Squid & Prawns - The Perfect Seafood Combi

October 17, 2007 at 1:40 am · Filed under Recipes: Seafood

There are times where you just want to shop for a particular ingredient at the market, but ends up getting a whole lot more ingredients after some persistent persuasion by the stall uncles. So when I was buying the prawns, I couldn’t resist bringing some squids home.

I thought of making calamari but detest the idea of having to clean up the kitchen. A dual seafood combi stir-fry will be perfect. And I had better finish up the bottle of teriyaki sauce before it hits its expiry date. The end result is a simple and flavorful dish. I wish there was more rice. Haha..

Seafood tends to get cooked very fast, so try not to overcook them, as the flesh will get tough.

Stir-fry Squid & Prawns with Teriyaki Sauce
Serves 2

1 medium squid
6 prawns, medium-sized
1 tbsp teriyaki sauce
⅓ white onion, thickly sliced
3 chilli padi, sliced, seeds removed
1 tbsp soya sauce
½ tbsp hua teow wine
½ cooking oil
cornstarch water (for thickening gravy)

Preparing the prawns
Remove shells from the prawns. Butterfly them. To butterfly the prawns, turn each one on its back and, with the point of a sharp knife, make a cut down the centre of each prawn, but do not cut through. Pry open with your thumb like a book and remove the brownish-black vein, scraping it away with the point of the knife – it should also come away easily. Wash and pat them dry with kitchen towel.

Preparing the squid
Pull the head out. Remove the guts and soft bone. Peel the skin(thin purplish membrane). The skin should comes off easily as you pull them off. Cut open the body as it lays flat on the cutting board. At this stage, it might be visually gross because the squid ink will flow out. (You may reserve the squid ink, if you’re interested in making squid ink pasta. Lol)

Wash the squid thoroughly until it’s clean. Next, makes diagonal light cuts(do not cut through) on the squid, with each cuts 0.5cm apart. Then do the same in the opposite direction (intersecting with the previous cuts). This makes the squid looks nicer when cooked, as it will curled inwards and creating a nice pattern. I made mine too far apart, so it didn’t curled nicely. Wash and pat them dry with kitchen towel. Slice the squid into small pieces (approx. 4cm by 2cm).

However, if you prefer to have your squid rings, you do not need to cut open the body. Just slice them into rings. It’s just a different presentation.

1. Marinate prawns and squids with teriyaki sauce, soya sauce and hua teow wine for about 1 hour in the fridge.
2. To cook, heat pan with oil. Fry onions and chilli until the onions are slightly translucent.
3. Add in the prawns and squids, together with the marinade. Keep frying for about 2 to 3 mins.
4. Add the cornstarch water slowly while frying the prawns and squids. Approx. 2mins.
5. Once the gravy thickens, remove pan from heat.
6. Serve hot with rice.

Enjoy!

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Bacon & Cheese Muffins and Marshmallow Cake

October 13, 2007 at 10:46 pm · Filed under Bakes

A few months just after our first baking session of the year, we had the second one. This time, we have little Chevelle joining us. I had fun playing with her. I found it rather amusing that we were busy baking in the kitchen and she was in the living room stuffing her mouth full of potato chips. Haha…

As usual, we planned a list of goodies we wanted to bake and head to the supermarket to shop for the baking stuffs. We wanted to take it easy this time, so it’s just muffins and cakes. Since we made orange chocolate chip muffins in the first session, I suggested making savoury muffins instead. So we decided on Bacon and Cheese muffins. AC suggested that we make Marshmallow Cake. And I am glad we did. It was delicious!

Fret not, if you noticed that this savoury muffin recipe calls for more liquid than dry ingredients. It’s not the typical muffin batter where it’s lumpy. I learnt from Gina(Kitchen Capers Forum) that this one has less butter(fat) content and is healthier. Muffins that are made from lumpy batter have to be cooled to room temperature before you eat them. Whereas, muffins(like this one) made from watery batter, enjoy them fresh out from the oven. Once cooled, they don’t taste good. We were worried because the batter was so watery, and added more flour than required. I got the tips from Gina only after we did the muffins. The muffin texture didn’t turn out great, but taste wise, it’s not bad. Something different for a change from the usual sweet muffins.

You can start your day with some Bacon & Cheese Muffins and a glass of milk. I think it’s great for breakfast or tea. You can make some extra muffins and keep them in the freezer. When needed, just heat them up in the toaster.

