Fried Fish

Featuring one of my home cook dishes.

Ingredients:

~ 1 Tilapia fish fillet
~ Thinly shredded gingers

Batter for fish:
Self rising flour, salt & black pepper. Mixed in with enough water to make a thick batter.

Method:

Heat up oil, made sure the oil is hot, if not the fish will stick to the wok. Or use a non-stick skillet. Dipped the fish fillet in the batter and slowly put it into the hot oil. Deep-fry both sides until golden brown. Dish out. Add in the shredded gingers and deep-fry until crispy, dish out and place on top of the fish. You can drizzle some soy sauce on top. Serves hot!

Great News!

One look at the pictures, you should have guess what news it is right? :) That's right, baby number 2 is on the way. Baby will be due in October. These are our first glimpse of the baby. During the ultrasound, the baby was very active, bouncing and turning around, perhaps because the ultrasound guy was poking at my tummy and at the baby. He needed to get the measurement done and thus it was necessary. Got to see the beautiful beating heartbeat and heard it for a few seconds. :)



I went for the first trimester screening which included a blood work and an ultrasound to measure the fluid on the baby neck to check for any abnormality. Seem like this is something new because I was not offer this option when I was pregnant with Evy.



The pictures were not very clear, guess we couldn't really complaint since this was not a 3D one that others get. Still we could make out the head, nose and body. It was still too early to know the sex yet, so the ultrasound guy didn't even bother to check.



Look! He managed to make the baby facing us. Thus we could see the face with the eyes and mouth. Looks like I'm going to have a big head baby number two too!

Oh yeah, don't think I have it easy with this pregnancy. I was actually suffered from a pretty bad morning sickness since 5 weeks. Vomitted up to 3-4 times a day and felt sick most of the day. Last two days were the worst because I think I got stomuch flu/virus which resulted in severe vomitting (up to 7 times a day). Whatever I put in, out it came, even 1 french fry and water. Thus, I was not getting anything in for the last two days and actually lost 2 pounds. I never experience this before and thus it sorta freak me out.

Luckily I felt much better today and actually got to eat and not throw up. * knock on wood* This in fact is a great news because this morning I actually felt very weak from not eating for 2 days. Oh yeah, guess now I will have to blog about my pregnancy and baby too. Hehe...

Update April 3th: Both the blood and ultrasound tests came back normal. :)

The Big Two

My little girl is going to be two in a few days. It's great to see her grow up and being independent. I remember when she was a baby, I was thinking how I wish she could sit, then crawl, then walk, then talk and being more independent. Hahaha... guess I'm the opposite from all the moms who wish their babies will remain babies forever.



We got her a notebook after we moved. Now she has her own little corner in our computer room. I saved a few children friendly websites on the desktop and taught her how to open her notebook, use it, open the links on the desktop to play and shut down the notebook when she is done. She definitely is a fast learner because I only need to show her once and now she is a little expert.

Teaching her how to use the computer definitely paid off for me because now she learned to recognize A-Z and even pronounced all of it except a few she still couldn't. 1-10 in English and a few English words she learned while playing and surfing on her own. She already knew how to say 1-10 in Mandarin, I taught her that. She speaks Mandarin to us and can I say she starting to form sentences in Mandarin. I know she understood a lot of words but she still couldn't pronounce it, but I believe all this come sooner or later.

I am very happy with her progress. How proud I am of her speaking in Mandarin because no matter where we are, deep down we are pure Chinese and I don't want people to call her a banana (yellow outside but white inside) or being look down by Chinese in the future. No matter what, bilingual is a plus no matter where you are. I always look at the wider range and into the future and I strongly believe we made a right choice.

My little girl, mommy and daddy only want what's the best for you and for your future. A little obstacle in the beginning is nothing because you will be fluent in English in no time. All we wish is you remain speaking in Mandarin with both your parents and never forget the language.

Spaghetti with Homemade Sauce

I made this sauce using chopped garlic, chopped yellow onion, fresh mushroom, ground pork, Italian seasonings, diced tomatoes and canned tomato sauce. Served it with angel hair pasta and top it with chilli oil and grated parmesan cheese. Quite an easy dinner for a lazy night!


When stirred to coat well.

