House of Annie

Basic Dashi and Second Dashi

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 16:59:00 +0000

Dashi is a simple broth that is a very important component to a lot of Japanese foods. The Japanese use dashi as a base for miso soups, noodle soups and as a liquid in many simmering braises.

Making Dashi

We’ve been living in Kuching for a little over 3 months now. We’re settling in all right, getting to know the place and people. But we haven’t had a big party of guests over to our house yet, like we used to do almost weekly back in San Jose. We really wanted to invite our friend Paul (who welcomed us on our first day to Kuching) and his family over for a meal.

Annie mulled over the different menu options and eventually decided on a Japanese menu. Of course, there would have to be miso soup. She also wanted to do niku-jaga (meat and potatoes) dish. Both dishes call for dashi as part or most of the ingredients list.

The base of making dashi is the use of kombu/konbu (a dried piece of kelp seaweed) which is placed in cold water then heated to almost a boil. The other ingredient is katsuobushi (bonito flakes) which is added after taking the kombu out. These days, you can get handy instant dashis that you just add to water. But there is nothing like making your own dashi from scratch. And they are not very hard to make at all.

Smells Like the Sea

On its own, dashi is not very strongly flavored but it has a very nice "sea" aroma. And when used to make miso soup (miso is really salty already), it adds that briny sea flavor to the soup. My Japanese friend tells me that the flavors are different based on the kind of kombu you use. I had some miso soup at her home where she had used some very good quality kombu and the miso soup was excellent.

I got this dashi recipe from The Japanese Kitchen by Hiroko Shimbo. I love this cookbook quite a bit. Shimbo has done a great job in presenting Japanese food to a novice and her book shows her evident love for the details of cooking Japanese. Sometimes, she does get a little bit too complicated for me and I do simplify when I think it’s necessary but her detailed instructions and steps are what makes this book a lovely instructional on traditions of Japanese food and cooking.

Try out this dashi recipe if you’ve never made your own from scratch. The ingredients can easily be found in Asian grocery stores (Japanese and Korean stores will have more choices of kombu and bonito flakes but in a pinch, the other Asian groceries will also carry at least one of each of the above items).

First dashi

adapted from The Japanese Kitchen by Hiroko Shimbo

Ingredients:
3-4 pieces of dried kombu, about 6 inches in length each (seaweed)
a large handful of bonito flakes (around 1 cup pressed down)
2 quarts water (about 8 cups)

Method:
1. Wipe kombu with damp cloth (do not rinse kombu). Place kombu into pot with cold water.

Wiping Kombu

2.Heat pot over medium heat and wait till it's almost boiling. Do not let it come to a boil. Once you start seeing some bubbles, remove kombu.
3. Reserve kombu for second dashi. Add bonito flakes now to the broth. Heat for roughly two minutes. Turn off the heat and wait for bonito flakes to sink to the bottom.

Adding Bonito Flakes to Dashi

4. Pour broth through a sieve and reserve bonito flakes for second dashi.

Second dashi

1. Take another 2 quarts of water and put kombu and bonito from first dashi into pot of water. Heat until almost boiling and then simmer for 15 minutes or a bit more. Remove kombu and bonito and reserve stock.

Note: Use first dashi when you want clear dashi flavors like miso soup, or dishes that are lighter and where the dashi carries the dish.
Use second dashi for stronger flavored dishes like those that contain meat where the dashi is not the main player in the dish.

You can also make it vegetarian by not adding the katsuobushi. Instead, add dried shiitakes (rehydrated first) to the stock and you will have a mushroomy flavored dashi. We’ve also tried adding ginger to our dashi for a little extra heat. Play around with your dashi—if you want a more fishy flavor, try adding some dried anchovies. The added ingredients do change the character of the dashi so be mindful of that when you are thinking of adding different flavors.

Once you have your dashi, there are plenty of ways to use them. Look out for our coming posts on Miso soup and Niku-jaga (braised beef and potatoes) that utilize dashi.

Cheers, Annie

Hungry for More Japanese recipes? Click below:

Japanese Oden Recipe

Broiled Salmon Collar Recipe

Pan-fried gyoza

Broiled Miso Seabass

Korokke

The Big Guide to Foodie Gift Guides

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 15:56:00 +0000

If the House of Annie’s Foodie Gift Guide and Rasa Malaysia’s guide weren’t enough, I give you guides from over 50 different sites, full of gift suggestions for foodies.

Here’s a Gift for You!

The Foodie Gift Hunter, based in the UK, is a huge respository of foodie gift finds. You could get lost on that one site alone!
Something We Dreamed shares a delicious list of mail-order foods, including a Rebuen sandwich kit from Zingerman’s that Oprah calls “an 11 on a scale of 1-5”.
Treehugger.com gives us their list of Green Gifts for Foodies, such as a Lodge cast iron pan that could probably outlive you.
Fanny at YummySF.com picked out a list of under $25 gifts, including a 3-tier cooling rack to save you space when you’re baking up a big batch of cookies.
Bon Appetit magazine published their list of must-have gifts for foodies. I like the “Space Invaders” ice cube tray :-)
Dine Dish Delish came up with a list of different foodie gift basket ideas that you can put together yourself. I could use one of her “Grillmaster” baskets, actually ;-)
The website “Fair Trade the White House” has a huge list of gift suggestions of fair trade products, including fair trade foodie gifts.
Delish.com, part of the MSN network, has a list of foodie gifts for under $10. I like the cute farm animal-themed kitchen timers.
The Sweet Tidings craft blog gives us her picks from the ETSY.com Home Chef Gift Guide.
The Holiday season isn’t just about Christmas. Epicurious.com shows us a list of tasty and kosher gifts for Hanukkah. I know I’d love some lox and bagels from New York!
These aren’t technically holiday gifts, but our readers K&S from “Our Adventures in Japan” showed us some lovely Japanese foodie gifts that they received from a wedding reception.
Dig Under Rocks, another craft blog, presents their list of foodie finds from ETSY, all under $40. I’m drooling over that one cookie collection.
The New Zealand-based Pretty Clever blog has some pretty clever foodie gifts. The Milly’s Vegetable Twister is totally cool. You have to see it for yourself.
Confessions of a Bookworm says don’t buy cheese for a foodie because cheese smells. While I don’t agree about that, I do like her list of non-cheese suggestions, including the Drinking Chocolate set which features no cocoa powder!
The UK website Not Delia has their own list of Five Fabulous UK Foodie Gifts.
The blog at Craftzine.com has a baker’s dozen list of affordable or homemade foodie gifts. The chalkboard table cloths are a great idea!
The Evergreen Moms list focuses on artisanal products from the Pacific Northwest. Can someone send me the DIY Mozarella and Ricotta kit?
L.A. Splash magazine has a tasty list of foodie gifts under $15. Lots of chocolate ideas, including Hot Chocolate on a Stick.
Australia-based Lifestyle Flossie, part of the Flossie network, shows off their foodie gift list. I am intrigued by the Wine Finer, which is an all-in-one aerator, filter, pourer, and stopper. Me likes!
The site “Creative Christmas Gifts” is all about gift ideas for different intetests, like foodies. What foodie wouldn’t want a deep fat fryer?
The Unconfidential Cook gives us her terrific cookbook recommendations over on the Bookstore People blog. “Lost Deserts” by Gail Monaghan gets a compelling mention.
Beth, who Eats, Drinks, and Smiles in Tennessee, passes along her foodie gift ideas. Gimme that Kuhn Ricon Corn Zipper!
The Retro-Modern Housewife tells us about her ETSY list of gifts for men, including Foodie Men. I think the Masculine Spice Rack is a great idea, but it should be BIGGER!
L.A. Weekly suggests you stay off the road and just order from their list of online specialty foods stores. Zingerman’s is their top pick. I wonder why?
Camilla Cheung, writing for the Suite101.com network, offers her list of budget gift ideas for the aspiring chef. The cupcake carrier suggestion – now that’s a great idea!
Raging foodie “Dreaming in Meta” shares her wish list of foodie gifts. They’re mostly cookbooks, but she has a Shun 8” chef’s knife thrown in for good measure.
Country Living Magazine gets in on the action with their Farmer’s Market Foodie gift list. How about the “Cast Iron Cookbook”?
Check out The Foodie Forkful blog, which is doing a whole 45 days’ worth of foodie gift ideas. Did you know there was a board game called “Foodie Fight”? Someone, bring it over!
LSD site (Love, Sex and Dating, not acid!) YourTango.com has a big list of gifts for every type of guy, including the Foodie Guy. I totally endorse getting your guy a smoker!
The Chapters chain of Canadian bookstores selected their Top 10 picks of cookbooks for the fab foodie. I think Julie and Julia is a great read.
The “Cooking with Anne” blog has a nice list of holiday gift ideas. I want Nigella to cook for me from her Christmas cookbook!
WineCountry.com has a wish list that is guaranteed to please the foodie in your life. I couldn’t agree more about the Silpat baking mats.
The CafeMom blog presents their list of gifts under $10. Check out the cute Head Chefs Silicone Turner!
Bee and Jai of the fabulous Jugalbandi blog posted their list of gifts for the Foodie, Photographer, and Fitness Freak. I love their list of Japanese knives.
Jamie Dougherty, the SF Life Coach on Examiner.com, features food fanatic gift ideas, all made in California by small companies. You HAVE to get the Rancho Gordo heirloom beans.
The Palm Beach Post’s food writer/snob, Charles Passy, gives us his list of Stuff He Likes. The DaysAgo Digital Food Counter is a brilliant stocking stuffer.
Inside Jersey Magazine offers some unique foodie products, all from New Jersey-based producers. Nice to know you can get more than M2 plastique from Jersey. (Just kidding!)
If you’re in St. Louis, MO, then you ought to look up the St. Louis Today’s list of local foodie gifts. Somebody please send me some salumi! Please!!!
Look on My Gourmet Connections for their guide to Great Foodie Gifts under $50. I like the kitchen compost pail made of sustainable bamboo.
Mandy in Toronto has Everyday Obsessions, including her favorite foodie suggestions under $50. How about that cute Sur La Table waffle set?
Thomas Richie on the Siouxland Voice blogs his 10 Great Gifts for Foodies. I don’t like his BBQ Fork with Thermometer suggestion, but can’t argue with a KitchenAid.
The Constant Chatter site has a Foodie Edition Holiday Gift Guide. It’s an eclectic list, but I agree with their CaliBowls suggestion.
Although not specifically a holiday gift guide, Ken’s Wine Guide has a list of highly rated Cabernets, all under $50. Find a deal in the Charles Krug 2006 Cabernet.
Single Minded Women’s Food and Wine section came up with their list of foodie gifts. Hey look! Another offer to adopt an olive tree!
Did you know there was such a thing as a Disney Food Blog? Check out their list of Disney-themed foodie gifts!
Project Foodie has a great list of foodie gift options. I like the “Wine Wars” game – kinda like Foodie Fight but focused specifically on vino.
Judyfoodie from Culinary Escapade has a three-part series on foodie gifts, starting out with gadgets: gadgets, dinner/cookware and appliances. Those Trudeau pot clips are sure to make great stocking stuffers!
The Santa Cruz Sentinel came out with their list of foodie gifts, sourced on the California Central Coast. Try some John Kelly Truffle Fudge Bites…mmm…
The Guardian newspaper in the UK came out with their foodie wish list chosen by their own writers and editors. One of them even chose a tin of fabulous smoked anchovies! Okay, I’ll go with that.
Kerry Lowe of the Nashua Telegraph reveals her list of foodie gifts, broken out by price. I highly recommend getting a digital food scale!
British Columbia-based Kelowna.com published a small list of Foodie Faves. All of them seem to come from one shop – one stop shopping!
About.com’s Nutrition Guide Shereen Jegtvig published her terrific Top Ten equipment pics for healthy cooking. It includes items seen on other lists, but also touts the FoodSaver vacuum sealer.
The venerable New York Times has 5 separate gift lists created by their own food writers. Check out that Chocolate Wine sauce featured on Florence Fabricant's list!
Our good friend Kalyn from Kalyn's Kitchen came out with a list of food blogger cookbooks that will definitely make great gifts for any season. Of course there's Steamy Kichen and Pioneer Woman, but there are many others that I was not aware of.
Delphine Ephemera has a wonderful list of foodie favorites. I’m drooling over the Italian Black Truffle paste.
The folks over at Change.org posted a big list of sustainable producers and products. But they also list of organizations, charities and community service to support as well.
The lovely Sarah’s Cucina Bella blog presents her list of favorite gifts for food lovers. I think everything on it would be my favorite too!
CNN Money.com came out with a short list of culinary gift ideas. Can’t argue with dry-aged steaks!
Epicurious.com shows up with another gift list – this one focusing on edible gifts you can make, or alternatively buy. I wanna try making some chocolate truffles.
Gaby from the excellent What’s Gaby Cooking? blog shares her holiday foodie gift guide. I really want that Kitchen Aid Pasta Press!
Maria and Josh from Two Peas and their Pod also put together their great holiday gift list. Everything they list is great, but I most want the Kitchen Aid Pasta Roller attachment. (Hm, I’m detecting a pattern here…)
Julie Anne of Peanut Butter and Julie revealed her Favorite Things list. And what is her #1 favorite thing? Her own granola mixes. Cool!
I just found out about the site Yummery.com. It is a "shopaholic food fantasy". Every post is a new and interesting foodie item. You could seriously get lost on this site.
Kathy over at the fantastic Panini Happy blog has a most excellent list of 10 gift ideas. Of course, there would have to be a panini press in it!
Mike and Carol of Everyday Simplicities cooked up their own Top 5 gifts for the home chef. You'll want at least one of everything!
Eric Braun, the beer columnis for the San Antonio Express, pours out his own list of gifts for craft beer makers. First thing on his list? Other peoples' beers.
Not to be outdone, A Blog About Beer (seriously, that's the name of the blog) in New England has its own Top 10 Gifts for beer lovers. What's this game called "Cornhole"? Sounds naughty.
Watch this video from the Gift Gal on the Today Show for the Hottest Edible Gifts (hottest edible gifts, hottest edible gifts) for the foodie in your life. I want that tea basket!
Mainline Magazine presents their list of Tasty and Useful Gifts for Food Lovers. The whiskey stones which chill your premium liquor without diluting it are a great idea.
There's an article on Suite101.com by Cherrine Banks aimed specifically at cheese lovers. Everyone who is into cheese should have some proper tools for cutting the cheese.
Blogger Megan from Megan's Cookin' cooked up an extraordinary list of her 10 Favorite Things. I am intrigued by the Smokey Blue Cheese Truffles!
There's an ETSY shop called LittleFluffStuff that makes cute felt toys, some of which look good enough to eat. Those felt Shanghai dumplings are wow!
Sara Rich, an editor at Dwell.com, shows off her kitchen tools wishlist. I think every kitchen should have a Le Creuset dutch oven.

