Little Joys

The Boy and I went on a weekend ferry trip to Bruges in Belgium, and it was a really beautiful city full of visitors, souvenir shops and...touristy trappings.

That means expensive and mediocre meal offerings. Wikitravel recommends walking further out of the city centre to get a more 'genuine' and local feel of life...and so we did. We meandered down a street off Burg, crossed the river and found outselves on Langestraat.

Map location:

View Larger Map

And here, we found a deli, greengrocer's and a tapas restaurant, all on the same street. And one morning, we came back to buy some ham, salami, cheese, bread, roasted chicken leg, salad greens, nectarines and juice...

...and walked to a park and made our own breakfast sandwich.

I took a couple of ravenous bites before remembering to take a photo.

With a pond in front of us, ducks, family and dogs playing in the sun, people on grass reading and relaxing, it was one royal meal on budget.

Banana Loaf

Did I tell anyone how much I love banana loaves? And how I was such a noob that my 'baking' experience was limited to cookies in Home Economics class and that I thought I'd be hopeless at baking?

Well not that I've suddenly turned professional, but I've tried making brownies, ready-made puff pastries and now banana loaves, and it's suddenly not too difficult. It's just very different from cooking...baking is an exact science - all measurements and weights and numbers, cooking is just 'instinctive'...but that's not a new thing anyway.

Anyway, I thought it was one of those things I'd never get to buy casually in England, because it seems more American than English, and only places like Marks & Spencer and the huge Sainsbury stock them. But at £1.99 per loaf, it has been a rare and far in between treat for me (in comparison, a small loaf of wholemeal bread costs about 79p)

I've once made a banana loaf back in March, but it was less than successful with no enticing banana aroma (or taste!) and was quite soggy. But I intended to try again, and saw a bag of bananas going reduced at Sainsbury and grabbed it. And let 3 of them stand on the side til they were soft and turning dark.

And it turned out beautiful! Quite on par with the ones I've bought! I was haaappy! :D

Here's a photo evidence:

Rolo enjoying cheese

Opps, so that's not a banana loaf, just my housemates' hamster, but isn't she so cute?!

This, on the other hand, is the real thing.

That was freshly taken out of the oven, with 3 cheery walnuts on top of the beautiful split. My loaf looked like a work of art. I loathed cutting into it. It was so beautiful I spent minutes upon minutes cooing and fussing over it. Like a baby.

Here's the recipe (which was given to me by my housemate Tim):

Banana Loaf
for a 2lb loaf tin

2-3 large, very ripe bananas, mashed
115g butter or margarine
170g sugar (any type, but demerara gives a better depth of taste)
225g self-raising flour
2 eggs
1 handful of walnuts, chopped (can be omitted).
(I left 3 whole for decoration)

1. Pre-heat oven to 180C
2. Grease the loaf tin
3. Cream together butter and sugar, mix in eggs, then add mashed bananas and walnuts
4. Mix in flour
5. Scrape into tin, bake for 40 minutes, then a further 20 minutes at 150C
6. Cool it, slice it, and devour!

Isn't that beautiful? Or what!

-End of gushing-

Lamb patties

When I dropped by a Tesco after work one day in March, I saw reduced price minced lamb and thought, aha, dinner.

Lamb Patties
Minced lamb
1 onion (very finely chopped)
1 potato (grated and squeezed dry to prevent sogginess)
A handful of parsley (chopped, could be substituted with mint or any herbs of your choice)
1 tbsp garam masala
1 tbsp ground coriander
1 egg
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Combine all the ingredients above and mix well with hands.
2. Form into patties (not too thick, to ensure even and quick cooking).
3. Pan fry with a bit of olive oil. You can griddle or grill on a George Foreman as healthier options.
4. Serve with yogurt and mint raita!

(I served it with Thai chilli sauce because it was at hand and *someone* thought it was weird to eat savoury yogurt)

Summer BBQ

Friends, housemates, boyfriend, sunshine, charcoal and meat...

From left: Pork sausages, lamb burgers, lamb chops, kebabs, 

skewered peppers and mushrooms

...if that's not bliss I don't know what is!

Banishing thoughts of dying animals and the year I was vegetarian

Wa Tan Hor

Phew, not abandoned yet......Not yet anyhow.

