It's a Murder

Singapore Hainanese Chicken Rice

2011-02-17T19:58:00.003+01:00

Chicken rice is one of the MUST TRY food when you visit Singapore, it is one of our national dishes in Singapore, well known and well known by both the locals and tourists too. It is also one of my daughter´s favourite food too! She could eat it everyday and never get tired of it.

My mum used to tell me, countryside chicken is best when making this dishes because this chicken are free-range chickens that are allowed to roam instead of being caged. Though scrawnier than their farmed counterparts, these chickens are generally considered to have higher nutritional value. Mum prefer older chicken because she prefer she think that they are sweeter in flavour and she like to chew the tough texture of chicken meat compare to young tender chicken. I remember once her false teeth flew out of her mouth when she was trying to get a big bite on the huge chicken drumstick!

Whenever Mum make chicken rice, I could smell it from far away. The unique aroma is very strong, the fragrance keep reminds me of Chinese New Year. Whenever I cook chicken rice here in Sweden, just imagine even 3 layers of glasses window could not keep the smell from escaping out of my house.

If you are at a food mall in Singapore and do not know what to eat, watch out for customer on qeue..if there are many people qeueing at a particular stall, this mean that most likely the food from that stall are good. Take a look at this chicken rice stall for example, the qeue are so long!! Singaporean will do anything to eat good food including waiting 2 hours for a donut!

Here´s a video I find quite easy to fellow if you like to have a better understanding of how to cook this dish.

And also the recipe for chicken rice if you like to experience this popular dishes without having to travel to Singapore. Good luck!

Ingredients (6 servings):
1 chicken drum stick ..about 2 kgs
3 cloves garlic, crushed
2" fresh ginger root, crushed
2 spring onions, chopped briefly
2 tsp salt
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil

Rice:
3 cups long grain rice
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon sesame oil
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 lemongrass, crushed
2 screwpine leaves
4-5 cups chicken broth
Salt to taste

Chilli Sauce:
2-3 calamansi limes, seeded
2 tbsp chicken broth
2 tsp sugar
2-3 red chillies
4 cloves garlic
1 inch ginger
salt

Garnish:
2 cucumbers, sliced
2 fresh tomatoes, sliced

Methods:

1.
Remove excess fats off and reserve for cooking rice IF DESIRED.
2.
Bring a large pot of water to boil with some sea salt (enough to submerge the whole chicken), add in garlic, ginger and spring onion.
3.
Submerge the chicken into boiling water, then cover and reduce heat down to slow poach. Let it cook for 30 to 35 minutes.
5.
When chicken is cooked, remove and plunge immediately into a bath of icy cold water, submerging the chicken for about 10 minutes. Remove chicken from the water, drain well and set aside.
6.
RICE: Rinse rice till water is running clear, drain well.
7.
Heat wok on high, add in vegetable oil and sesame oil. If using chicken fat, add in reserved chicken fat and cook until the oil is rendered. Fry chicken fat untill crispy. My cat was roaming around my leg while I was frying the fat..I gave her a few when it was done..she love it!

Add in some vegetable oil if oil to make up 3 tablespoons of oil if chicken oil is insufficient.
8.
Add chopped garlic, stir-fry for a few seconds or till browned lightly. Add in raw rice, stir-fry till the rice grains start to look translucent.
9.
Transfer rice into an electrical rice cooker, add 5 to 6 cups chicken broth (up to level "3" in the rice cooker pot), pandan leaves and lemongrass. Add salt to taste if necessary and cook as if cooking plain rice.

10.
Once the rice is cooked, turn heat off and wait for 10 minutes before opening the lid. Steam inside will gently finish steaming the rice.
11.
Fluffy up the rice with a wooden spatula, remove pandan leaves and lemongrass.
12.
SAUCE: Put all ingredients in the blender and pause the blender a few times to make paste. It does not need to be very smooth. I separated the chilli sauce because I like the strong clean sharp flavour of the ginger and garlic.

