Hi there......

I have been neglecting this blog for quite some time. I am still cooking here....trying out quite a few dishes but just lazy to snapshot the photos to upload to the blog.

Talk about nasi lalapan. This is our latest craze. Hubby and I have been searching around the best nasi lalapan in town and almost we had at least once eating out a week.

Finally, we found out the best sambak cobek served is from Muara Restaurant and it serves the best lalapan in town.


I will prepare nasi lalapan next week for dinner and definitely share with you the ingredient and recipe in preparing sambal cobek. Stay tune!

Grilled Chicken Drumstick

I cooked this for lunch yesterday and it was simply delicious and yet easy to prepare.


Ingredients:-

1) Few Chicken drumstick, trimmed off the fats and let the skin intact; Marinate with Teriyaki Sauce, Black Pepper and dash of brown sugar; Leave in the fridge for 3 hours;

2) wash and cut potato, broccoli, green capsicum, big onion and carrot into chunks;

3) Few button mushroom;


Methods:-

1) Extremely easy! Arrange everything on the tray, pour olive oil all over the meat and veggie.

2) Turn the temperature to 220'c for 40-50 minutes.

Note:- It is best to put in the veggie 20 minutes before the chicken is well cooked.

This grilled chicken drumstick serves together with boiled sweet corn create a very yummy and wholesome meal!

Simple Lunch - Udon

I was short of time the other day when the kids came back from school and they "shouted" for lunch. I think they must be really hungry that day because they normally take their lunch after their bath and rest.

In the nick of time, I came out with this dish. Udon with sausage and mushroom minced pork meat sauce and topped with ikan bilis (their favourite!)

Luckily, I made some mushroom minced meat sauce a few days before and keep some in the freezer for next meal to stir fry with Japanese tofu. Besides, there is always a bottle of dried anchovies ever ready in my kitchen.

So, I thawed the frozen sauce in microwave while cooking the sausage and the udon in the boiling water in a saucepan.

Once the sauce is thawed and warm, just mix it with the udon. Final touch was topping the dish with their favourite ikan bilis!

Tuna Puffs

I browsed through a mommy blogger' website the other day and came across this recipe. Since I had an oven now and I can try my hands on baking puffs for kids and hubby. My cheeky boy likes it very much because he has been fancy on all those crispy food all the time.

Verdict: The tuna puffs do not look "nice" but it is really tasty, especially when it is just out from the oven. see one missing, can't wait to let hubby tried my "produce"


Here's the ingredient you need:-

6 pieces ready cut puff pastry 10X10cm, thawed
2 hardboiled egg, cut into quarter

Tuna Filling Ingredients :
1 can tuna in olive oil, drained & mashed coarsely
½ cup grated cheddar cheese

Method:
1. Lightly grease muffin pan and line puff pastry.
2. Fill each pastry with quartered egg and tuna mixture.
3. Sprinkle the top with some cheddar cheese.
4. Bake it for 20 to 25 minutes until pastry is golden and crispy.
5. Serve crispy tuna pies while it is still hot.

After A Long Break - Homemade Lor Mai Kai

After a long break, I finally come back to update my cooking blog. Not that I didn't cook for the past 4 months (in fact, yes. I didn't cook for the 2 months holiday in Kuantan as I had my Dad to take care of this! )


Okay, let's start on the ingredients we need to make lor mai kai:-




1) Chicken fillets ( I use drumstick and deboned), cut into strips . Marinate chicken with seasoning sauce. set aside for an hour.
2) 500 g glutinous rice, soak for an hour and drained
3) oil
4) cloves of garlic (estimate), chopped finely
5) small shiitake mushrooms, soaked and removed stalks
6) 1 large onion, chopped finely
7) chinese sausage (lap cheong) (optional)
8) Roast pork (char siew)/ sliced (optional)


Seasoning for chicken

oyster sauce
rice wine (optional)
ginger juice
light soy sauce
dark soy sauce
sesame oil
sugar
a little of cornflour
water


Sauce ( to mix with glutinous rice)

oyster sauce
light soy sauce
sesame oil
fine sugar
thick black soy sauce
1 cup water



soak glutinous rice in warm water for an hour and drained. Steam for 45 minutes. Set aside until ready to use.


Method:

1) Heat oil in wok over medium fire. Stir fry garlic until fragrant. Add mushroom and continue to stir fry. Remove and set aside.

2) Heat oil in the same wok and stir fry onion until fragrant, add steamed glutinous rice and sauce. Stir to mix well. Turn off fire.


3) Lightly grease 10 rice bowl (same as below) with oil. Put in the mushroom, chicken, and others meat into each bowl.




4) Fill glutinous rice until 3/4 full. Press rice firmly into bowl.


5) Steam over boiling water for about 40 minutes. It's best when serve with chili sauce.

Steamed Fish with Japanese Tofu

I steamed the 七星斑 fillet for dinner last week. It was so yummy that the kids eat most of the fish.


