Easy Microwaved Broccoli with Butter Thyme

I liked the mixed vegetable side dish that was offered at Texas Roadhouse.  It was really simple and crunchy.  So, I tried to create it at home using the microwave.  You can steam yours if you like but for me microwave is easier in this easy dish.  You can omit the salt if you use salted butter and also you can replace the butter with extra virgin olive oil.  When you use olive oil, just make sure you stir and mix the broccoli well with your hands before you put it in the microwave.

This is one easy side dish to serve with your American dinner.  I served with my Chinese dinner with no problem too.  One healthy meal can be grilled chicken with this broccoli, baked sweet potato wedges and a piece of toasted whole wheat bread.

Stir Fried Tang Hoon (Glass Noodle) with Ground Pork

I out did myself as this plate of fried tang hoon (glass noodle) was so delicious!  I added my secret ingredient, minced anchovies just to test how it would turn out.  The glass noodle was not broken into pieces and the bean sprout was crunchy and everything just came so well together.  I used chives because I saw a Chinese cooking show which said chives was really good for our body as it had the ability to clean the poison out of your body system. Listening to that I was sold, we needed to eat more chives from now on.  Chives seem to be very easy to plant here during summer.  Guess I will have more chives recipes coming out too.

My plate of fried glass noodle with ground pork!  Another secret ingredients is the fried eggs, you got to have eggs in this to bring out the overall flavor.  The glass noodle I used for this stir-fry is called Special Grade Bean Thread from China.  It has two red dragons on the cover.  I added it here so that next time I would know which brand to get for stir-fry, if my memory served me right, this brand is not expansive.

I'm sharing this noodle with Presto Pasta Nights, an event created by Ruth from Once Upon a Feast.  This week host is Cynthia, The Kitchen Slave! Check out her delicious round up on April, 23rd!

Almond Konnayaku Jelly

I promised my girls to make them some Konnyaku jelly.  I always made the konnyaku jelly to bring to friend's house or party and my girls always complaint that they never got to eat it.  Poor thing right?  So, this time I made it all for them.  I have a canned of evaporated milk and I loved almond jelly so decided to make it almond jelly.  I added slightly more water so that it was not as chewy as usually we liked our almond jelly soft.  Almond jelly was best served with mixed fruits or canned longan (picture shown) or lychee.  It was a great party favorite dessert too.  Truly delicious!

If you don't have the konnyaku jelly, just use the normal plain jelly powder and added some evaporated milk or milk and almond essence.  Usually the milk is an added on as this almond jelly should be enjoyed soft.  Read the direction at the back of the box and change according to package direction.

Brown Rice Fried Rice

Since I switched to brown rice, I haven't really gotten enough leftover rice for fried rice.  Or I mixed it with the take away leftover white rice for my fried rice.  Today, I finally get to try the 100% brown rice fried rice as according to one of my readers, the brown rice made good fried rice.  The brown rice that I got in the Asian store was of high quality short grain variety.  I was lucky enough to receive some BBQ pork from a friend which made my fried rice extra special.  I added minced ginger, dried shrimps and "lap cheong" (Chinese sausage) and I tell you these combination made a good fried rice.

I can tell you the brown rice makes good fried rice too.  Even though I found it on the wet side, I guess we used more water to cook the brown rice, also brown rice has more moisture compared to white rice.  It tasted different and I liked it, a bit like eating the stir-fried glutinous rice in the dim sum shop.  Why don't you give it a try too?   Don't you love my colorful creation?

Barley and Pear Chicken Soup

 
I got this recipe inspiration from  Nasi Lemak Lover.  This soup is new to me as I haven't cooked any soup with fruit before.  I know people used papaya, apple, watermelon skin and pear to boil soup but I never tried making it myself.  I used pear because I had one that had been sitting in my refrigerator for a long time and had turned soft.  What better way than to throw it in soup eh?  This soup turned out to be very sweet and really nice to drink.  Strangely Evy didn't like it but the rest of us drank it clean.


Two days later, I tried it with apple (added Goji berries) and it was equally sweet and delicious.  This soup became Edda favorite as she was the one requested for it.  But Evy won't touch hers at all, I wonder why as this soup was really sweet.

  

Salmon Noodle Soup

This noodle soup is almost identical to my Chicken Shells Soup.  The only different is salmon was used and I added red bell peppers.  This is the first time I used salmon in soup and I was impressed at how well it hold it's shape and tastes really good.  Now I have new way of cooking salmon as this gives me an idea of creating other soupy salmon dishes.

I really loved these two types of noodle soup, of course you can use other kind of dried pasta that you have at home.  You can easily cook a big pot and enjoy it for days.  Give it a try and feedback to me ya!

I'm sharing this noodle with Presto Pasta Nights, an event created by Ruth from Once Upon a Feast.  This week host is Daphne from More Than Words! Check out the delicious round up on April, 16th!