13.
SERVING: Line a serving platter with sliced cucumber, arrange chicken pieces on top and drizzle soy sauce and sesame oil over, garnish and serve with rice, soup and chili dipping sauce.

Do you like .. spaghetti al sugo :-) ?

2011-02-17T12:27:00.013+01:00


*spaghetti al sugo* (with tomato sauce)

This is a classical spaghetti with easy to prepare tomatoes sauce.
Is quite fast to do , it need something more than half hour if you put to boil the water for pasta during the sauce preparation.
I used the vegetables I had in the fridge, you can put what you have instead of carrots and cucumbers ;-) . Sometimes I make it with squash , potatoes , beens, egg plants or what else I have.
Usually I save half of tomatoes sauce in the fridge , it will be good for pasta for one week. So I can prepare again spaghetti or other pasta at evening very fast.

Part 1 .. the tomato sauce:
This is a very easy to prepare tomato sauce
Ingredients:
1 can of tomatoes pulp
1 carrot
half cucumber
half onion
1 garlic clove
salt
olive oil
a pinch of chily pepper
sugar

Cut and mince the half onion and the garlic clove.
Put olive oil in a little pot and add the minced onion with garlic.
Cook it for 5 min with middle fire (till the onions became golden).

Cut the carrot and the half cucumber in little pieces and add it in the pot, let it run with low fire for a couple of minutes. Add the pinch of chily pepper.

Add the tomatoes pulp and about two tablespoon of water (usually I use this water to clean the can of tomatoes pulp to take all the pulp!!).
Add a teaspoon of salt and less than half teaspoon of sugar and cook it for about half hour with low fire.

Now as your wish you can let the pieces of vegetables or mince it with handy mincer, I often mince it all to get a creamy sauce!!
PS: Taste it and add some salt or some water if is too salty ;-)

Part 2 , spaghetti.
Ingredients :
spaghetti (about 100 gr for person)
salt
olive oil
grated parmesan

(mm , is really necessary explain how to do ? :-) ) You' ll need your pasta pot , put water, let it boil , add half fist of salt (and a table spoon of oil) to the water , add spaghetti and let it cook for 11 minutes.
Then serve it with the sauce and add some fresh grated Parmesan cheese!!

Fast Food?

2011-02-10T13:13:00.002+01:00


Hamburger with fried cauliflower "svizzerina e cavolfiori impanati"

Sometimes I like to eat some hamburger, this dish is also fast to cook ;-) .
In Italy we called hamburger also "svizzerina" ( this means little Switzerland )
My granny use to call it like that. I searched about why we prefer Switzerland to hamburg :-) I find that we call it just to indicate the "origin" of recipe, and we link it to germans languages areas , the near place with german recipes maybe was Switzerland ..
hamburger preparation : Usual we think hamburger as fat and not healthy food, here I try to make it as much healthy as possible.
I grilled it with olive oil , little pinch of salt and few chili pepper (that have good anti-bacterias property) .
Of course not much red hot chili pepper , otherwise it will burn your tongue as hell :-))
Anyway if you like it spicy , or if you put too much pepper as mistake consider that some bread or drink some milk will reduce the burn sensation, much more than one liter of water!!
I didn't add any mayonnaise (too fat!) if you like.. put some ketchup ;-)
cauliflower preparation: This take sometimes more ;-)
I steamed cauliflower (if you re hurry you can steam it faster in pressure pot , but consider that this maybe will destroy all vita-mines)
I whip in a plate the white of an egg then I add the red and I whip it more :-) , I add some salt and again few chili pepper. I put pieces of cauliflower in the egg, then I pass it in dry bread dust.
I fried it and then I dry it in cooking paper and serve with the grilled hamburger!

