Alternative to KFC

There is no KFC where I'm living (These people don't know what they're missing out on!).  And it has been 2 years since I last went home.  When the craving hits, it's like an itch deep in the throat, a place where I can't reach!  So I crawled the net looking for recipes which can satisfy my craving a little and I found what I was looking for from one of my favorite food blogger, Nasi Lemak Lover!

And so I marinated the chicken last night, fried them before lunch...

This is our lunch today! Home made KFC alternative, close enough to satisfy my craving and healthy (reduced salt)!

This is the link to Nasi Lemak Lover's recipe! Go try it yourself!

Easy Spicy Korean Pork

This is one of my husband's favorite and it is very easy to make. This is a very good recipe from Beyond Kimchi.

Things you need, soy sauce, sesame oil, sugar, Korean chili paste, corn syrup together with garlic, ginger and onion (which are not in the picture).

This is the Korean chili paste I used which can be bought from the Siam Store downtown.

Prepare the ingredients for marinate...

I usually marinate the pork for about 2 hours because I'm quite sensitive to the "porky" smell but if you're not as particular as me, you can just mix the ingredients together and get cooking straight away!  First heat up the oil and put in the pork.  I usually fry the pork till they are a little brown (not burnt ok!) and then....

......add in the onions and stir them around.  And once the onions are soft...

.... then it's done! Easy right? ^.^

 Ingredients:

450g of very thinly sliced pork of any cut
Half of a large onion or 1 small one
3 tbsp of Korean chili paste
2 tbsp of Korean chili flakes (which I omit because we have 2 small kids who are not yet trained to eat spicy food)
1 tbsp of soy sauce
1 tbsp of sugar
2 cloves of finely minced garlic
1 tsp of fresh finely minced ginger or half a tsp of ginger powder
1 tbsp of sesame oil
1 tbsp toasted sesame seeds (which I also omit because the kids in our family get "freaked" out by white seedy stuff on anything they eat...)
1 tbsp corn syrup, optional
1 tbsp canola oil for stir frying

Method:

1. In a small mixing bowl combine chili paste, chili flakes, soy sauce, sugar, garlic, ginger, sesame oil, sesame seeds, and corn syrup, mix well.
2. In a large mixing bowl combine pork with the sauce, and mix well to coat all the pork slices with the sauce evenly.
3. Drizzle 1 tbsp oil to the skillet and bring it over medium high heat.  Place pork over the skillet and add the sliced onion on top.  When they sizzle, start tossing everything to cook evenly all the way or until the pork is fully cooked and onions are soft, about 3 - 5 minutes.
4. Serve hot with a bowl of rice.

Seems like this blog is turning into a food blog..... my crafting mode is totally turn off at the moment.... :(

Homemade Tofu

I attended a Taiwanese/Chinese (and 1 Singaporean - that is me!) gathering some time ago.  We had a lot of good food and desserts.  We gossiped and shared experiences about our lives in Sweden.  And when I saw one of the tofu dish, I just had to ask for recipe!

This recipe comes from Lorina, a Taiwanese friend who is very good in cooking and baking.  Check out her blog (in Chinese)!  And this is my homemade tofu!

The ingredients and some salt of course!

I don't have a bowl that is the right height, so I used 2 small dishes for sauce.  Improvise my friends!

I started by have the lid completely closed on the rice cooker to get the temperature going.  Once the water is boiling, I opened a small gap so that the temperature doesn't get too high.

Voilà! Tofu!

Then I cut them into cubes (it's kinda soft, so the cubes are not so even.  But I didn't waste anything, the rest of the small and uneven pieces went into my mouth!) and coat them with corn flour (normal flour will work as well).

Then they all go into the hot pot!

Fried tofu with sweet chili sauce! That's the way we like to eat our tofu!

Here is the recipe in English (well, good things need to be shared!):

Ingredients

250ml Unsweetened soy bean milk
3 eggs
salt or chicken powder to taste (do not add chicken powder if this is for baby consumption)
As much spring onion, bonito flakes as you like (taste great with seaweed strips as well!)
Small amount of Japanese bonito soy sauce

Method

1. Beat the eggs and add into soy bean milk, mix well.
2. Sieve the mixture until all the bubbles are gone, add in the seasonings, mix well and pour into the appropriate container.  Put into rice cooker and steam until mixture is firm.  Done!
3. Sprinkle on spring onion, bonito flakes, seaweed strips and pour in a small amount of the Japanese bonito soy sauce before eating.  It tastes great when it's cool as well.

Gentle reminder
To prevent the mixture from having the "bee hive" appearance, temperature control is important.

1. You can put more water in the rice cooker.
2. Do not allow the container with the mixture to touch the base of the rice cooker, you can put an inverted bowl at the base and put the mixture on top of it.
3. Do not close the lid of the rice cooker completely and leave a small gap.

Fried Rice for Busy Moms

I have a basic fried rice recipe which I use quite often, all I need to make it more interesting is to change the ingredients.  It is simple to make and a popular dish for dinner in our household.

I know most people make fried rice from left over rice, but our family is big (there's 6 of us!), so very seldom do we get left over..  So I usually cook the rice about 2 to 3 hours before I make dinner. Once the rice is cooked, I fluff it up by stirring it around with a pair of chopsticks and turn off the rice cooker.  Also I added in 2 cubes of chicken bouillon, so there will more flavor to the rice.

