Quick and Easy Black Sesame Paste

Black sesame is said to be good for keeping hair dark and glossy and preventing the growth of white hairs. Once again..the chinese and our penchant for associating like-coloured foods to supposed health benefits...

But i was surprised not to find a recipe on my favourite Asian food blogs....

After some tweaking and experimenting, ta-dah!!! Quick and easy black sesame paste!!! (U do need a food processor or blender though...)

ingredients for 2:
1/2 cup cooked rice
1/4 grounded black sesame seeds (i bought mine in a packet but you can also get whole black sesame seeds and toast them slightly)
2 tbs sugar
1 to 2 cups boiling water (more or less depending on your preference)

directions:
Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan.
Blend with hand blender or food processer til smooth.
Bring to the boil and stir constantly to prevent burning/ sticking.
Serve warm.

Kung Po Chicken

Ingredients:
Chicken 500g, cubed
15 dried chilli (originally recipe called for 30!!)
2 garlic clove, sliced
10 slices ginger
2 stalks spring onions, cut into 1 inch lengths
1 tsp sichuan pepper corns
1/2 cup toasted cashews
optional:
1 red capsicum, sliced
1 green capsicum, sliced

Marinade:
Season the chicken with 2 tsp light soya sauce, 2 tsp cornflour, 1 egg white.
Stir well and marinate for at least 20 mins.

Gravy:

3 tbsp Chinese cooking wine 

3 tbsp sugar 

2 tbsp black vinegar 

2 tbsp water 

1 1/2 tbsp light soya sauce
1 1/2 tbsp black soya sauce

1/2 tbsp sesame oil 

1/2 tbsp cornflour 

stir well to combine

Method:
Heat pan and add 2 tbsp oil. When it's hot, add chillies and fry til they are black and smoking. (warning: the smoke will make you cough and choke!!)
Toss in garlic, ginger and peppercorns and fry for 1-2 mins.
Add chicken and fry til 90% cooked.
Add capsicum and gravy and stir fry til chicken is cooked (when you can cut through the meat quite easily).
Add spring onion and nuts and stir through.
Serve with rice.

comments: this is the definitative dish to cure any pangs of homesickness...for me at least! Love love it!!!! Essential ingredients: sichuan peppercorns, dried chillies, spring onions and cashews. Without any of these, the dish seems incomplete...perhaps it's just cos that's the way my uncles cooked it...my mom's three brothers all had their own zi char stalls..strange that i never thought of asking my uncles for any cooking tips...til now! hmmmm...

Wanton Mee!

yes i have been MIA for at least a month
But i have been cooking! Just that i am getting lazier -x And i dont take pretty pics at all so abit shy to put them up at times!

Cooked wanton mee the other night
Simple.

Wanton fillings
500g chicken minced
4-5 TBSP soy sauce
1 TBSP seaseme
1 egg
1 TBSP soy sauce
A dash of salt
1 can of water chestnut, chopped finely
1 carrot, chopped finely too

mixed them and leave them overnight in the fridge, Buy the wanton skin from chinatown 60 pieces for $1.50.

You can fry them or boil them, did both!

Noodles, i used 'mee-kia' or thin noodles.
Sauce:
Oyster sauce and seaseme oil, abit soy sauce. Add as much as you want, until you are satisfied cos that is what i did

Add veggies of cos!

Green Tea Muah Chee

recipe modified from here

Ingredients:
250g glutinous rice flour
350ml water
4 tbsp shallot oil

Green tea peanut mixture
Ingredients:
250g toasted peanuts, grounded into a fine powder (some bigger pieces are fine)
2 tsp green tea/ matcha powder
50g caster sugar
2 tb toasted white sesame seed

Method:
1. Prepare peanut mixture by combining all the ingredients. Set aside.
2. Mix glutinous rice flour, water and 2 tbsp of shallot oil together to form a smooth batter.
3. Grease a microwavable container with the remaining oil and pour batter into it.
4. Cover with lid and microwave on high for 2 minutes. Remove from microwave, stir the semi-cooked dough briskly in one direction. Return dough to microwave and High for 1 minute. Remove, stir and return to the microwave high for 30 seconds. Repeat this method twice or until it is cooked.
5.Using a pair of scissors, cut cooked dough into small pieces and toss it into the green tea peanut mixture.
6. Serve and sprinkle more peanut mixture as desired.