Crabmeat Cream Corn Soup

Featuring one of my home cook dishes.

Ingredients:

~ 1 egg, lightly beaten
~ 1 canned of creamy corn
~ Shredded wood ear fungus
~ 1 small canned of crabmeats
~ 1/2 cup of cubed tofu pieces
~ 2 canned Swanson chicken broth

Thickening:
Potato starch + water

Method:

In a big saucepan, add in the chicken broth. Turn up the heat and let it boil.

When boiled, add in the above ingredients except egg. Lower the heat and let it simmer for 15 minutes.

Turn the heat off and add in the beaten egg, when pouring the egg, write 8 with it with a chopstick so that it has the egg drop effect.

Lastly, add in the thickening and stir until the soup thicken.

Char Siew Night

Char Siew with Noodle and Nai Pak



Char Siew with Mantou (store bought mantou)

Haven't been making char siew for ages, so just out of the blue felt like making it and thus the char siew night was born.

Short-Cut Char Siew Recipe

2 pork chops

Honey

Marinade:

3-4 Tbp. Lee Kum Kee bottled Char Siew sauce

2 Tbp. Hoisin Sauce

Method:

1. Marinate the pork chops with marinade overnight, give it a few turns along the way.

2. Preheat oven to 350'F. Bake pork chops (pour all the sauce on top of pork chops) for 30-40 mins or until cooked, turn once half way through. Keep basting the pork chops with the sauce while baking.

3. When done, take it out of the oven and brush it with honey on both sides. Set aside to cool for 5 mins. before slicing. When sliced, brush the leftover char siew sauce from the pan on top of the char siew.

Hot and Sour Soup

Want a bowl of hot and sour soup? This is also an Americanize dish. Not sure whether you can find it in M'sia.



This recipe can be found at Lily's blog. I omitted the bamboo shoot and char choy and added cut baby corns.
I also added dark soy sauce and chilli paste into mine to make it real spicy. Also thicken the soup with potato starch.



This hot/spicy and sour soup is really suitable for winter. The sweating helps to keep you warm. :D Thanks Lily for the recipe!

Dinner

Homecook meals again! I just love homecook simple meals at home because often times it's very healthy compared to what you eat outside. Everyday thinking of what to cook for dinner can be such a chore. I would just love to go out and eat sometimes but sadly there is no authentic Chinese restaurants here. We will have to drive to Denver to satisfy that cravings for good chinese food. How often we drive up there? Hardly! Because it's not a short drive and to think to drive all the way up just for a meal, it's pretty ridiculous or extremely desperate. We only drive up there if I need to do grocery or visiting friends.


Nai Pak in Oyster Sauce


Moist, Tender and Juicy Pork Chops

Thus, I made these for dinner. One to cut cost of eating out and two because it's healthier. We eat out during the weekends anyway, my off days from cooking, so got to cook during weekdays to save money. :P My hubby is pretty nice, he gives me days off from cooking. :)

Sour Cream Butter Cake

Tried out a new butter cake recipe using sour cream. I read a lot of reviews that this cake is moist and yummy. I modified it from the original recipe that I found at allrecipes.com.

Verdict: It is indeed moist and delicious.

Clear Noodle Soup

A hot soupy noodle sounds great in cold weather. It's hard to resist especially with my short-cut version. It's so easy to make and it's delicious too. I served it with my chilli in oil mixed with soy sauce.



Super Easy Soup Base:

2 canned of Swanson chicken broths

2 cups of water

Fish sauce to taste

Drizzle of sesame oil in the end

Ingredients:

Chicken breasts, sliced

Do Do Fish balls, cut in half

Do Do Tofu fish cake, cut into three slices

Soften Chinese dried mushroom, sliced

Spinach, washed

Toasted garlic & garlic oil (to garnish on top)

Dried noodle ( I used Jiang Xi Rice Vermicelli)

Method:

1. Heat a big pot of water and cook the rice vermicelli, drained and set aside.

2. Prepare the soup base. When boiled, add in the chicken breasts. When the chicken is almost cooked, add in the rest of the ingredients except spinach.

3. Let it boiled, when boiled add in the spinach. Do not overcooked the spinach, dish the spinach out when cooked and set aside.

