garlic, ginger and chili until fragrant
2. Add on pork, use spatula to break down the meat to small pieces, cook until well done, add on mirin so that the meat won't turn out too dry
3. Add on tofu, and leek. Use spatula, break the tofu per your liking
4. Season it with salt and pepper and it's done

Point:
1. Ginger eliminate the porky smell
2. If you like the meat to be softer, on a bowl, mix the meat with about 10gr of maizena
3. You can substitute the leek with spring onion (they add color too)

Enjoy!

Poached Pear

Finally! I made the poached pear again after so many years... This time it's with white wine. I used a Chardonnay because I like it better than Sauvignon Blanc and it's cheaper than Port wine, yeah, I'm those type who doesn't really splurge on wine, and it's for cooking, not for drinking...

Beautiful isn't it? Such an eye candy without any garnish... perfect with ice cream...

What you need:

1 pack of pear (I use the small pears, 1 box has about 8 pieces)

1 bottle of white wine

25-30 gr sugar

How to:

1. Peel the pear skin

2. Arrange the pears standing in the sauce pan and pour in the wine and sugar

3. Boil for about 1 hour on low fire or until the wine reduce by half

Points:

1. Regular recipe would state about 150gr of sugar. I find it too sweet especially if your pear is already sweet to begin with.

2. If you cut the pear into pieces not poaching them in whole, you'll need to use lesser wine because cooking time can be cut tremendously.

3. The benefit of leaving the stem aside for aesthetic function is because you can lift them around by just holding on to that stem. Mine didn't break at all when I move them around.

Enjoy! 

French Toast

I'm feeling like having a French Toast, and been itching to try this recipe from the Japanese variety show that I watched some time ago. It's simple, cheap to make (especially if you already have jam in your fridge), and the most important, it's rich, filling and melt in your mouth! 

What you need:
1 Baguette - cut diagonally with about 3cm thick, 1 Baguette can make about 4-5 servings
For custard bath:
250 gr milk
2 no egg
20 gr sugar
Butter for frying
For sauce:
50 gr strawberry jam
2 tbsp Balsamic vinegar (use the regular tablespoon, not the measuring spoon)
8-10 piece of mint leaves, chopped

How to:
1. Whisk custard bath ingredients until well mixed on a rectangular shaped container. This is easier for you to later dip the baguette.
2. When you dip the baguette pieces, press the side so that the liquid penetrate the whole piece quickly. But, don't leave it for too long, or it'll get soggy.
3. If your pan is a tefal based one, then you don't need butter to pan fried the french toast under low to medium fire. But using butter will add to the richness though, so it's your choice. Remember, control your fire, else your french toast will be burnt, fast.
4. Make the sauce by mixing all the sauce ingredients in a small bowl.
5. Assemble: place the French toast whenever you like in your plate, glaze them with the sauce, and dig in!


Enjoy!

My First Mochi

When you want to do an experiment, Daisho is the good place to go, they have the packs of mochi mix, dango mix and other Japanese sweets ingredients and they're all at 2SGD. So, it won't really hurt if you fail LOL...

So, how does it fare? For first try, I think it's not bad, it's not as elastic as the usual mochi (because I didn't put lots of oil) but it's quite soft which is quite important because I won't eat them if they're hard to eat. It'll be more delicious if I use the home made red bean paste (made that before, it's a labor of love, sob)

What you need:
230 gr non glutenous rice flour
200 ml warm water
100 ml oil - set aside
100 gr red bean paste
100 gr soya powder

How to:
1. In a bowl, combine flour and water, mic with hand until well combined and you can tear the dough
2. Tear the dough to big balls and place them on damp cloth, cover them and steam for 20-25 minutes
3. Take out the dough along with the cloth and start knead them and tap some oil to make it easier to handle.  If you happen to have the big pounding stone bowl (along with the pounder), then you can use that, but I find that kneading do the job faster for making small batch. Keep kneading until dough become smooth and quite shiny.
4. Tear small piece of the dough, with small roller (if you have, if not big one also can do) roll it flat. Take 1 tsp of red been paste, place it on center then seal the dough and make it into a ball. Roll the ball into the soya powder until throughly cover. Repeat the process

It's not difficult to make, but you have to deal with hot water, and hot dough :)

What I want to try now is eat this with ice cream hehehe...

Egg Benedict

This weekend brunch menu is Egg Bennedict. I took the recipe straight from the Japanese variety show. And here's the result. Now I know what impact can Vegemite (that weird taste spread) make into your Hollandaise sauce. It gives a soft cheesy salty bite to the sauce. Nice for salad dressing too. 

Recipe makes for 2 portion

What you need:
2 eggs - Poached
1 English biscuit - halved, toasted with butter
1 thick slice of ham - grilled
Water cress
Hollandaise sauce:
2 big egg yolks
30 cc white wine
125 gr butter - melted, still hot
15 cc lemon juice
Seasoning: Salt, White pepper, Vegemite

How to:

1. On a stainless steel bowl, whisk egg yolk and wine until light, use bain marie to get to sabayon form.

2. Once reach the sabayon form, add on butter, keep whisking, until reach a similar to slightly thinner than mayonnaise consistency

3. Add the rest of ingredients and whisk until well mix and set aside the Hollandaise sauce

4. For poached egg, on a medium size pan, heat water to about 90C (not boiling). *For cheaters like me: add on vinegar, it'll make the egg easier to stick together* Add in the egg, and with spoon stir to 1 direction SLOWLY until the egg white fully formed and the yolk are covered with egg white. Using small strainer, take it up. Repeat the process.

5. Assemble: English biscuit - Ham - Greenies (I use mixed greens) - Poached egg - Hollandaise sauce

Cheats:

I failed on the Hollandaise sauce because it's too watery (greedy, add too much wine and my sabayon can't get thickened). So, I cheat! I quote what the chef said in the show, 'Hollandaise sauce is a warmed mayonnaise.' Get the picture? You're right! So this is what I did:

What you need:

100 gr mayonnaise

5-7 gr white wine (basically just a splash)

splash of lemon juice

Seasoning: Salt, White pepper, Vegimite

How to:

1. Heat up mayonnaise in microwave for about 15 sec (just hot enough will do)

2. Add on white wine, whisk until airy

3. Add on the rest of ingredients and keep on whisking until all well mixed and light airy, and you're done! Save all the washing, and you can keep the left over!!! :d :d.

Points: If you use Kewpie mayo, you'll still can taste Kewpie unique mayo flavor, so it'll be a little bit different from original recipe, but if you use the generic brand, you should get the same taste. Why? Because basically mayonnaise is egg yolk and oil whisked *insert troll face, LOL*

Enjoy!