Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

Wishing All... a Joyous Christmas Holiday
& a Happy New Year!!

Marinated Fruits Dessert

We had an early celebration of the mooncake festival last night at my sis place. My sister-in-law prepared a huge tub of the marinated mixed fruits salad to the party; they were well received by all the guests. Since I love them so much and had ate a huge portion, I thought I should try to make some as she had shared the recipe in her blog.

These marinated mixed fruits consists of Chinese pear, guavas, red and green apples which are so refreshing when served chilled! They can be served as either an appetizer or a salad!

To enhance the refreshing taste, I have added 1 tablespoon of lemon juice and minced some lemon zest so that it has a stronger citrus flavor imparts to these marinated fruits.

One will not regret after having tried them, despite the much cutting and slicing during the preparation.

Ingredients (Serve 8-10) 2 large guavas 2 green apples 3 red apples 1 large Chinese pear 2 pkts preserved mandarin peel (15g each) 2 chillies 10 calamansi or limes some lemon juice some lemon zest Methods 1. In a small pail of water, squeeze some lemon juice into it and set aside, for the sliced fruits. 2. Peel and seed both the guavas and Chinese pear. Seed the apples and sliced all fruits to approx 2mm thickness. Soak them in the pail of water,to prevent browning. 4. Minced or chopped the mandarin peel thinly. 5. Remove the seeds of the chili, chop or slice them into tiny stripes. 6. Obtain the calamansi juice and chop up 1 calamansi. 7. Drained and mix all fruits, mandarin peels, calamansi and its juice, lemon juice, lemon zest and chilies together. Toss to mix well. 8. Transfer into a container with cover, store in fridge for 4 to 6 hrs or longer. 9. Serve chilled.

Black Rice Pumpkin Fried Rice

For some of you, black rice may not be commonly used in your kitchen. Well, at least it was the case for me; until one of my good friend introduced this wonderful rice to me two years ago. If you want to know the nutritional value of black rice, please read here.

With no dark sauce added, the rice looks purplish-black when cooked.

An additional okra (lady's fingers) side dish added.

Dinner

This is my first Yee-Fu noodles(伊府面), got the recipe from a friend long time ago and didn't had a chance to try until today (I think I added too much carrot and the colour actually looks more orange in the photo). Frying was very simple as compared to the preparation. Hubby - J is out-stationed and therefore he missed the chance to be my guinea-pig. Everything was fine except that it was slight sweet than saltish... Never mind then...practise makes perfect! I should be able to fry better on my second trial.

Vegetarian Fried Kuey Tiow in Creamy Sauce

Since I have a packet of kuey tiow in the fridge, I decided to try my hand on cooking my favorite fried kuey tiow in creamy sauce for dinner.

Ingredients A
1 tbsp sesame oil
500g kuey tiow
1 tbsp light soya sauce
1/2 tsp dark soya sauce

Ingredients B
1 tbsp oil
some fresh mushrooms
some cut cabbages
some chye sim
a little carrot, sliced

Seasoning
2 tbsp vegetarian oyster sauce
1 tsp vegetarian mushroom seasoning
some pepper
1 tsp sesame oil
600ml water
1 1/2 tbsp cornstarch, mixed with 3tbsp water (for thickening)

Method
1. Heat up oil, stir fry the kuey tiow at high heat until fragrant. Add in the light soy sauce, dark soy sauce and stir-fry until well mixed. Dish onto a serving plate (as shown on above photo). (U may use a non-stick pan where oil can be omitted because kuey tiow are always coated with a layer oil to prevent sticking).

2. Heat up oil, add in ingredients B and stir fry until aromatic. Add in the seasoning and bring to boil. Thicken with cornstarch water.

3. Pour the creamy sauce over fried kuey tiow and serve with green chilies.

I like my version of this fried kuey tiow in creamy sauce, which is not too salty nor oily as compared to what we have at Zhu Chow store (^o^)

Spicy Vegetable Curry With Black-Eyed Peas

I made the second attempt of these black-eyed peas mixed vegetable curry, but... this time is the spicy version.

Instead of broccoli which I used on my earlier post, I replaced it with potatoes chunks which is husband favorite!

The cooking method is similar to the earlier post; I merely added more of the raw mustard seeds, two cut green chilies, one tablespoon of each of curry powder and chili powder.

Somehow... the colors and photos looked the same, but this version was spicy which goes so well with rice or bread!

Black-Eyed Peas Mixed Vegetable Curry

I recalled the last time I posted black-eyed peas was quite some times ago, and that was of a Chinese soup which I duplicated after I came back from my Hong Kong trip.

Last night, I decided to try soaking some black-eyed peas for an Indian style curry which I came across on a magazine, a couple of months ago. Though I can only recalled that they uses cumin and turmeric powder; I decided to do a hands-on trial on my own version since I have some spices left in the fridge!

I tried to make use of most of my vegetables found in my fridge... in the end, I have created a pot of very delicious and nutritious black-eyed mixed vegetables curry!

This version of curry is non-spicy which is suitable for kids who love curry with spices. If you love spicy curry, I would suggest adding some fresh cut green chilies or either chili powder into it! ^^


Prep time: 10 mins
Cooking time: 30 mins (approx.)
Soaking time: 8 hrs or overnight

Ingredients

1 cup of black-eyed peas - pre-soaked 8hrs or overnight(drained)
2 cup of water for boiling the peas
2 medium tomatoes, finely chopped
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp raw mustard seeds
1 tsp Masterfood wholegrain mustard seeds
1 tbsp of cooking oil
salt - as per own preference
1/2 cup water
some chopped french beans
some chopped broccoli
some cut celery

Method
Soak black-eyed peas overnight or minimum eight hours. Wash them and cook with two cups of water and a pinch of salt for 20mins. Drain and keep aside.