Do you have any more foodie gift guides to add? Leave a comment below and I’ll add it in!

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Aloha, Nate

Holiday Foodie Gift Guide

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 15:41:00 +0000

If you’ve wracked your brain thinking about what gift to get for your foodie friend or relative, and are just about ready to get them a lame gift card, STOP RIGHT THERE!

Trust me on this, a gift card is NOT the way to go (in case you don’t know, most gift cards don’t get used and it’s the STORE that benefits, not your friend). But, have no fear! We decided that this year, we would make a list of things any foodie who is like us would love to get for Christmas.

To help you decide, we’ve decided to break it down into three categories:

1. Gifts under $25
2. Gifts under $100
3. Splurge gifts!

Edit: Our good friend Rasa Malaysia also has a Holiday Foodie Gift Guide up on her site. Click here to see her gift ideas!

Making a List

We thought long and hard about this gift guide and we want you to know that some of the things we have listed here are already mainstays in our kitchen and things we cannot live without when it comes to cooking. Others are things on our “wishlist” which we hope one day to purchase or receive as gifts!

Gifts under $25

1. Microplane grater. One of the most useful tools in my kitchen—grate zest, chocolate, ginger, garlic, cheese with ease and confidence.
2. Silpat silicone baking mat—one would be under $25 unless you got them the large sized one (one of my wishlist items really, just can’t justify it at $50) which is the perfect gift for the baker friend of yours. You can never have enough of those!
3. Silicone spatulas in various sizes. These things are great stocking stuffers and they are also very useful in the kitchen. I have about 5 in different sizes but the ones I find most useful are the medium sized ones from Williams-Sonoma (and I love that they come in so many colors!).
4. Cookbooks! The more the merrier. I just received Asian Dumplings as a gift for my anniversary and trust me, it would make a great Christmas gift as well. You should have seen how giddy with joy Nate and I were when we made our own gyoza skins from scratch. It was so easy with Andrea’s book guiding us all the way (look for our post and review of the cookbook in a future post). Other cookbooks we recommend include: The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook, The Asian Grandmothers Cookbook, Momofuku, Ad Hoc at Home (this one is just a little over $25—sorry…). It was hard for me to stop there. I am a lover of books and have so many that I would love to own and there’s another long list…maybe I should just have a list for books alone!
5. Ready cut 9-inch parchment paper rounds in different pan sizes—especially the round ones. Trust me on this—I have cut enough parchment rounds for my cakes to wish I wasn’t so pake and would just buy the ready cut ones! I would be thrilled if someone got me some to put me out of my misery.
6. Tea! Because it’s Christmas, splurge and get them some really luxurious teas—Mariage Freres flavored teas (Marco Polo is my fav!), Lupicia flavored teas, Harney and Sons, Republic of Tea…
7. Specialty salts from Spice Hound. We love Tammy and we love her spices but we love her salts even more. Where else can you find salts from all over the world as well as seasoned salts that are so unique and delicious? Our favorites right now are Kala Namak (smells like eggs and tastes WONDERFUL!), Murray River seasalt, White Truffle sea salt, and Himalayan Pink Salt).

Gifts under $100

1. Wusthof Santoku knife and sharpener—Other than my chef’s knife, I love this knife for everyday cutting. If you are going to give a friend a knife, don’t forget to ask for a coin back (ancient Chinese belief—cannot give knives as gifts, therefore coin given back denotes friend buying from you, therefore friendship is saved and not severed).
2. Remote probe thermometer—so you don’t have to keep opening that oven door to check if your roast is done, or opening your grill to check if your meat is done. Amazing thing, this!
3. Butcher block cutting board—what is a good knife without a good chopping block to go with it?
4. Ice Cream Maker and David Lebovitz’s “Perfect Scoop” Cookbook—because it’s only winter for a little bit more and nothing is better than making your own ice cream in assorted creative flavors. And because I could use some really good ice cream right now…
5. Magazine subscriptions to Fine Cooking and Saveur—they are my top two favorite magazines and what better than a gift that keeps giving throughout the year!

Splurge gifts

1. Kitchen Aid—cannot live without it! I’m discovering this the hard way as I haven’t bought a transformer for mine here in Malaysia and had to knead bread by hand in this hot sweaty climate. THAT was tough!
3. Any Zingerman’s Gift Package—after having had their apple pie, I would die for any of their other gourmet food items, like artisanal bread, or their cheeses and their coffees.
7. Fancy Camera and lenses and lighting equipment. Had to put this in for Nate who wishes he had more than his ghetto lighting equipment and second hand camera to take all our wonderful pictures. Doesn’t he do such a great job with the little he has?

Gift Someone a Home

Some of you may feel that this whole holiday season just smacks of too much commercialism. We are just as big a fan of giving to charity and making this season something meaningful for others. Our favorite cause is Living Stones Village, an orphanage in China that houses abandoned children with disabilities.

The orphanage has just recently purchased a large piece of land and is in the process of turning that land into a village that will not only house these orphans but build a community around them (with family units, a music and arts center, rehabilitation center, schools, training center, and roadside businesses to provide career opportunities for the handicapped orphans) and they need the funding to finish building this community. Click this link to donate directly to LSV. No amount is too little!

All of the Amazon links in this post are affiliate links, which means we get a small percentage of any purchases made through those links. We will donate 100% of the earnings made from now until Christmas to LSV. So click away and buy, and enjoy your retail therapy!

If you have more ideas to add to our lists, feel free to leave a comment.

Cheers and Aloha, Nate and Annie

Thanksgiving Turkey Leftovers: Turkey Tortilla Soup

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 16:24:00 +0000

Tired of eating the same old dried out, microwave-reheated breast meat for days? I sure would be. This Turkey Tortilla Soup will spice up your leftovers!

Originally posted 27 Nov 2007
Updated 25 Nov 2009

In the past, we've always saved the carcass of the turkey to make stock, and most of the time we turn that stock into turkey jook (rice congee). It's pretty easy to do.

But I was getting tired of Asian food. I just didn’t want to fall back on warming up leftover turkey again. I wanted some kicked up flavors and spice! So I went Southwestern with a Turkey Tortilla Soup.

Turkey Tortilla Soup Recipe

Adapted from Fine Cooking Magazine November 2006

Ingredients

2 Tbsp olive oil
1 yellow onion, finely diced
2 Tbsp ancho chili powder
2 Tbsp tomato paste
1 quart homemade turkey broth
6 cilantro sprigs (I left them out)
Kosher salt
2 cups shredded or medium-diced leftover roast turkey
1-1/2 cups medium-diced fresh tomato
1 cup cooked fresh corn kernels (or substitute thawed frozen corn)
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained

Garnishes:
1/2 to 1 ripe avocado, medium diced
1/4 cup crumbled queso fresco or feta cheese
3 Tbs. chopped fresh cilantro
2 Tbs. sour cream, or to taste (optional)
1/2 lime, cut into wedges

Turkey Tortilla Soup Ingrendients

Method:

1. Heat the 2 Tbsp oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until softened and just beginning to brown.

2. Add the chili powder and tomato paste and cook, stirring, for 15 to 30 seconds. Pour in the broth and scrape the bottom of the pan with the spoon to loosen any cooked-on bits.

3. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to medium low and simmer, uncovered, until the broth has reduced by about a third, 20 to 30 minutes. Season to taste with salt.

4. Divide the turkey, tomato, corn, and beans four bowls.

Esther and Daniel dividing the ingredients

5. Ladle the hot broth into the bowls, top with chopped avocadoes, a sprinkle of feta cheese, and a dollop of sour cream.

Turkey Tortilla Soup

If you have it, squeeze some lime juice on top to give it a tart bite. I would have garnished with chopped cilantro but the cilantro was sitting in the bottom of the veggie drawer and I didn't find it until later. Instead of fresh fried corn tortilla strips, I just crumbled some corn tortilla chips and mixed that in to the soup.

So there you have it, another delicious way to enjoy your leftover turkey!

Aloha, Nate

Hungry for more recipes for turkey leftovers? Click below:

Turkey Jook

Recipe for Leftover Turkey (or Ground Turkey) and Pinto Bean White Chili with Lime and Cilantro on Kalyn’s Kitchen

Turkey Noodle Soup on Andrea’s Recipes

Turkey and Squash Risotto on Closet Cooking

Tips for Using Thanksgiving Leftovers in Bento Boxes on Just Bento

Sweet and Spicy Sticky Chicken Recipe

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 17:19:00 +0000

This tasty recipe has all the flavors that I could imagine would make a chicken dish great. And it is a very easy recipe to put together for a weekday meal.

Sweet and Spicy Sticky Chicken

The title - “Sweet and Spicy Sticky Chicken” - doesn’t that just sound super yummy? It brings to mind a barbeque-like idea for this chicken dish BUT it’s not barbeque—it’s just a braised chicken dish that is delicious.

I’ve made this dish several times already. The recipe calls for chicken thighs but this last time I made it, I used chicken wings and that worked out good too. I think thighs and legs are probably the best parts to use, though, as they hold up better than wings in a braise.

Intensify the Flavor

Midway through the cook, you’ll have to take the chicken out so that it doesn’t get overcooked and mushy. The most important thing to remember is to reduce that sauce down a lot after taking the chicken out. The flavors really intensify when you let the sauce reduce to a thick sticky texture. Once the sauce gets to that point, it is a good idea to put the chicken back into the sauce to let the sauce really absorb into the chicken.

The flavors in this dish reminds me a little of adobo but the addition of ginger, dried chile flakes, and brown sugar gives it a special twist. For me, it’s not very spicy at all and if you like your dishes more spicy, you can definitely double or even triple the chile flakes. It works well for my family though—the kids can handle this level of heat and the adults still get a little sum’n sum’n.

Throw a little garnish of cilantro or extra green onions and you’re good to go. Make it and see how this wonderfully intense-flavored dish gets wolfed down quickly!

Sweet and Spicy Sticky Chicken

adapted from Cooking New American

Ingredients:

1 kg (2 lbs) chicken (dark meat is preferable or chicken wings)
1 Tbsp peanut or vegetable oil
3 scallions (white and green parts), thinly sliced
Cilantro sprigs as garnish or just use another scallion, thinly sliced

Sauce:

1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup fish sauce
1/3 cup water
3 Tbsp rice-wine vinegar
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp minced fresh ginger (about 2 inches)
1 clove garlic, minced (yeah, here I go again, I used about 2-3)
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1/2 tsp crushed red chile flakes (or more if you like it spicier)

Sauce Ingredients for Sweet and Spicy Sticky Chicken

Method:

1. In a bowl, whisk together the brown sugar, fish sauce, water, rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, ginger, garlic, pepper, and red chile flakes.
2. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over med heat. Add the scallions and cook until soft, about 3 mins.
3. Add the chicken and the brown sugar mixture. Turn the heat to high and bring to a boil. As soon as it comes to a boil, reduce the heat to low and simmer, turning the chicken occasionally, until cooked, 25-30 mins.

