Pork Balls Soba Noodle

When my husband was away for a business trip, I cooked something easy for lunch. I had minced some pork and decided to make pork balls with it. Then, I just boiled the soba noodle until cooked and set aside. Boiled another pot of water to make the soup for this noodle. When the water was boiling, added the marinated pork balls, boiled until the pork balls were cooked. Added in the bok choy and seasonings for the soup such as soy sauce, sesame oil, chicken stock granules, salt and a little dark soy sauce. I added some cripy fried shallots too.



Served the noodle in a bowl, added in the soup with pork balls and bok choy. Later cut some Japanese seaweed (for sushi roll) and place it on top of the soup. It was special with the added seaweed as it brought another flavor into the noodle. Easy to prepare and nutritious too! I ate mine with spicy chili in oil with soy sauce as a dipping sauce, shiok lah!

Now, I would love to share this dish with Presto Pasta Night, an event created by Ruth from Once Upon a Feast. This week host is Amy of Very Culinary , do go and check out her round up on Friday!

And I am also submitting my recipe to the Original Recipe event hosted by Lore at Culinarty. Check out others' recipes around the week of 15th.

Stir Fried Thin Spaghetti with Spam

Do you loved luncheon meat? We do as we grew up eating pan-fried luncheon meat. My mom used to pan-fried slices of luncheon meat, some sunny side up eggs and toasted bread for us to have as lunch. It was really a treat then because instead of the usual rice and dishes, we got to eat western food and with ketchup. As a kid, I was really looking forward to it. Now that I am older, I only buy SPAM luncheon meat, no more luncheon meat made in China for me anymore. Better yet, SPAM Lite where there is 50% less fat, 33% fewer calories and 25% less sodium and still tasted great, how cool is that? I stock up when it was on sales for $2 each, just for a day when I feel like cooking SPAM.

Today was the day as I have half a packet of leftover thin spaghetti and mee rebus sauce and a Presto Pasta Night event to catch. So, I sliced some carrots, washed some Chai Hsin (a Chinese veggie) and chopped some garlic to whip this up.

Stir Fried ShanDong Ramen (山东拉面)

ShanDong ramen (山东拉面) is a Chinese style dried noodle. It came in three different sizes, thin, medium and thick. The one I got here is medium. It is suitable for cold noodle, in soup or stir-fry. I usually used it in stir-fry, I guess it is easier than cook up a flavorful stock to go with the ramen. I think Taiwanese used this kind of dried noodle for their beef noodle soup.

Stir Fried Whole Wheat Spaghetti with Ground Pork

One of my quick dinner is to stir-fry noodle. I always have some chopped garlic and cut carrot in my refrigerator ready to be used. So, all I needed to do for this noodle is to julienne some red bell pepper, shallots and washed and cut some baby bok choy (available at WalMart or your local Asian supermarket). I kept boxes of 100% whole wheat spaghetti in my pantry for use in Asian or Western cooking, whichever strike my fancy that day. According to American Heart Association, diet rich in whole grains and other plant foods, and low in saturated fat and cholesterol, may help reduce the risk of heart disease. Only look for those that said 100% whole grain or 100% whole wheat to get the full benefit.

100% whole grain or whole wheat spaghetti can be delicious, just cook to the maximum amount of time listed at the back of the instruction. Cook it a minute or two longer if you prefer the texture to be softer. I once tried a sample at Costco where they tried to market the whole grain spaghetti but the salesperson undercooked it as the spaghetti was hard and chewy, what message did he send? That whole wheat/whole grain spaghetti was hard and chewy which seem to be agreeable with what the majority think. Do you think people would buy it with that kind of experience? I am doubtful. Anyway, instead of eating it with Parmesan cheese (as served in Costco), why not try stir-frying it Asian style? I have no doubt it is much delicious this way. Try it!

Stir-fried Flat Rice Noodle (kway teow/ hor fun) with Black Pepper Sauce

Bought some flat rice noodle (kway teow/ hor fun) and decided to cook something different with it. Instead of the usual Penang fried kway teow or the Chinese style beef hor fun, I wanted something unusual. Since I alway have a bottle of LKK black pepper sauce in my refrigerator, I thought the combination would be great. So, I stir-fried my first kway teow in black pepper sauce.