Ingredients:-

1) 1 packet of Japanese Tofu

2) Handful of salted vegetable ( 咸菜 )

3) ginger

4) 1 tomato , cut into wedges

5) Bragg liquid amino

6) Dash of sesame oil


Method:-

Very easy. Just look at the pictures below:-

Steam the fish for about 10 minutes and a wholesome dish is ready to be served!

Fish Maw Dessert

Apart from its' nourishing ingredients, "yoon" in Cantonese, it cures cough too.

See how I cooked this dessert.





Ingredients:-

1) Fresh fish maw
2) Rock Sugar (I use the brown colour one)
3) A handful of red dates


Method:-

1) Soak the fish maw overnight.

2) Just before you put everything into the slow cooker, make sure you cut the fish maw into small pieces.

3) Then, just put all ingredient into the slow cooker/crock pot. Let is cooked for about 5-6 hours on auto mode.

Salmon Fillet

The salmon fillets taste really good to be fried this way.

Ingredient:-

1) Few Stalks of lemongrass.
2) I clove of garlic
3) Salmon fillets


Method:-

1) Heat up 3 tablespoons of oil in a wok/frying pan.
2) Add in lemongrass stalks (slightly smashed) and garlic.
3) Once you smell the fragrant, put in the fillets to fry.
4) Turn side when see the colour turn golden brown.
5) Squeeze some lemon juice on the fish as final touch while it is still being fried in the pan, then dish up and serve.

Home Remedy

I read a post from a blogger mommy on the home remedy to cure her chronic cough. But in her post, she mentioned that she uses fresh olives from Hong Kong.

However, it is hard to find fresh olives here and coincident there is a type of "black olives" in Miri. So, I am just try my luck and use it to double boiled with lean pork.

Surprisingly, Jia Jia's cough has been cured after she drank about 4 bowls continuously in two days. I think the fresh black olives work just well as the fresh green olives. At least she does not need to complete the course of singulair prescribed by the doctor.


Very easy to prepare.

Ingredient:-

1) A handful of black olives
2) some lean pork


Method:-

1) Wash all ingredient and put everything into the double boiler.
2) I use Milux double boiler and set the time to 4 hours.





Here's the soup. Taste not bad. Jia Jia drank the soup and I ate all the olives.

Stir Fry Japanese Tofu with Mixed Veggie

It is an easy to cook dish. I normally fry the Japanese tofu before stir fry it with the mixed vegetables. I find that the tofu taste better this way.

You can use any veggie but I personally like to use broccoli and cauliflower because both my kids loves it.

Braised Fish Maw with Sea Cucumber

Braised fish maw in sea cucumber, chicken, shitake mushroom and clams

Here is one of my best dish and it is a all time favourite during "big day'. I learnt to cook this from my dad.

Ingredient:-

1) Fish maw. Cooked in a boiled water until soft. Wash and cut into bite size.

2) Shitake mushroom. Soak until soft and cut into halves if the size is big.

3) Cut the chicken thigh into halves. Marinate with pepper powder, oyster sauce and ginger slices.

4) Sea cucumber (optional). I normally buy the ready-to-cook type. Cut into bite size.

Method:

1) Stir fry chicken for about 15 minutes until it is half cooked. Place it nicely in a big pot.

2) Sautee garlic until fragrant. Add in the shitake mushroom. Cook for about 10 minutes. Dish up and place on top of the chicken.

3) In the same wok, add in the cooked fish maw and continue to stir fry. No need to add any oil.
Stir fry for about 8-10 minutes. Dish up and place on the mushroom.

4) Now, bring the pot to add water just enough to cover the fish maw 9which is on the top layer).

5) Bring the pot to boil and slowly add in oyster sauce to taste. Let it simmer on low heat for about 2 hours. Then add in sea cucumber and continue to cook for another 1 hour and then turn off the stove.

6) Clams can be added just before serving. Reheat the pot and add in clams and let it cook for about 8 minutes.

Steam Tofu with Dried Shrimp

Yet another easy-to-prepare dish and very yummy too!

Ingredients:-

1) 1 pack of tofu

2) a handful of dried shrimp. Soak in water to soften up. Drain and chop.

3) a few stalk of spring onion. chopped.

4) garlic and shallot

5) Oyster sauce

Method:-

1) Put a tiny dash of sesame oil on top of the tofu and steam for 10 minutes. Drain the water. Pour some oyster sauce on top of the tofu. Leave it aside.

2) Heat up 3 tablespoon of oil in a wok. Add in chopped dried shrimp. Stir fry until the colour turn golden brown. Add in garlic and shallot. Continue to stir fry for another 5 minutes.

3) Once it is done, dish up and pour over the top of the steamed tofu. Lastly, garnish the tofu with the chopped spring onion.

Barley Ginkgo Dessert

I have a hubby who loves dessert. So, I'll make dessert at least once a week. This is one of the desserts that I made. De-seeding the ginkgo/ lotus seeds is slightly time consuming, so, I normally cook this on weekend.