Adding Sauce to Chicken

4. Remove the chicken from the pan and cover with foil to keep warm. Increase the heat to high and reduce the sauce by half or until it is slightly thickened and resembles a bubbling caramel sauce. Return the chicken to the sauce to coat and absorb more of the sauce.
5. Plate up and garnish with the cilantro sprigs or scallions.

Sweet and Spicy Sticky Chicken

Enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

Hungry for More Chicken Recipes? Click Below:

Seven Secrets for Perfect Thai Fried Chicken Wings

Malaysian Chicken Wings: Two Ways

"Huli Chicken" recipe

3 Cups Chicken Recipe

Chicken with Vinegar & Onions, Warm French Lentil Salad with Smoked Sausage

Turkey Jook

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 16:12:00 +0000

I hope you save that turkey carcass from Thanksgiving dinner, because you can use it to make turkey jook ("rice congee" -- aaahhh, just call it "jook"). And because I'm making it, you know the recipe has to be easy!

Turkey Jook

Originally posted 1 Dec 2008
Updated 23 Nov 2009

The Thanksgiving feast is done. Much of the remaining turkey meat has been cut off the carcass and saved for making sandwiches later. Now you’ve got a bare carcass sitting on your counter. You’re not going to throw that away are you?

Oh, heck no!

One of the best ways to deal with the turkey carcass is to make a big pot of turkey jook the next day. Making turkey jook takes relatively little work, especially compared to the culinary acrobatics that normally take place in the kitchen on Thanksgiving. Here’s what you do:

Put the turkey carcass in a big stock pot along with the thigh bones and wings, cover with water and simmer for 3 hours or more. You should get a rich, brown stock.

Turkey Stock

Ladle out half of the stock (about 7-8 cups) into another pot. Remove the carcass bones and let them cool. Chill the remaining stock and reserve it for something else (turkey tortilla soup might be good).

Optional: add to the stock pot a cup of dried scallops that have been reconstituted in warm water.

Adding Dried Scallops to Turkey Stock

Add a half cup of uncooked Japanese short grain rice, rinsed. We recommend short grain rice as opposed to jasmine, because the starchiness of the short grain will help thicken the jook. Let the rice simmer in the stock for 2 hours.

Meanwhile, peel the meat off the cooled turkey bones. Add half the meat to the jook and reserve the other half for (you guessed it) something else. (If you have any more leftover turkey meat, you might want to chop that up and use that too. But I'm lazy ;-) )

Peeled Turkey Meat

Adjust the seasonings with soy sauce to taste. Ladle the jook into bowls, then garnish with chopped green onion or cilantro, and a couple dashes of white pepper. Drizzle a little sesame seed oil on if you like.

There you have it. A nice, warm bowl of turkey jook to feed your soul.

Turkey Jook

Aloha, Nate

Hungry for more easy recipes? Click below:

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Stir-Fried Green Beans with Savory Tofu and Peanuts

Lazy Heirloom Tomato Gazpacho

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Gourmet Chestnut and Sausage Stuffing Recipe

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 18:33:00 +0000

One of our most loved Thanksgiving recipes, a tried-and-true favorite stuffing dish. You’ll want to make a double batch just so you have enough for leftovers!

Chestnut and Sausage Stuffing

Over the years, we’ve made many different turkey recipes for Thanksgiving. The famous Good Eats Roast Turkey by Alton Brown was the most often used recipe. We’ve also used other recipes, like Melinda Lee’s apple juice-based Master Brine, our WSM Smoked Turkey, and a disastrous pineapple brined, smoked turkey (shudder).

For the centerpiece of the Thanksgiving meal, we like to try different things out. But one side dish has been a constant companion on our Thanksgiving table, for at least 5 years now: this Gourmet Chestnut and Sausage Stuffing.

Chestnut and Sausage Stuffing Thru the Years

Annie loves roasted chestnuts. Their complex sweetness adds a delicious oomph to many dishes, both Asian and Western. We can easily find packages of peeled, roasted chestnuts in our local Asian grocery. Then it’s just a matter of chopping them up at home to use in the stuffing recipe.

Chopped Roasted Chestnuts

Chestnut and Sausage Stuffing Recipe

From Gourmet Magazine, November 2003 edition

Ingredients

1 (1 1/4-pound) loaf country-style bread, crust discarded and bread cut into 3/4-inch cubes (8 cups)
1/2 pound sliced bacon, cut crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces
3 medium onions, coarsely chopped
3 celery ribs, coarsely chopped
1 pound bulk pork sausage
1 turkey liver (optional), coarsely chopped
1/4 cup Cognac or other brandy
1 1/2 cups half-and-half
1 cup turkey stock or low-sodium chicken broth
2 large eggs
1 (14- to 15-oz) jar peeled cooked whole chestnuts, coarsely crumbled (3 cups)
1/4 cup coarsely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 1/2 teaspoons dried sage, crumbled
1 teaspoon dried thyme, crumbled
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
print a shopping list for this recipe

Method

1. Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 2 1/2- to 3-quart shallow baking dish.

2. Spread bread cubes in a large shallow baking pan (1 inch deep) and bake in lower third of oven until completely dry, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pan on a rack 10 minutes. (Leave oven on.)

3. While bread bakes, cook bacon in a 12-inch heavy skillet over moderately high heat, stirring, until crisp, about 10 minutes, then transfer with a slotted spoon to a large bowl.

4. Pour off and discard all but 2 tablespoons bacon fat from skillet, then sauté onions in fat over moderately high heat, stirring and scraping up brown bits, until softened, about 10 minutes. Add celery and sauté, stirring, 3 minutes, then transfer vegetables to bowl with bacon.

Bacon, Celery and Sausage

5. Cook sausage and liver (if using) in skillet, stirring and breaking up sausage with a fork, until meat is no longer pink, 8 to 10 minutes, then transfer with slotted spoon to onion mixture.

Frying Sausage and Turkey Liver

6. Pour off any remaining fat from skillet. Add Cognac (off heat), then deglaze skillet by simmering over moderate heat, stirring and scraping up any brown bits, 1 minute, and add to sausage mixture.

7. Increase oven temperature to 375°F.

8. Soak bread cubes in half-and-half in a bowl, tossing frequently, until liquid is absorbed, about 15 minutes. Gently squeeze excess liquid from bread, then stir bread into sausage mixture, discarding remaining half-and-half. Stir together stock and eggs and add to stuffing, then stir in chestnuts, herbs, salt, and pepper until combined well.

Mixing the Stuffing Altogether

9. Transfer stuffing to baking dish, press it down flat, and cover with foil.

Smoothing the Stuffing Down Flat

10. Bake in upper third of oven 20 minutes. Remove foil and bake until top is crisp, about 20 minutes more.

I just love how all the flavors meld together so nicely. The sage and the celery just go so well with Thanksgiving turkey. I totally have to stop myself from taking more than 3 helpings at the table. Otherwise, there’d be none remaining for leftovers.

And we all know how good leftovers are, right?

Aloha, Nate

This post was entered in the Yeastspotting roundup for November 27.

Hungry for more savory bread recipes? Click below:

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Honey-Glazed Yams

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:37:00 +0000

Try this sweet and simple side dish, which is elegant enough for a Thanksgiving party but also humble enough for a weeknight meal.

Honey-Glazed Yams

Annie made this dish for Thanksgiving last year, but we’ve only gotten around to posting it now. They were tuber-rific! I think we scarfed these down even before the turkey came out! My mom, who was visiting us in San Jose then, asked Annie for the recipe so that she could make it for the family Christmas party back home in Honolulu.

My mom doesn’t like overly complicated recipes. This recipe for Honey-Glazed Yams, originally from Bon Appetit magazine, couldn’t be simpler! Cut 5 yams into wedges, then rinse them and pat dry. Toss them with 1/4 cup of olive oil and a teaspoon of salt.

Honey-Glazed Yams

Arrange them in a single layer on a baking sheet. Bake at 400*F for an hour. At the last 15 minutes, brush with honey. Serve, garnished with chopped parsley. So easy, even I could do it!

Aloha, Nate

By the way, even though I (and many Americans) call these tubers “yams”, they are really dark sweet potatoes. True yams come from the tropics, and are generally sweeter than sweet potatoes. Now you know.

I am entering this in the 210th edition of Weekend Herb Blogging, hosted this week by Healthy Green Kitchen and administered by Haalo of Cook Almost Anything.

Hungry for more potato dishes? Click below:

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Korokke

Creamy Winter Greens Gratin

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:54:00 +0000

Looking for a flavorful side dish for your Thanksgiving or Christmas party? There’s no compromising on flavor with this creamy Winter greens gratin.

Updated 17 Nov 2009
Originally posted 25 Nov 2006

Annie last made this gratin a while ago but I wanted to revisit it because it was such a memorable dish. It was one of two, fantastic side dishes that she made for a Thanksgiving party at our place. (The other was a really wonderful green bean casserole that I unfortunately don’t have very good pictures of – guess we’ll have to make it again soon!)

This recipe calls for Swiss chard, but you can use almost any dark, leafy green like kale or even spinach if you have to. I love Swiss chard, though, because it still maintains some texture when cooked, not dissolving into almost nothing like spinach does. Swiss chard is especially good in soups, such as our Barley and Lentil Soup with Swiss Chard.

Swiss Chard

The recipe also calls for bacon, cream, butter, and cheese. Definitely not a low-fat dish! But you can be sure that it’ll be high in flavor!

Creamy Winter Greens Gratin

From Fine Cooking Magazine, February/March 2006 issue, p 41.

Ingredients:

1-3/4 lbs Swiss chard, center ribs cut away, leaves roughly chopped
3 strips bacon, minced and fried until browned
2 cloves garlic
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup fresh breadcrumbs
1 Tbsp melted butter
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Buttered Breadcrumbs, Parmesan Cheese, Browned Bacon

Method:

1. Fry the minced bacon in a large nonstick skillet until browned. Set aside.

2. Add the greens to the pan and toss until wilted, about 1 minute.

3. In a medium sauce pan, simmer 2 cloves garlic in 1 cup heavy cream until the cream is reduced to 3/4 cup. Remove the garlic cloves.

4. Toss 1/2 cup fresh breadcrumbs with 1 tablespoon melted butter.

5. Place the greens in a casserole dish and spread them out evenly. Crumble the bacon over the greens. Sprinkle on grated Parmesan.

Swiss Chard, Bacon, Parmesan Cheese

6. Pour the cream over the greens. Top with the breadcrumbs.

7. Bake at 400*F until the gratin is browned and bubbly, about 25 minutes.

This dish was the first to be finished at our Thanksgiving party. It's not a lot of work, but there is a lot of flavor here!

Aloha, Nate

Hungry for more side dishes? Click below:

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Old Bay Blackened Shrimp

Roasted Butternut Squash Soup with Bacon

Bread Pudding Recipe

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 16:56:00 +0000

This recipe for bread pudding is so easy and can be used for just about any stale bread you have lying around.

Sometimes, when I’m making sandwiches, I save all the crust pieces in the freezer. If I have end pieces of bread, I save those too. When I’ve got a lot stashed up, I just break them all up and make this delicious bread pudding.

Of course, if you happen to have day old brioche bread, you could use that and have a really rich bread pudding but I think it’s just fine with regular bread. Matter of fact, when my friend’s mom gave me this recipe, she told me that you could use pretty much anything you have leftover that is going stale—bagels, doughnuts, sweet breads, french loaves, or any other bready thing.

Tips for Making Bread Pudding

I’ve baked this bread pudding quite often and here are some tips I recommend:
1. When you’ve assembled the bread pudding and poured the custard over it, leave it in the fridge for at least a few hours if not overnight so that the bread gets to soak up all the yummy custard. This will lead to a more cohesive bread pudding. Also, if you leave it overnight and bake first thing in the morning, you get to enjoy this for breakfast. Yum!

2. The original recipe called for raisins and apples to be placed on top. If you plan to use any fruit in it, especially dried fruit, don’t sprinkle the fruit on top. Instead, bury the fruit in between the bread. That way, the fruit won’t get dried out and burnt on the top (notice how burnt my apple slices got on top?).

3. The better the bread, the better the bread pudding. If you use wonder bread or really cheap white bread, you’re going to get gummy bread pudding.

4. Stale bread works better than fresh bread (you should be EATING your fresh bread anyway). But if you absolutely have to, I guess you could get some fresh bread to make this (toast it first to dry it out a little). OR, do like me, and go to those bread shops that sell day-old bread and buy some OR go to your favorite bread vendor at the farmer’s market and ask if they have day-old bread to sell to you.

This recipe normally makes enough to fill a 13x9 rectangular baking pan but if you want to make a smaller bread pudding, just cut the recipe based on how much bread you have and the size of your pudding container. Today, I used a deep round casserole dish and thought that the recipe might be a bit much, so I just cut it down by 1/4.

This bread pudding recipe also doesn’t give precise amounts for the broken bread. I would say just tear up the bread to fill your pan and then just pour the custard over it. For my casserole dish, I used about 10 or 11 Pullman loaf-sized slices of bread.

Alrighty then, on to the recipe.