To Serve:

Place some noodle in the bowl, some spinach on the side and ladle the soup and the rest of the ingredients on top. Garnish with toasted garlic and a little of the garlic oil. Serve with chilli dip of your choice.

Sweet Potato Dessert

This is one sweet dessert to enjoy in the cold winter days. Super easy to make and take less than 30 minutes.

For the Syrup:

Water to your liking
Gula Melaka (sweetness to your liking)
or the brown bar shape sugar (found in oriental stores)
Few slices of gingers

1 peeled and cubed sweet potato

Method:

Boiled the water, gula melaka and ginger in a saucepan. When the sugar has melted, add in the cubed sweet potato. Covered and let it simmer for 10-15 minutes or until the sweet potato has soften. Turn the heat off and serve warm.

Basic Bread

I finally bought a bread machine! Tried out one of the recipes provided in the booklet, got to test whether it's working or not. Thus, my first bread machine bread. :)



This is a basic 1.5 lb white bread. It's crusty on the sides and soft inside. I cut off the sides and ate it with olive oil with some spices and it was good. Funny though, why my top is like that huh? I saw others have nice rounded top. Can anyone shed some light into this? Thanks! Will see whether the sides remain crusty tomorrow or turn soft.



So, the crust turned soft the next day, just like normal bread. I added bread improver into the recipe so the bread remains soft.

Need to get me some whole wheat flour and start making whole wheat bread, healthier.

Dried Shrimps Crabs & Fried Tang Hoon

Dungenous crabs was on sale the other day, so I bought some to try out a new recipe. We had this crabs cooked in dried shrimps at a friend's house the past CNY and it was delicious. My hubby just loved it. But we didn't really have the recipe, just noticed the main ingredients used were dried shrimps and curry leaves. And thus I have to recreate this dish myself using my own version since the sauce that we used were probably different, so it didn't taste quite the same. Overall, it's still not bad since my hubby finished almost all of it.


Dried Shrimps Crabs


I also fried some tang hoon with bok choy, straw mushroom and eggs to go with the crabs. My little girl actually enjoyed the crabs more than the tang hoon. I think she didn't fancy the texture of this noodle. But she sure ate quite a lot of crab meats that night.


Fried Tang Hoon

Dinner Last Night

I bought some fresh wonton mee at my last recent trip to the asian supermarket. So, this was what I made yesterday. I didn't have any pork in the freezer so had to make do with chicken. That's mean no char siew for the mee. What you see are sliced mushroom (which had been soften by simmering for hours previously), baby bok choy, marinated chicken pieces and DoDo fish balls. Served with chilli padi.

Sauce for the noodle:
When the noodle is cooked, drained and put into a big bowl. Then, add oyster sauce, soy sauce, sweet soy sauce, white pepper and a little sesame oil. Mixed well with the noodle. If you want it to be a little wet, add a little water to the noodle.
As for the ingredients, I boiled it in water until cooked and served with the noodle.

Baked Nian Gao

I just love nian gao, either baked or steamed. Of course if I have to make it myself, I would prefer an easy recipe. Got this nian gao recipe from Lin, courtesy of her co-worker. But no clue why mine looks so different from her. I did omit the red bean paste, perhaps that's why my nian gao is so flat.



I also added Gula Melaka into the brown sugar and baked it in my new convection oven. Since my convection oven automatically lower the temperature to 325'F, it also took longer to bake. I ended out baking mine for 65 mins. The top is crusty brown and inside is soft and a little chewy. The sweetness is just nice and overall I like it. See that big slice on top, I ate two of those!!

Haven't pan-fry it with egg batter yet. Will see how long it keeps and whether the texture will be different as the days go by.

Oh, next time I would probably use 2 smaller pans to achieve the height that I want.

Ginger Chicken

I assumed every cook knows how to make this easy and delicious dish. I learned how to make this because my mom used to cook this for us when we were children. It is like a comfort food and the house smells great when this is cooking.

This dish is also good for lady in confinement because it uses a lot of gingers and sesame oil.

