My grandfather loved to eat this snack and there was a lady at the morning markets near my house who makes these with turnip or yam. Delish to boot! Unfortunately – as with everything that the older generation makes – when the lady decided to retire to focus on her failing health, I lost access to one of the best chai kueh I’ve ever tasted. Everything else that I tried lacked something – the filling was either too peppery, too salty, there wasn’t enough garlic, the skin wasn’t chewy enough, the list is endless but one thing was for sure, it wasn’t the same.

So I gave up my search for this snack and decided to try and make my own. It was hard in Switzerland as I couldn’t find the right flour – you need wheat starch flour which isn’t the same as regular white flour. It was only upon arriving that I decided that I would try my hand at making this dish. It wasn’t immediate as I was quite busy – as you may already know – with heaps of stuff. It didn’t help that I spent some of my free time on trivial stuff like looking for costumes (work-related) and so forth. Heh.

While the filling is satisfactory, the skin still needs more work to give it that extra chewy texture. And of course, the size and pleating wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. So I might just give this another go again. This just goes to show that cooking requires regular practice!

Vegetable dumplings (Chai Kueh)

Ingredients

(A) Filling
1 smallish turnip/jicama/sengkuang – shred finely
1 medium carrot – shred finely
50-80 gms dried prawns
5-6 cloves garlic – finely diced
1 tbsp oyster sauce
Soy sauce and pepper to taste
Oil for frying

(B) Skin
165 gms wheat starch (tang mein hoon)
85 gms tapioca starch
420 ml BOILING water
5 tbsp oil

Method

1. Prepare the vegetables by finely slicing them into thin stripes. You could use a food processer or grated BUT the effect is not the same. It doesn’t give the dumpling filling the right texture.
2. Fry the garlic in some oil until golden brown and fragrant. Remove half for use later. Using the remaining half, fry the dried prawns until fragrant before adding in the turnip and carrots. Add in the oyster sauce, soy sauce and some pepper to taste together with about 50ml of water (or more if necessary).
3. Fry until the vegetables are soft and then turn the fire down to a simmer to dry up the sauce. It’s crucial that the filling is not too wet. Once ready, turn off the heat and place aside to cool.
4. In a separate bowl, add boiling water to the wheat starch and tapioca flour. The temperature of the water is important as hot boiling water is needed to make the dough translucent. Stir immediately until the mixture comes together. Allow to cool and rest for 10 minutes.
5. Once the dough is ready, knead on a lightly oiled surface while gradually adding five tablespoons of oil. The dough should be smooth yet stretchable when it is ready. The longer you knead, the better the texture will be upon steaming.
6. Divide the dough into small portions and roll them out into flat circles. Fill each piece with about 1 to 2 tablespoons of the filling. Fold the edges and pleat them. Lightly oil them with the garlic oil that was set aside earlier and place the dumpling onto a lightly oiled steaming dish.
7. Steam on high heat for 10-12 minutes or until the skin is translucent. Remove and serve cool on its own or with some chilli sauce.

After three days of salads with a slice of bread on the side as well as half a bowl of mushroom soup (this kind of diet will definitely keep the Plano cosmetic dentist at bay!), I was hankering for something more substantial but not rice. Rice is slowly beginning to bore me, especially the Asian way of serving rice – with side dishes. I miss risottos and paella, and although there is the humble fried rice, there is the issue of cooking it with way too much oil. Gah.

I had some leftover mushroom soup (thanks to Campbell) and some capsicum (one of our favourite vegetables) plus some yummy smoked pork belly in the fridge and I thought, why not whip up something with some pasta? Hence the dish above. If you’re worried about the overpowering taste of mushroom, there isn’t any. Instead the sauce is subtly flavoured by the smoked pork with a tinge of sweetness in the capsicum. The overall result was a very thick, smokey ham-pepper-mushroom concoction which begs to be eaten! And it’s quick to whip up too!