Bread Pudding Recipe

makes one 13x9 pan

Ingredients:
12-16 slices (4-5 cups) stale bread or anything bready, broken up into pieces
4 cups milk (whole is best)
1 stick butter (4 oz), melted
1 1/4 cup sugar (I’ve gotten away with less especially if you’re using sweetened bread)
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
Optional ingredients: dried fruit (raisins, cherries, etc), fresh apple slices, bananas
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Bread Pudding Mise en Place

Method:
1. Place broken pieces of bread all over pan. If using fruit, layer some in the middle of the bread and cover with more bread.
2. Beat eggs with vanilla and then mix this with milk, butter and sugar. Whisk to ensure ingredients are mixed evenly.
3. Pour mixed ingredients (custard) over broken bread.

4. Sprinkle with cinnamon on top.

5. Place bread pudding in fridge and let soak for at least 2 hours.
6. Preheat oven to 350 F.
7. Bake for about 1 hour or until tester comes out clean. If using a deep dish casserole, expect it to take a little longer.

I have another bread pudding recipe to share but that will have to wait for another post. That one is a tropical bread pudding that my friend Melissa made for our Ultimate Backyard Lu’au a few months ago that was also a great success. And I recently saw a post by Foodgal on a savory bread pudding from Thomas Keller’s “Ad Hoc at Home” cookbook that I am keen to try too. Man, talk about carb overload. I will need to make more friends to share all this yumminess!

In the meantime, enjoy this easy bread pudding and let me know if you like it!

Cheers, Annie

This post is entered into the Yeast Spotting Roundup for November 20.

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Ayam Pong Teh (Nyonya-style Braised Chicken with Potatoes)

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:00:00 +0000

A sweet and savory, easy to make Malaysian chicken dish that has become a mainstay in the House of Annie’s kitchen.

I first tried Ayam Pong Teh at a Nyonya restaurant in Kuala Lumpur. My cousin had taken me to eat it and we all enjoyed the flavorful tender chicken and potatoes and also the savory sweetness of the sauce on our rice. It was the most popular dish that day.

I had been wanting to try to make Ayam Pong Teh ever since then. So imagine my surprise when I saw that this recipe was featured in one of my Saveur magazines many years ago.

When I saw the feature on Malacca and saw the recipe, I must admit I was skeptical. Very often, I don’t trust Western magazines to do justice to Asian recipes (they often substitute and “westernize” the flavors a little so that they are no longer truly authentic). But when I looked at the Ayam Pong Teh recipe, I thought it sounded pretty good. And I should have trusted them more—Saveur’s editor is James Oseland after all and he has spent many years in this part of the world, even coming up with a cookbook that I love. And next to Fine Cooking, Saveur is the other food magazine that I love. (Man, I’m missing both these magazines right now!)

So, I tried the recipe, and ever since that first time, this has become a mainstay in my kitchen. The flavors were just right! Also, it’s quite a simple recipe really for something that delivers so much flavor.

The key is the use of gula Melaka (palm sugar) in the making of this dish. The smoky sweetness imparts a depth that cannot be substituted with regular sugar. If you can, do try to get yourself some gula Melaka (or gula Jawa at the Asian grocery stores) when making this. Don’t use Thai palm sugar for it, it’s not the same. You need the dark smoky flavors for this dish. If you absolutely cannot get it, dark brown sugar will do in a pinch but it won’t have that same rich sweetness.

Try this recipe tonight and see if it doesn’t become a mainstay in your kitchen too!

Ayam Pong Teh recipe

(Nyonya-style Braised Chicken with Potatoes)
adapted from Saveur Magazine

Ingredients:
2 shallots, peeled and roughly chopped (I tend to double this as I like the flavor of shallots)
5 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
1/4 cup peanut oil (or vegetable oil will work too), and I have used a little less oil with no problem
1/4 cup taucu (brown bean sauce)

3 Tbsp dark soy sauce
1 Tbsp soy sauce
2 Tbsp palm sugar, chopped
1 3-3 1/2 lb chicken, cut into bite-sized pieces, about 18 pieces
4 small boiling potatoes (I find Yukons or Reds will hold better in the braise than Russets), peeled and cut into large pieces (if the potatoes are really small, leave them whole).
3 cups water
salt to taste

Method:
1. Pound shallots and garlic into a coarse paste. Set aside.
2. Heat oil over medium heat, add shallots and garlic paste and fry for about 2 mins, making sure not to burn the paste.

3. Add taucu, dark soy sauce and palm sugar. Stir until palm sugar has dissolved and liquid has thickened, about 30 seconds.
4. Add chicken and potatoes and the 3 cups of water. Bring to a boil.
5. When the water boils, reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 1-1 1/2 hours.
6. Season with salt and soy sauce to taste. Depending on how sweet your brown bean sauce is (some brown bean sauce is sweetened), you might need to add a bit more salt/soy sauce to balance out the sweetness. The end flavors should be a nice marrying of savory saltiness with undertones of sweetness.

Serve over rice.

Enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

I am entering this post in the October 2009 edition of A Worldly Epicurean’s Delight, created by Chef In You and hosted by Annarasa.

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Homemade Pho Ga (Chicken Pho Noodle Soup)

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:37:00 +0000

Learn a few simple tips to make un-pho-gettable, pho-lavorful pho like a pro.

When I first moved to Hawaii, I discovered Vietnamese noodle soup - more specifically Pho. The first time I had it was in Honolulu’s Chinatown where a friend had recommended we go to this one restaurant that specialized in Pho. When we got there, there was a line out the door—a sure sign that the food was going to be good. And it was and my love affair with Pho started.

Un-pho-gettable

When we got to San Jose, I discovered that the Vietnamese population here was even bigger and we got exposed to so many more Vietnamese dishes. But even as I learned to love many other dishes, I had to have my pho every so often and every time I sat down to a bowl of Pho, that first sip of the broth would have me sighing contentedly. There was just something so heartwarming about the soup—the spices and herbs along with the hearty meat stock marrying together and creating a fragrance unlike anything else.

Even though beef pho is more common, Nate and I will sometimes order chicken pho (pho ga). The broth is often cleaner but with a more distinctive sweetness from using chicken stock, I suppose. Whatever it is, it is just as compelling as beef pho. We love them both equally. How about you? Which do you pre-pho?

Looking Pho-ward

Now that I’m in Malaysia, I find that Vietnamese food is not as popular here. I suppose that Malaysians have so many noodle dishes already that people are not as impressed by the subtleties of pho (or maybe they just aren’t aware of it). Our family misses this noodle soup quite a bit (Daniel and Esther gave a cheer when they heard I was making it). Thankfully, we brought most of the spices we would need to make it ourselves.

However, I have never made beef pho. Every so often, I have made chicken pho in California. That being the case, I decided that I would save the more daunting task of cooking beef pho for another occasion (it seems more daunting because beef stock is very unfamiliar to me). So today, I went to the market to get all that I needed for chicken pho.

The first thing I did was to make sure I got myself a really good chicken (I bought a free range chicken) and some extra chicken bones (I had saved some from previous cooks). Then I went looking for the fresh herbs and beansprouts that I would need for the garnishing. The noodles were an easy acquisition since pho noodles are very similar to kuay teow and I could find fresh ones at the market.

Everything else I already had at home in my pantry so I was set to go.

Can We Say Pho-lavor?

Before I first made pho, I heard from friends that making pho broth is a real production that takes days. But I learned how to make this dish from a student friend in my graduate student days. She made it look so simple, basically just boil some chicken with spices and aromatics that had been charred in a fire, add some seasonings, garnish with fresh herbs and dashes of lime and fish sauce. She alone convinced me that pho could be a simple meal and soon I was making it like a pro.

The one key thing that I learned from her was that the flavors in pho formed from the charring of the spices (cinnamon, black cardamom, cloves, star anise) and aromatics (ginger and onion). When we were in the dorm, we didn’t have access to a gas stove so we just broiled these ingredients in the oven till they had blackened in some parts. The charring lends the soup stock more depth and color.

Charring Onion and Ginger

Once that is done, just put all the spices in a large stock pot and add the chicken and chicken bones. Fill with enough water to cover the chicken (about 15 cups). You want to have enough water at the start so that you don’t have to add water later which will then dilute the flavors. The stock is then simmered for a long time to extract the most flavor out of the chicken bones. You do want to take the whole chicken out midway (around 30-40 minutes) and cool it before removing the meat. The carcass is then tossed back into the stock to simmer some more.

As for seasonings, I find that you need to season quite strongly as the noodles themselves are very bland. I normally add salt and fish sauce and also a little bit of chicken bouillon. I also add some rock sugar into the stock to sweeten it up a little (I learned this from a former ESL student who was a cook at a popular pho restaurant in San Jose, and Andrea Nguyen also recommends it). When you taste it, it should be more strongly flavored than a normal soup. This will balance out once you add the noodles and beansprouts.

Pho-nishing Touches

The rest of the dish is really pretty simple. As the stock is simmering, just assemble the garnishes—beansprouts, Thai basil, sawtooth leaf herb, some jalapeno or other chilli peppers, and lime. Prepare the noodles—if you have dry ones, blanch in hot water quickly to soften, or if using fresh noodles, just give a quick rinse in cold water. Cut up the chicken meat into bite sized pieces.

One other trick that I have when serving I learned from observing the hawker stall vendors here that serve noodle soup. Ladle some hot soup into your assembled bowl of noodles and beansprouts and herbs, drain the soup back into the soup stock (which should be boiling hot by the way). Then ladle the soup back into the noodles again. This is to blanch and heat all the ingredients thoroughly and ensure that the soup itself is piping hot when served.

Finish by adding a squirt of lime and peppers to your taste. Serve hoisin and sriracha on the side if you like (I mainly use this as a dipping sauce for my meats but omitted it this time as the chicken was tasty enough without it)

Chicken pho (Pho Ga) recipe

serves 6-8

Ingredients:

1 whole free-range chicken (the better the chicken, the more superior the stock), about 1.5 kg (3-4lbs)
additional chicken bones (I used some chicken feet and neck and also an extra 2 whole rib bones)
2 large yellow onions, skin removed
3 inches ginger, skin removed
3-4 star anise
3-4 cloves
1 inch stick of cinnamon (thank you White on Rice couple for providing us with authentic Vietnamese cinnamon)
1-2 black cardamom pods, slightly pounded to allow flavors to be released
15 cups water
2 Tbsp salt
3 Tbsp fish sauce
1 inch chunk rock sugar
1 tsp chicken bouillon
1 tsp ground black pepper

Garnishes:
2 cups beansprouts (I err on the side of more in case some people like more sprouts in their bowl, whatever is leftover can be used in a stirfry or in making Vietnamese summer rolls later)
1 bunch Thai basil, washed
8 sawtooth herb leaves (optional)
2 limes, quartered
1 Jalapeno chilli, sliced
4-5 green onions, diced
Hoisin sauce and Sriracha sauce on the side

1 kg (about 2 lbs) fresh pho noodles (koay teow noodles) or a packet of dried rice noodles that have been softened in hot water

Method:
1. Char the onions and ginger over an open flame till they have dark brown bits all over. Do the same with the star anise, cloves, cinnamon, and cardamom (I just hold it with my tongs under the fire for a few seconds).

Charred Onion, Ginger, Cinnamon, Star Anise, Black Cardamom, Cloves

2. Put the charred aromatics into a large pot with the chicken, chicken bones and water.

3. Bring to a boil. Skim off the scum that has risen to the top. Turn fire down to low and let simmer for about 2 1/2 to 3 hours.

4. About 30-40 minutes into the simmer, take out whole chicken and rinse in cold water to stop cooking. Drain and let it dry and cool. When cool enough to handle, remove wings, legs, thighs and cut off the breast meat. Return the rib carcass to the stock pot. Place the meats (uncut) on a platter and keep cool until needed.

5. Clean and wash beansprouts, sawtooth leaf herb, and Thai basil. Prepare plate with the garnishes, green onions, lime wedges and chillies, if using.

Garnishes for Pho: Thai Basil, Bean Sprouts, Sawtooth Herb, Lime Wedges

6. Prepare noodles (wash with cold water if using fresh noodles, and soften dried noodles in hot water).
7. Slice chicken into bite sized pieces. Remove dark meat from bone.
8. When ready to eat, taste broth and adjust seasonings if needed. Remember that the stock should be strongly flavored (it should have a nice saltiness with an underlying sweetness). Put in freshly ground black pepper and bring stock back to a rolling boil.
9. Assemble bowl: place noodles, sprouts, herbs and chicken on the bowl. Ladle hot stock into bowl and then drain back into stock pot, without letting the other ingredients fall in (use a slotted spoon to hold them back). Re-ladle stock into soup bowl. Finish with a handful of green onions.
10. Squirt lime and add chillies to individual taste.

Pho Ga: Chicken Pho Noodle Soup

Go Pho It! (i.e. Enjoy)

Cheers, Annie

Since we used White on Rice Couple’s Vietnamese cinnamon in this dish, we are entering this post in Weekend Herb Blogging #209, hosted by Paul Chen’s Food Blog and administered by Cook Almost Anything.