Featuring one of my home cook dishes.
Ingredients:
~2 skinless and boneless chicken breasts, cut into pieces. (Marinate it with a little soy sauce, dark soy sauce and cornstarch for at least 2 hours)
~2 inches of ginger, juliened (you won't eat it if it's in big pieces). Eat your ginger, it's good for you! :P
~1/2 onion, sliced
~Sugar to taste, about 1 tsp.
Seasonings:
Soy sauce (about one round on the wok), dark soy sauce (about 1 tsp.), sesame oil (about 2 tsp.) and about 1/4 cup of water.

Method:
1. Heat up a wok, when smoking, add in some cooking oil. Add in the gingers, give it a quick stir to release the fragrant. Then, add in the chicken pieces. Stir-fry well until chicken is almost cooked. Add in the onion, mix it around and add 1/4 cup of water and let it simmer.
2. Season to taste with some soy sauce, dark soy sauce, sugar and let it simmer a bit. Switch the stove off and add in some sesame oil. Quick stir and serve on a plate.

Note: For confinement, use sesame oil to cook the ginger and chicken.  Also add wood ear fungus for iron.

Belacan Okra (or Ladies Fingers)

Update:
Finally sorta settled down into my new house. There are still some things that need to be changed, things to buy and landscaping to do. So, I might not be able to update as often, but here is one that I did weeks ago.




I love okra! To save time, I used the frozen cut okra right from the freezer and bottled shrimp paste sauce, belacan powder and bottled chillie garlic sauce to make this delicious comfort food.

Living in the U.S., we just have to adapt. Fresh okra is pretty hard to come by but the frozen ones are basically every where in the freezer section. This frozen okra is actually very fresh because it was packed and freeze right after it was harvest, clean and cut. One thing though, don't defroze the veggie, it would get soft and mushy. Just cut it open and pour into the hot wok to stir-fry. You don't even have to wash it.

The result? You can't even tell it is from a frozen package.

Will be MIA yet Again!

Finally the long awaited 7 months is coming to an end tomorrow (Monday), where we will close on our new house. Hooray! We will move on Wednesday and sleep in our new house from then on. We are not allowed to enter our new house until the closing day which is also the walk through day. So, I am really excited to see what's the finished product will be. Believe it or not, the walk-through is scheduled at 8am and the closing is at 12pm on the SAME DAY! We were like, they are sure felt very confident about their products (in this case, a house!). One thing though, our next door neighbor just moved in last weekend, at least we know we are not the only house that is occupied in that row.

I am packing getting ready for the moving day. So, no more baking of CNY cookies for me, at least not until I moved and unpacked my stuff first. It's great that we get to move in before the Chinese New Year as one great plus is that my Spring cleaning will be short and sweet because the house will be cleaned and presented to us. And luckily CNY lasted for 15 days!! So, after I moved, I still get to make pineapple tarts (if I'm not too bum out). :P

Therefore, I will be away for a week or so or until I have my Internet connection back again. Will definitely miss checking and reading on my fellow bloggers' blogs. Miss ya!

Happy Chinese New Year and Gong Xi Fa Chai to you!!!

Three Faces of Evy

I took some pictures of my little girl few days ago. Often time when I took picture of the food, she also wanted to be in the picture. Thus, the result of these pictures.

Snapping picture of her is not an easy task these days because she won't sit still for me to snap it. She would sit for a little while and then rush over to see her picture through my camera screen. My digital camera often takes its own sweet time to focus, lock and snap, so by the time the camera done all that, she already standing up ready to come over. As a result, I have all sort of weird and blur pictures of her.


1) Her Smiling Face!
2)Her Laughing Silly Face!


3)Her Serious Face!

Anyway, thought I will share the three different looks of my sweetie. They sure are growing up fast.

Stir-Fry Tom Yam Shrimps

I always looking for way to cook shrimps. I got this idea from Amy Beh's Vietnamese Prawns in her first cookbook. What can I say, I always attracted to easy recipe that tastes good. I made this recipe simpler by using the bottled key lime juice that available in all WalMart stores at the produce section. Hehe...short-cut all the way for me.

Featuring one of my home cook dishes.