Ingredients:

1	beef hamburger (pork hamburger or chicken hamburger is also good!)
	olive oil
	salt
	chily pepper
	some cauliflower
1	egg
	dry bread powder

Preparation:

Step 1	Grill the hamburger with some olive oil , little pinch of salt and few chili pepper .
Step 2	If you like.. put some ketchup
Step 3	Cauliflower preparation:
Step 4	Cut cauliflower in some pieces
Step 5	Steam cauliflower for 10 minutes
Step 6	Whip in a plate the white the egg
Step 7	Add the red and I whip it more
Step 8	Add some salt and few chili pepper.
Step 9	Put pieces of cauliflower in the egg.
Step 10	Pass it in dry bread dust.
Step 11	Fried it
Step 12	Dry it in cooking paper
Step 13	Serve with the grilled hamburger

Something good against flu and cold :-)

2011-02-10T11:37:00.013+01:00

A list of food that help the immune system and raises the body's natural defenses:

1) ... cinnamon, which has antibacterial and disinfectant.
When I find this I was surprised, now I add often some cinnamon powder , also the taste is good ( I try it in beef, tomatoes sauces)

2) The onion, diuretic and anti-inflammatory, capable of promoting recovery from colds and bronchitis.
I knew this, I often add minced onions every time I can .

3) Blueberries, the antibacterial function, useful in case of urinary tract infections.
Also this surprised me, I knew blueberries have a lot of vitamins that help eyes but I didn't knew it help and that's good as anti-bacterias.

4) The chili pepper, known antibacterial, used in very hot countries to improve the body's defenses against infections and food-borne diseases.

I knew this , I use chili pepper instead of common black pepper very often.

5) Prebiotic foods such as fruits and vegetables (especially chicory), are characterized by the presence of carbohydrates, which stimulate the growth and metabolism of certain specific types of intestinal bacteria, with positive results on the functioning of the intestine, and everything ' body.

I knew also that veggy are very healthy, but I didn't know is because of carbohydrates

6) Probiotics, which regularize the intestine, considered the heart of the entire immune system: the intestinal flora, in fact, is able to release substances that fight inflammation and strengthen the defenses.

Yeah I think a good idea is eat yogurt ( pro-biotic) with fresh blueberry and maybe some cinnamons.
Then a salad with fresh vegetables , light cooked carrots (cook too much destroy vitamins) , with some fresh cut onions can be very good in winter ;-)
Also fresh fruit salad is very good!!

7) Garlic To this list I add also garlic that is know as natural antibiotic.

8) Walnuts Walnuts is very good for omega 3 balance and is a natural resource of magnesium that help metabolism of glucose in cells.

9) Mallow , mallow is a natural herb. this is a natural and good antiflamatory , it's very good against cough. Tea with mallow is great for this.

10) honey and propolis (two other products good against coughs and colds)

Salmon Pizza

2011-02-09T17:34:00.005+01:00

If you like salmon then it´s good to try salmon pizza. I got this idea from Fabio..he told me I should try it so I did! I think the Swedish will love this recipe because they LOVE salmon!
In Sweden, there are lots of Pizzaeria..mostely these pizzaria are owned by people from Middle Eastern. The topping is far too complicated for my taste..I wonder where all this ideas come from? Would you be surprise if I tell you there are Swedish people eat banana, starwberry, , kebah, curry chicken, jam even chocolate on pizza? To me that´s weird! I prefer the classic one, I feel that pizza should have clean taste, if too many different topping, the taste will be too complicated. I prefer to spend more time making sure the bread are prepared properly..with quality and care. If possible, I like to used wholemeal flour because it´s more healthier!

Here´s is a great recipe I tried using wholemeal flour

Ingredients

2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tsp fresh yeast ,crumbled
1 tsp sugar
2 tbsp olive oil or oil
1 tsp salt

Method

1. Combine all the ingredients except the olive oil in a bowl and knead into a soft dough using enough water until it is smooth and elastic (approx. 5 to 7 minutes).
2. Add the olive oil and knead again.
3. Cover the dough with a wet muslin cloth and allow it to prove till it doubles in volume (approx. 15 to 20 minutes).
4. Press the dough lightly to remove the air.
5. Divide the dough into 2 equal parts.
6. Roll each portion into a circle of 250 mm. (10") diameter and 6 mm. (1/4") thickness.
7. Use as required.