I'm really sorry. The fact that I need to keep this blog alive is always at the back of my mind, I thought maybe an update every 2 weeks would be decent enough but I've fallen dreadfully behind. I don't know what it is, like maybe I'm not passionate or motivated enough about writing (because I sure am about food), I don't bother to take photos or upload ones that I actually took, maybe it's just general laziness. Yet I still stalk EatingAsia, Camemberu and a few other food blogs faithfully...it's easier to consume than to produce. Obvious fact, no?

I'd still like to do this though, I just need to be a lot more disciplined and structured about it. Write down deadlines and so on if it comes down to it.

But this is a long-due entry for Cantonese noodles (Wa Tan Hor) or Eggy Noodles, as I use with Tim.

It's always one of my favouritest tze char noodles along with the dark Hokkien noodles, and one I never thought I could reproduce. But with a few recipes floating about, I thought I'd try it out, and this is probably my third attempt to date and the best (apart from a slight mishap in the end).

Wa Tan Hor
For two

Hor fun (fresh or rehydrated)
4 tbsp oil
dark soy sauce
light soy sauce

The noodles:

I bought fresh hor fun from the local Oriental supermarket, stir fried with oil, dark and light soy sauce til slightly charred around the edges. Put aside.


The gravy:

3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
2 eggs
2 tbsp oil
1 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp cornflour (mixed with some cool water)
1 cup chicken stock
*Prawns (shelled and deveined)
*Calamari (sliced)
*Lean pork/chicken (sliced)
*Napa cabbage/Choy sum (sliced to 1" width)
Salt and pepper to taste
(*How much is up to personal preference)

1. Heat wok til very hot and stir fry prawns and calamari until just cooked, set aside.
2. Stir fry garlic til fragrant, add pork/chicken slices and stir fry for 1 minute.
3. Pour in chicken stock and bring it to a boil. Simmer for a 3-5 minutes.
4. Add in cabbage/choy sum and cornflour mixture.
5. Add cooked prawns and calamari and season to taste.
6. Turn off heat, crack 2 eggs and stir gently to cook the eggs. DO NOT stir too vigorously as this will make the gravy stodgy. You want smooth egg wisps, not scrambled sauce.
7. Dish gravy onto noodles, serve.

Eggy noodles has always been a favourite from home, and surprisingly easy to make!

Teriyaki Chicken

Get a bottle of Teriyaki sauce...

And a pack of chicken thighs (or any chicken parts, for that matter)...

Marinate for at least 2 hours (I defrosted the thighs over night in a bag, and when I transfer the chicken from freezer to fridge, I whacked in loads of teriyaki sauce so 2-in-1 action heh)...

Bake in oven a 200C for about 25-35 minutes (until juices run clear), and baste once with honey...

And yummeh results with minimal fuss!

Okay, as a journalism graduate sourcing and not crediting photos is not the best practice, so here are the links to them:
Honey
Freezer bag
Chicken
Teriyaki sauce

The different types...

Ham choy


Credit: masak-masak


Choy poh


Credit: Simple Life


Char choy


Credit: Very Sedap!!!


Tung choy


Credit: CT Food


Kiam chye (that comes with bak kut teh)


Credit: munkhea

This is for my own reference, due to my lousiness with the Chinese names of preserved vegs...I buy them by sight, not names :S

Sometimes the unlikely tastes nice together...

...such as this combination of breakfast and instant noodles.

In this case Indomee with chopped Chinese cabbage, and topped with bacon, sausage and egg.

Very satisfying Sunday lunch, that.

Wrapped stuffed chicken

Tim made this meal! Well, almost...
I made the gravy and baked the potatoes.

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts
Bacon slices
Philadelphia cheese with garlic and herbs
Peas
2 potatoes
1 onion, peeled and chopped
1 gravy granule
1 tsp cornstarch mixed with a little cold water
1/2 pint water

1. Wash and pierce the potatoes with fork, then chuck both into microwave for about 10 minutes, and bake in a pre-heated oven (about 200C for 30 minutes). I do find while microwaved potatoes cook quicker, their skin tend to be soggier, so it's an question of speed versus quality.
2. Slice breast in the middle, stuff with Philadelphia cheese and wrap with bacon. Place on a foil-lined tray and bake in oven along with potatoes for about 20 minutes, or until cooked.
3. Gently saute chopped onion in a little olive oil, then add the water, bring to a simmer. Add gravy granule and simmer gently for 5-10 minutes, or until onions are soft, before adding in cornstarch mixture.
4. Boil the peas briefly.
5. Assemble the meal into 2 plates, and serve.

The magic of Dulce de Leche

This is probably the easiest, the most divine, the most sinful sweet stuff one can make at home. Only three (3) ingredients needed.