The Marshmallow cake was buttery, moist and very tasty indeed. And the colourful marshmallows make the cake so pretty looking. Recipe is from AC’s cookbook, so I won’t be posting the recipe here.

I am glad our friendship is going on strong and I wish we could still do this often in our years to come.

Bacon & Cheese Muffins
Recipe Asia Cuisine, from Gina Choong (Kitchen Capers Forum)
Makes 12 muffins

375g self-raising flour
200ml milk
125g cheddar cheese, diced
8 pcs streaky bacon, cut into smaller pieces
60g butter, melted
1 egg
50g light brown sugar

1. In a mixing bowl, add butter and sugar to mix. Add egg and milk to mix together.
2. Add flour to fold in gently. Add diced cheese, stir to mix evenly.
3. Add bacon pieces on top of the batter.
4. Baked in preheated oven 180C for 20 minutes. Serve warm.

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Steamed Flower Crabs for Supper

September 22, 2007 at 12:52 am · Filed under Recipes: Seafood

I LOVE crabs, cooked in any style. Chilli, black pepper, steamed, deep fried and cold crabs. And I love the nice soft creamy roe even more. Argh… I feel like having some right now.

When I was much younger, mum used to cook chilli crabs at home. The crabs were bought live, killed in the bathroom, chopped up into pieces and cooked immediately. As we grew older, mum didn’t cook live crabs anymore. She probably couldn’t bring herself to kill them. I won’t want to kill the crabs alive, thus I won’t attempt to make any chilli crabs or whatsoever at home. So when I spotted small tiny flower crabs in the market, I brought home half a kg for just $2. Yes, it’s that cheap cos they were small and already dead at the market. The intention was to steam them after dinner as a light supper.

Steamed Flower Crabs with Ginger and Wine
9 small flower crabs
1 to 2 tbsp hua teow wine (花雕酒)
4 to 5 slices of ginger, cut in thin strips

Wash and scrub the flower crabs clean. Prepare the wok for steaming. Bring water to boil. Meanwhile, place half the amount of ginger strips on a plate big enough to hold all the crabs. Then lay the flower crabs on the plate. Add the remaining ginger strips on top. Drizzle hua teow wine all over the crabs. When the water has boiled, put the plate of crabs into the wok and cover. Steam for 10 to 12 mins.

Add a splash of hua teow when you are feeling luxurious. In fact, I use them a lot in my cooking these days. I add some when I marinate my meat, or to add a more intense flavor to my eggs or prawns. You may have seen recipes calling for shaoxing wine(绍兴酒), which is in fact hua teow. Some get confused about which to buy without realizing that they are actually the same wine. Hua teow comes from a place in China, called Shao Xing. That’s precisely why people terms hua teow as shaoxing wine too.

While the flower crabs are steaming, I just stood by the wok, smelling the natural seafood sweetness that filled the whole kitchen. I couldn’t wait to dig in! Haha..

These crabs have thin shell and are easy to break them apart. Although they are small, with only tiny bit of flesh, I still enjoyed eating them cos they tasted really sweet. Other than the above method, you can also fry the flower crabs with chilli, just like the usual chilli crabs. They can also be cooked in soup. But just by simple steaming is really good cos you can taste the natural sweetness of the flesh. When I buy them again the next time, I will get the bigger ones. I’m sure they will have more flesh.

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A week of Goodwood Park’s Durian Mousse Cake Goodness

September 20, 2007 at 1:37 am · Filed under Food Reviews

One shiok week of their durian mousse cake, my pants became tight. It’s not hard to see it coming. That’s the price to pay for finishing off the whole 1.3kg worth of durian mousse cake with B. But it was SO good. Every mouthful is heavenly full of the durian flesh.

I want to order their other durian delicacies next year. I bought a box of their durian puffs too. When I was there to collect the cake, the other durian products on display overwhelmed me. Sitting on the display shelf are the durian crumble, durian dar dar, durian wafer, durian pudding, durian crepe and the back-by-popular-demand durian pandan & coconut cake. I wanna grab a bite of each!

Goodwood Park’s durian delights really live up to its name. BUT their durian snowskin mooncake is so disappointing. It’s also ridiculously expensive, not worth buying. My sis bought them at the Mooncake Fair at Takashimaya. I wonder if you get better quality ones at the hotel itself.

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Sarpino’s Pizzeria – Pizzas for Couch Potatoes

September 19, 2007 at 4:49 pm · Filed under Food Reviews

There are evenings where you just want to sit back and relax. You surf the net, play games, eat and drink while watching your favorite tv programs. And there are days when you don’t feeling like cooking, not even instant noodles or takeaways. You just want to be a couch potato clad in your comfy pyjamas while having your dinner.