How to make swedish grav salmon? You can either buy it ready from supermarket or marinate it yourself.

Here´s is how you can do it yourself from scratch:

This traditional Swedish method of curing salmon is easy to do at home. Fish must be very fresh.

Fillet or have filleted by the fishmonger, leaving the skin on:

1 salmon (4 to 5 pounds)

Mix together:
2 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups salt
2 Tbspns. of crushed white peppercorns
1 Tbsp. black pepper

Rub fillets all over with this mixture. On the flesh side of one of the fillets, lay:

2 cups coarsely chopped fresh dill, including stems.
Sprinkle with:
2 Tbspns. brandy, aquavit, plain or lemon-flavoured vodka, or other spirits.

Lay the other fillet flesh side down on top of the dill-covered fillet. Wrap in plastic wrap or cheesecloth, sprinkling the outside with any scraps of dill or remaining salt mixture. Place on plate, cover with another plate, and top the whole package with 3 or 4 pounds of weight. Refrigerate.

Twice a day, open package and baste the fish all over with the juice it has exuded. Wrap it up again. The gravlax is done when it is opaque, usually in 3 days but it could be 2 or 4. Thinly slice.

Gravlax keeps well, covered and refrigerated for several days. To keep gravlax in the refrigerater be sure and pour off all the brine -- otherwise it will get too salty.

This salmon pizza is not the typical pizza with tomatoes sauce.

I like more flavouur in my filling, so I marinated the mozellla cheese in olive oil, little salt and some dried basil leaf.

I also sitr fried the onion & yellow pepper with a little with some balsam vinegar and sugar so it´s more tastier and softer.

It´s better to add mozzarella cheese 5 mins before due time so it´s not over cooked..it will give a pizza cheesy effect and it more moist too! Make sure the oven is hot..I have it set at 250 degree and the first initial baking time is 8 mins fellow by another 5 mintues with the mozzarella.

You put the salmon and rucola salad ONLY before serving because the pickles salmond is more tasty raw. You can also add more parmesan cheese for extra flavours!

Hope you like this recipe too! Ciao!

Onion Soup - A Natural Remedies for Cold, Flu and Asthma

2011-02-07T21:27:00.003+01:00

I have astma. I knew I should have had vaccine every year so I do not to put up with this troublesome illness. I heard from Fabio about the natural remedies to fight cold and flu so I thought I gave it a shot! I am surprise that Onion is the number 2 best remedie for flu.First place is Garlic as it can kill harmful bacteria and viruses and even eliminate fungi, 2nd place is Onion, Onion soup is also used to fight flues, common colds.
Garlic is used in seasoning since hundreds of years for many conditions, and garlic is also known to bolster your immune system, making your body more efficient at fighting off invaders as well. Garlic should be included in foods regularly, and you can also chew on a raw clove if you do not mind the garlic breath or strong taste and odor. This natural remedy will definitely clear your sinuses and relieve symptoms.
One of the most common and effective natural remedies for flu is an onion. One method is to mix equal parts of honey and onion juice, and take a couple of teaspoons every four to six hours. Onion soup is also used to fight flues, common colds and asthma at times. The heat of the soup and the nutrition can help relieve symptoms while shortening the duration. Onion tea can also be made by slicing one small onion and boiling in water until cooked. Strain out the onion and drink the tea. The taste is not great, so you may need to add sweeteners, but this natural flu remedy can help you get better sooner.

To be kaisu, I added both garlic and lots of onion in this French Onion Soup recipe!
Hope for double killing!!

To make this delicious soup, I chopped 4 large onion finely with 30gm of butter. I slowly cooked it till light brown under low heat..(15 mins) I think if you add salt, it will speed up the browning process.