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Fancy Baked Mac and Cheese

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:00:00 +0000

What do you do when your kid wants mac and cheese and you don’t want to give him that gross boxed stuff? Make it from scratch, and fancy it up!

By now you know that Nate and I love our food. We love to cook / grill / barbecue it, eat it, sample it outside, wander around farmer’s markets and taste what’s in season. We love the textures of food, and the aromas and the visual appeal of foods.

Sadly, most times our two kids are happy to eat junk foods like french fries, chips, and - to Nate’s disgust - the so-called “Hawaiian” pizzas with ham and pineapple. As for our son Daniel, who loves all things cheesy, his most requested meal is…Mac and Cheese. It doesn’t have to be any fancy kind either (he snubbed the truffled mac and cheese at Alexander’s Steakhouse); he’d be super happy if I fed him that Kraft Mac and Cheese boxed stuff everyday!

Ick.

One day, our friend Felicia served this amazing baked Mac and Cheese at her house. She said that she got the recipe from Ina Garten on the Food Network. My son devoured it in a minute flat and came back for seconds even before we adults had started on our meal! It was really delicious, so I decided I would have to try to make it too.

Fancy Baked Mac and Cheese

The first time I made this baked mac and cheese, I thought the amount of sauce was too much. Being the pake Chinese I was, I added more than the one pound of elbow pasta. I decided I could stretch it out and make a pound and a half.

That was a mistake. My son told me, “Mommy, Aunty Felicia’s mac and cheese is better!” I told him, “Fine! Get her to make it for you from now on!” and went off to sulk.

Well, hellooo? It was my own fault for being cheap by trying to stretch it. I had lost the rich, decadent flavor that was the point of this whole mac and cheese recipe! So the next time around, having learnt my lesson, I stuck to only one pound of pasta (which, by the way, still makes a LOT of mac and cheese).

I did adapt it a little this time but not in a way that makes it less tasty. Instead of gruyere, I used Parmesan (I actually prefer the flavor of Parmesan). And instead of fresh breadcrumb, I used panko (Felicia was the one who gave me that tip) and increased the amount because who doesn’t like a nice breadcrumb topping!

The outcome? Absolutely delicious. My son wolfed it all down and asked for seconds AND thirds! There you go, it’s been given his seal of approval.

(Basking in the warmth of son’s approval).

So if you’re looking for a more fancied up version of Mac and Cheese, do give this recipe a try. This recipe really isn’t too hard. Probably the most time consuming part is the grating of the cheese. Other than that, it’s quite quick to assemble.

(It does involve quite a number of pots, though. That part is no fun when you have to clean up. Thankfully, I have a dishwasher named Nate. ^_^)

Fancy Baked Mac and Cheese

adapted from Ina Garten, Food Network

Ingredients
Kosher salt
1 pound elbow macaroni or cavatappi
1 quart milk
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, divided
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
12 ounces Parmesan (the good kind, please don’t use the pre-grated stuff in the green cylinder), grated (4 cups), original recipe called for Gruyere
8 ounces extra-sharp Cheddar, grated (2 cups)
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
3/4 pound fresh tomatoes (4 small)
1 1/2 cups panko bread crumbs (or more, I used almost double), original recipe called for fresh bread crumbs

Method
1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Set a large pot of water to boil and make sure to salt it well. When boiled, add the macaroni and cook according to the directions on the package, 6 to 8 minutes. Drain well.
3. Meanwhile, heat the milk in a small saucepan, but don't boil it.
4. Melt 6 tablespoons of butter in a large (4-quart) pot and add the flour. Cook over low heat for 2 minutes, stirring with a whisk. While whisking, add the hot milk and cook for a minute or two more, until thickened and smooth. Turn off the heat, add the Parmesan, Cheddar, 1 tablespoon salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

5. Add the cooked macaroni and stir well. Pour into a 3-quart baking dish.
6. Slice the tomatoes and arrange on top.

7. Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, combine them with the fresh bread crumbs, and sprinkle on top of the mac and cheese.

8. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until the sauce is bubbly and the breadcrumb topping is golden brown.

Enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

I am entering this post in the November 13 edition of Presto Pasta Nights, hosted by Sweet and Savory Says it All.

Hungry for more kid-approved food? Click below:

Seven Secrets for Perfect Thai Fried Chicken Wings

Our Favorite Layer Cake Recipe

Blueberry Muffins Recipe

Pandan Waffles

Secrets to Making Spam Musubi

Recipe for Khau Yoke (Pork Belly Cooked with Taro)

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:19:00 +0000

House of Annie takes you step by step to create this ambitious, yet delicious, dish of marinated pork belly and taro.

When I first got to know Nate, I found out that he loved Khau Yoke (spelled kau yuk in Hawaii). More specifically Wu tau khau yoke (wu tau is taro or if in Malaysia, known as yam). I love this dish too but had never tried to make it at home. It seemed like something that only good restaurants could make and I never thought I’d be able to replicate it at home.

But my friend Elizabeth (whose mom used to run a chicken rice stall and is a fantastic cook) shared her mom’s recipe for khau yoke with me many moons ago. I’ve always wanted to try it just never found the time or ambition. But recently, when I was looking through my list of recipes to try, I reconnected with this dish. And having had a taste for yummy pork lately, I decided I had to make this dish (and please my hubby at the same time!).

A bit of this and a bit of that

The only thing about Elizabeth’s recipe is that it doesn’t come with exact measurements. This is very common for recipes handed down from our parents’ or grandparents’ generation—I’ve found that so many of them just use the eyeball method so they never have precise measurements. “Oh, just throw in a bit of this and a bit of that and then taste and adjust” seems to be their mantra. So for this khau yoke recipe, I had to guess on amounts (and lucky you, readers, I noted them down—though again, use my measurements as a guide and go with your own tastebuds for best results).

Now, khau yoke is an ambitious dish and I recommend you do this only when you have the time as there are many steps. It isn’t totally difficult but there are many different cooking methods employed and then the steaming time is rather long so read the whole recipe through and map it out in your own head before attempting!

Things I learned

Here are some things I learned after making this dish:
1. Make sure your pork and taro are the same size in thickness and height. I had some pieces of taro that were taller than the pork and the bowl and those pieces did not soak up any of the sauce and so remained rather hard.
2. Steam it for the full 3 hours for maximum tenderness on the taro.
3. Don’t slice the pork and taro too thick but don’t make it too thin either as that will cause the taro to disintegrate. 1/4 inch thickness seems to be reasonable (I had 1/2 inch thickness and the taro did not soften well).
4. Make sure you get taro that is “powdery”. I have no idea what this meant really but thankfully, here in Malaysia, I just had to tell the seller at the market that I was making khau yoke and she chose the right taro for me. According to my mom, if you touch a cut piece of taro, the good ones will leave a trace of white powder on your finger or your knife. Try that out and see if that works for you.

5. When preparing taro, don’t get the taro wet as you’re peeling it. This will cause the taro to become slimy and slippery AND on top of that it could make your hands itch. Instead, use a paper towel to hold the taro as you’re cutting off the skin. Wipe off any residual dirt from the cut taro and do not wash. (If you absolutely have to wash your taro, slice them first, then put into a colander and run some water through and drain.)
6. Making khau yoke does involve boiling, deep frying, and steaming. Prepare ahead. It’s a complicated dish. And yes, I actually deep-fried AGAIN! Can you tell I love my husband?

Now, this recipe did end up giving me a LOT of khau yoke so I recommend that if you only want a small portion to halve it. OR, impress your friends and share some.

Khau Yoke recipe

Ingredients:
1/2 lb (300g) pork belly (buy it in a big slab)
1 medium taro (ask the vegetable seller to recommend a fluffy taro)
1/2 Tbsp thick soy sauce
2 tsp chinese 5 spice powder
Marinate:
1 1/2 cube nam yue (preserved red beancurd)
1 Tbsp taucu (brown bean sauce)
1 tsp sugar
1 Tbsp thick soy sauce (divided)
Oil for deep frying
Sauce:
3/4 cup - 1 cup water (add more water if you prefer more sauce)
1 tbsp oyster sauce
dash of pepper
pinch of Chinese 5 spice powder
1 tsp soya sauce
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp Shao Hsing Wine
1/2 cube nam yue
1/2 tsp thick soy sauce

Method:
1. Bring a pot of water to boil. Blanch the pork belly for 2-3 mins to make for easier slicing. This process also helps to get rid of the porky smell and helps to achieve a slightly crispy skin when deep frying.
2. Remove from water and let cool. When cool enough to handle, use a fork to prick all over the pork belly skin several times.
3. Rub the belly pork with dark soy sauce & Chinese 5 spice powder. Leave to marinade for 30 mins.

4. Heat oil for deep frying. Deep fry the pork belly till skin becomes crispy. Drain it on paper towels then cut the pork belly into thick slices. Don’t worry if meat is not cooked, you’ll be steaming for a long time!

5. Marinate pork slices with preserved red beancurd, brown bean sauce, sugar and dark soya sauce. Set aside while you prepare the taro.
6. Peel the taro. Slice taro into thick slices about the same size as the pork belly slices. Deep fry taro pieces until golden brown. Drain on paper towels and set aside.

7. Use a deep bowl (not plate). You can either use individual porcelain rice bowls (to serve as individual portions) or a big porcelain bowl (I used a small claypot bowl and an oval corningware deep casserole dish). Alternate slices of yam & pork belly (make sure the skin side of the pork is facing down) in the bowl/s. Taro slices should be on the outer side on both ends (meaning start with taro slice and end with taro slice).

8. There should be some remaining marinade in the bowl where you have marinated the pork belly. To this bowl add the sauce ingredients.
9. Pour this mixture evenly all over the pork belly & yam slices in the steaming bowl.
10. Steam for 3 hours or until pork and taro are tender in a covered wok or steamer. Don’t forget to replenish water every so often to prevent burning your wok!

Before serving, Elizabeth recommends that you arrange lettuce leaves on a round large serving plate. Remove khau yoke carefully from the steamer & let it cool a little. Turn the steamed khau yoke over onto the lettuce leaves carefully.

If you’re not so good at this, forget the lettuce leaves and just place a plate over bowl and turn over that way to ensure less mess (like me!). Then decorate sides of dish with cilantro or other greens to make it attractive. And yes, this is important since you have taken the time to make this immensely complicated dish. Present with pride and watch husband devour!

Enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

Hungry for more pork belly dishes? Click Below:

Braised Pork Belly with Tomatoes in Soy Sauce

Jiu Hu Char

Tau Yu Bak (Pork Braised in Soy Sauce)

Mum's Popiah is the Best!

Recipe for Kalua Pig with Cabbage

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:04:00 +0000

Updated 30 October 2009
Originally posted 13 June 2007

This recipe for Hawaiian Kalua Pig with Cabbage calls for simply roasting a pork shoulder in an oven bag. No heavy lifting involved!

Kalua Pig with Cabbage

When Annie and I got married in Hawaii, one of my groomsmen made kalua pig for the big banquet after the wedding. Real kalua pig, cooked in an imu in his backyard the night before the wedding. Instead of coming to my bachelor party, the guy stayed up late to tend to the pig. That was a special wedding meal!

We don't have a pit in our backyard in San Jose but we still like to enjoy Hawaiian-style kalua pig and cabbage every now and then. For our Ultimate Hawaiian Backyard Lu’au, we made our kalua pig the night before. We shredded the pork and reserved the juices from the bag too cook the cabbage on the day of the lu’au.

Recipe for Kalua Pig with Cabbage

Ingredients

1, 5lb pork shoulder
2 Tbsp Hawaiian sea salt
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
4 cloves garlic, peeled
3 slices ginger
2 tsp liquid smoke
2 heads cabbage (or more), chopped

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 325*F.
2. Place the pork shoulder in an oven roasting bag.
3. Add all the ingredients to the bag and massage it in to the shoulder.

4. Seal the bag and place it in a roasting pan. Cut a few holes in the top of the roasting bag to allow steam to escape.
5. Pour some water into the pan until it comes about halfway up the sides of the pan.
6. Insert a remote probe thermometer through one of the holes in the bag and into the center of the pork shoulder. Set the target temperature for 195*F.
7. Place the pan in the oven and roast until the shoulder reaches the target temperature.
8. Remove the pan from the oven and allow the pork to cool.
9. Remove the pork from the oven bag, but reserve the juices from the bag in a stock pot. Refrigerate the stock.

10. Shred the pork shoulder using a couple of forks. The pork should shred fairly easily, but you can also chop up some of the tougher chunks.

11. The next day, you will find that the fat from the pork juices has risen to the top of the juices and congealed. You can now easily remove all the fat.

12. Bring about half of the reserved juices to a simmer in a large pot or saucepan. Add half the chopped cabbage and cook the cabbage down until softened, then add half the shredded pork.

13. Mix well until the pork has been heated through. Empty the kalua pig and cabbage into a serving tray and cook the remaining stock, cabbage and pork.

