They say a person just needs three things to be truly happy in this world

Ingredients: (For 5 servings)

15 small black flower mushrooms, reserve mushroom water

150g spare ribs

100g pork ribs

2 small saito fishcakes

10 pork & mushroom balls

1 carrot peeled and sliced

5 leaves of lettuce chopped

200g of rice vermicelli presoaked

500g of prawns, deshelled and deveined, marinate with a dash of soy sauce, shaoxing wine, pepper, a dash of sesame oil. reserve head and shells.

5 cloves of garlic, minced

1 tablespoon of sesame oil, 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

Oyster sauce 2 large tablespoons

0.5 teaspoon of salt to taste

1 cube of Knorr chicken stock (no MSG)

500ml of pork rib stock

2L of water

Parsley, chopped red chillies

Method:

Blanch spare ribs and pork ribs and set aside.

Once pan is heated, add sesame and vegetable oil. Fry minced garlic till fragrant and add prawn shells and head. Fry and lightly press the head while frying :) 

Add 2L of water, 500 ml of pork rib stock, flower mushrooms and reserve mushroom water. Once it comes to a boil, add sliced carrots. Let the soup continue boiling, add 1 chicken stock cube, oyster sauce and salt to taste.

Let the soup continue to simmer over low heat. Add in the pork ribs and spare ribs, fishcake and prawns.

Once ready for dinner, let soup come to a boil and add in the presoaked vermicelli to cook in the soup. Divide the vermicelli into 5 portions and the sliced lettuce before arranging ingredients and adding soup. Finish with a dash of white pepper to taste. 

Top with parsley and serve with cut red chilli padi :)

From our kitchen to yours,

Brenda x

米粉被谁骗了？🐟 因为鱼骗米粉！

Two of Dad & lil bro's prized fish. After my fingers have been sliced, stabbed, pricked and my nails ruined to the moon and back, all while trying to gut, clean and fillet fish, I have newfound respect for all fishmongers! 

And I'll pay any amount to have fish soup outside.

But for now,

this was what came out of a whole arvo spent in the kitchen from 11am till 4pm.

Just to make things clear though. 

I've never cleaned or filleted a fish before.

So this could all possibly be done in a fraction of the time for the more skillful chefs.

Or really, just get the fishmonger to do it for you. :)

Bubble, bubble. Toil and ALOT of trouble.

But it was all worth it!

Presenting fishhead rice vermicelli soup UPSIZED! :)

• One fish of 1-2 kg (Slice the fish flesh in thick pieces and set aside fish head, bones and tails)
• 5 stalks of spring onion – White portion
• Few stalks of choy sum (Chinese flowering cabbage)
• 5 cm of ginger, sliced into thin pieces)

• 250 grams of rice vermicelli – blanched and set aside.
• 3-4 leaves of salted vegetable (sliced into thick pieces)
• 2 fresh tomatoes (cut into 4 quarters each fruit)
• 2 tablespoons of sesame oil
• 2 tablespoons of anchovies
• 1 cube of chicken stock
• 1 – 1.5 tablespoons of fish sauce
• 1/2 cup of Chinese cooking wine
• Dashes of white pepper
• 1 tablespoon of XO alcohol (optional)

I added slices of bittergourd. Sliced thinly. :)

Fish meat marinate (depends on the quantity of fish meat that you have)

• Some sesame oil
• Chinese Shaoxing Wine
• Kikkoman Soya Sauce
• White pepper

• Marinate the fish meat with white pepper, sesame oil, corn flour and salt for about 1 hour. I skipped the deep frying part so I just left it to sit in the fridge after marinating.

• Use the same oil to deep fried the  fish head, bones and tails for 2-3 minutes or until the exterior is cooked. This step is optional and the main purpose of this step is to remove some fishiness of the fish and to preserve the exterior texture of the fish. You can deep fried these either with flour or without flour. Dish up and set aside.

• In another stock pot, put 1-2 tablespoons of oil and the sesame oil above, Sauté the ginger slices until fragrant, add the anchovies, the white part of spring onion, add water gradually just adequate to cover fried fish head and bones earlier. You can always adjust the water later.