Comments:
Last year, Sik Yin n i tried to make muah chee using the steaming method and we wasted took more than 2 hours...
using the microwave, the whole process takes less than 15 minutes, including the preparation of the shallot oil!! Fantastic isn't it!! And we didn't even have to 'pound' the dough....yeah....traditionally muah chee is not served with green tea but it is a nice twist...so you can omit the green tea powder if you can't find it. :)

ginko barley beancurd dessert

ingredients:
100g barley
100g beancurd sheets (the neatly folded variety; the scrunched-up looking ones are for savoury dishes)
125g gingko nuts (can be less...depends on personal perference)
4 pandan leaves, rinsed and tied into a knot
2.5L hot water
1 Egg

method:
Soak beancurd sheets in cold water for about 5 minutes/ til soft.
Rinse barley and put into a slow cooker. Add hot water, pandan leaves and beancurd sheets.
Cook on high for 2 hours. (If using the stovetop, simmer for the same amount of time.)
Add ginko nuts and sugar.
Separate the egg yolk and egg white and slightly beat both. Add egg yolk first and allow the soup to become cloudy before adding the egg white. Swirl the soup in one direction so that you get 'egg flowers'/ strips of egg white.
Serve hot or chilled.

comments: The ginko nuts were abit bitter so i boiled them in a sugar syrup beforehand. I like my ginko barley thick and flavourful...the fragrance of the pandan needs to be pronounced and the soup should taste similar to soy milk...
I just realised today that when i cook, I'd usually replicate the best memory of that particular dish and try my best to make it taste like 'it should be'..do you do the same?? :) I believe it's called "the education of the palate" or something...hmm..

Asian Carrot Cake aka Chai Tow Kueh!

If you mentioned 'carrot cake' to a Singaporean or Malaysian, chances are that we'd think immediately of the savoury version with lots of egg and oil instead of the sweet nutty version so loved by Americans.

After making it today, i wondered how it was first invented. It never fazes me how complicated/ time consuming Asian cooking is!! First, you've got to grate the carrot (raddish, but in Mandarin, it's called 'white carrot'), then you've got to fry it til tender, mix it into a rice flour water mixture, steam for an hour, cool for 1.5 hours and then leave it in the fridge for at least 8 hours! And that is only half the job...then you've still got to stir fry it in a copious amount of oil and egg for around 10 more minutes and in the process, infuse your home with oily fumes. (I really do feel sorry for my housemates sometimes!)

Ok! No more whinning! The result is relatively authentic i think...though I'd follow the recipe more closely the next time (if there is a next time! I only cooked chai tow kueh today cos I had half a daikon i had to finish before leaving for placement tomorrow!) and stir fry it for at least 8 minutes..I was impatient and remembering the hawkers back home, I thought that it can be cooked in a jiffy! (Most probably, the hawkers have already stir-fried the carrot cake once through, that's why they take a much shorter time! Thanks Peter for the tip!)
Most pieces came out a tad too chewy but on the whole, was still acceptable! Oh...and I think it is not advisable to cut back on the oil....otherwise, it won't be crispy or fragrant enough....Eat this only occasionally ok!!

Got the recipe from Epicurious.

PS: Actually I like the 'white' carrot cake much better...if you've got a good recipe for that, please share with me!! Thanks!