Ham, capsicum & mushroom cream pasta

Ingredients

A handful of smoked pork belly
1 medium-large yellow capsicum
Half a can of Campbell mushroom soup
Some pasta
Pepper to taste

Method

1. In a pot, bring some water and a teaspoon of salt to boil before adding in the pasta to cook.
2. In a non-stick wok or pan, dry fry the smoked pork (the fat from the pork is sufficient) for a few minutes until fragrant and slightly crisp before adding in the capsicum. Stir fry for a few minutes to slightly soften the capsicum (they won’t be mush) and then proceed to add in the soup with about 50ml of water, depending on how thick you want your sauce to be.*
3. Season the sauce with some pepper – no salt is necessary as the soup base is already salty – and put aside when cooked. Reduce if necessary.
4. When the pasta is done, drain and toss into the sauce while it’s still hot/warm. Dish immediately and serve warm on its own or with a sprinkle of cheese (parmesan, cheddar, etc – it’s a personal choice).

* This is not an exact science and don’t worry if you add a little bit more water than you intended to. Just cook the sauce longer to reduce it.

I’m not a really big fan of cincaluk, fresh shrimp preserved in brine and sugar before being allowed to ferment, because of its rather overpowering smell and tendency to explode when shaken (a result of its gassy content). However, it’s AWESOME when cooked, particularly with pork and plenty of chillies! This is a Nyonya dish and although my mum isn’t Nyonya, my grandmother was and my mum managed to learn how to make this dish AND cook it regularly as I was growing up. I remember the tangy yet sweet and seafood flavour infused with the pork, and those chillies…just yummy!

For this recipe, I missed out on the tamarind – something which happens when you’re hungry and trying to cook dinner without starving in the process! – but the outcome was still quite delish although that true to the actual recipe itself. I also used pork belly, the only cut of pork meat I have in my freezer/fridge (you may want to bulk up on those best weight loss pills as pork belly is usually fatty!) but my mum makes this dish using lean meat, loin meat to be exact, but feel free to experiment with other cuts, including the ribs.

Stir Fried Pork with Cincaluk

Ingredients

About 400 gms of pork meat
1-2 tbsp cincaluk
3 cloves garlic
3 small-medium sized shallots
1 green chilli
1 red chilli
Light soy sauce
A sprinkle of brown sugar
Oil for stir-frying

* Don’t forget to add in some 1-2 tbsp of tamarind juice (taken from water mixed in with some tamarind pulp) if you want a bit of sour tangy to the dish.

Method

1. Prepare the meat, chilli, garlic, and shallots by finely slicing them.
2. In a non-stick wok or pan, fry the garlic and shallots on medium-high heat until fragrant before adding in the cincaluk and chillies. Fry until aromatic.
3. Add in slices of pork and fry until brown. If you’re adding in tamarind, do it after the meat is cooked.
4. Add in some sugar, and if necessary, light soy sauce (taste first before adding in the soy sauce). Stir fry until evenly mixed. If you need the dish to be a little bit wet, feel free to add in some water – about 1-2 tablespoons. If it’s too wet, cook it a little longer so that the sauce will thicken.
5. When ready, dish and serve warm with some rice or other dishes or eat on its own.

Prawns are wonderful. Never mind that they are bottom feeders and people think they are filled with tons of junk. Nil and I simply love prawns – doesn’t matter if they come to us boiled with a slice of lemon or stir fried or in curries. Prawns are yummy!

BUT getting to the flesh can be tedious if you hate peeling prawns to bits. Then there is the preparation – if you want to eat the flesh without having to peel it, you need to shell it before you cook it. They leave a stench on your fingers and anything that comes into contact with it, including my stroller basket. (I wouldn’t and cannot imagine parents with preppy strollers like this Bob stroller putting in prawns in their stroller basket so it must be just me/Nil!). My Swiss-Italian housemate used to think that I was nuts shelling my own prawns back in Australia when you can buy them shelled. They cost more and I was a stingy poker back then when it came to food. Besides, you can do more with unshelled prawns – pan fries, boiled, grilled and so forth instead of the regular add-in-veg or fried rice with shelled ones!

It takes a certain kind of skill to pick out fresh prawns from not-so-fresh ones – I’m still working on it although I got most of it down to pat, I think. Choose prawns with a firm texture, hard shell and not slippery. Sometimes I’m too busy thinking about other stuff to buy and get one or two which aren’t fresh but no biggie. Often, they are still edible; they just don’t taste as good as fresh ones – not-so-fresh prawns when cooked are often mushy, and their flesh sort of splits or falls apart easily.

When storing prawns, the old school style has always been to fill a container with some water and sugar, toss the prawns in immediately upon returning home and freeze it. For shelled prawns, sprinkle some sugar over and freeze. Sugar is used to maintain the firmness and enhance the sweetness in the flesh. Both methods have worked well in my favour; I find it great when prices are low and I want to stock up on prawns.

When cooking prawns, look out for the characteristic pink colour throughout the prawn. It should be even – this means even the tail and head has to be pink. Half-cooked prawns can result in you having a rendezvous with the toilet – not recommended at all. Having said that, don’t overcook your prawns – they will end up dry and tough. You want something juicy yet fully cooked.

How to cook whole prawns? Well, there are many ways – with butter, garlic, cereals, on the grill with/without marinate, boiled, curries and flavoured sauces, and Nil’s favourite style – with plenty of tamarind pulp. Note that with this dish, the more “burnt” the prawn is, the better the flavour so don’t worry about having to watch out for your prawn and use plenty of high heat. A non-stick pan will work best in this instance.

Pan fried tamarind prawns

Ingredients

500 gms medium to large prawns
100 gms of tamarind pulp – more if you like it stronger
Light soy sauce
Some water

Method

1. Remove the sharp bits on the prawns head and tail as well as the whiskers and rinse before marinating the prawns with the tamarind pulp and soy sauce.
2. Leave to sit in the fridge for at least one hour or more if you want a stronger flavour.
3. When ready, put a non-stick pan on medium-high heat and wait till the pan is smoking hot before placing the prawns in on one side. Flip over when the flesh is pink and the shell is slightly charred. Remove when both sides are fully cooked and slightly charred. Repeat until all the prawns are cooked.
4. When the last batch of prawns are ready but still in the pan, pour the marinate into the pan (still on medium-high heat) with the previously cooked prawns.
5. Add in about 50ml of water and stir until the sauce thickens or is nearly dry, leaving a coat on each prawn. If you like more sauce, then you don’t have to reduce a lot of the sauce. If you don’t like the sauce, then cook it for longer.
6. When ready, dish and serve warm with some rice or other dishes or eat on its own.

On lazy days or days when I just have no idea what to cook, I dig out various cuts of chicken and prepare them with just soy sauce and some garlic. My favourites have always been to use the following cuts either mixed in or separately: chicken feet (YUM!), drumnets or wings. Nil doesn’t really fancy the feet so I do those mostly for lunch plus that part is pretty cheap. I often get about 20 or so feet for around SGD2 or less. The outcome is still very yummy!

In fact, you can use just about any cut of meat or type with this dish. Some people make it with pork belly; others with pork ears (YUM as well!) and so forth. I love it with huge amounts of garlic but discovered of lately that the key in the sauce is the quality of the soy sauce used. I tried to cook this dish with a soy sauce that had less salt (and indirectly less flavour) and found it wanting in so many ways.

For the taste, it should be sweet yet tinged with meat flavours; savoury would be the key word we’re looking for. The sauce is fab on its own or with some soft white rice and even noodles or pasta! Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go lick my fingers and try not to get any sauce while I’m working on some exposed acne treatment systems.

Dark soy sauce chicken

Ingredients

Some chicken pieces
Dark soy sauce
Light soy sauce
Garlic
Water
Sugar

Method

1. Fill the wok with about 250ml of water or more, depending on the amount of chicken you’re using – just ensure that you cover at least 3/4 of the pile of meat.
2. Once the water boils, added in some cloves of garlic – how much depends on your tastebuds. Remember to wash them as you’d be using unpeeled garlic.
3. Allow the water to boil with the garlic for a few minutes before adding in your meat. Turn down the heat to simmer and cover.
4. Once the meat is cooked, add in a dash of light and dark soya sauce plus sugar. Don’t forget to taste the sauce – it should be savoury, not too salty or sweet.
5. Remove the wok, turn up the heat slightly so that it’s still simmering but not boiling and stir occasionally to get an even dark colour on the meat. Leave to cook until the sauce is reduced to a few tablespoons or more (how much, again, depends on you).
6. When ready, dish and serve warm with some rice/noodles/pasta or other dishes.

Kacang botol or more uncommonly known as winged bean (its English known counterpart here is “four angle bean”) is one of my favourite vegetable and is often used in stir fries with plenty of chilli but is more commonly used in Malay cuisine as an ulam or Malay salad where raw vegetables, chosen for their medicinal (and nutritional) properties, are eaten with sambal belacan. It is high in Vitamin A, C and several others, and is often cooked in the same way as other leafy greens. Great for when you’re on a diet – no need to resort to things like phentermine!

One of the more popular ways of cooking this is with sambal and prawns although I too like it with some garlic and dried prawns. The key to yummy sambal-based dishes is not to overdose with the salt, keep the “meat” (prawns, fish, etc) fresh and add in a pinch (or two) of sugar – at least that’s how I prefer my sambal dishes. And oh, not too much on the oil either.

Sambal kacang botol with prawns

Ingredients

A good amount of winged beans
200 gms of fresh prawns – shelled save the tail
Sambal belachan*
Salt, pepper and sugar to taste
Oil – for stir frying

Method

1. Wash the beans and slice them diagonally before putting them aside.
2. Heat up your wok to medium-high heat and add some oil before tossing in the sambal. Fry them until fragrant.
3. Add in the fresh prawns and stir fry until the prawns turn pink. Then toss in the vegetable and add in a few tablespoons of water if necessary. Cover the wok for about one minute
4. Remove the wok and stir fry. Season with salt, sugar and pepper to taste. You’ll know the vegetables are cooked when they are bright green. Dish and serve warm with some rice and other dishes.

* For the recipe for sambal belachan, please refer to this link.

I love simple vegetable dishes. Maybe because I’m such a lazy bum when it comes to cooking these days. I’m always pressed for time and ever since Eva hit 5.5 months, she has been going through these separation anxiety moments whereby she’d want to keep me in her line of sight otherwise the poor dear will start fussing. So my days of ratatouille and stews have been really limited to when Nil is around – thankgawd he can calm her down *keeps fingers crossed*, otherwise I’d be a total goner!

Snow pea shoots are one of my favourite vegetables – the other is the yummy bean sprout. These young and tender shoots are the tips of the vines of the snow pea plant. It can be served raw, blanched or stir fried and even used in soups but the most common way of serving this vegetable is to quickly stir fry it with some garlic, which is what I do as well. But this time, I thought I’d give it a twist and serve it up with some dried prawns.

I might be more adventurous and add some seafood in the next time or mix other vegetables in as well but for now, this ingredient just got jazzed up quite nicely! The recipe is very simple, quick and fast. One tip is to have your shoots still soaking in the water while you fry your dried prawns on medium-high heat. When it’s time to add in the shoots, make sure that your wok is hot so that it cooks the vegetables the instant it hits the surface of the wok. You’ll need to work super fast as well – think of your body as an extension of Ferrari parts – as cooking these shoots for too long will make them ultra mushy and limpy – not good!

Snow pea shoots with dried prawns

Ingredients

A good amount of snow pea shoots
Handful of dried prawns
Soy sauce
Pepper to taste
Some oil

Method

1. Wash your shoots in some water and leave them soaking in the final change of water while you prepare your wok.
2. Heat up your wok to medium-high heat and add some oil before tossing in the dried prawns. Fry them until fragrant.
3. Quickly toss in the shoots and cover the lid for 1 minute. Remove the lid, stir fry and add in a dash of soy sauce. Pepper is optional.
4. You’ll know the vegetable is ready when it is bright green and has “shrunk” to half its original size. Turn off the heat, dish immediately and serve hot with a serving of rice and other dishes.