Enjoy!

Aloha, Nate

Hungry for more Hawaiian food? Click below:

Lomi Lomi Salmon Recipe

Ahi Limu Poke Recipe

Huli Chicken Recipe

Chocolate Haupia Pie Recipe

Mochi Ice Cream from Bubbies (Honolulu)

House of Annie’s Third Bloggerversary

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:35:00 +0000

Today marks the 3rd anniversary for the House of Annie food blog and boy did it come up fast! We originally had plans to do something big and fun to celebrate but since Annie and I were out of town in KL, we didn’t have enough time to work it all out. Oh well; there’s always next month…

A lot has changed in a years’ time! A year ago, we were happily living, eating out and cooking in San Jose, California. The blog was growing, and I think we were beginning to hit our stride and get noticed. We even got a little mainstream press attention when I wrote our memorial to Ryo, the Sushi Man of San Francisco, who was unfortunately killed at the beginning of this year.

An Eventful Year

We got to go to the Fabulous Food Festival and also participated in online blog events such as Grow Your Own and Weekend Herb Blogging. But our biggest, most fun foodie events were throwing the Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 parties at our house. Starting off with the Chinese New Year Cioppino, followed by the Ultimate Rib Showdown, and then the Ultimate Backyard Lu’au, we were excited to not just cook for ourselves but organize larger and larger parties for our friends.

But we hit the brakes when we found out in April that we had to move to Malaysia . It really put a damper on our blogging activities while we prepared for the move. But it also got us excited over the possibilities of blogging from Annie’s homeland.

We arrived in Kuching, Sarawak in August and almost immediately began making friends. We got to know about local foods, local ingredients, and local markets. We even got to do another Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 post, this time focusing on a local delicacy of Sarawak Layer Cakes. And once our kitchen supplies arrived, we started up cooking and baking again!

I really want to thank all you loyal readers who have stuck with us through the ups and downs. And welcome to all the new readers who have joined us this year. Special thanks to those of you who comment regularly – you really bring a smile to our faces by letting us know we’re not just posting into a vacuum but building a virtual community.

There is so much more that we want to do with the House of Annie. More baking, more cooking, more events, more giveaways. There is still the matter of migrating over to our own domain. Let’s see what the next year will bring!

Aloha, Nate

Click below for more

Two-Year Bloggerversary Week

2008 Year in Review

Thanks and Thanks Again, PLUS a Seven Things Meme

Bad Ass Coffee: A Little Taste of Hawaii in KL

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 19:49:00 +0000

I’ve joined Annie in Kuala Lumpur on holiday for just a couple of days. Annie’s cousin has been graciously taking us around to makan (eat) at places around town. One place she said she must take me is Bad Ass Coffee Company of Hawaii because I’m Hawaiian (well, Hawaii-born at least).

Bad Ass Coffee Company of Hawaii, Tropicana City, Kuala Lumpur

Bad Ass Coffee Company is located on the ground floor of the Tropicana City Mall, a newer mall in the SS22 area of Petaling Jaya. We showed up there around 4 PM on Friday afternoon. We couldn’t see too many patrons there at the time – just a table of young guys enjoying the free WiFi, and another couple sitting on tables outside the establishment.

Bad Ass Coffee Company, Tropicana City, Kuala Lumpur

One thing we noticed right away was that they were playing Hawaiian music over their sound system. Not the hapa-haole, steel guitar, touristy muzak, but good, contemporary Hawaiian music by artists like Keali’i Reichel, Makaha Sons, and Amy Hanaiali’i Gilliom. Wow, I haven’t heard real Hawaiian music played at a restaurant since the last time we were in Hawai’i! Nice touch.

There were other touches of Hawaii evident in the ambiance of the restaurant, like the surfboard above the counter and the staff clad in Hawaiian print shirts greeting us with a hearty, “Aloha!”

Bad Ass Coffee Company Surfboard Sign

Still, this is a lone coffee shop in a mall that also boasts a Starbuck’s. What would make anyone want to come and have a cuppa joe here? Two words: Kona Coffee.

Coffee connoisseurs know that Kona coffee – coffee grown on the Kona side of the Big Island of Hawaii, is among the best tasting coffee in the world. Bad Ass Coffee Company sells two kinds of coffee, a “Kona blend” which contains only 10% beans from Kona mixed with other beans from Columbia and Brazil, and 100% Kona coffee. 100% Kona coffee is expensive, but after you’ve tasted it, you will understand why this coffee is so prized around the world.

Bad Ass Coffee Company Coffee Menu

Besides your standard coffee preparations, they also have special flavored coffee concoctions that you can get either hot, iced, or blended. For non-coffee drinkers, they have fruit smoothies that are blended with milk, or “Hawaiian Ice” which is basically a fruit smoothie without the milk. (I was a bit disappointed to hear that, because I would have expected something more like a Hawaiian shaved ice.)

There’s a glass case to the side of the counter that contains various sweet desserts and pastries. Annie’s cousin wanted us to try their macadamia nut cream pie, which is a small pastry tart containing chopped macadamia nuts, and topped with a toasted meringue (but interestingly, no cream!). I opted for the passion fruit mousse. The mousse was delightfully tart, but a little dried out from sitting too long in the case.

Passion Fruit Mousse, Macadamia Nut Cream Pie from Bad Ass Coffee Company

What was also interesting about this place was they had a kitchen that was serving hot entrees like “Hawaiian Pizza”, “Tom Yummy Spaghetti”, and “Lamb Pita Bread”. You don’t find many coffee shops with such an ambitious and varied menu. At least, not in Hawaii.

Bad Ass Coffee Company Hot Food Menu

Daniel was enjoying the music, but he wanted to know if they could play the song “Ala Moana Annie” by Amy Hanaiali’i Gilliom over their system. I went up to the counter to ask, but the staff there said they didn’t know how to access the songs – the songs were played from the owner’s iPod plugged into their sound system. Then Annie’s cousin pointed out that the owner was actually sitting at another table there just outside the doors of the restaurant.

I went over to the table and asked if they had that song, explaining that I was from Hawaii, my wife’s name is Annie, and my son really likes this song. The owner said that he didn’t know if he had that song in his playlist. I thanked him and returned to our table.

A little later, the owner came over to talk to us. It turns out that he used to live in Hawaii, and graduated from the same alma mater – Hawaii Pacific University - as me and Annie’s cousin! He said that I was the first Hawaiian to visit his restaurant, so he wanted to meet me.

He also had one of his servers bring over a slice of cheesecake and a humongous sugar-coated donut, on the house. The kids devoured the donut while Annie and her cousin shared the cheesecake, which they liked. I thought that the cheesecake would have been better with some actual coffee grounds mixed in.

Bad Ass Coffee Company Cheesecake

The owner said that he had really fallen in love with Hawaii, and wanted to bring back a little something from Hawaii to Malaysia, especially the laid-back, aloha spirit. This coffee shop is the first Bad Ass Coffee Company to open in Southeast Asia and it’s been open for only two months. He has plans in the future to expand to other areas of Malaysia, and other SEA countries as well, but first he wants to spend time building up this flagship store and building a reputation for good, quality coffee as well as good customer service.

The hot foods menu, he admits, is a work in progress. He has a chef developing recipes for the menu, but it’s tough to balance the desire for authentic Hawaiian dishes with the Malaysian palate. (To be honest, I really didn’t think the menu was very Hawaiian. Maybe he could try selling a Spam musubi, using Turkey Spam?)

As for the drinks, the kids loved their mango smoothie. My “Jitter Juice” blended coffee drink gave me heart palpitations after drinking about 1/3 of the cup. And Annie’s cappuccino ended up as a latte after some confusion and miscommunication with the counter staff.

Bad Ass Coffee Company Latte

The restaurant’s location in a far corner of the mall, next to the San Francisco Steakhouse, is out of the way for regular mall traffic except on Saturdays. But he hopes that business will pick up when the new office tower opens up, and people begin finding out that there is good, Kona coffee being served here. I wish him well.

Aloha, Nate

Hungry for more Hawaiian food? Click below:

Ultimate Backyard Lu’au

Mochi Ice Cream from Bubbies (Honolulu)

Waiola Shave Ice: the Best Shave Ice in Hawaii

Secrets to Making Spam Musubi

Microwaved Cabbage and Carrot, a Bachelor’s Tale

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 14:03:00 +0000

The House of Annie has been pretty quiet lately, as Annie took the kids with her to Kuala Lumpur to visit with friends and family. I’ve been staying here at home in Kuching, living the bachelor life for the past five days. Fortunately, there’s a public holiday coming up on Friday so I’ll be joining Annie and the kids in KL for a few short days over the coming weekend. (Yay!)

So, what have I been eating? On Saturday, I ate pretty well, thanks to our friend Mike who took me to have FooChow beef noodle soup in the morning, Hainam chicken rice for lunch, and thosai and garlic naan for dinner. But the rest of the time, I’ve been eating leftovers for dinner.

Annie left me with a big dish of kau yuk – fried and steamed pork belly and taro . It took me three nights to eat it all, but I finally finished it. So here I am on Wednesday night with no more leftovers to eat. Besides finishing the prepared leftovers, Annie told me that I should cook the head cabbage that was left in the fridge.

What the Heck?

I rooted out the cabbage in the veggie bin and also saw some tomatoes left over from the braised pork belly dish she made last week, plus a bell pepper and a carrot. What the heck can I make with that? We don’t have any potatoes, so I can’t make colcannon (besides, there’s no corned beef to enjoy it with!).

On top of that, I wanted to make something fast, and I wanted to make something that didn’t require a lot of cooking implements. Life as a bachelor means a lot of eating in front of the tv or computer, and a lot of unwashed dishes in the sink. If I could minimize the amount of dishes to wash and maximize my time out of the kitchen, all the better. So I got the brilliant idea to cook everything together in the microwave.

Unfortunately, Google is no help in finding recipes for cooking cabbage in a microwave. But there is an Indian recipe site, run by my friend Srivalli of Cooking 4 All Seasons, that talks about easy microwave cooking. And surfing her site brought me to Veggie Platter, which sparked an idea that I could actually toast spices like cumin, coriander, and mustard seed in the microwave, and use that to cook my veggies with.

I thought I’d give it a shot. I’m no gourmet chef. I am barely passable with a knife. But I’m only cooking for myself, so who’s it gonna hurt?

I started off by shredding the cabbage. Then I julienned the bell pepper, then thinly sliced the carrot. Finally I cut the tomatoes into chunks.

Hey, that didn’t take long at all!

In a large glass bowl, I heated a couple of tablespoons of oil on high for 2 minutes in the microwave. Meanwhile, I ground up some coriander seeds, cumin seeds, and white peppercorns in our mortar and pestle. When the oil was done heating, I tossed the spices in. Back in the microwave for 2 minutes on high, give it a quick stir, and two more minutes.

Then, I dumped all the chopped veggies into the bowl, sprinkled on a little curry powder, added a cup of water, and put it back in the microwave for 2 and a half minutes. I took it back out, tossed and turned the veggies, then cooked it for another 2 and a half minutes. When it was done, I tossed the veggies once more and gave it a taste.

Needs salt.

I could have gone for the kosher salt, but since this was an “Indian-ish” dish, I thought I try sprinkling on some Indian Kala Namak salt that we got from our friend Tammy the Spice Hound. This salt is a finishing salt with a high sulfur content, so it tastes strongly of eggs. A little dash’ll do ya!

Here’s the final product.

How’d it taste?

I’m not going to say it was the best thing I ever put in my mouth. I thought it was lacking something, maybe garlic or onions or soy sauce. But it was edible. And I was hungry. So I ate it. In front of the computer. As I’m writing this post. And you know what?

It’s all gone. AND I only have one dish to wash!

Aloha, Nate

Annie will be back to the House soon, cooking legitimately good dishes. So subscribe to our site and receive all our latest posts to your RSS reader or to your Inbox.

I'm entering this post in the October edition of the "Microwave Easy Cooking" roundup, created by Srivalli of Cooking 4 All Seasons and hosted by Suma of Veggie Platter.

Wanna read about more of my cooking experiments? Click below:

Leftover Turkey Omurice

Mushroom and Gruyere Omelette, Banana-Nut-illa

Evolution of Dinner: Grilled Pork Tenderloin

Evolution of Dinner: Grilled Halibut

Evolution of Dessert: Sake-Poached Asian Pears with Ume and Li Hing Sauce

Braised Pork Belly with Tomatoes in Soy Sauce

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:00:00 +0000

Pork is so tasty here in Malaysia compared to the US. I don’t know what it is but there is just more flavor to the pork meat here. It is unabashedly porky and isn’t dry like what I have found in the US, where I always have to brine the pork for it to taste like anything at all. Maybe it is also because the pork we get here at the market is really fresh and mostly locally raised. Whatever the reason, it’s just delicious.