Singapore Curry Laksa

My pot of Singapore curry laksa with fried tofu puffs (tau fu pok). The difference between a Singapore laksa and Malaysia laksa is Singapore laksa has dried shrimps in it. Both are coconut based curry made with grinded spices and chillies. If you think I made it from scratch, you are dead wrong. Hahaha... Come on, with the convenient of premix paste available which taste about the same or better than the home cook one, why should I trouble myself? Furthermore, this ready made paste is ready in 5 minutes. This time I used the Dancing Chef's Singapore Curry Laksa paste which is much cheaper than the other brand.

I served mine with fried tofu puffs, fried fish balls, fish balls, tofu fish cakes and bean sprouts. Top it with my homemade chili in oil.

Wow, my chili is so spicy! A yummy bowl of curry laksa is ready for dinner. Of course, you can add shrimps, chicken slices and hard boiled egg if you want to.

I would love to share this dish with Presto Pasta Night . Presto Pasta Night was created by Ruth from Once Upon a Feast. This week host is The Food Hunter's Guide to Cuisine. Please hop over on Friday to see the round up.

Stir-fried Two Types of Noodles

This is my stir-fry two different types of noodles. It happen because I have a little of this noodle and a little of that noodle left, not enough to make a full meal and hence have to marry these two together.

Ingredients:

Flat egg noodle (1/3 of packet)
Wontan type egg noodle (1/3 of packet)
Napa cabbage (about 4-5, sliced)
Carrot (1 small, sliced)
Red bell pepper (half, sliced)
Fried fish balls (8, sliced)
Garlic (2 cloves, chopped)
Green onion (2 bunches, chopped)
Crispy fried shallots (1/4 cup)

Sauce:
Oyster sauce (about 3 Tbsp.)
Dark soy sauce (about 1 Tbsp.)
Sesame oil (about 1 tsp.)
Freshly crushed white peppers

Method:

1. Boil a pot of water. When boiling, add in the dried egg noodles and briefly cook it. Drain and set aside.

2. In a wok, heat oil, add garlic, fried fish balls, napa cabbage, carrot and red bell pepper. Stir-fry well and season with a little oyster sauce. Pour into the bowl of waiting noodles.

3. Add sauce in the noodles and stir well to mix. Do a taste test, adjust the taste accordingly. Lastly garnish the top with green onion and crispy fried shallots.

I would love to share this dish with Presto Pasta Night . Presto Pasta Night was created by Ruth from Once Upon a Feast. This week host is Noob Cook. Please hop over on Friday to see the round up.

Ground Meat Wontan Noodle

This is one of my lazy night dinners. I would store some dried wontan noodle (egg noodle) in my pantry for a day I bought some ground turkey. This noodle dish is very simple, only few ingredients needed, dried egg noodle, ground turkey or meat of your choice, dried Chinese mushroom and garlic. And the result would be a satisfying meal.

Ingredients:

Egg noodle (about 6 bundles), boiled in boiling water until cooked, drained and set aside.
Ground turkey (about 1/2 pound) or ground meat of your choice.
Chopped Chinese mushroom (About 6-8, soaked in warm water until soften)
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
Oyster sauce
Dark soy sauce
A little sugar

Method:

1. In a heated oil, add cooking oil. Add ground turkey and garlic, stir-fry until the meat is cooked. Add mushroom and stir-fry well.

2. Add drained noodle and stir well. Season with sauces and a little water if needed. Dish out and serve with chili of your choice.

Instant Prawn Mee (Noodle)

How can a bowl of instant noodle looks so appetizing? These days the instant noodles are getting creative and we certainly can buy a lot of variety of instant noodle like bak kut teh, duck herbal flavor, prawn mee, mee goreng, assam noodle, tom yam, tom yam with coconut milk, yee mee, pan mee just to list a few. If you are only used to the flavors offered in the supermarkets, I suggest you to pay a visit to your local oriental store and pick up other exotic flavors to try, you won't be disappointed. Warning: huge selection, might give you a headache! :P



This is a bowl of instant prawn mee from Ibumie made in Malaysia. I really love this mee as it tasted pretty authentic to me. When you are lazy, a bowl of instant noodle made in Malaysia can be really satisfying. What is your favorite brand and flavor of instant noodle?

