All posts
Chicken giblet with cucumber (sustainable living #3)
Chicken giblets need to be cook quickly to avoid over cooking. So I blanch the giblets in hot water quickly before slicing and pan frying. Once blanched, I cook the giblets the same way as the chicken liver.
Here are the easy steps:
- Blanch the giblets quickly in hot water; transfer to a plate to cool
- Thinly slice the giblets
- In a frying pan, add some cooking oil, bring it to very hot temperature; add sliced ginger, minced garlic, and sliced chili; add sliced giblets, a little sugar, toss; splash a little dark soy sauce, sesame oil, white pepper, toss; remove from heat
- Add some sliced shallot / scallion, toss
- Add some sliced cucumber, toss
- Garnish with chopped coriander
The giblets taste better the next day, served chilled as a salad (‘liang-ban’).
Chicken liver with chili, garlic and ginger (sustainable living #2)
My favorite chicken liver recipe calls for a quick stir fry in a very hot wok.
It is super simple:
- In a frying pan, add some cooking oil, bring it to very hot temperature
- Add sliced ginger, minced garlic, sliced chili, and sliced shallot / scallion (white part only), toss lightly
- Add chicken liver pieces (cleaned and trimmed in advance); splash in a little sugar and toss (for aroma), splash in some dark soy sauce (for color), oyster sauce, white pepper, stir fry till cooked
- Add some sliced shallot/scallion (green part), toss
- Garnish with chopped coriander and toasted sesame seeds
Stir fry pig tongue with garlic and ginger (sustainable living #1)
Our family talked about sustainable living from time to time. We achieved very little – the house is unsuitable for solar panels, and we are too busy to run a productive veggie patch or to keep a coup of chicken.
One thing we do well as a half-Asian family, is to use “fifth quarter” cuts such as offal.
I am posting a few of our offal recipes, hope you will like them.
Method is as follows:
Wonton ‘salad’ with XO Sauce
Some beautiful people at my husband’s work organised a picnic lunch last weekend. It was a diverse mix of people – Australians, Germans, Chinese and a few Indian families. A father brought his son and some yummy curry cooked by his wife’s friend.
“Why your wife’s friend cooked for us, a bunch of strangers?” we asked.
“Our Indians always help each other out in the community”, he smiled, ‘my son, for example, lived with his aunt for a few years; and our neighbor had picked him up from school for many years, unpaid of course”.
That sounds lovely, and a dream for many of us.
I live in a suburb in Sydney. I like the area because it has lots of big trees and the community was warm and welcoming. Things changed over the past few years with skyrocket housing prices. Moms are now working more hours and the stress spreading in the air.
How I wish we could have a closely knit community who can help each other, or simply having the time to ask each other, “are you ok?”
Here is a large wonton ‘salad’ I prepared for the picnic, a dish perfect for sharing.
The dish is somehow Cantonese, spiced with a Hong Kong style XO sauce made with scallop, fish, garlic and chili; yet it is not quite Cantonese as it was served lightly chilled, a cooking style used frequently by Northern China called the ‘liang ban’ (cool-mix).
A video on how to wrap wontons is also attached below.
Recipe is as follow: Read the rest of this entry »
Fried rice with Asian spices, and memories of Auntie Wong (gluten free option)
I first learned how to use Asian spices from my best friend’s late mother whom I dearly called Auntie Wong.
Growing up in Malaysia, Auntie Wong was an acrobat in a circus, and later became a self-trained dentist. ‘How do you install a denture for an old lady without a single tooth,’ she laughed,’ luckily I was young and good looking then, I asked male dentists for helps and was never refused’.
Auntie Wong migrated to Australia in early 1980s with her three daughters. She ran a small take away shop in Glebe, an inner Sydney suburb, selling Malaysian fast food. To supplement the limited income from the shop, in the evenings she made spring rolls for catering companies. My friend Mei, the youngest daughter, helped with the spring rolls while she was still in primary school.
Some years later, Auntie Wong saved up enough money and bought a studio apartment. Auntie and Mei lived there for many years, sharing a bed. In their tiny but always welcoming home, Auntie Wong cooked me many heart-warming meals. The smell of delicious food filled the small space, and what a wonderful place it was. My favorite dishes were the Singapore meat and bone soup, noodles with salmon XO sauce, and fried rice with Indian spices.
While enjoying meals, auntie told me many of her life stories. I was always inspired by her amazing abilities to adopt to changes, and her keen spirit for new adventures.
Here is my version of a spiced fried rice – simple, aromatic and satisfying, with fond memory of Auntie Wong’s kindness and love. Read the rest of this entry »
Snow fungus (雪耳), goji berries (枸杞) and chicken soup
Cantonese love soups.
There are soups for every weather condition, every season and very occasion. There are soups to warm your body, or to cool your temper. The key to a good soup is to balance all the ingredients for maximum nurturing effect. Snow fungus with goji and chicken is one of these well-balanced soups that can rejuvenate your mind and soul.
Snow fungus, also known as the silver fungus, is sometimes recognized as the champion of all fungus. Historically it was used by the royals and rich families as a remedy to boost their health, with supposedly nurturing effects for internal organs, skin and brain, as well as anti-inflammatory and anti-tumor effects.
Goji berries as a herbal remedy, was documented in various ancient Chinese medicine compendiums dated as early as the 1500’s. Today, it is a common Chinese ingredient with supposedly positive effects on liver, kidney, sore back, joints, tiredness and poor eye sight. Families use it frequently in soups and teas.
Sounds like a magic, doesn’t it. The soup is warm, gentle and comforting. Hope you will like it.
Easy method is as follows:
Meals for the homeless – chicken siumai dumplings
Winter is finally here, and it rained most days last week. This means it was very uncomfortable for our rough sleepers, with many of them having to seek shelter at temporary accommodation. However, I was assured that they would not miss our homemade hot meals on Saturday night. So I made an extra effort to provide them with some nice food – apricot chicken, prawn and chorizo pilau, and chicken siumai dumplings.
Although time consuming, chicken siumai dumplings are very easy to make. My simplest version has only a few key ingredients – wonton wrappers, chicken mince, chicken bouillon powder, salt and white pepper, and cooking oil for pan frying.
I first made the meat filling, then the dumplings. I steamed the dumplings, following by pan-frying the dumplings slightly, so they won’t stick during transit to the homeless feed.
The easy method is illustrated as follows:
