Cooking Express

These babies are one of the most useful food types in modern cooking. Easy to make, keep and cook, no wonder the Americans built a whole industry around it! Look at McDonald's, Burger King and Wendy's!  Personally, I rather know what goes into my patties. Hence why I came up with these!

Recipe:
500g of minced meat (pork, beef or both, but not chicken!)

Seasoning:
Salt,
Coarsely ground black pepper,
White pepper,
Ground coriander seeds,
Nutmeg
Worcestershire Sauce

Binding Agents:
1 egg
Breadcrumbs

Alternative Alert! [I have not tried mince chicken with these spices. Typically chicken requires a unique blend of spices as the meat has no flavour. If there are requests for this, I'll look into it!]

This will make 6 patties of around 85g each. For monster burgers, do 4 patties of 125g. The way to make the patties are shown below:

1. Make a meatball
2. Lay meatball on grease paper
3. Press the meatball until it is flat
4. Cover top with more grease paper
5. Cut paper and freeze

Longevity:
These babies will keep for 3 weeks in the freezer

A simple breakfast dish. Prepare some hardboiled eggs the night before. Have some cheese handy (mozarella for the texture, with some aged cheddar for some cheesy goodness) along with nice soft buns or rolls.

Next morning, slice the eggs using an egg slicer (available at most stores). Slice the buns, toss in some egg slices and a bit of cheese. Pop the stuffed buns in the oven for 2 minutes at 110 degrees Celsius or unit the cheese melts. Remove, add ketchup before consuming!

Voila! Simple sumptious breakfast!

All the while, cook shows talk about 'Chicken Stock' or 'Beef Stock' and stores have 'Real Chicken Stock' on their shelves. Often I wondered how the real deal tastes like. Here's how to make your own.

This recipe has been modified a bit to suit Asian dishes. This neutrality in flavour is important so that the stock can be used in Asian dishes.

Recipe:
Leftover chicken bones from 1 chicken (preferably from a roast; if raw, cook in a pan with salt and pepper)
1 or 2 sticks of Celery
2 large Onions
2 or 3 large Tomatoes
1 or 2 Carrots
12 Peppercorns, cracked
A generous pinch of salt
Around 4 litres of water, when filled to top of pot

Recommended Equipment:
5L Thermal Cooker Pot

Note that usually chicken stock would contain parsley and a bay leave, which have been omitted here. The absence of these 2 herbs allows the stock to be adapted for Chinese dishes later.


Fill the pot to simmer all the vegetables. There's no need to fill the pot to the brim as the stock is meant to be concentrated. It is also a lot quicker to heat the pot this way. Typically, the stock is boiled for around 6 hours. I have a trick up my sleeves to keep this hassle free!

Tip Alert! [Boil stock in Thermal pot, and leave it over night. Reboil it in the morning before heading off to work. When you return at night, the stock would be as good as after a 6 hour continuous boil!]

After 6 hours or overnight when using my thermal pot trick, use a masher to crush the vegetables. This is to get every drop of goodness from the vegetables. The chicken bones would have boiled themselves into an unrecognizable pile anyways.

No point saving the leftovers as they do not have much nutritional value any more. Everything is in the stock now! Strain the stock and discard the leftovers. And voila, Home Made Chicken Stock.

Alternative Alert! [Alternatively, you can use beef bones. Lamb and fish bones leave an undesirable smell, which limits their versatility.]

Alternative Alert! [Vegetable stock would require more vegetables, especially root vegetables such as turnips, parsnips or carrots as these guys pack a lot of flavour. Throw in some leftover vegetables such as the thick stems which can be consumed. These parts have even more flavour!]

The stock can be used for risotto, pasta, soup base, gravy, stews and more for Western dishes! For Chinese dishes, the stock can be used for noodles, soup base and sauces for stir fries!

Total time:
6 hours, or
Overnight using Thermal Pot

Longevity:
Refrigerates for 5 days before requiring reboiling
Freezes for 3 weeks

 

An attempt at Indian fish curry. A torrential downpour was taking place outside and the only way I could get some good curry was to make it at home. This is my first try at Indian fish curry! I just followed the instructions on the spice pack but added a few twists!

French bread is very versatile and one of my favourite breads. Used here is a whole wheat baton. The baton is sliced down the center. Tomatoe slices are inserted, together with a piece of ham and slices of mozarella (my favourite cheese!). Baked at 110 degrees celsius for 2 minutes or unit the cheese melts. Add ketchup and serve!

This recipe is the classic pasta with bolognaise sauce. Instead of spaggetti, fettucine is used. The bolognaise uses pork instead of minced beef. (This is a bit of a misnomer as bolognaise is usually associated with beef, and there is no beef in this recipe!) More on this recipe to come...

The soup is made from my home made Chicken Stock, diluted and boild with tomatoes, carrots and served with lettuce and chives.