Char Kway Teow Malaysian Style

Since I haven't cooked fried kway teow (fried flat noodle) for awhile, while shopping at the Asian grocery store recently, I picked up the necessary ingredients and cooked it at night. The Asian restaurants here serve this noodle in a different way, they called it beef or chicken hor fun (炒牛河 or 鸡炒河). It is cooked differently from our Malaysian kway teow.



This is my hubby and daddy favorite dish. I don't normally eat this dish while I was in Malaysia. But once I came here, all these hawker style noodles, like char kway teow, hae mee, curry mee, mee rebus, mee goreng, or lam mee became something special. I guess the saying is true, you don't know how to appreciate when there is in abundance, but you will see the value when it is scarce.

Spicy Mee Siam

One of my Friday night noodle dishes: Spicy Mee Siam.



This fried mee siam recipe I invented years ago, as I was not (and still) someone who flip through cookbook for recipe. Sorry won't be sharing this recipe so don't bother to ask me for the recipe. Just enjoy the food porn. :P

Stir-fried Whole Wheat Spaghetti

Friday night is noodle night for us. I will cook rice with two dishes sometimes plus soup on Monday-Thursday. On weekends, we eat out or takeaway/to go. What meal I cook depends on what grocery I buy, so sometimes we will have something different, most time we will have something familiar. One can't be creative all the times right? What happen if I ran out of creative idea to prepare dishes and I have nothing interesting to post in my blog? I saw a Chinese cooking show before where he was asked the same question and he said a cook will never run out of ideas to cook, if you give him the ingredients, he will cook the dish for you. If you are a cook, when you step into someone else kitchen, you will still be able to come out with a delicious dish with the ingredients at hands. Right or not? Anyway, above is my Friday noodle dish: Stir-fry whole wheat spaghetti with asparagus and chicken.

Merdeka Open House 2008: Mee and My Malaysia: Stir-fried Silver Needle Noodle (銀針粉) or (老鼠粉)

This noodle is known as silver needle noodle in Hong Kong but "Rat Noodle" (老鼠粉) in Malaysia and Singapore. These noodles are named this way because it is shaped like a needle or rat's tail. It is made of a mixture of rice flour and wheat starch or cornstarch. I have known this noodle as 老鼠粉 and it is usually served in clear soup or stir-fry in Malaysia. I used to eat this as a kid so it brings back memory of home. When I saw Florence making her own silver needle noodle, I wanted to make it too. I have all the ingredients and the recipe seem easy enough. Little did I know that making this noodle actually was quite a tedious process. The process of shaping this noodle each and every single one took me a while. I even enlisted Evy as my helper, but this helper hardly help at all. After she done with a few, she said, "Mommy, I don't want to do it anymore, my hands are tired." Oh man, my only kitchen helper, who normally loved to play with dough quit on me. So, I had to make the rest on my own. Then, I got a mishap when boiling the noodle. The instruction said boil until the noodle turned transparent. But no matter how long I boiled, it never turned transparent. At the end, I just drained it under the cold water, and after I did that, it turned transparent. But the damage was already done, my noodle was soggy and sort of stuck together even after I applied some oil on it. However, I was not going to throw all my hard work in the trash, so in the refrigerator it went (like the instruction said).


The next day when I took it out from the refrigerator, the 老鼠粉 was stuck together in a big lump. So, I had to separate each noodle by hands. I ended out with a lot of broken pieces but I went ahead and stir-fry my 老鼠粉 and the above was the result. Not too bad I would say and actually quite delicious. Not sure I would make it again soon though but will definitely make it when I have the craving again.

Ingredients:

老鼠粉/ rat noodle
Shredded carrots
Thinly cut Chinese green, or bok choy
Chopped garlics
Sliced yellow onion
Pork or chicken of your choice
Oil for cooking
(A)
Soy sauce
Dark soy sauce
Oyster sauce
White pepper

Method:

1. Heat up oil in a wok. When heated add in meat of your choice, garlic and stir-fry until meat is 80% cooked. Add in onion, carrot and green and stir-fry until cooked. Add in rat noodle and sauces (A), stir-fry until well mixed. Serve hot!


I am serving this dish to Merdeka Open House 2008: Mee and My Malaysia hosted by Babe in the city_KL. Do visit her on Aug. 31st for the round up to celebrate the Malaysians' Independent Day. Hereby I also want to wish all Malaysians a Happy Merdeka Day!