Working with a tabletop oven is definitely challenging! Unlike with regular convection stove top ovens where I know what to expect in terms of time, heat and so forth, tabletop ovens are a different thing altogether – the heat distribution is different, the duration and temperature varies and so forth. My only way around it is to start from scratch and use it for a variety of dishes ranging from meats to desserts and cookies just to be doubly sure about how a certain item is going to turn out the moment I put it into the oven. With this dish, I found myself standing in front of the oven too often for my liking, so much so that I had to juggle entertaining Eva, checking out Outer Banks vacation rentals AND baking! ARGH!

This dish is tangy but subtly tinged with that sharp gingery taste – just great for getting rid of that slight salty sea taste that most sea fishes have. I used snapper slices for this dish but you can replace it with just about anything you like, from tuna to salmon and other white-meat fishes like cod, and trout. Feel free to experiment by using different citrus fruits – orange, lime, grapefruit – and herbs – oregano, rosemary, dill – when and if you replace the fish with breeds like tuna and salmon. I didn’t add in any salt or pepper because the fish sauce is salty enough coupled with the natural salty taste of seafish and I wanted to retain that natural flavour without any hint of pepper – black or white. I would have liked it a little bit more brown on the top, but this is still quite yummy.

Most of all, I love the fact that this is a very healthy dish – minimal oil with lots of natural flavours. It’s definitely different from what I’ve been eating all this while WITHOUT the use of an oven. Do note that temperatures here will depend largely on the thickness of your fish. Mine were nearly 1 inch thick so I had to bake them for much longer!

Lemon-ginger baked fish

Ingredients

Two medium-large fillets/slices of white fish
Handful of chives
1 1/2 whole lemons
1 inch ginger
Fish sauce
Olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste (optional)

Method

1. Thinly slice the lemon, julienne the ginger and finely chop up the chives.
2. Wash and pat dry the fish slices and prepare the baking pan by lining it first with lemon slices before sprinkling over the ginger shreds.
3. Place the fish slices over the ginger shreds and then sprinkle the chives before lining the tops with ginger shred and lemon slice. Extra lemon slices can be squeezed over the fish and tossed into the baking pan as well.
4. Lightly dress the fish in some fish sauce and olive oil.
5. Let it sit in the fridge for about 45 minutes before baking. When ready, preheat the oven to 210°C and bake the fish covered for about 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven and increase the temperature to 240°C.
6. Bake the fish again but this time uncovered for another 10-20 minutes (depending on how thick your fish slices are) or until the lemon tops have browned a little. Serve hot with a side serving of fresh salad or rice and don’t forget to use the sauce left behind from the baking process.

Buttery, eggy yet rich, the profiterole or cream puff is a dessert item made with choux pastry, which is basically butter and flour cooked together with eggs and water. It is popular as a simple dessert item and the base – the choux pastry – is often used to make other pastries like eclairs and the traditional French wedding “cake” called croquembouches (filled and glazed with caramel). The little cream-filled pastries are simply divine when eaten chilled with side servings of fresh fruit or drizzled with chocolate sauce!

Making them is not very hard or time-consuming. Choux pastry can be mixed by hand – especially when you’re making small quantities – and then pipped into small balls before a 25-minute baking session which will result in some very lovely golden puffy structures. Definitely a quick bake for those with tight schedules or those who simply hate having to sit in front of the oven waiting for baked goods to finish cooking. After these pastry balls are done, it is just a simple matter of filling them which doesn’t take very long.

For the filling, simple vanilla whipped cream is the standard but you can opt for flavoured versions like lemon, strawberry, orange, etc. In my case, I decided on blueberry – still yummy to boot, even when served without the chocolate sauce. The result? If you’ve used low-fat whipped cream like I did for these babies, they are just great for that summer afternoon snack, especially when chilled!

