Stir Fry French Beans With Beancurd

Another plain, easy and healthy vegetable dish to prepare at home for your family.

Ingredients

300 gm french beans - break into 2-3 smaller pieces

2 pieces firm beancurd [taukwa] - cut strips

1/2 red carrot - sliced

50 gm fresh prawns - shelled [optional]

2 tbsp oil

1/2 tbsp chopped garlic 

a pinch of msg

salt to taste

50 ml water

1. Heat oil in wok to fry cut beancurd till firm and slightly golden.  Dish out and set aside.
2. With remaining oil, saute garlic till fragrant and add in the prawns.  Fry till prawns are cooked and add in french beans and carrot.  Stir fry and add in fried beancurd and seasoning. Stir and add in water.  Cover to cook till french beans turns greenish and cooked.
3. Dish out onto serving plate.

Homemade Fishballs and Meatballs Soup

Meatball and Fishball Soup

150gm Home made Fish Paste Shaped into 20 pieces fish balls

Ingredients

150 gm fish paste - makes 20 pieces of fish balls

[see home made fish paste recipe from previous post]

150 gm minced meat - [season with 1/2 tsp soy sauce, 1/4 tsp salt, dash of pepper and sesame oil and 1/2 tbsp cornflour]

750 ml water

1/2 tbsp tung choi - washed [optional]

salt and msg to taste

garlic crisps

some lettuce leaves or chopped coriander leaves

1.  Boil water with tung choi till boiling for 5 - 10 minutes.  Shape season minced meat into meatballs and drop into boiling soup to cook.
2. Add in fish balls. Add in salt, msg/chicken stock granules and pepper  to taste.  Continue boiling till fish balls float up to the surface.
3. Serve soup in bowl with lettuce leaves or chopped coriander leaves or spring onions and garlic crisp.  

Notes

• Can add any blanched noodles [tunghoon, mee suah, instant noodles or rice vermicelli] if not serving with rice

Bakstik [Minced Meat Steak] With Sauce

'Bakstik' is a Hokkien name for minced meat patties pan fry like a shape of a small piece of steak.  This is my Ma's recipe and of course, it may be different from other such recipes.  It is tasty on its own with or without the sauce.

'Bakstik' Served in a Bowl

Fried 'Bakstik' before Adding Sauce

Cooked 'Bakstik' Sauce

'Bakstik'  Served on Plate

Ingredients

600 gm minced meat with some fats

1 tomato - cut wedges

1 big onion - cut wedges

1 red chilli - cut wedges

1 spring onion - cut 3 cm lengths

Sauce - Mix together all ingredients except the cornflour

1/4 tsp 5 spice powder

2 tsp soy sauce

1 tbsp oyster sauce

1 tsp sugar

500 ml water

2 tbsp cornflour + 4 tbsp water

salt to taste

Marinade for Meat

1 tsp 5 spice powder

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp pepper

1/2 tsp msg

2 eggs
1 tsp sesame oil

3 tbsp cornflour

1. Marinate minced meat with marinade and set aside for 1/2 hour.  Prepare the tomato, onion and sauce ingredients.
2. Heat enough oil in wok to pan fry the 'bakstik' .  Shape the meat mixture into about 40 gm meat patties, flatten slightly and pan fry till cooked and golden brown [see photo].  Set aside.
3. Remove excess oil.  Use the same wok to fry onions and add in sauce ingredients.  Bring to a boil, add tomatoes and taste to adjust seasoning.  When sauce boils, thicken with cornflour mix add in cut spring onions.
4. Arrange 'bakstik' in a serving dish and scoop sauce over meat patties to serve.

I'm submitting this recipe to Red Meats Feast hosted by MySpicyKitchen.

Home Made Fish Balls

Fish Paste Before Shaping into Fish balls

The type of fish best for making fish balls

Chopped Fish Meat Before Adding Seasoning

This is a very simple home made fish paste for fish balls.  The texture is not that bouncy or crunchy like those in the market but it definitely has the taste of fish meat and genuine sweetness.  The quantity to make need not be much.  I have the recipe to make at least 300 gm but since I can only get 150 gm fish meat today from the 2 pieces of fish [see photo - costs only Ringgit 2.00], I just make do with it and maybe add minced meat to it or meatballs for soup.

Ingredients

150 gm fish meat

Seasoning

1 tsp tapioca flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1/2 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp sesame oil

50 ml ice cold water

1. Clean fish and debone to get 2 pieces of fish fillet.  Then use a flat metal spoon to scrape off the flesh from the bones and fillet.  Use a knife to chop the fish meat into finer pieces and set aside is a bigger bowl [see photo].
2. Mix all the seasoning ingredients and make sure the water is ice-cold or just mix all seasoning and keep in fridge  while you prepare the fish meat.
3. Quickly stir in the seasoning to the fish meat.  Start to stir mixture with your hand, stir in one direction till the seasoning and fish meat is well combined.  The mixture will be sticky.  Continue stirring then start to slap a handful of mixture in the bowlat a time for at least 5 minutes.  This is important so as to incorporate the seasoning and fish meat well and to get more bouncy/crunchy fish balls.  Slap until the paste comes together and no longer sticky.  Transfer to a container, rest in fridge for at least 1 hour before cooking.  Do not freeze fish balls.
4. To cook, just boil enough water/stock for soup.  When soup is boiling, wet your hands first before using a spoon and hand to shape paste into fish balls.  Drop fish balls into soup to cook as and when you make it.  The fish balls will float up when cooked.  Season soup and add leafy vegetables or chopped coriander and pepper to taste. [See next post - Meatball and Fishball Soup recipe]

Simply Delicious Spread of Porridge Dishes

How lucky we are to have so, so many varieties of food each day to choose and yet, I always hear comments such as "Don't know what to cook for the family" usually at the wet markets when the home makers are scouting around for ingredients.  Anyway, my family are lucky to have my Ma who does the planning and we do the marketing and also there are 'contingency plans' too, just in case some ingredients are unavailable.