Ingredients:-

1) Barley

2) Ginkgo/Lotus Seeds

3) Fu Pei (bean curd skin)

4) Rock sugar

On side note:- I use pressure cooker to make this as the bean curd skin dissolve /become soft easily when cook in the pressure cooker.

Method:-

1) fill the pot with water. Add in the bean curd skin and barley to boil. Cook for about 45 minutes. Then put in the ginkgo and rock sugar. Let it boils for another 30 minutes.

2) Turn off the stove. You can either serve it warn or chilled it. I find out it taste good when serve chilled.

Mixed Vegetable and Fruit Juice

I have been juicing this since the past two weeks ever since I found out that both my kids love it.

I normally mix at least 2 types of veggie and 2 types of fruits in a time. It is either be:-

(A) celery, carrot , green apple and orange or

(B) cucumber, carrot, green apple and orange

It is so good that they eat the celery in this way and they normally do not like to eat celery.

I'll try adding beetroot next week and see how well they can take it!

Stir Fried Fish Fillet With Ginger

My kids like this very much as it goes very well either with rice or porridge. Besides, it is so easy to prepare.

Ingredients:-

1) Fish fillet (marinate with sesame oil, pepper and soy sauce for about 20-30 minutes)

2) a few stalk of spring onion

3) Slices of ginger

4) 1 clove of garlic

5) cili padi (small red chili) . Optional. I normally add this at last stage after dish up a portion for the kids as they can't take spicy food.

6) Dash of corn starch.

Method:-

1) Sauteed garlic and ginger until golden brown.

2) Add in the fish fillet and stir fry.

3) Put in the spring onion, chili and water. Continue to stir fry.

4) Lastly, mix corn starch with water and pour in to thicken the sauce.

Stir Fried Squids in Sauce

I like sotong (squids) very much. Whenever I cook squids, I am the only one who eat up everything because hubby cannot take squids due to health issues.

Here's the ingredient:-

1) One big squid

2) One big onion (cut into wedges)

3) One tomato (cut into wedges)

4) Green & Red bell pepper (optional)

5) 1 clove of garlic

6) A dash of black soy sauce

7) Some light soy sauce to taste ( I use Braggs )

Method:-

1) Heat up 2 tablespoon of oil in a wok. Sauteed garlic until golden brown.

2) Add in the onion and stir fried until fragrant.

3) Put in the tomato and green pepper and continue to stir fry.

4) Lastly, pour in the squids and add in the black soy sauce, light soy sauce and a little bit of brown sugar. Stir fry for about 5 minutes. Dish up and serve warm with rice.

It goes very well if serve with rice alone as there are already include veggie in this dish.

Assam Fish

I normally used the ready mix rempah in making this assam dish all the time. Of all the ready mix products in the market, the brand that I like most is Rempah Nyonya.

Here's the ingredient I used:-

1) Whole fish or fish fillet ( I used mackerel fish fillet because I couldn't find a fresh ikan merah)

2) A few stalks of lemongrass

3) 1 tomato , cut into wedges

4) 1 red chili, cut into slices

5) few slices of Mengkuas

6) Assam paste (mixed with water and strain)

Method:-

1) steam the fish for about 5 minutes and let aside.

2) put 2 tablespoon of oil to wok to heat, add in the lemongrass and Mengkuas to stir fry until fragrant. Then add in the red chili and ready mix rempah. Stir fried for about 3 minutes.

3) Pour in the assam water and add in the tomato. Stir for a while.

4) Put in the fish and let it simmer for about 5 minutes. Dish up and serve warm.

Simple Lunch

I cooked something different and wanted to tried new dishes on them the other day. We had plain porridge for lunch with stir fried french bean and fish fillet.

stir fried french bean with eggs.

stir fried fish fillet with fermented sweet bean paste and garlic. (I just put in a tiny bits of fermented bean paste as taste)

Verdict; Both of them like it so much. Sometimes it is good to serve plain porridge with other side dishes instead of put everything into the pot and cook together.

Quick Fixed Lunch

Jia Jia has to attend ballet lessons today and she was really hungry when we reached home. So, in order to fill up her hungry tummy, I had to come out with this as quick fixed lunch.






Shell pasta cooked in Heinz white sauce and tuna, sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. It is served with broccoli coated with butter .

These are the ingredients. Easy, right?

Simple Meals

Read a few blogs the other day and was keen to try out some yummy recipe that shared by the mommy blogger. Here are what I had cooked for our dinner today.





fry prawns (dry-style) with soy sauce, Chinese cooking wine and brown sugar.






stir fried french bean with garlic and fermented bean paste.










marmite chicken served with stir fried broccoli and cauliflower. Thanks to HN for sharing this.






Not forgetting the fruits after dinner. Cherry tomatoes, grapes (red and green) for the kids.