After that, I add 100ml of sherry, 850ml of boiling water, I cube of beef broth, some chilly peppers, 3 tables spoons of tomatoes puree, and a little dark soya sauce. Let the mixture simmer under medium low heat for half hour..the liquid will eventually evaporate. I added 100ml of fresh full cream for the creamy taste..you dont have to add it if you afraid of fat.

The soup is nice with a couple of toast topped with some Franch Cheese or any mealting cheese.

Korean Sweet Potato Vermicelli

2011-02-06T22:38:00.007+01:00

Ever heard of Korean noodle made from sweet potato starch?
As you can see , it is a thin long, translucent noodle with a chewy texture. They are perfect for steam boat, stir fired and even soup! They are similar to cellophane noodles, except they are slightly thicker and tougher.

To prepare: Place the noodles in a heatproof bowl, pour boiling water over the noodles, and let them stand for 10 to 15 minutes, until noodles have soften.
Cooking Time: When the noodles are added to a stir-fry or to soup, further cooking is accomplished during the cooking of the dish.

I have been sick these day, really no apetite at all! Soup is normally what I eat when I am sick. My Mum used to make bee hoon soup for me, it´s just like a comfort food where I only get it from Mum who specially prepared it just for me when I am sick! Nowaday, Mum not there anymore! But I have someone who are just like my Mum, he gave me alot of advise on what I should eat and how to prepared it. Yes, he is my savior, Doctor Fabio!

My chinese girlfriend had this Korean Noodle at her steam boat party some weeks ago, I thought I really like the consistence of the noodle, kids love it too! Even Nelina who is not so fond of noodles love it!

To make this wonderful noodles, I first cooked the noodle as stated from the packing..with hot boiling water and later cooled it in ice cold water to restore it´s elasticity. No oil is needed to spearate the noodle because it does´nt really stick to one another.

I then prepare the soup with chicken broth, soya sauce, seasame oil and lots of white pepper. I like it peppery so all my germs from my nostril could be clear once it and for all!
I also prepared some boiled vegetables and chicken meat. Instead of cooking together with the noodle, I like to stir-fried it separately. I know, this step is not typical chinese, I did this because the chicken are more tastier this way.
I marinated the chicken with ginger juice, soya sauce, corn floor and pepper..
then stir fried them for 15 mins in a hot pan till golden in colour.
To serve this, I reboil the noodle & vegetables in the soup for 30 seconds, I later pour everything in a big bowl and garnish it with stir-fried chicken, chilly sambal and more white pepper! Serve this noodle piping hot!!!

Thai - Tom Yum Soup

2011-02-06T22:16:00.001+01:00

It´s minus 25 degree cold today..when I was driving to work this morning, I thought..damn it! I feel I am gonna catch a cold soon! I just feel the cold air rushing into my body system and I knew I need a good remedie to stop the cold before it is too late. My Mum used to cook very spicy food when she noticed a cold syptom.

I made a Tom Yum Chicken soup when I got home..it´s so simple and fast you can´t believe. For this soup, I used ready Tomyum paste my sister brought me from last visit.
This is so conveinent to use, it really saved alot of my time because making curry paste can be a pain in the ass sometime!

All I did was to cut the chicken breast, egg plant and mushroom into pieces and them into a pan filled with 1 liter of boiling water & the mixed spices then let it cook for 20 mintues.

Nelina was not a home, so I enjoyed this hot moment all myself infront of fire place, with a blanket, 2 cats keeping my feet warm on each leg, some light Jack Johnson and Jason Marz music at spotify and soft candle lights..
I love the way the heat rushed into my body & keep me away from the cold and make me feel alive!!

Chinese New year ..traditional food

2011-02-06T22:15:00.001+01:00

I remember when I was a child, one of my favourite food is steamboat. Steamboat during the 80´s is consider a luxury food. We only eat them a few times a year..and to many chinese family steamboat is one of the most popular dinner during the reunion dinner during Chinese new year. Steamboat is perfect in Sweden irregardless of the seasons.
Best, I think is during winter.The spicy hot herb soup is what a cold body need.
Here are a few picture I took at my last steamboat party..