Guaranteed to make anyone and everyone ask for another. And another. And another.

Ingredients
Dulce de leche*
Dessicated coconut
Malted milk biscuits

1. Pound malted milk biscuits until very fine.
2. Mix in dessicated coconut aplenty (amount depends on your preference).
3. Mix in dulce de leche a little bit at a time until very thick and sticky, add some milk if desired (I only added a splash).
4. Shape concoction into balls (could be a messy affair; we used spoons and an ice cream scooper), and roll it in more dessicated coconut.
5. Good to eat as-is, or chilled for a more solid bite.

Don't say I didn't warn you: This is very, very, very dangerously addictive.

*The recipe was shared by my housemate and friend Marcia, and dulce de leche can be substituted with condensed milk. It is also sold as Carnation Caramel 397G in cans for £1.78 in Tesco, but in my case was given by Marcia who just returned from Chile.

Blog challenge

So a friend of mine has sent me a challenge:
I blog about a Malaysian recipe that's simple to make with easy-to-get ingredients and he's going to make it and send me some feedback.

So after some thinking, this is what I came up with...

It's not Malaysian strictly speaking, but more of home slash comfort food that my mom made me as a kid, a dish my brother loved and a recipe I mastered easily.

The ingredients you need, as in all home cooking, is adjustable to the amounts you want and personal tastes. Remember though oyster sauce is quite salty but I like the taste of it, so I add in a spoonful at a time until I achieve the taste/saltiness I wanted.

Potatoes braised with minced pork

1-2 large baking potatoes, peeled and sliced thinly
1/2 lb minced pork (also adjustable, can be as much or as little as you want)
1 onion, halved and sliced
3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
2 tbsp vegetable oil
Sesame oil
Light soy sauce
Oyster sauce
1 cup water
Salt and pepper

1. Marinate minced pork with about 1 tbsp sesame oil, 1 tbsp light soy sauce and pepper before preparing and slicing the potatoes, onion and garlic.
2. Heat wok or large saucepan with oil, saute garlic until fragrant and add in minced pork. Stir-fry until minced pork is no longer red, and add in onions. Stir-fry til onions turn soft.
3. Stir in potatoes, and add about 1 tbsp sesame oil, 2 tbsp light soy sauce and 2 tbsp oyster sauce, mix and add in water. It should be enough to cover most of the potatoes. Bring to a boil, simmer on high heat for a few minutes before turning heat down. Simmer on low for 20-30 minutes, or until potatoes are soft and the liquid reduced into a thick, full-bodied gravy. Remember to taste the liquid and add in more oyster sauce/soy sauce as needed. Season with some pepper, and serve with rice and some stir-fried greens.

Good luck! (And I want photos!)

Malaysian food in London Chinatown

I really love this place. None of its food I can fault at all. Their drinks aren't great...teh tarik's a bit weak, soya bean from a bottle, but it was the food I came here for anyway.

And as a testament to the yummy-ness of the food, my lousy-in-a-hurry photo taking still made the food look gorgeous. Malaysian food rocks!

Wat Tan Hor. Only problem with this restaurant is their relative inflexibility in changing it (or adding, really) to even more sublime-tasting yin yong. I guess they don't want the hassle of deep frying rice vermicelli, but the hor fun's got a nice smoky taste and the gravy's excellent.

Singapore Laksa. Maybe it's memory playing up how good it was, I mean, it was pretty damn good, but the last time I had it was a day or two before I flew home in September, after a year of not tasting a decent bowl of curry laksa. I remember it creamier and with more intense flavours...although in reality this particular bowl must be almost exactly the same one I had, because a creamier and more intense bowl of laksa would've made me sick (jelak) after a while. Still, its a better bowl than a lot I've tried in KL, definitely up there with the amazing ones.

And course my beloved belacan. Ooooo yeah belacan. I can sing odes to belacan.

Couple days later, we went back to the same place for more Malaysian nosh, promising ourselves to try something different. There's so many things on their menu I've not tried...bak kut teh, Hainanese chicken rice, Ipoh nga choy kai, nasi lemak, Hokkien mee, char kuey teow, sambal petai, ....mmmmph...nevermind, when I can afford it, I'll spend a week in London, and eat 10 meals there in that week!

Prawn noodles. Quite spicy, perhaps not as good as the best ones in Penang but its even better than some in my neighbourhood (and I live in Kepong! GREAT FOOD!).