Profiteroles
Adapted from The Cook’s Companion by Lisa McCormick

Ingredients

(A) Choux pastry
5 tbsp or approx 60 gms butter
scant 1 cup water
3/4 cup all purpose flour
3 eggs, beaten

(B) Cream filling
1 1/4 cup whipped cream
2 tbsp cane sugar
2 tbsp blueberry jam
1 tsp vanilla extract

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C and preparing a baking pan by greasing it with butter or lining with greaseproof paper.
2. In a pot, heat the water and butter together until the mixture boils. Meanwhile, sift the flour into a boil. Once the butter-water mixture boils, turn off the heat, remove from the fire and beat in the flour until smooth. Cool for 5 minutes.
3. Gradually add in the beaten eggs until the dough is of a soft, dropping consistency. Transfer to a pipping bag with a 1/2 inch to 1 inch plain tip. Pipe small balls of about 1 1/2 inch in diameter onto the baking sheet and bake for 25 minutes.
4. Remove from the oven and pierce each ball with a skewer in the center to let the steam escape.
5. In a separate bowl, whip the cream, sugar, jam and vanilla extract together until stiff. Cut the pastry balls across the middle (but not fully) and then fill with the cream.
6. Pile the profiteroles onto a dish and serve as is (or chilled) or with drizzles of chocolate sauce, and fresh fruit on the side.

It’s the man’s birthday today and being the birthday boy, he has the privilege of deciding the menu for the entire day – yes, breakfast, lunch and dinner! I had actually spent the past couple of weeks bugging him about what he wanted since the only thing I could afford (well, I can get him a gift but I’m just stingy) was a lovely meal comprising of a main dish and a dessert. Well, as much as people like to think that I am capable of running a restaurant, I’m not a chef and neither is my home a restaurant.

Anyway, Nil filed in a request – yes, it sounds awfully funny but I did tell him that the kitchen is now only taking special orders and in advance due to the baby belly – for some asam laksa and his all-time OTHER favourite dessert – tarte au citron.

FYI, I HATE LEMONS. Sure, I like the smell, I like using the rind in baking but to make a lemon tart with tons of lemon juice and rind…no, no, no!

BUT it IS the birthday boy’s wish so okay, tarte au citron it is. I looked around my cooking books and found a pretty easy recipe with no fuss ingredients – eggs, cream, lemons (of course), butter and so forth. As usual, yours truly made some adjustments to the recipe, particularly the pastry. I had some leftover cocoa powder which I’m trying to use up so hey, why not make a chocolate pastry shell? I didn’t put much as I wasn’t too sure how the mix would go plus I just wanted a hint of cocoa in the pastry NOT full-blown chocolate. Nil was a bit shocked at first (”why chocolate????”) but it turned out surprisingly good. I halved the recipe to get just enough for a small (and shallow) 8″ pie pan.

The result was a very tangy custardy tart – perfect with a side serving of fresh strawberries to take the edge off the sourish taste of lemon but still fragrant and delish without being too…well, lemony! Again, both the pastry and custard filling was not very sweet as I cut back on the sugar and/or substitute white/refined with cane sugar.

Tarte au citron & chocolat
Adapted from The Cook’s Companion by Lisa McCormick

Ingredients

(A) Pastry
1 1/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp cocoa powder
1/2 cup butter
1 tbsp cane sugar
1 egg yolk
2 tbsp cold water

(B) Filling
Rind from 2 lemons
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup whipped cream/cream (35% fat)
1/4 cup cane sugar
2 egg yolks
1 whole egg

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C and lightly grease an 8″ tart/pie pan.
2. Sift the flour, cocoa powder and salt into a bowl before adding in the sugar and cubing the butter into the flour mix.
3. Rub the butter with the flour, using your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Make a well in the center, add the egg and water. Mix well until it forms a dough – add more cold water if necessary.
4. Cover and leave to rest for 1 hour in the fridge.
5. When ready, remove from the fridge and roll out before covering the tart/pie pan. Remove excess dough from the top/sides, prick some holes in the base before pouring in the baking beans.
6. Bake for 15 minutes or until the pastry is set.
7. Remove the pastry shell from the oven, put aside and immediately lower the temperature to 190°C.
8. In a bowl, mix the rind, lemon juice and sugar. Beat well. Gradually add in the cream – do not overwhisk as it will result in bubbles or a frothy mixture. Add in the eggs one by one while stirring gently.
9. Remove the baking beans from the pastry shell and pour the filling in before baking it for 20 to 25 minutes until the filling has set.
10. Remove from the oven, and allow to cool. Serve as is or with a dollop of cream and/or some fresh fruit.