I think of pizzas whenever I’m in such a mood. So I surf around the net for some untried pizza joints instead of the usual Pizza Hut. I wanted to try out Rite Pizza reviewed by Camemberu but ordered mine from Sarpino’s instead after reading some nice reviews about them. Took their 1 for 1, but there are limited choices. Will try out the rest some other time.

It’s a pity that the pizza didn’t came piping hot. The cheese has already harden abit. Taste is not bad, and just the right amount of cheese. I kinda like the Sorento Delight, which is just mozzarella, tomatoes, roasted garlic and basil leaves. San Remo is not too bad topped with my favorite bell pepper and chicken chunks. B says the crust by the side is too hard. But I thought they were ok and still crispy to the bite.

The pictures are not very well taken under the warm lighting. We were too hungry and can’t wait to dig in. Hehe..

Overall, pretty satisfied, but still not quite since the pizza didn’t come hot. I like my melted mozzarella cheese. One more thing is they only give a pack of chilli flakes and parmesan each for one pizza, which is definitely not enough for me. If you do call for their pizza deliveries, do let me know your experience with them, yah?

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Watercress Soup for a Heaty Me

September 18, 2007 at 5:45 pm · Filed under Recipes: Soup

Feeling heaty? How about a bowl of hot piping watercress soup? Watercress Soup (西洋菜汤) is a cooling soup suitable for hot and dry months. It’s one of the soups I grew up with. And now I cook this quite often as watercress is easily available and is one of B’s favorite soups. Best of all, I can share the watercress with my syrian hamsters. Oh, and they like the red dates and wolfberries I add to the soup too.

Watercress is loaded with iron, calcium, folic acid, vitamins A & C. The westerners use watercress in their salads. So I thought they must have taste good raw. So while preparing food for my hamsters, I pick a stalk of leaves and stuff them into my mouth and munch. Eww.. it’s bitter and weird for my liking. I can take arugula(wild rocket), red coral leaves which are of peppery taste but not watercress. They probably taste better tossed with the right salad dressing. I guess I better not attempt to eat like my hamster. lol

Here’s a tip when using pork ribs for all your soups or dishes. You need to blanch them before hand for a good 5 to 10 mins. This will get rid of all the dirt and awful grey-colored foam which you will find floating on top of the water. Then you rinse the pork ribs before putting them into your soup.

If you do not like pork, you can replace them with chicken pieces with skin removed. Else the soup will be too oily with the chicken skin on. If you want to go meatless, then replace the water with chicken or vegetable stock. You may want to omit the salt then. And if you like your watercress crunchy like I do, follow the steps below. Else just throw in all the watercress in step 4.

Watercress Pork Rib Soup
Serves 2
Watercress (西洋菜), one bundle
800ml water
200 gm spareribs, rinsed and scalded with boiling water
½ tbsp dried wolfberries (枸杞)
6 dried red dates (红枣)
Salt to taste

1. Wash and rinse watercress, cut off the stems and separate them from the leaves.
2. Wash red dates and wolfberries.
3. Pour water into a pot and bring to boil.
4. Add red dates, wolfberries, pork ribs and watercress stems into the pot.
5. Simmer over low heat for about 30 to 40mins.
6. Add salt to taste
7. Before serving, add the remaining watercress into the soup for about 5 to 10 mins.
8. Serve hot with rice.

There will be MORE soup recipes coming up.

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My First Soufflé

September 14, 2007 at 12:50 pm · Filed under Recipes: Baking

Wow, you did your first soufflé?
Yes. I did.

So did you succeed?
No, I failed badly.

Why?
It did rise beautifully in the oven. Read some tips that I should never open the oven while it’s still baking. But it’s way past the amount of time it’s supposed to be baked and it’s still not golden brown on top. And there are some who said, I can check if it’s done when the toothpick/skewer came out clean. So, I OPENED the oven. And, the soufflé starts to sink. And it sank all the way down.

A soufflé (soo-flay) is a light, fluffy dish baked with egg yolks and beaten egg whites with other ingredients. It can be served as a savory dish or as a sweet dessert. Made from 2 basic components, a base that gives the flavor and beaten egg whites to introduce air into the soufflé so that it will rise. In French, soufflé means “to blow up” or loosely “puff up”.