Ingredients:

12 extra large shrimps, shelled & deveined but leave the tails on

1 lemon grass, cut into 1 inch length (optional)

2 Kaffir lime leaves, sliced (optional)

4 shallots, sliced

3 cloves of garlic, chopped

4 chilli padi (Thai chilli), chopped

2 Tbp. Tom Yam paste

1 Tbp. key lime juice

1 tsp. sugar

Drizzle of dark soy sauce

1/3 cup water

sesame oil

Method:

1. Heat the wok with some oil. When heated, add lemon grass and shallots. Stir-fry for a little while, then add in garlic, chilli padi and kaffir lime leaves. Stir- well until fragrant.

2. Add shrimps, give a quick stir. Add in tom yam paste, key lime juice, dark soy sauce, sugar and water. Stir-fry until the shrimps are cooked and sauce thicken.

3. Turn off the fire and drizzle a little sesame oil on top. Give it a quick stir and serve on a plate.

Stir-Fry Bean Sprouts

Featuring one of my home cook dishes.

Ingredients:

~ Bean sprouts
~ 2-3 cloves garlics, chopped
~ 2-3 Scallion, cut into 2 inches length
~ One small piece of ginger, thinly shredded
~1/4 cup dried anchovies, washed and drained

Seasoning:

Salt to taste, 1 tsp. chicken stock granules & 1/3 cup water.

Method:

Heat oil in a wok. When hot, add in dried anchovies and ginger, stir-fry until anchovies turned crispy and brown then add in garlic. Stir well and add in the bean sprouts. Give a few good stirs and add the seasonings. Let it simmer a little while and then add scallions in the last few seconds. Stir well and dish out. Serve hot.

Note:

Do not overcook the bean sprouts, it shoud be crunchy when you bite into it.

Double Chocolate Banana Bread Muffins

Made this using my marble banana bread recipe. But instead of marbling it, I mixed all the batter with the melted chocolate and added chocolate chips, thus made it a double chocolate banana bread muffins.

Note:

1. I think I overbaked it because I found it to be a bit dry.

2. Thus, for those that are trying, add 1/4 cup more oil into the recipe.

Step-by-Step Kuih Bangkit Guide

I didn't know that so many people have problem with making kuih bangkit. Thus, I decided to make mine again with step-by-step pictures guide. I followed my recipe to the T and got no problem at all. No need to add more flour or more coconut milk. And it's all done in exactly 15 mins (baked time). Only the seashell mould ones needed 20 minutes.

For kuih bangkit recipe, click here.


Place the tapioca flour on top of the paper towel and in a microwave safe bowl and microwave for 1 minute, stirred. Set aside and let cool.


Measured all the ingredients ready before adding into the flour. I put the yolk into the melted butter and gave it a quick stir before adding it into the flour.


This is the thick coconut milk that I used. It's a coconut cream, very fragrant and more expensive but nothing can beat this brand. My kitchen smelled so nice while baking my kuih bangkit.


This is how the dough looks like after kneading.


Roll it on a lightly flour surface to the thinness you like. Flour the rolling pin as well.


Dip the cutter into the flour and then cut it, give it a twist and pop it on top of lined parchment paper cookie sheet.


Like this.


Baked in preheated 350'F oven for 15 mins.


Cool on wire rack.


I made 4 sea shells one from using the mould for experiment (on the left). This one are thicker, need 20 mins baking time.


I bite one into half, trying to let you see what the inside looks like. Too bad, my camera cannot zoom in too much and this is the best I can do.


Remember to line your cookie sheet with parchment paper, if not you would get this. The kuih bangkit would stick and there's no way to get it out unbroken. See, what my laziness cost me! Haha...

Hope these pictures help! So that my whole morning spent making this is not wasted. *whoosh*

Tom Yum Fish

I like to make my own Tom Yum soup sometimes as we can get Tom Yum Paste virtually in every oriental stores these days. Tom Yum Gong is for tom yam soup with shrimps only. But there are a lot of variety these days, you can have seafood tom yum where fish, shrimps and cutterfish would be added. Or you can have fish tom yum, even crabs tom yum would be delicious.

The above is my fish tom yum (short-cut version). It's my way of cutting down on shrimps (or more precisely cholesterol intake).