The interesting thing about buying pork in Malaysia is that if you go to the wet market, you will find all the pork vendors in a separate part of the market away from the rest of the other meat vendors. Pork is non-halal for Muslims so whenever you want to buy pork, you need to buy it from a special section. The same happens if you go to a grocery store—they have a special section for all the non-halal items including some imported desserts and foods that may contain lard, gelatin and other pork parts.

The other day, I was at the grocery store in the non-halal section and found some pork belly on sale at a 25% discount. Though it was a thin slice, it had beautiful layers of meat and fat and was just calling my name. I decided that I had to buy it and figure out something to cook later on.

The next day, when deciding on what to make with it, I looked to see what I had and saw that I had some onions and some tomatoes. I decided that I would make a braise with tomatoes and onions and use dark soy to give it a rich salty-sweet flavor. Combined with the tomatoes, this made a really nice braise. So simple and yet delicious.

Braised Pork Belly with Tomatoes in Soy Sauce Recipe

Ingredients:
1 Tbsp vegetable oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 medium yellow onion, halved and sliced
1/2 lb (300g) pork belly, cut into bite-sized chunks
3 medium or 5 small roma tomatoes, large dice
8-10 button mushrooms, halved (optional)
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 Tbsp dark soy sauce
2-3 Tbsp soy sauce
dash of white papper
Garnishing: chopped cilantro and halved cherry tomatoes

Method:
1. Heat up oil in a medium-sized heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat. Stir in garlic and onions and saute till onions are just softened.
2. Add pork chunks and let it brown (move onions and garlic to sides). Stir every so often to ensure pork pieces get evenly browned. Season with a little salt.

3. Add tomatoes and the rest of the seasonings. Stir to combine well. Once ingredients come to a boil, lower heat and let simmer for 30-45 minutes or until pork is tender. If using mushrooms, add it now.

4. Taste and adjust seasonings. The dish should taste salty and slightly tart-sweet from the tomatoes.
5. Plate up and garnish with cherry tomatoes and cilantro.

There you have it, a quick weekday meal.

Enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

Hungry for more porky dishes? Click below:

Ultimate Rib Showdown

Pork and Daikon Soup with Red Dates and Carrots

Tau Yu Bak (Pork Braised in Soy Sauce)

Homemade Breakfast Sausage

Braised Char Siew (or Non-bake Char Siew)

Dutch Apple Bread

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:10:00 +0000

Dutch Apple Bread

Several Thanksgivings ago, a friend, Andrew, made this fabulous Dutch Apple Bread and shared it at a church dinner. It was so simple looking but on that cold evening, with the bread still warm from the oven, it was a total hit. The bread was moist, hearty and infused with apple flavor. It was comfort dessert at its best.

I ate a slice and it stayed in my memory for days. I love homey cakes and quick breads without the frills of adornment especially when the flavors satisfy every craving I have. And it’s not just the flavor, it’s the texture and the simplicity of good ingredients that make it so memorable for me.

So I talked to Andrew about the bread (it is really more like a cake) and in our conversation he mentioned that he had gotten this recipe from a cookbook called “More With Less” by Doris Janzen Longacre. Our conversation left me intrigued about the cookbook and even though I had asked him to email the recipe to me, I had to look the cookbook up in my local library. Lo and behold, they actually had a copy and I ended up getting the book before he had sent me the recipe!

A Real Treasure

This cookbook is a real treasure. It’s not flashy and it doesn’t have pictures but the recipes in this book are truly comfort foods that use everyday ingredients. For an older cookbook, this is one that is classic and is not dated at all. Her ideas and philosophy are as relevant today as it was then.

I flipped through the cookbook and quickly found this recipe. Even though Andrew had not told me the name of the bread, I surmised from reading the recipe that this was the one. The only thing that stumped me was the sour milk in the ingredients list.

I didn’t quite know what “sour milk” meant. And even though the author gave a substitute suggestion, I really wanted to use the sour milk. So I emailed Andrew and asked what he did. He told me that he usually just put in a teaspoon of vinegar into warm milk and let it curdle. So I did just that and it worked out great (my technique was to put the vinegar into cold milk, stick it into the microwave for about a minute and – tadah - curdled milk!).

The only other thing I changed around was the margarine (I used butter instead). And instead of chopping the apples, I went with Andrew’s suggestion of putting the apples through a large-hole box grater. The bread was really easy to make and most of the ingredients I easily had available in my pantry.

Now that apples are in season, you really need to get yourself some apples and bake this bread. You won’t regret it!

Dutch Apple Bread Recipe

from “More With Less” by Doris Janzen Longacre
(makes 1 loaf)

Ingredients:

1/2 cup margarine (or butter)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup sour milk or orange juice
1 cup chopped apples (or grated with box grater)
1/3 cup chopped walnuts
1/3 cup chopped cranberries (optional)—I didn’t use them

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 350 F (180 C).
2. Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
3. Add eggs and vanilla and beat well, scraping down sides after each egg.
4. Combine flour, baking soda, and salt.
5. Alternating with the dry ingredients, add the sour milk or orange juice.
6. Fold in the chopped apples and nuts (and cranberries, if using).
7. Bake in greased 9x5” loaf pan for 55 minutes or until loaf tests done.

Dutch Apple Bread

Let cool, remove to a plate, slice, and…

Enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

This post was entered in the 2009 edition of World Bread Day.

Hungry for more bread? Click below:

Recipe for Corn Bread with Bacon

Buttery Dinner Rolls Recipe

No Knead No More

Pandan Kaya Bread

Foccacia w/ Poached Garlic

Roasted, Salted Pumpkin Seeds

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:33:00 +0000

Roasted pumpkins seeds are a favorite snack food here in Asia. And, they’re quite easy to make at home. All you need is a pumpkin.

Last year, I made a pumpkin swirl cheesecake using a Halloween pumpkin that the kids had decorated. It wasn’t carved, so the pumpkin was still intact and unspoiled. I cut the pumpkin up, roasted it, and pureed the flesh to use in my cheesecake.

After first sectioning the pumpkin, I scraped out the pulp and the seeds.

Then I put the seeds and pulp in a colander and rinsed them off while the kids picked out any stray bits of pulp.

After the seeds were cleaned off, I spread them out onto a sheet pan to dry. The kids were kinda impatient, so I broke out the hair dryer. Daniel did the “heavy lifting” as he diligently dried those seeds.

After they were dried, I drizzled a couple tablespoons of olive oil onto the seeds and tossed them to coat. Daniel and Esther then stepped in to grind some sea salt onto the seeds.

They went into a 300*F oven for 30-35 minutes until they started turning brown.

After cooling, we started snacking. And we didn’t stop. Those seeds were gone by the end of the night!

Aloha, Nate.

This post was entered in the October edition of the Heart of the Matter recipe roundup.

Hungry for more pumpkin and squash recipes? Click below:

Pumpkin Mee with Prawns Recipe

Kabocha Squash with Spinach in Coconut Milk

Pumpkin with Egg and Green Onion

Roasted Butternut Squash Soup with Bacon

Recipe for Banana Cream Pie

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 16:36:00 +0000

Banana Cream Pie

I love, love, love pies! There’s something about crust filled with yummy things that just appeal to me (to the cost of my hips). When I first came to the US, I was amazed by the variety of pies and I just couldn’t get enough of them.

I discovered banana cream pie when an acquaintance who attended the Hawaii Writing Project with me brought them one day to share. They were so delightful that I had to get the recipe. She generously shared it with me.

Testing, Testing

I baked this banana cream pie recently because I’m testing out the microwave/convection oven that came with our house. I figured if the crust didn’t turn out, it wouldn’t be as big a loss as a whole cake. From my research into other similar types ovens plus all the help I had gotten from some of you, I plunged ahead with this pie as my first bake.

And it turned out pretty good despite the oven not coming with any manual at all. The crust did bake up brown but I think I still need to work out the timing and temps a bit more to get it perfect. For a first attempt, I was quite happy.

I also chose to bake a banana cream pie because I am now in a land of plentiful bananas. Local bananas are so varied and delicious that we are eating a bunch or two a week. For this pie, I used Pisang Rastali/Kering, a banana that is very similar to the apple bananas you find in Hawaii. They are creamy but have a slight tart apple finish. Simply delicious—my absolute favorite variety!

Lessons Learned

The first time I tried to bake a banana cream pie, I must have had beginner’s luck because everything turned out really well. There have been a few times since then that the egg paste curdled when I mixed it into the milk. I suspect that the milk was too hot when I added the egg yolks (I get impatient and crank up the heat sometimes) and that is what caused the curdling. So make sure you keep the heat on the milk low when you’re adding the egg paste. Don’t let the milk come to a boil! But if you do get some curdling, all is not lost—just strain the pudding before filling the pie.

The recipe for the crust makes a really flaky and tender crust. It’s not the most flavorful crust because it doesn’t have any butter in it. But since the banana and the pudding is very flavorful already, this crust is a nice complement. If you want more flavor, feel free to substitute butter for the shortening, but you will lose the flaky texture you get from the shortening. Maybe next time, I will try it with half butter and half shortening. Anyway, if you are making this dough as it is written, be sure to chill the dough first so that the crust won’t shrink back too much while baking.

This recipe bakes up enough crust and filling to make two pies. And I recommend making two as they disappear very quickly. I served this at a church small group meeting and when the evening was done, I only had a quarter of one pie left to take home as leftovers.

Banana Cream Pie Recipe

(makes 2 pies)

Pie Crust Ingredients:
A:
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup crisco (I used a butter blend here in Malaysia)
B:
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup milk

Pie Crust Method:
1. Rub ingredients A together to form a shaggy dough in a medium bowl. Yes, I know it’s quite a bit of fat but you can always add more flour later if it’s too wet. It’s the fat that makes this pie crust flaky and tender.
2. Mix ingredients B together to form a paste in another bowl.
3. Add B to A and mix gently with a spatula until it forms a dough. If it’s too wet, add more flour to the dough to get a nice soft dough. Don’t overwork the dough; the crust will be more tender and flaky the less it is worked.

4. Form two balls, cover them in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for at least an hour.

5. Preheat oven to 400 F (210 C).
6. Roll out your dough into a round, about 1/8 inch thick, dusting with flour to keep it from sticking. Place dough rounds on your pie pan and press into pan and crimp edges to the side of the pan. Dock with a fork all around the crust.

7. Cover with foil or parchment paper and cover with pie weights. In truth, I normally just press the heavy duty foil into the crust and I’ve never needed to use weights. Bake for 10-12 minutes.
8. Remove foil/parchment paper and bake for another 10-12 minutes till golden brown.
9. Cool pie crust.

Pudding ingredients:
4 cups milk
1/2 cup butter
1 1/2 cups sugar (or less, you can taste the pudding later and if it’s not sweet enough, you can add more sugar)
6 heaping Tbsp all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
6 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla essence

Pudding method:
1. Heat on stove 4 cups milk and 1/2 cup butter over med-low heat in large sauce pan.
2. Mix in another bowl the sugar, flour, salt and yolks. Add to this mixture enough milk from the sauce pan to make a paste.
3. Add paste to milk/butter mixture on stove. Make sure the milk mixture is not too hot when adding the paste or the eggs will curdle. Whisk mixture constantly over med-low heat until the mixture thickens and comes to a boil.
4. Remove from heat immediately and stir in vanilla essence. Let it cool slightly. If you want a smoother pudding, strain it so that the bits of cooked egg will be strained out.

To assemble banana cream pie:
1. Slice 5-8 bananas (depending on size of bananas) in half length-wise. You can choose to slice them into rounds but I find that the pie slices hold better when you slice in half and lay them in circles around the crust. Cut as needed to fit all the bananas into the bottom of the pie crust.

2. Pour warm pudding over bananas until the bananas are covered and the pudding is almost at the top of the crust.

3. Cool in refrigerator until set, about 2-3 hours.
4. Just before serving, whip some heavy cream (about 1/2-1 cup depending on how much whipped cream you like), with 2 Tbsp sugar and 1/2 tsp vanilla. Spread whipped cream over pie.

5. Slice into wedges and enjoy!

Cheers, Annie

We're happy to find that our combi convection oven can still bake something, and making plans to bake even more. Don't miss a bake! Subscribe to our blog and receive all our latest posts to your RSS reader or to your Inbox.

Hungry for more pies? Click below:

Zingerman’s Apple Pie

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Vi’s Fruit Pastry

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:46:00 +0000

My forum friend Vi shared this recipe with me a long time ago. She calls it a fruit pastry but to me it’s a coffee cake which is topped with fruit. It’s simply lovely at tea time or anytime at all actually! Just beware, it is a very addictive cake and after one slice, it’s really hard to resist going back for a second and third…

Plum Nectarine Grape Fruit Pastry

The recipe is so simple and uses the basic creaming method for the cake. And it uses up whatever excess fruit you may have handy. If you don’t have any fresh fruit handy, just use canned—they work too! I’ve used a combination of different fruit—strawberries, plums, peaches, blueberries, and mandarin oranges. Just don’t press down on the fruit when you lay it down on top of the cake batter. It will sink into the cake all on its own while baking.