The common ingredients used for a dessert soufflé are chocolate, lemon, Grand Marnier and a lot more if you are creative enough to come up with your own flavors. Mos Burger fans might notice that Mos Burger previous promotions on Green Tea Soufflé with red beans compote which I thought was pretty unique. Green tea flavored desserts pairs up so perfectly with red beans. There’s another flavor, which I can’t remember.

The savory soufflés are usually made up of cheese, spinach, bacon, onions.. etc. I’ve yet to taste one. But it will be perfect for a morning brekkie, in another form instead of the usual bacon and scramble eggs. And you probably needs a big bowl of this, because it will be so light that you hardly feel full if you were to eat just a small serving.

Traditionally, soufflés are baked in ramekins (the bowl I used in the photo) which has flat bottoms for the soufflé to rise properly. You can also use cups, but make sure they are ovenproof.

I’ve heard so much about how intimidating it is to get a soufflé to rise nicely. And also how the egg whites have to be whipped to the right consistency to get it work. The commonly tested flavor is the chocolate soufflé, which is rich and at the same time light and fluffy. I tasted my first soufflé at Bakerzin served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and I really like it. So when I come across the lemon soufflé recipe in Donna Hay magazine, I gave it a try.

Sorry to tempt you to looking forward (if you are) to this post which is actually a flop. I just want to note down the experience. But fret not, I will attempt to succeed in making the chocolate ones or maybe even the savory ones. Somehow, the base for this lemon soufflé recipe seems too little to be mixed with the egg whites. It’s supposed to yield 8 servings and all I could get was just 2 servings. And it didn’t call for egg yolks for the base. And it’s a little too sweet, you might want to reduce the amt of sugar but I don’t know if it will affect the end result. Will any experienced baker help me try out this recipe and let me know the outcome?

It’s a pity that I didn’t take a photo of them rising in the oven. All I get was 2 ‘deflated’ bowls of unappetizing soufflés. Haha…

Lemon soufflé
Donna Hay Magazine Issue 32
Makes 8 servings

Unsalted butter, melted for greasing
Caster (superfine) sugar for dusting
1 tbsp cornflour (cornstarch)
1 tbsp water
2 tbsp lemon juice
1/3 cup (72⅔g / 2½oz) caster (superfine) sugar
2 egg whites
2 tbsp caster (superfine) sugar, extra
icing (confectioner’s) sugar to serve

1. Lightly grease 8 x ½ cup (4 fl oz) capacity ceramic cups with butter and dust with sugar. Place the cups on a baking tray.
2. Combine the cornflour with the water, mix to a smooth paste and set aside. Place the lemon juice and sugar in a small saucepan over low heat and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Bring to the boil, add the cornflour mixture and cook, stirring continuously, for 1 minutes or until thickened. Set aside to cool completely.
3. Preheat the oven to 180ºC (355ºF). Place the eggwhites in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat until soft peaks form. Gradually add the extra sugar and beat until glossy. Place the lemon mixture in a large bowl and gently fold through the eggwhite mixture. Spoon into the cups and bake for 5 – 7 minutes or until risen and golden. Dust with icing sugar and serve immediately.

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Zesty Garlic Prawn Pasta

August 20, 2007 at 2:14 am · Filed under Recipes: Seafood, Recipes: Pasta

Lemon-flavored pasta? As promised, more pasta recipes. I was searching for a recipe for my garlic prawn pasta and it occurred to me that I ever saw recipes calling for lemon juice. I wonder if the pasta will turn out be a plate of salad instead. Curious and adventurous, I dared myself to try out the recipe I’ve found.

This yellow citrus fruit serves us wonders. Lemons are valued for their many uses in flavoring the food we eat, as a garnish, and for household purposes.

Selection
Choose lemons that are firm and have a bright yellow color. Avoid soft, wrinkled lemons with spots. One medium lemon has about 3 tablespoons of juice and 3 tablespoons of grated peel.

Storage
Store lemons at room temperature for about two weeks. They can keep for up to six weeks in a plastic bag in the refrigerator. Use lemons as quickly as possible after cutting.

Some Quick Tips

Bananas, bananas!

August 18, 2007 at 3:10 am · Filed under Recipes: Baking

My first experience in baking a real dessert was a banana cake. What I meant by real was because I tested out my oven using Betty Cocker’s chocolate cake and blueberry muffin premix. It’s still real baking, just that a premix definitely tastes good. And baking a cake from scratch is more experimental. Joanne from Kitchen Capers contributed this recipe. It seemed to get good raves from the many members who have tried the recipe, and foolproof was one of the words they use. Ah…. foolproof sounds good to me. This is the one cake that I’ve baked many times for the past year.