Kuih Bangkit

I love kuih bangkit and was so happy to have found the recipe at KC, generously shared by Leelee (Hugbear). However, I just realized that I have accidently changed her recipe by converted it to cups by using my lousy conversion table. I also modified some of her steps to suit my lazy lifestyle. Thus, my kuih bangkit is crispy when you bite into it and then simply melt-in-your-mouth. No wonder her kuih bangkit looks so different from mine! Now I will never know how hers tasted like.

Penang Char Kuey Teow

You gals might have think, wait a minute, I don't see any shrimps nor the "si hum" in it right? Hahaha...
Well, it is my version of healthy Penang char kuey teow with boneless and skinless chicken breasts.

This is one of my hubby favorite dishes. He used to fry a killer kuey teow while I seated waiting to be served. See...I have no idea how to fry kuey teow before. He used to order Penang kuey teow from his favorite hawker store while in Malaysia and he learned how to cook it by standing there and watched. Thus, in the first few years while we were married, he was the only one who fried the kuey teow.

I think I started to take over the fried kuey teow last year because I just wanted to show him I could make a really good kuey teow too (I stole his secret while watching him fried the kuey teow a couple of times plus my added years of cooking experience helped). :) Now, I could proudly say I fried a killer kuey teow as well, might even tastes better than his. ;P Because since then, he never wanted to fry any more kuey teow (Men!).

Normally I will fry the kuey toew with shrimps and cut the scallion in 2 inches length unlike the one you see in this picture. But today, I only have some chopped scallions in the refrigerator.

Uh hum...Sorry, the recipe for my fried kuey teow is family secret. However, if you do a search, I'm sure you will find the recipe on the web. :P

Recipe translation from Roman Holiday's blog.

For two:
300g kuey teow

150g bean sprouts

150g shrimps

1/2 chinese sausage, cut

3 eggs

2 green onions, cut

1 Tbsp. chopped garlic

2-3 Tbsp. oil

Chili paste to taste

Sauce:

1/2 Tbsp. soy sauce

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. chicken stock granules

Dash of White pepper

Dark soy sauce to suit

Method:
1. Heat the oil, add in garlic, fry til fragrant,add in the chili paste.
2. Add shrimps, fry til cooked. Add in kuey teow, mix well.
3. Add bean sprout, chinese sausages and sauceingredients, fry to mix well.
4. Push kuey teow to the side, add in some oil and the eggs.Fry together with the kuey teow. Lastly add ingreen onion and fry til dry.

Malaysian Style Spring Rolls

This was my easy version which used only a few ingredients. As this was my last minute subtitute for what I had in mind to cook earlier and thus I didn't have time to thaw the ground pork. You could add ground pork and shredded soften chinese mushroom in your filling.

Ingredients:

-1 jicama, julienned
-1 carrot, julienned
-3-4 cloves of garlic, chopped
-1/4 cup of dried shrimps, soften

-Canola oil for stir-frying
-1 tsp. chicken stock granules
-Salt & Sugar to taste
-Sprinkle of white peppers
-A little sesame oil

-Spring Roll wrappers
-Cornstarch glue (2 tsp. cornstarch + 2 tsp. water)
-Oil for deep-frying

Method:

1. Heat up a wok with canola oil. When heated, add in garlic and dried shrimps. Stir-fry until fragrant, then add in jicama and carrots. Stir-fry a little while, add in salt, sugar & chicken granules. Add in a little water. Stir-fry well until jicama soften. Turn off the heat, sprinkle with white peppers and a little sesame oil. Stir well to mix. Dish out to cool in a bowl.

2. When cooled, wrapped the filling in the spring roll wrappers, sealed it with the cornstarch glue. Covered the made one with wet paper towel to prevent them from drying out.

3. When done, deep-fry the spring rolls in hot oil until golden brown and crispy. Drain on paper towel. Serve hot.

Chilli Crabs

Believe it or not, I never had a chilli crabs before until I came to the U.S. Didn't even know this dish is so popular in Singapore until my Singapore friend here cooked and served this dish to us. My hubby fell in love with this dish after he tried it. And I finally cooked it for him on New Year day. :)



I adapted this chilli crabs recipe from Elaine (YongOne from KC). I made mine with frozen crabs and ready-made Vietnamese chilli-garlic paste that easily available in the United States.