• Put in the fish head, fish bones and tails. (Note that at this stage, you can add in the salted vegetables if you want to. However, it will be very difficult to serve the  vegetable as it will mix with the fish bones. Therefore, I have advised to add it at a later stage though adding the salted vegetables at this stages will yield a tastier soup). Bring to boil and let it simmer at medium heat for at least 30-45 minutes. Add water gradually if you find that the water level is low.  In this process, you will witness the fish stock will become cloudy. *Achievement unlocked! Once done, sift the stock from the first pot to another pot. Throw away the fish head and fish bones.

• In the new pot, add the chicken stock, Chinese cooking wine, salted vegetable, diced tomatoes and bittergourd. Bring to boil and add seasonings of your choice (fish sauce, dashes of white pepper). Once boiled, off the heat, add the XO (if any) and set aside for assembly. Meanwhile, have a pot of water, blanched the choy sum with some drops of oil and followed by the bee hoon. Drained and set aside.

• For assembly, have a bowl, put some bee hoon in the serving bowl and followed by some gravy adequate to cover the bee hoon,  put some blanched choy cum, tomatoes and fish meat on top of the rice vermicelli. Garnished with deep fried shallots, dashes of white pepper and chopped coriander or Chinese celery if preferred.  Best served with red cut chilli and some light soya sauce and usually served as a standalone noodle dish. If you do not like rice vermicelli, it can be served as a soup dish that goes well with white rice.

Credits to : https://kwgls.wordpress.com/2014/07/28/fish-headfillet-rice-vermicelli-soup-%E9%B1%BC%E5%A4%B4%E7%89%87%E7%B1%B3%E7%B2%89%E6%B1%A4%EF%BC%89/

One Tonne of Wontons! :)

 Marketing started at 8am this morning. 

Two packets of baby bokchoi.

A handful of chestnuts, prawns and minced pork.

Blanch the baby bok choi in a pot of boiling water with a dash of oil and a sprinkling of salt.

To the minced pork, diced prawns and chestnuts,

Add:

A generous sprinkle of white pepper.

A dash of light soy sauce.

A heaped tablespoon of oyster sauce.

A generous drizzle of sesame oil and shaoxing wine.

Toss them up till well combined.

Rope in the family to join in for the wonton wrapping. :)

Prepare a pot of boiling water to boil up batches of wontons.

Till you get a whole tonne of them.

And while we're at it.

Chop up some onions (since we ran out of shallots)

and fry them over low heat for some shallot oil.

These weren't burnt.

They were actually sweet and pretty yums!

Don't underestimate the fragrance that the shallot (fried onion) oil imparts to the dish.

Add it to the soup or the noodles.

Or both!

Pick up some of those roasted meats from your friendly local roast meat seller at the wet market.

Which comes with a soy based gravy.

Toss the wonton noodles in a tablespoon of the soy sauce gravy.

Top with blanched baby bokchoi, roast meats and a generous serving of wontons! :)

Serve with a bowl of piping hot chicken broth.

That was one tonne of work for some wonton noodles.

Well worth the effort.

Well fed for the night! :)

Seoul food. Japchae.

These korean glass noodles made from sweet potato starch are honestly the bomb.

They take in so much flavour it's a treat for the taste buds every mouth you take.

The key is to make sure these strands are nicely separated from each other.

After boiling them in hot salted water,

drain and toss in sesame oil before setting aside to cool.

1 tbsp cooking oil

2 tbsp soy sauce (or 1 tbsp soy, 1 tbsp fish sauce)

1 tsp sugar (optional)

1 yellow onion, chopped

3 cloves garlic, chopped

1 piece of bacon, chopped

1 piece of fishcake, sliced

1 green capsicum, cut lengthwise into matchsticks

1 carrot, cut lengthwise into matchsticks

Half a packet of korean glass noodles

Heat oil in pan, and pan fry bacon and garlic till fragrant.

Toss in onion and fry till translucent.

Add in carrot sticks and fry for a couple of minutes before adding in capsicum sticks.

Leave in pan to be cooked through till frying slice can be used to cut through the carrot sticks with little effort.

Add soy sauce (and sugar if used)

Lastly, add in fishcake pieces and fry for a couple of minutes.

Throw in the cooked noodles and toss till ingredients have been well mixed into the noodles.

Best served when hot.

**Other ingredients for the japchae would include: black wood fungus, black mushrooms, spinach and sesame seeds.

Seoul food.

Japchae.