In a separate pot, heat oil and add cumin and raw mustard seeds. Let it fry for a min. Fry till the some mustard seeds start popping.

Add the hard stems of broccoli, follow by chopped tomatoes, french beans, celery and cook for 5 mins. Add the cooked black eyes peas and stir well till as the ingredients are mixed well.

Add turmeric powder and wholegrain mustard seeds. Add in half cup water and let it simmer on low flame for 5 minutes. Finally, add in the chopped broccoli and continue to simmer till all flavors blend well. Add salt to taste.

Garnish with some Chinese parsley and serve with rice or any bread.

Stir-Fry Rice Vermicelli With Side Dishes

Whenever husband and I go to the Giant Hypermarket at Tampines, we bound to reserve "a corner" of our stomach for the vegetarian stir-fry beehoon (rice vermicelli) with some side dishes.

I like the taste of their white version of vegetarian beehoon, which has some julienned cabbage and carrots in it. However, they are not very generous with their servings; it will not be sufficient to feed a hungry person even with the order of two/three side dishes of your choice.

So for this afternoon lunch, I decided to duplicate the idea of stir-frying my own version of beehoon with cabbage and carrots; together with my selection of two side dishes I cooked separately! ^^

Yummy okra(again!!) with chili broad bean paste and stir-fry bean sprouts.

Here's...Fried Beehoon with two side dishes and homemade green chilies.

And..the third side dish is my left-over five-spiced dark soy sauce tau pok (puffed tofu) with Chinese mushrooms.

Okra With Chili Broad Beans Paste

I love Okra - a vegetable with a mild flavor but somewhat unusual texture! Okra releases a sticky substance when cut; which is why I love to add them into vegetable curry where these sticky substance can thicken the gravy! If you want to minimize the sliminess, keeping the pods whole helps.

One of my best and easiest method of cooking them is to steam them after washed and drizzle with a little Chinese salted soybeans and lots of sesame seeds...

This afternoon, I cooked my the other method by slicing them diagonally and cooked them with salted broad beans chili paste. No oil was added during the process of this cooking, as I uses only the oil which comes with the salted chili beans paste!

After simmering them in less than 2 minutes, you get a plate of yummy and still crunchy okra with chili bean paste. Simply delicious when serve hot with cooked mixed rice ^o*

Ingredients

400g Okra - wash and sliced into thin diagonal

1 1/2 tbsp of broad beans paste with chili

1 tsp of sugar (i used brown sugar)

a little water

Method

Heat a non-stick pan with broad beans chili paste, add in sugar to dissolve together. Pour in all sliced okra and mix well. Add in a little water if it is too dry. Simmer for 1-2mins with cover. Serve with warm cooked rice. (*broad beans chili paste are rather salty, so adjust the taste with more sugar, according to your preference)

East Meets West Fried Rice

You must be wondering why I have named this fried rice as the East Meets West fried Rice??!! Well... it is due to the usage of Asian black olives and the western olives, as additional flavours to this fried rice which I cooked yesterday.

I had specially fried the rice with mustard green so that husband could bring a box for my father-in-law who loves mustard green.

This mustard green with olives fried rice has a slight different taste of what I have cooked here, due to the mixture of the western olives which carried a sourish taste.

I specially took a picture of the black seedless olives (above), which I am sure some of the Teochew are familiar with; something which belongs to the "old-world" and are not often being seen these days! For me, it is also a childhood memory of what our grandparents or great-grandparents used to eat with the Teochew porridge - something which is so close to the heart ^o^

Some might say that these preserved black olives are bad for health...well I know! It is just something I wanted to add in for more flavours once in a blue moon; or rather something which just for the old times' sakes! >o<

Mixed Rice Sushi

Last weekend I bought the Japanese daikon pickles from Medi-ya. Since I have many other vegetables in the fridge, I decided to try using mixed rice to make some sushi!

I used mixed red rice, quinoa, buckwheat and Japanese short grains.

Here are my many colours mixed rice sushi... yum..yum...

Tempeh Vegetarian Curry

In fact this is rather back-dated, I cooked this more than two weeks ago! Just another simple vegetables curry which I had mixed with tempeh!

Last year, I talked to a close friend of making full use of the soy beans paste which derived after making of my soy milk. She suggested if we can add into the curry. Therefore, I decided to give a try when I cooked my vegetables curry and surprisingly, the soy paste added a thick and rich texture to the curry gravy!

Since then, my soy beans paste became a replacement of coconut milk when I needed to cook curry at home.

As usual, I have used the brand 'Baba' vegetable curry powder with additional turmeric powder.

Mixed them in ration of 4:1, with water to form a thick curry paste.

This is the look of fresh soy bean from the making of my soy milk.

I usually store the extra boxes in the freezer for backup, if the fresh ones are not available.

Lightly pan-fry the strips of tempeh before adding them into the curry.

A pot of nutritious vegetables tempeh curry, ready to be served ^o^

Miffy Updates

Here are some of Miffy recent and old photographs which I have sorted... some of her very funny laying positions, which will happen every corners of the house... (^o^)

One of her ideal corners... squeezing in between of narrow gaps... ^^