How to Make Ground Meat from Scratch

I decided to make this post so that my daughters will know it is actually very easy to make your own ground meat at home. I figure if I don't show them, they will not know when they grow up. I noticed a lot of people only know how to purchase ground meat at the supermarket and really have no idea how to make it at home. So, if you haven't gotten a clue before, after reading my post, you will know! :D Of course I learned it from my mother when I was little, used to help her made ground meat in her kitchen.


First you will need a sharp Chinese cleaver. And then of course ground meat of your choice, pork, beef, chicken, etc. You will have to cut the meat into small pieces and then use your cleaver to chop on it. Just chop through the meat, flip it and chop again, flip the meat again and chop again until you have worked all your muscles. In the olden days, the butcher used two big cleavers to chop ground meat for his customers. This is really a good hand exercise for anyone who wants to try. Haha...


My ground pork is done after multiple times of flipping the meat and chopping. Now it's ready for seasoning for my pork balls noodle soup later.


Serving up my homemade pork balls with glass noodle (tang hoon) soup!


Who wants to try my pork ball with Thai chili? :P

I cooked my broth with 2 chicken drumsticks, 1 baked chicken cavity, 1/4 cup of yellow beans, shrimp shells that I saved, dried Chinese mushroom stems (I saved this for making broth too), 1 whole large yellow onion and 3 carrots hence my broth turned out very sweet and flavorful.

Use of Leftovers 4: Stir-fry Steamed Rice Rolls

Leftovers: one piece of salt & pepper pork and XO fried steamed rice rolls from a Chinese restaurant.


Turned into: Yummy plate of stir-fried steamed rice rolls with shrimp paste sauce.


I cut the steamed rice rolls into smaller pieces, added 1/4 yellow onion, 3 stalks of scallions and sliced the salt & pepper pork into smaller pieces. Heated up my wok with some oil, added in some garlic, onion and the pork, steamed rice rolls and stir-fried until warm. Added in shrimp paste in chili oil, my homemade chili in oil and dark soy sauce. Lastly added in the scallions, gave a few good stirs and dished out and served hot.

Use of Leftovers 3: Stir-fried Soba Noodle

Haha, my hubby was real funny the other night when he saw the leftovers from picture on the left, he asked what are you going to do with this? I made noodle soup the other night and I have a plate of extra ingredients sitting on the table just in case he wanted more (he can always add in with his noodle you see). I told him, I could make something out of it. Now, see how I turned these leftovers from a Chinese take-out and ingredients for noodle soup into a yummy plate of soba noodle.


I just boiled some soba noodle, drained and rinsed with cold water and set aside. Then, I stir-fry all the leftover ingredients in a wok with a little soy sauce and pour them on top of the soba noodle. Mix well together and season to taste with Chinese vinegar, more soy sauce, a little salt and sesame oil. This noodle can be enjoyed cold or warm.


Now, I have a plate of yummy soba noodle that didn't look one bit like eating from leftovers! Serve this up with cut chili padi (bird eye chili) or my chili in oil. Delicious!

I'm also serving this dish to Pesto Pasta Night. This week host is Michelle, from the Greedy Gourmet, do check out her blog on Friday for the round up.

Mee Rebus

I had my mee rebus with pan-fried firm tofu, shrimps, boiled egg, chinese green (choy sum), chopped scallions and lots of fried shallots.


Glad to say I finally tried the well talk about Prima Taste Mee Rebus! Excellent recommendation as I certainly enjoyed it. The gravy for this was fairly thick (can dilute slightly more) and I liked that the flavor tasted great.


Update on the Prima Taste products at Viet Hoa Supermarket in Denver: I went there few weekends ago and they no longer sell the wide range of Prima Taste products. I only found few packets of Prima Taste Bak Kut Teh (must be the leftover) and that was it. Hmmm...could it be possible that it was priced at the higher end and thus the demand was not great and the store decided to stop ordering it? Definitely a possibility!! Anyway, let see whether they restock again. I go there probably once in two or three months so I might be a bit updated.