A simple hawker dish, especially common in Singapore and Malaysia. Good stuff for a chilly or rainy day.

The broth is made from dried anchovies, ginger, pepper and salt. The egg noodles, known locally as "yee mee" can be found at most groceries or hypermarts.

Ingredients:

For broth: dried anchovies, ginger, pepper, salt, vegetable oil.

Yee Mee

Tomato

Egg

Lettuce

Mince pork, marinate with soy sauce and pepper

Sliced pork, marinate with soy sauce and pepper

Sliced fish cake

Steps:

Prepare broth.

Soak anchovies for a while to rtemove dirt. Then fry anchovies and ginger in a pan or wok. Once anchovies become crispy, put then and the onion into a stock pot. Add water and salt, then bring to a boil. To get full flavour from the broth, boil for 45 minutes.

Get a nice single serve claypot. Place yee mee into pot, add in tomatoes. Pour broth prepared earlier into claypot. Don't fill up the claypot. Ideally, the claypot should be 3/4 full. Add in a dash of soy sauce. Cover claypot and bring to boil. Open lid, toss in minced pork, sliced pork and fish cake. Close lid and let boil. Once noodle are soft and pork is cooked, taste and season as required. Next, crack in the egg, add lettuce, close back the lid. Turn off the flame and serve.

Farmer's sausage with penne pasta cooked with tomatoes and herbs. The tomatoes are cooked until they become a thick and sauce-like. This makes it stick to the pasta. I can't remember the Italian name for this method of cooking at this moment.

Ingredients:

Tomatoes

Garlic

Basil Leaves (Both dried or fresh works fine)

Italian farmer's sausage

Lettuce

Steps:

Cook penne separately.

Boil tomatoes until skin begins to peel. Remove and put tomatoes into cold water. Peel off skin and chop tomatoes. Remove the stem. Heat up a pan with olive oil and fry the garlic until it changes colour. Toss in the chopped tomatoes and cook. Keep cooking until tomatoes start to turn into a thick paste. Toss in basil and stir. Season the paste to your tastes (sugar, salt and pepper). Often ketchup is used to provide some acidity. Personally, I prefer balsamic vinegar.

When the paste is seasoned, toss in penne. Cook a while to reduce the water from the penne. When the paste sticks to the penne, it is ready. Garnish with lettuce and serve immediately. You can replace the sausage with other meats, or have the penne with the tomato sauce as vegetarian dish.

This dish goes really well with meatballs. More on my meatballs recipe soon...

The broth is prepared with tomatoes, celery, any leftover vegetables and chicken bones.

This pasta is boiled until soft. Then stir fry some bacon bits. Then add pasta, vegetables and boil again. Don't forget to add salt.

You can top it up with sausages or hard-boiled egg .

It has been a days of experimenting with claypot dishes. This dish - chicken with lap cheong and rice are cooked separately in claypots.

The chicken are marinated with Chinese soy sauce, pepper and a little dash of salt.
Then cook the chicken with ginger.
For the sauce, add Chinese rice wine, thick black soy and oyster sauce. Cook until the alcohol from the rice wine evaporates.
Add lap cheong.

Finally, pour the chicken with sauce into the rice claypot and let it set.

This is a simple and balanced meal which can be served practically anytime of the day.
It has burger as the main with mashed potatoes and lettuce and tomatoes as side.

The selection of bread for the burger is important. You can get best burger buns from Carrefour.
But, like any burger buns they need to be lighted toasted.

What's inside the burger?
a) HOMEMADE Burger patty
b) Cheedar cheese (melted on top of the patty)
c) Japanese mayonaise
d) Thin sliced of tomatoes, gurkin
e) Lettuce

The patty consists of minced pork and bacon bits, seasoned with coriander seeds, nutmeg, pepper, salt with an egg and breadcrumbs. More on this later...

This is simple mashed potatoes dish. Use 2 potatoes and peel them. Chopped them into cubes. The boil the potatoes until soft. Add in carrots for coloring. Bring the carrots to boil as well.

Finally pour away the hot water. Add peas, 2 spoonful of mayonaise and sprinkle a little bit of salt. This dish takes about less than 1/2 hour to prepare. This is very suitable for party as it's very easy to make. Add a sausage to complete the dish.

This is a quick vegetable dish. The spinach is pan-fried with garlic, chilies and soy-sauce.

Ginger Chicken with spring onions

French beans cooked with "har mai" (tiny shrimps) and chilies.

2 simple dishes consists of :

a) Choy sum with sliced fish cakes
b) Potatoes with minced meat.

A simple Chinese dishes consist of steamed eggs, kangkung and Chinese sausages.
Total Cooking time - approx 1/2 hr

a) Pan fried fish coated with curry powder, sprinkled with coriander with dash of lemon.
b) Yaw mak vegetables cooked with beancurd preserved.
c) Corn soup with tomatoes and meat base.

Cooking time - less than 1 hr