This is really one easy cake to bake. Simple and straightforward. You need ripe bananas to get a really fragrant banana cake. Ripe bananas are sweeter, thus you can reduce the amount of sugar as stated in the recipe by a quarter. Don’t get Del Monte bananas or any other similar ones. Use local bananas or what they call ‘pang jio’.

Result is a very moist and fluffy cake. The strong banana fragrance, its scent fills your whole home with a wonderful aroma. Banana Bliss!

Need some energy before you go for your workout? Suffers a diarrhea? Eat some bananas then. It’s low in calories, fat, sodium and is a good source of vitamin B6 and potassium. It’s easily a tropical fruit loved by many. My nieces love them to bits. They can’t see bananas hanging in the kitchen, they gotta eat it. LOL.

Banana Cake
Recipe adapted from Joanne in Kitchen Capers

1oz = 30grams

6oz butter
6 oz caster sugar
2 eggs, large
3 tbsp milk
3 large banana (riped, mashed)
8 oz plain flour
1tsp baking powder
1tsp bicarbonate soda

Preheat oven to 180°C. Grease a 8 x 8 inch square tin. Beat butter & sugar together using a mixer until creamy and smooth. Add eggs, one at a time until it’s well corporated. Add milk and banana, mix well. Sift flour, baking powder & bicarbonate soda and add to mixture. Pour batter into the tin and bake for 1 hour.

The oven duration really depends on the oven. My oven took only about 40 minutes, faster if I were to use fan-assisted mode. So set your timer earlier and test the cake by inserting a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out clean or with a bit of crumbs, it’s done. Else bake a while longer, but do keep track of the time. And if you use individual cupcake cases like me, the time needed is even shorter. Perhaps, 20 to 30 minutes.

For a variation, mix in a handful of chocolate chips into the cake batter before baking it in the oven. If you intend to add in chocolate chips, remember to reduce the amount of sugar before you cream with butter, cos you don’t want your cake too sweet. Yummy… chocolate and bananas goes hand in hand. Try it and let me know how it goes, yah?

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Mad about Donuts?

August 15, 2007 at 1:30 am · Filed under Food Reviews

No, I didn’t queue for the donuts.

There was once the bubble tea, the Roti boy and now the current food craze are donuts. I am not a fan of donuts even when Dunkin Donuts were still available at Far East Plaza. So there was never a craving for them. The crazy 2 hours queue for Donut Factory, I think it’s a waste of time.

A few weeks back, I went Batam with a group of friends with a purpose. Other than shopping, their main intention was to buy back dozens of J.Co Donuts. If you can’t beat them, join them! LOL. It was rumored that the texture of the donuts to be quite close to Krispy Kreme and better than Donut Factory. Well, I’ve never had any from Donut Factory or Krispy Kreme, so I can’t give any comparison.

J.Co Donuts have quite a variety of choices. We stood in front of the trays and trays of mouth-watering donuts. So irresistible! The donuts were really glossy-looking. And they seems to be calling out to us. “Buy me, buy me..”, haha… J.Co Donuts & Coffee is a nice and cosy café where you can have your donuts with coffee and hot chocolate. We could have each bought a different flavor of donuts and have them with the coffee, and then decide which are the better ones to buy home. But instead, we were lured over to A&W for their root beer with ice-cream and waffles. It’s a pity they ran out of curly fries that day.

Verdict: The donuts were generally quite nice, soft and fluffy. On the downside, our throats didn’t feel too good after eating the donuts. They must have used the oil for too long. I bought a dozen home with mainly the chocolate and double chocolate ones. I love chocolate! Their tiramisu and glazzy ones are pretty good. Cheese Me Up looks good but didn’t taste fantastic. I was really disappointed after trying out Copa Banana cos there is no trace of bananas and the banana taste is too mild. I love this combination, chocolate and bananas. Mango Blitz was sweet(artificial mango flavoring I guess), however it tastes like mango pudding to me. The donuts tasted quite good straight out from the fridge. The cream in the donuts tasted like ice cream. The best thing is, the queue is very short. I waited probably 2 minutes for my turn?

Have your tried Summerhouse donuts? They started selling donuts at Burlington Square way before Donut Factory was opened. I missed their savory ones. Hope they bring them back soon. Their cream cheese donuts are pretty good too.

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