Plum Blueberry Mandarin Fruit Pastry

The key to this cake is in the tangy ingredients—the sour cream and lemon/orange zest makes the cake come alive and is what makes you keep coming back for more. I always zest my lemons and oranges whenever I use them and put the zest in a ziplock and stick them in my freezer. That way, whenever I have a recipe that calls for only the zest, I already have some handy to use. My friend, Vi, suggests that instead of freezing, just put the zest into a jar with some sugar and that will keep it from spoiling and is great to be added as flavoring to any of your baked goods.

Plum Blueberry Mandarin Fruit Pastry

Vi’s Fruit Pastry Recipe

Ingredients:
200g sugar
3/4 stick (100g) butter
50g sour cream
3 eggs
210g all-purpose flour (I’ve substituted 1/3 with whole wheat without any issues)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 tsp lemon/orange zest
500g fruit tossed with 2 Tbsp sugar (I find that 500g is sometimes too much so I slice up as much fruit as I think I will need and if I use canned fruit, I omit the sugar)

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Cream butter and sour cream and sugar till light and fluffy.
3. Add eggs one at a time and beat till incorporated in batter.
4. Add vanilla essence and zest.
5. Stir in flour and baking powder and mix till smooth.
6. Butter and flour a 9” round pan. Pour batter into pan and even out top with a spatula.
7. Place fruit on top. Don’t press the fruit down into the batter. Decorate the fruit as you please.
8. Bake for 60-70 minutes or until tester comes out clean when inserted into the cake.
9. Cool and then remove from pan. If you want to pretty it up some more, you can dust the cake with some powdered sugar but it is really good as is too.

Plum Blueberry Mandarin Fruit Pastry Slice

You might even want to double the batch just so you can share with friends. Enjoy this cake and let me know if you are as addicted to this as I am (I love it so much that I’m now afraid to bake it as I am very capable of wolfing down half the cake myself!).

Cheers, Annie

This cake was entered into the “High Tea Treats” Monthly Mingle, created by Meeta and hosted by My Diverse Kitchen.

Hungry for more cakes? Click below:

Pandan Chiffon Cake

Our Favorite Layer Cake Recipe

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Third Aunt’s Butter Cake

Seven Secrets for Perfect Thai Fried Chicken Wings

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 14:45:00 +0000

Thai Fried Chicken Wings

Who doesn’t like fried chicken? I know it’s something I can’t resist. As a matter of fact, when I was pregnant with my kids, the only thing I ever had cravings for was fried chicken. No, I didn’t crave pickles, and I didn’t crave ice cream. I ONLY wanted fried chicken. And after eating it, I would be so happy and contented.

Thing is, I don’t really like to deep-fry at home. As a matter of fact, I try to stay away from deep-frying as much as I can. I just don’t like how it makes my whole house oily and how much it makes myself oily.

But ok, when I saw this recipe for Thai-marinated fried chicken at Chez Pim’s site, I just could not resist it. The chicken looked so scrumptious, and the flavorings were distinctly Thai but without the spicy bite. And I could just imagine the crunchy snap as you take that first bite into crispy skin. Yum!

Thai Fried Chicken Wings

And so even though I normally don’t like to fry at home, I gave in for this Thai fried chicken recipe. And it was worth it. The chicken was amazingly good. The flavors of the fish sauce, oyster sauce, garlic and cilantro made it mad good! Even my son, who is normally a selective eater, made approving noises while chowing down on these fried chicken! “Hmmm…um…this is very good, mommy! Mmm…can I have another one? Mmmm…” With praise like that, how could I not make this again? I actually have made this recipe about three times now since finding it. So much for not liking deep-frying…

But ah, readers, I have found the secret to deep-frying without too much of a mess: Use a deep dutch oven (like my beloved 5-quart Le Creuset oval dutch oven pictured below). You don’t have to fill with too much oil, and the oil stays pretty much contained in the pot.

The Le Creuset heats the oil very evenly leading to a really nice even browning of the chicken. And I find that if you have to fry, smaller parts are easier than big pieces of chicken. Therefore, I recommend frying chicken wings, which cook up faster and more evenly than chicken legs. I tried them both and the next time I made this Thai fried chicken recipe, I used only chicken wings.

The other trick that Pim recommended was to use rice flour in coating the chicken. I’ve also done this when I first discovered this trick while living in Hawaii in the graduate dorm. A Japanese friend was making chicken karaage using mochiko (glutinous rice) flour, and the deep fried chicken pieces were scrumptious—I’ll have to share that recipe sometime soon. The mochiko flour makes the Thai fried chicken crispy and flavorful! Give it a go and tell me how it works for you!

Thai Fried Chicken Wings Recipe

adapted from Chezpim.com

Ingredients:
2 lbs or 1kg chicken wings (or chicken parts)
4-6 cloves of garlic (if you’re like me, you’d go with 6!), peeled
1 Tbsp chopped cilantro roots (or the bottom stems if you cannot get the roots—I used them both!)

Garlic and Cilantro with Cilantro Roots

1/2 Tbsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp kosher or large grained sea salt (don’t use fine salt)
3 Tbsp oyster sauce
1/4 cup fish sauce
About 2 cups rice flour
enough oil for deep frying

Method:
1. In a mortar or food processor, pound or chop the garlic, cilantro roots, and kosher salt into a rough paste.
2. Transfer the paste into a large bowl, add the oyster sauce and fish sauce and stir to mix well.

3. Rinse and dry the chicken pieces thoroughly, then place them into the bowl. Toss and rub the chicken pieces all over with the marinate mixture. Cover the bowl with plastic and let marinade in the fridge for at least 3 hours (I marinated them overnight).

4. When you are ready to fry the chicken, place your pan over medium-low heat, fill it with enough oil (I used Canola) to cover about 2 inches from the bottom of the pan. Let the oil come up to frying temperature (How do you know the oil is ready? I use the Martin Yan method of placing wooden chopsticks in the pan and waiting for bubbles to form around the chopsticks).
5. Meanwhile, put the 2 cups of rice flour into a large plate (a pie plate works very well for this.) When the oil is ready, take the chicken pieces, one at a time, dredge them with the rice flour. Shake each piece to remove excess flour and place them, gently, into the hot oil. Do this in batches so as not to crowd your pan.

6. Don’t let the oil get too hot. If the chicken is browning to quickly and you see large bubbles forming around the chicken, lower your heat lest you get half-cooked chicken. It should just be gently bubbling and sizzling in the pan.

7. Fry the chicken until they are golden brown and crisp. If you are using larger pieces, cut into one to make sure they are cooked through. If the juices do not run clear, stick them into a warm oven to finish cooking.
8. To retain their crispiness, here’s a trick I learned from Alton Brown, place the chicken on a rack with paper towels underneath the rack to wick the oil away. If the chicken is placed directly on paper towels, the moisture from the chicken will get trapped in the paper towel and cause the chicken to get soggy. So by putting the paper towels under the rack, the oil still gets wicked away but the space between allows the chicken to stay crisp.

Thai Fried Chicken Wings

Enjoy on its own or add a little sweet chilli sauce to add another layer of flavor!

To recap, here are the seven secrets for perfect Thai fried chicken wings:

Use a deep dutch oven
Use smaller pieces of chicken
Dredge the chicken in rice flour instead of regular flour
Test the oil temperature with the bubbling chopstick method
Don’t crowd the pan
Gently cook the chicken
Drain the chicken on a rack over paper towels

Cheers, Annie

Since the cilantro roots were harvested from our garden, we are entering this post in the 37th edition of Grow Your Own, created by Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes.

Hungry for more chicken recipes? Click below:

“Huli Chicken” recipe

Smoked Shoyu Chicken recipe

3 Cups Chicken recipe

Malaysian Chicken Wings: Two Ways

Braised Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic

Grace Place Sarawak Laksa

noreply@blogger.com (Nate-n-Annie) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 17:01:00 +0000

First off, I want to say thank you to all our readers, who have been bearing with us while we get settled in to our new home in Kuching. Even though Annie has been cooking most nights of the week, there haven’t been too many House of Annie recipe posts lately. Most of our posts have been about going out someplace to eat.

The main reason for this is, the big shipping crate carrying all our stuff (including kitchen appliances, all our normal herbs and spices, and the home computer with all our archived food pics on it) from San Jose hasn’t arrived yet. On top of that, the one tiny fluorescent lamp in our wet kitchen (where most of the cooking is done) has gone out, so it’s nearly impossible for me to get good pics of whatever Annie is prepping for dinner.

I never intended for this blog to be a restaurant review site. Most of you readers probably couldn’t fly here to Kuching to eat at the places we’re eating out at. That being said, I do want to tell you about a place we’ve found that serves some good Sarawak laksa.

Grace Place Sarawak Laksa

What is Laksa?

According to Wikipedia, laksa is a spicy, soup noodle dish, originating from the merging of Chinese and Malay cultures (also known as Peranakan or Nyonya) which is found primarily in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. Okay now, show of hands: How many of you know have tasted laksa? All right, now how many of you have tasted Sarawak laksa? That’s what I thought, very few.

Like me, most people are familiar with the curry laksa, a coconut-and-curry-based dish found in Singapore or KL. There’s also assam laksa, that sweet-spicy-sourish, fish-based dish found in Penang (I am absolutely in love with assam laksa from Penang!). But I didn’t know about Sarawak laksa until one day on maybe my second trip to Malaysia, when Annie’s cousin in KL took us to a stall in Bangsar that was known for its Sarawak laksa.

At first, I didn’t know if I’d like it. The broth was thin and brownish. There were a few prawns in it, plus shreds of chicken and strips of egg omelette. There was coconut in it, but no sharp curry flavor like curry laksa. Instead it was a mysterious but harmonious blend of spices, punctuated by a generous helping of fresh coriander. After first tasting it, and then finishing the entire bowl, I knew it was something I could enjoy again and again.

Looking for Laksa

When we first arrived in Kuching, we tried some Sarawak laksa from a stall near the hotel. It wasn’t very good – heavy on the white pepper, which covered up the nuances of flavor. Disappointing, but not daunting.

Later on, we moved into a house rented from a friend. We were cleaning up the place one day, when the friend brought over some lunch (what did I tell you about Kuching hospitality?). It was Sarawak laksa (of course, being already in Sarawak, they just call it laksa here).

This laksa was awfully good. I finished it all in no time, and was left longing for more. Our friend said that the laksa was made by a relative who owned a laksa stall. She gave us the location so we knew where to find the place.

Grace Place Sarawak Laksa Stall

One thing I have to note here. In Kuching, everybody eats early. This is especially true if you want to eat ~~Sarawak~~ laksa. The best laksa stalls are sold out by midmorning; after 10 am, you may either get the dregs, or you may get nothing.

So we were very fortunate when we recently showed up at 10:30 at the laksa stall, to find Aunty Rose still tending there. But as you can see, there wasn’t much soup left in her pot! She was literally scraping bottom to fill our order.

Grace Place Sarawak Laksa

Aunty Rose put a lot of effort into making a quality laksa. Every day, she would wake up at 4:30am to heat up her soup. By 6:30, she would be at the stall, selling her laksa. She’ll finish at around 2 pm, then head home to start prepping the ingredients for the next day. By 8 pm, she’d be done prepping and off to rest before the next day comes and the cycle begins again.

I don’t think I could survive that kind of life. But Aunty Rose does it with calm grace, and a smile.

Aunty Rose’s Laksa

Her laksa is thoroughly enjoyable from the first bite to the last slurp. Mix in a little homemade sambal belacan, add a squirt of kalamansi lime juice, and dig in. The thin rice vermicelli noodles still have a little crunch to them. The shredded chicken is flavorful in its own right. The bean sprouts, normally an afterthought, have their tips meticulously picked (another sign of the care she puts into her food).

And the broth? Oh the broth! Rich, savory, coconutty, with a pleasant chilli heat to it, it is slurp-alicious! This is not a broth to be left alone once you’re done eating the noodles. This is a broth that is good to the last drop. Next thing you know, it’s all gone.

You push back from your bowl with a sigh, face slightly sweaty, nose lightly runny, lips and throat tingly. You’re satisfied for now, but you know you want to come back for more.

Grace Place Sarawak Laksa

Unfortunately, you can’t have any more. You see, as of the end of September, Aunty Rose has retired from her stall. (Notice the “Stall for Rent” banner in the pic below.) I literally got the very last bowl of Aunty Rose’s laksa!

I asked Aunty Rose what she is going to do in her retirement. She laughs. “I’m going to clean my house!” Too many years of dedication to the stall, and to her laksa, left her with little time to do anything else.

I say she deserves her break. Of course, it would be a shame to just let her recipe be lost, wouldn’t it? So we asked her if she would share it.

That’s right. We got her laksa recipe!

And we’re going to share it. Because you see, our shipping crate has arrived in Kuching and will be delivered shortly. We have a contractor who is coming to replace and upgrade the lighting in the kitchen. Soon, we’ll be posting recipes (including laksa!) once more.

Life is good!

Aloha, Nate

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Hungry for more Malaysian noodles? Click below:

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