Tim ordered Teochew meehoon and I had no idea what it'll look like. When they put it down, I was worried it's going to be bland, but it was really well seasoned, and with a bit of briny-and-meaty gravy. I sure won't order it myself (cos it IS less exciting than spicy stuff that I can't reproduce) but it sure suited Tim pretty well.

Finished the meal with bubur cha cha. It was good because they used gula melaka and good coconut milk. Bad because the yam had too much of a bite and the sweet potato was a little...off. I was a bit dubious about it to be honest, like it was frozen and then reheated with sago thrown in before serving. But hey...while it wasn't excellent it's edible. Couldn't really ask for more! (You could tell I'm easily pleased.)

C&R Cafe Restaurant, 3-4 Rupert Court, London, W1D 6DY

Valentine's Dinner

My posts must be quite confusing now...because they're not in order.

Maybe I should explain: The idea to write my food blog started couple months ago, I just haven't gotten around to doing anything until quite recently...and I already have a backlog of material so I rather use than waste them. I also have a tendency to not upload photos til there's about 300 photos on my camera (yes yes maybe it's just plain laziness) but now that I'm starting to get into the groove of things...

Chinese New Year eve I made a big dinner for a few of my friends, and even though the food was ok, the photos turned out awful because I have an annoying habit of taking photos too close to the subject and have not learnt my lesson well so far.

Still, Valentine's Day Tim booked for a table in a restaurant he heard about in town, and the food was pretty impressive (and I'm rarely impressed with the quality and taste of food in Sheffield). We walked into town to All Bar One, which is just outside Orchard Square off Fargate, and ordered two starters for £5 and lamb shanks for mains.

The first starter was tiger prawns with lemon, parsley & garlic olive oil dressing, and I struggled to find the 'tiger' in the prawns, scrawny as they were, or taste in the dressing. We both resorted to dipping our prawns into the mayo for our other starter.

This was much better. Listed as calamari with lemon, lime & garlic mayonnaise, it was warm, crunchy and slightly greasy, and very very tasty. We fought over batter crumbs.

As big fans of lamb, we both ordered the lamb shank in a minted gravy with spinach and a rustic parsnip & sweet potato mash, and this was just gorgeous. I had Gordon Ramsey's infamous 1-year shelf life without refrigeration lamb shanks playing in my mind as I ate this, but with fall-off-the-bone tender meat and nothing artificial tasting, I may have been a tad paranoid. The spinach was gorgeous, silky and well-cooked and the mash still had good chunks in it. The dish was well-seasoned and if the lamb shank doesn't fill you up, the mash will do the job.

All in all, a very very pleasant experience.

All Bar One, 13-15 Leopold Street, Sheffield, S1 2GY. Tel: 0114 275 3423

Favourite nom spot in England...

...its gotta be Malaysian.

Of course, what else can it be? What can beat a decent bowl of Wat Tan Hor or laksa?

C&R Cafe Restaurant, 3-4 Rupert Court, London, W1D 6DY

Winter cheer

Okay, apologies for my silence...I know to start something's easy, to find the motivation and energy to keep it going is another, and this is set for a failure if I don't post something up right now.

The camera I use is Sony Cybershot DSC-W210 SteadyShot 12.1 megapixels and course I'd like to play about and own an actual DSLR but that will have to wait til I have the moolah...meanwhile, my profuse apologies for asking you to content with (sometimes) bad lighting, shaky shots and less-than-satisfactory inferior-quality photos.

That being said, hey I think I'm a decent photographer, and hopefully this blog will see through improvements with a few teething issues (like my tendency to shoot too close to my food subject). Alright, moving swiftly on...

...Let's start with something simple shall we?

Cafe Rouge is one of those chain restaurants that is prominent in the eatery scene in England (as far as I know)...which is not really a guarantee of good quality food, though it looks sufficiently posh enough for a decent 'special meal' (you'd think there's quality control!) so for our six-month anniversary we downloaded a meal deal voucher and headed there.

Appetizers: We ordered two. Course!

Crevettes du Café Rouge. Tail on king prawns cooked in garlic and herb butter with a warm cherry tomato and chilli dip and slices of French baguette.

This tasted pretty damn good, especially the salsa. Prawns were nice and crunchy.

Champignons de Paris. Baked Paris mushrooms in a creamy roasted garlic and mushroom sauce, with melted Raclette cheese and slices of French baguette.