First I boiled the soup with some chinese herb, like Goji berry (very good antioxidant)when people heard about the magic power of this berry, the scientist claimed that this Goji berry is good remedie for many critical illness..this berry is quite expensive here, people respect it alot, but it´s so cheap in Asian and of the best quality too! and also some dried red dates, ginger to keep body temperature, salt, spring onion, yellow onion and a fried fish for flavour.

While the soup is cooking, I prepare the marinate. I used moose fliér here. If you like your meat to be tender, use a little bi-carbonate powder to marinate the meat 20 mintues..rinse off with cold water after that.Then marinate it with crushed garlic, light soya sause, salt, seasame oil, ginger juice, corn flour and black pepper.

I love vegetable, especially marinate one. I used fresh mushroom and egg plant as side dish..I marinate them with some crushed garlic, soya, sugar, olive oil, & black pepper.

Nelina love meat balls in the soup, so I mixed some salt, pepper, spring onions, seasame oil and corn flour with minced beef. If you want the meat ball to bounch to reach the ceiling...use potatos flour instead of corn flour!

I brought this korean style 2 in 1 steamboat and BBQ hotplate in Singapore. Yeah, I know it´s kind of too big..but I often bring empty lagguaes and filled it with lots of goodies..as thought there´s a war coming!
I love this kind of stuff, very difficult to find it here..if I could find them, it probably cost a bomb!

Eat with your eyes!

2011-02-06T22:13:00.001+01:00

There´s one common phase about eating in Sweden ..they said "Eat your eye!" This mean food presentation is very important here, the swedish like to know what they are eating, preferbaly food that look as it original form, the look of swedish food is often kept clean and simple. I think Asian would find it too simple and tasteless cos it did´nt look so "prepared". I notice this term when I tasted seafood in Göterborg and Stockholm last summer. The city are well know for it famous seafood. The concept of seafood here are very different from Asian, I think Asian people who are so used to freshly prepared seafood will not agree with the way seafood is served..probaly to the point they might even complain.."Eeee why the food is not cooked? So it´s just salt added for seasoning, no way!?"
This was what I thought in my mind initially too..but after some thinking and tasting I think it´s after all one of the best way to serve seafood as it should be in it´s most natural form inorder to taste the natural flavour of oceans. This is just my personal taste and point of view. I hope the Asians dont throw rotten egg at me ok?

Yeah..how much does it cost to eat seafood in Sweden? It all depend on where you eat. The seafood restuarant I tried at Göterborg was´nt so expensive considering you can eat as much as you like at one fixed price of 400kr (40 Euro).The restuarant I went is a classy one. The concept is more like a up market pub where business man hang out for beer and seafood after work. The seafood are served in a multi-tier plate filled with crushed ice and filled with many different kind of sea harvest.
There were both cooked & smoked shrimps in which I like very much for it´s unique sweetness and smoky flavour..this is something you must try when you visit Sweden, the shrimps... and also some crab, which are steamed, this I find it rather tasteless because I am so used to the Singaporean chilly & black pepper crab! (Which is so far the best I ever know!) some turkish clayfish which is cooked in strong beer and her, some slices of fresh salmond..(may be should advice them to include washabi, and some fresh scallops..(this I am not sure I would recommend it for people with weak stomach, may be it will give you diarea, I will eat it if I ever want to loose 2 kg in a day!) and some a few fresh oysters. The Swedish normally eat seafood with bread, specially homemade butter and some creamy, lemony dipping sauce.

If you like to know where to eat & what to eat in Sweden, let me know ..I will try my best to give you some tips.