See the spread of home cooked porridge dishes my Ma prepares for us all these years. It may be inexpensive and simple but it definitely solves the above problem.  If it interest you, below is a summary of the dishes.  For the recipes, please see the earlier postings.  Thank You, Ma.

.

Stir Fry Sambal Eggplant

Plain Porridge

Fried Fish [ Tuar Seh ]

Stir Fry Spicy Beansprouts With Egg

Fried Omelette With Minced Meat

Fried Omelette With Preserved Radish [Chai Por]

Braised Mui Choy With Pork Belly

Stir Fry Sambal Long Beans [Snake Beans]

Stir Fry Spicy Stingray With Preserved Mustard [Kiam Chye]

Stir Fry Cockles With Tau cheong

Braised Pork Belly With Eggs And Beancurd

Fried Soft Beancurd With Tau Cheong

Fried Sambal Ikan Cencaru

Fried Egg Omelette With 'Hneah'

Fried Egg Omelette With Long Beans

Stir Fry 'Teochew' Beancurd

Stir Fry Spinach With Fish Sauce

Stir Fry Sambal French Beans

Stir Fry Clams [Lala]

Stir Fry Beansprouts With Beancurd

Stir Fry Sambal Mixed Beans

Fried Tamarind Prawns [Assam Prawns]

Fried Chilli Anchovies With Peanuts

Stir Fry Sambal Sweet Potato Leaves

Fried Omelette With Bombay Onions

Stir Fry Sambal Emperor's Vegetable [Hong Thay Cai]

 

In Hokkien dialect, this vegetable is called 'Hong Thay Cai' meaning Emperor's Vege.  I checked and found its English name is Basella Alba.  It is a perennial vine vegetable.  A distinct feature of this vegetable is the succulent mucilage [alike okra or ladies fingers] and this mucilage is thought to remove mucus and toxins from the body.  A rich source of chlorophyll.  Anyway, this is a kind of leafy green vegetable that can be stir fry with sambal dried prawns like several of the other vegetables, beans etc. which I have posted the recipes earlier.  Basically, it is the same sambal dried prawns.

Ingredients

Basic Sambal Paste [Please refer earlier posts on Stir Fry Sambal Vegetables]

500 gm emperor's vege [di wang miao] - wash and pluck leaves and stems

a pinch of salt to taste

 2 tbsp oil

1. Heat oil in wok, saute sambal paste till fragrant.  Add in vegetables and salt [if necessary].
2. Fry till vegetables are cooked.  Dish out onto plate, serve with rice.

Sweet Potato And Sago Dessert

Dessert With Coconut Milk Brown Sugar Syrup

                                                                                                                                                  Dessert Before Adding Brown Sugar Syrup

Easy to prepare dessert and not much ingredients.  We had this for afternoon snack.

Ingredients
[serves 6]

500 gm orange color sweet potatoes - skinned and cut wedges, soak in water before cooking

100 gm sago pearls [small] wash under tap water 1 time]

1.7 litres water

125 gm sugar

2-3 screwpine leaves - wash and tie knot.

1. Boil water with sweet potatoes and screw pine leaves till soft.
2. When sweet potatoes are cooked and soft .Off heat.
3. Remove scum and turn on heat to boil again, add in the sago which has been wash and drained.  Continue to boil and stir till sago pearls turn clear.  Off heat, serve with brown sugar coconut milk syrup.

How to prepare syrup?

Boil 3 tbsp brown sugar, 2 tbsp sugar and 2 tbsp water, a pinch of salt and 2 screwpine leaves [tie knot].  Boil till bubbling for 1-2 minutes.  Add in 50 ml coconut milk.  Let it boil again, off fire. Syrup is ready to be served with sago dessert.

 

Steamed Pork Belly With Salted Fish Fillet

Again this dish has several versions.  Some would fry all ingredients then steam to cook. This version on my Ma's is simply steaming so that it is not oily and easier way.

Steamed Meat with Salted Fish

Ingredients

300 gm tender pork fillet or pork belly with skin - cut bite size pieces

150 gm salted fish fillet - wash, soak and cut into 1cm thick strips

1 1/2 tbsp shredded ginger

2 cloves garlic - sliced

1 red chilli - sliced

Seasoning

1 tsp sesame oil

1 tsp soy sauce

2 tbsp water

a dash of pepper and msg

Ingredients Before Steaming

Ingredients Before Steaming With Water and Sesame Oil Added

1. Mix meat and salted fish together with seasoning in steaming bowl.  Then sprinkle on top ginger, garlic and red chilli.
2. Steam over boiling water on high heat for 30 minutes or until meat is tender.  Garnish with spring onions.

I'm submitting this post to Red Meats Feast hosted by MySpicyKitchen.

Pork Belly, Tofu Puff Curry With Cabbage [Photos]

Curry Paste

Saute curry paste till fragrant

add in pork belly and cabbage

Add in milk

Add in enough water and tofu puff,

bring to a boil and add seasoning

 

Boil all ingredients till cooked and soft.

A Bowl of Pork Belly, Taupok & Cabbage Curry

Note:

For ingredients, please refer to earlier posting