By the time we had our two starters (appetizers to the American English speakers), I was pretty filled up, especially with the delish cheese and mushrooms, and they were pretty substantial especially with the baguette being really nice and light.

We both ordered seafood as mains, with the ever popular mussels and frites or as the menu described, Moules du Café Rouge Classic Café Rouge mussels cooked in white wine, cream, garlic and herbs with a choice of French fries or French baguette ordered by Tim.

First bite: Delish. Very briny, steaming hot, and I wanted to steal half the portion off the plate. But then as the concoction cooled down, it became really salty. VERY salty. Need glass of water NOW salty. Next to his mussels my food seemed bland, but it's actually correctly seasoned.

I had the fish casserole, which is missing from the menu these days, and it had cod, mussels, baby potatoes and leeks in creamy sauce. It wasn't bad at all, really, but was quite boring next to Tim's steaming mussels. Also as I'm not a big fan of waxy potatoes, I struggled to finish the halves, seemingly aplenty, in my dish.

But quite a good meal for about £25, including tip. Must admit, while it was a memorable meal, my memory is poor, and this is what happens when I try to blog about food 2.5 months later. Serves me right for procrastinating. Note though we do 'save up' by not ordering alcohol (good not to be a drinker!).

Cafe Rouge. 1 Sheffield Centre, St Paul's Place, Sheffield S1 2JL. Tel: 0114 2753815. Opening hours: Mon to Sat: 9.00am to 11.00pm, Sun: 10.00am to 10.30pm.

Happy Lunar New Year!

Gong Xi Gong Xi!

I'll be posting up photos of the food I made for CNY eve and what we had for Valentine's soon!

Meanwhile, a very Happy New Year and Valentine's Day!

Merry Christmas!

A very belated entry indeed, but better late than never eh!

For Christmas, Tim insisted on doing it the traditional way (except for Christmas Cake and Christmas pudding, which he conveniently passed over because he hates raisins and sultanas).

So, turkey, and roasted potatoes and veg, and a joint of pork it was! It was one hell of a stressful day, mainly because I've never roasted a chicken before, let alone a turkey, and there's a lot to do.

We started by going to Castle Market the week before Christmas to buy some taters and a economy turkey. Which meant said turkey had a risk of not having limbs intact. It was a gamble, and for £8 for a 3.8kg bird, a risk well taken. When we open the bloody (literally!) bag on Christmas day, the bird was lopsided and had its wings missing. We couldn't tell the head end from the back end at first sight. But hey-ho, all good, we managed to stuff butter under its skin and eschewing stuffing, whacked some herbs and sliced oranges (in substitute for clementines as called for by Jamie Oliver's roast turkey recipe).

I was pretty happy with the results, but had no idea how to carve a turkey, hence:

But the accompaniments were pretty good.

There's the roast potatoes, also by way of Jamie's recipe, we played it on 4oD over slow-mo so that we can do the step-to-step, and it was really worth it. It was tasty, crunchy, fluffy and just, well, good.

The roasted parsnips and sweet potato was a little...well...burnt because we left them in longer after realising in horror that we're supposed to parboil the babies. Still delicious. Oh well, next year I'll remember to par-boil!

The broccoli and Brussels sprouts were just there to counter the sinful spread, and thus nothing exciting about them.

Please don't tell me you don't want this.

I mean, he looked so happy, so it must be dead good, right!?

We made an amazing soup and a turkey and leek pie (also Jamie's recipe!) and after that storm of a cooking, I don't want to have anything to do with turkey for a long, long time!

Yummy chicken wings

For less than two quid, I couldn't resist picking up a box of chicken wings from Sainsbury.

Good thing too, cos it was just so good!

Baked chicken wings two ways

10-12 wings, washed and patted dry
Teriyaki sauce
2 tbsp curry powder
2 tbsp turmeric powder
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp coriander powder
Pinch of cumin seeds
Pinch of salt
2 tbsp honey

1. Divide wings equally into two containers or food bags, marinade half with teriyaki sauce making sure all surfaces are covered.
2. Mix the curry powder, turmeric powder, garam masala, coriander powder, cumin and salt together before spreading equally onto the other container of wings. Marinade both for at least an hour.
3. Pre-heat oven to 200C, bake on a foil-lined tray for 20 minutes before turning it over and basting it with honey. Bake for a further 10-15 minutes or until wings turn golden brown.

Christmas Log

This is a credit to Tim Chuter, my housemate who is baker-extraordinaire.

He made this Chocolate Yule Log, and must say it was really rich and sinfully yummy!