Bean curd ala shark's fin!!

ingredients:
silken tofu 1 pack
crab meat, fresh or canned, 170 g
oil 2 tbsp
1 onion, finely chopped
1 tsp ginger, finely chopped
1/2 cup chicken or fish stock (can replace with the liquid from the canned crab)
dash of pepper
dash of sesame oil
2 tbsp corn flour mixed with 4 tbsp cold water
chopped coriander leaves
chopped spring onion

method:
drain and flake crab to remove any bony tissue. Reserve liquid if using.
heat the oil in a small pan and gently fry onions and ginger for a minute or so, stirring, until ginger starts to turn golden and onions are softened. Add stock and crab meat and heat through.
Season with pepper and add cornflour mixture.
Stir over medium heat until sauce boils and thickens. Add tofu, spoon sauce over and heat until just it is to come to a boil.
Taste and add salt if necessary. Add dash of sesame oil, top with coriander and spring onions.
Serve with rice.

slightly modified from Charmine Solomon's Chinese Cookbook

comments: this tastes like sharkfins!!! ha....just the sauce..cos of the starch and crab meat....!!
Very easy and yummy...oh and do not substitute the crab meat with crab sticks, flavours are too different.....i got my can from Coles...new product apparently. :)

Steamboat

Nemo's 'pork-squid fire meat' (in the pot)..that's a direct translation from Korean...marbled pork and squid with onions, scallions in a spicy bean paste sauce...and chinese styled baked chicken wings


the steamboat .. we had chicken, beef, fish paste, deep fried yam, 4 types of mushrooms, assorted vegetables and noodles..


towards the end...looks really green and healthy with so much vegetables yar??


Steam boat ingredients for 10- 12
$8-10 each

Meats/ protein
Chicken thigh fillet 600g
Beef fillet 600g
Fish (lean white fish) fillet 400g
Squid balls 1 pack
Eggs 1 dozen

Vegetables
Chinese tofu 1 box
Fried dried beancurd 1 pack
Straw mushrooms 1 can
Enoki mushrooms 1 can
Swiss brown mushrooms 300g
Chinese cabbage half
Wong bok 1 bunch
Tong cai 1 bunch
Spinach 1 bunch
White fungus 1 packet
Yam 500 g, cubed and deep fried
Beancurd sticks 1 pack
Sweet corn 4, cut into smaller pieces
tomato 4, cut into wedges

Noodles
Hokkien noodles, tang hoon 500g
or mee hoon etc

Stock
Chicken bones 2-4
4 slices fresh ginger
2 scallions, cut into 1 1/2-inch lengths
Salt and pepper, to taste

method: blanch chicken bones twice and then add cold water. I used a 5 liter pot and threw in the rest of the ingredients and simmered for 8 hours.

Garlic and ginger paste (to divide equally btw the chicken n beef)
• 10 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1/2 cup roughly chopped ginger

Chicken marinade
• 1 tablespoon oyster sauce
• 1 tablespoon Shao Hsing wine
• 1 teaspoon light soy sauce
• dash of sesame oil
Beef marinade
• 2 tablespoons char siu sauce
• 1 tablespoon Shao Hsing wine
• 1 teaspoon Sichuan pepper (heated in pan until aromatic n crushed) and salt
• dash of sesame oil
Fish marinade
• 2 tablespoons finely sliced coriander stalks and roots
• 1 tablespoon peanut oil
• 2 teaspoons sea salt
• 1 teaspoon white sugar

Ideas for dipping sauces

Hosin sauce: Combine 1 teaspoon hoisin sauce, 1 tablespoon tomato ketchup, 1/4 teaspoon vinegar, 1/2 teaspoon sugar and 1/2 teaspoon soy sauce.

Sweet thai chilli sauce: 2 tbs sweet thai chilli sauce, 1 tsp lemon juice, 1 tsp sugar, 1 tbs fish sauce, 2 tbs water, 1 tsp chopped coriander. Mix well.

The mariandes and hoisin dipping sauce were from here.

comments:
steamboats are great for cold nights and they're meant to be long noisy affairs, best enjoyed with friends who have huge appetites!! :P We used a electric steamboat but you can also use a slowcooker or ricecooker, just make sure the stock is boiling hot when you pour it in..
Ingredients are extremely versatile as well..you can use almost anything you like...just keep in mind different colours and textures.. :) oh...and cook the meats first then vegetables..so that the stock becomes 'sweeter'..