 Then I'd open up the fridge and cabinet to see what we have to throw add into the fried rice.  Sausage, eggs and sweet corn is quite standard in our family.

I would also add in finely chopped sweet radish and garlic, which I usually throw into the blender to do the job for me.  I'd put about 5 to 6 cloves of garlic coz we love the smell of fried garlic! 

This is the radish I got from the Thai store.  It says "Salted Radish"....

but buy the one that has "Sweet" on it.  The other one was so salty we felt like raisins after I mix it in eggs to do fried eggs....

Fry the sausages first, then take them out and throw in the radish and garlic mixture.  Fry till it's fragrant and add in the rice.

Once the rice and the radish and garlic mixture is properly mixed, I'd push the rice aside and crack in the eggs.  Then I'll stir them around until they are very scrambled.  After that, I'll bring the rice and eggs together so they can mix around and be good friends.... (ok, now I'm talking strangely...)

However, if your pan is too small.  You can scramble the eggs separately and add them in later, the reason why I'm doing it this way, is just because I'm too lazy... >.<"

I'll then take out a small portion of the sausage and set it aside...

That is, if you have this little face staring at you when you're making food.... otherwise you can skip this totally unnecessary step.... 

And just put in ALL the sausage into your fried rice!

Stir around a little and add in the sweet corn.  Stir around a little bit more and turn off the heat.  You're done!

Dig in!

Fried rice (For 6 persons)

Ingredients:

4 cups of rice

2 chicken bouillon

100g sweeten radish

5 cloves of garlic

5 sausages - diced

4 eggs

1 small can of sweet corn (or any other vegetable of your choice - diced)

2 tbsp of oil

Dash of white pepper

Method:

Do this step about 2 hours before you start frying the rice.  Cook the rice like you normally would in the rice cooker and add in the chicken bouillon.  Once the water starts heating up, use a spoon to dissolve the bouillon thoroughly and blend well.  Let the rice continue cooking till it's done.  Then use a pair of chopsticks to fluff up the rice and turn off the cooker.  

Finely chop the radish and garlic and set aside.  Add in 1 tbsp of oil and stir fry the sausage until they're done.  Remove them from the pan.  Add in 1 tbsp of oil into the pan and fry the radish and garlic mixture till fragrant. Add in the rice and stir well.  Add in eggs, sausage and sweet corn.  Stir everything well together and turn off heat.

Red Bean Bun!

Yeah, I know, I'm posting food instead of crafts.  No, you aren't linked to a wrong blog.  Some of my friends asked if I can share some of the recipes with them and after pondering for a loooooong time, I decided to do it here on my blog.  However, I am NOT a professional, so everything I post here is based on others' recipes or my own trial and error, so pardon me if I made any errors or stupid mistakes!

There is a Thai store here where I'm living which I really like to go.  It's like hunting for treasures everytime!  And this time I found this!

I have tried to make my own red bean paste but it was too troublesome and the end result was not satisfactory.  So when I saw this, I grabbed it!

Then I walked briskly over to the flour section and got these!

Finally I can try a recipe which I have bookmarked a long time ago but lack the ingredient (mostly courage) to make - red bean buns!

This recipe is from the talented Lydia from My Kitchen (with my own adaptation).

Ingredients (makes 14 buns)

7g instant dry yeast

170ml lukewarm water (make sure it's not too hot 'cos it'll kill the yeast)

½ tsp lemon juice

280 low-protein flour

100 wheat starch

70g icing sugar (I reduced the sugar a little)

30g vegetable oil

10g baking powder

Filling:

35g red bean paste, divided and shaped into 14 balls (I think I'll make them bigger next time, around 40g per ball)

Methods:

1.  Sift together flours and icing sugar in a large mixing bowl and make a well in the middle.

2.  Mix lukewarm water, lemon juice and yeast well.  Pour the mixture into the well.  Gently stir the water to bring together the flour mixture.

3.  Add in oil and knead till a soft dough is formed. It should be smooth on the surface.

4.  Cover the dough with a damp cloth and let it rise for 30 mins or until it is double in size.  I had to turn my oven on and let it proof inside because it's too cold now - it's winter! 

5.  Dissolve baking powder in cold water, sprinkle over dough and knead until well combined.  Make sure you dissolve the baking powder thoroughly, otherwise you'll get yellow spots on your buns.  Divide dough into 14 equal portions. 

6.  To make bun, flatten the dough with a rolling pin to make a circle.  The place the filling in the middle, wrap and pinch the dough to seal it.  Cut out parchment paper into squares and place the bun on them.  (I ran out of parchment paper, so I just put them in cupcake paper.) You can choose to have the sealed side facing up or down.  My bun wrapping skill sucks, so I place most of them facing down and they still look ugly... =.="

7.  Arrange buns into a steamer, leave some gaps between the buns.  Spray water mist over buns and steam in a preheated steamer on high heat for 10 mins.  After wrapping all my buns, I realised that I don't own a 

steamer! (How did that happen?!) So I steam them in my tiny 1 liter rice cooker, 4 buns at a time.... =.=" 

Remove buns from steamer and cool them on a rack to prevent soggy bottom.

8.  Then make yourself some of your favorite tea/coffee and enjoy! 

Ok, I need to improve my bun wrapping skill... the red bean paste shouldn't look like a mustache .. but it tastes almost like the ones I get back home!