Singapore Style Mee Siam

I just realized in the recent years that Singapore mee siam (rice vermicelli) is completely different from Malaysian mee siam. I grew up eating Malaysian mee siam which is dried and spicy. So imagine my surprise when I learned that Singapore style mee siam has gravy in it and it's a combination of sweet, sour, spicy and made with fermented yellow beans. I was really curious of how it tasted like that my good friend V, from East Meets West Kitchen who is from Singapore purposely cooked this mee siam for me. That was quite a lot of work that went into preparing this mee siam from scratch and she really spent the whole morning cooking. I was really appreciated of her effort and 爱心.



I always heard about how tasty this Prima Taste mee siam is that I just need to grab one to try. Since my readers know that I'm not really as hardworking as preparing paste from scratch, this kind of ready made paste has suited me the best. I can have a bowl of delicious mee siam in 30 minutes or less. One thing is, this brand is not cheap. It's about US $6 per box and serves two American servings and three Malaysian servings. Compare to other brands that range between $2+ to $3+ and serve more servings, you do the math.



This is definitely a yummy bowl of Singapore mee siam that you can make your own in less than 30 minutes. Just a bit on the pricey end. Prima, Prima, if any of you are reading this, can you lower the price you set for US consumers so that we can enjoy this paste more often (can't blame me for trying right? ;P)?

Ingredients:

1 box of Prima Taste Mee Siam Paste
2 boiled eggs
1/2 cup of taufu pok (deep-fried soy bean cake), cut in half
6-8 Shrimps
1/4 cup chopped scallion
Half packet of dried rice vermicelli (mee hoon), soaked in hot water until soften

Method:

1. Follow the packet instruction for the mee hoon, set aside.

2. Follow the packet instruction for the soup, while boiling add in the taufu pok and shrimps.

3. Cut the boiled eggs.

4. Divide the mee hoon into two bowls. Add in the soup with the taufu pok and shrimps. Arrange the sliced boiled egg on top and sprinkle with scallion. Top with sambal and lime juice provided in the packet to serve.

I am serving this noodle to this week Pesto Pasta Night and sharing it with Ruth and her readers.

INA Oriental Seafood Pan Mee

Usually Sat & Sun are my days off from cooking. We combine dining out and Chinese take out for these two days and I just glad that I don't have to think of what to cook. But sometimes in order to save money, I would cook for Sunday dinner. The above is an example of those days. I wanted to try this new product that is offered at Mytasteofasia.com. INA Oriental Seafood Pan Mee that is flavored with abalone and scallop definitely sounded attractive. So, I grabbed the noodle and told my hubby let's try this noodle tonight. I took out some prawns, assorted fish balls, tofu and baby spinach and I was all set.

This INA pan mee is the thin version as you can see from the picture above and I totally loved it!! I actually much prefer this thinner version than the original wide version. It really smooth to the throat and the soup was tasty too. It came with dried seaweed, dried corns, etc and thus when you eat the noodle, you can taste the flavor of seaweed too.

A cheap dinner for us. If we dine out, it would be $40-$50. Order Chinese take out would be $20. So, this $5 dinner is considered cheap. Satisfying nevertheless.





This is the picture of the noodle which I grabbed from Mytasteofasia website. For those who already ordered from that website, please give this noodle a try next time. For those who are living in the U.S. and misses M'sian food, this website really is a one stop shopping heaven for you, provided you couldn't find these products at your local Asian markets. Please go support my friend R online store, okay? :) As you can see, I love to help my friend promote his online store. :P

My Dry Version Pan Mee + Soup

I wanted to try something different. And since I have a packet of Ina Pan Mee and some ground pork, so I was thinking of making Pan Mee but the dry version. I have seen some dry version emerging from some food blogs lately but I have never tasted it before. Can't even buy it here if I wanted to, so how? Have to make my own lor.



So, here's my version after mixed it together. Just like ko lor mee/wontan mee sauce but using this pan mee noodle instead. I used oyster sauce, sweet soy sauce, dark soy sauce, white pepper and garlic oil.

I made this soup with the seasonings came with the Ina pan mee. Added chai hsin (green) and frozen dumplings to boil it together. What a satisfying dinner it turned out to be. Oh yeah prepared some cut chili padi to eat with the noodle, hor jiak!

This is the picture of the Ina Pan Mee, taken from mytasteofasia.com. I like the Ina Yee Mee too, very good!


Announcement:
Lots of out of stock products have been back in stock so grab yours before it's gone again. Expect to see more new product arriving this week too. :)