Wontan noodles

2011-02-06T22:12:00.001+01:00

Ok, may be I was desperate..I badly needed a wontan noddle fix..so despite of what I do not have to make the "real" wontan noodle, I decided to make my own version with all the ingredient I can find at home. Wontan noodle is comfort food for me, I grew up eating that almost 3-5 times a week and I never got sick of it. If I am on my dead bed, I would request for the wontan noodle from Geylang.
To prepare this mouth watering dish, and without pork at home..I created this meal using minced beef as filling for my wontan. First I mixed all the 250 gm of beef, finely chopped leeks and black fungus with 1 egg yolk, 1 table light soya sauce, 1 teaspoon of salt & sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of seasame oil and white pepper. I then left them alone to make-out in the bowl.

Instead of BBQ pork, I used boiled chicken breast cooked with ginger,garlic and salt. After cooking for at least 15 min in medium heat.

I strained the chicken stock and use it to cook the cabbage,once again I do not have choy sum, so I replace it with some italian sallad.

Here in Sweden, it´s not so easy to find fresh vegetable like choy sum, pak choy, kai lan at supermarket. So far I could only buy it once a week at the local Asian food supermarket. This is consider very luxury compare to other part of Sweden inland,in which did´nt even had any Asian store.
I started to appreciate our Singapore wet market, it may not smell good there but you can buy all kind of fresh vegetable, meat, seafood etc.. I missed also the local dialect in Singapore, everybody is so causal..wearing short and t-shirt at market, speaking dialect like no body business..the atmosphere & memories is simply most memorable!
Ok, back to our dish..I wrapped the wontan with ready made wontan skin..and cooked them two ways..boil & deep fried! I like both, the boil one is more healthy of course.
Because I like to serve everything piping hot, I decided to make the gravy in advance so I can mixed it with the freshly cooked noodle once they are ready.
For the gravy, again I used what is available from my fridge..for 1 portion of 150gm noodle, I mixed half table spoon of light, a drop of seasame oil, half tablespoon dark soya, 2 tablespoon of chilly sauce, 1 teaspoon or 2 of ready made thai chilly padi if you like your face to be red, I also add 1 tablespoon of Ketchep..ok I know Fabio is definately gonna comment about ketchep in my food again, but this is exactly what they used in Singapore. So dont be mad at me ok Fabio? You can also add 1 table spoon olive oil if you are not afraid to grow horizontally.

It´s almost impossible to find freshly made noodle here..to get this dry wontan noodle..the chinese say..you have to 偷笑 "Steal a laugh" mean you should consider lucky! I cooked the noodle for 10 mintues, in really hot boiling water , once it is ready..I quickly removed access water & transfer it to my sauce mix.

End result, Nelina was at home when it was done..I quickly picked up my chopstick and dive in! Everything else seem unimportant anymore..just me & the wontan noodles!!! It was no doubt far from the one at Geylang but I enjoyed every bit of it! After 1 big plate , I settled down on my couch infront of the fire place with a my cup of espresso .. feeling satisfied!

Boiled wontan dumpling

Deep fried wontan dumpling

You eating shrimp or prawn?

2011-02-06T22:11:00.001+01:00

Am I the only one who is confused between shrimps and prawn?
I found out from internet that there´s actually a slight different between this 2..
Prawns and shrimps belong to the same family as crabs and lobsters and are similar in a number of ways. They are decapod crustaceans, which means that they have 10 legs and a hard shell covering their body, although the shell that covers prawns and shrimps is much thinner and not as hard as the shell of most other crustaceans.
I love shrimps..any dish with shrimps I dived in!
There are three types of shrimps in Sweden..one the typical swedish shrimp (Which is tiny and quite salty..they are normally sold frozen, peeled or unpeeled) The unpeeled on is of course sweeter because the shelf protected the sweetness of the fresh.

Here´s is how the swedish shrimps look like,they are easy to use, perfect for sandwich and quite cheap.

During the autumn, Swedish love to fish for clay fish..I am one of them!
If you did´nt see carefully, you can easily mistaken swedish clayfish for shrimps..
The different is the texture, the clay fish are normally more salty because they are been packed in canned or frozen. Of course the best is freshly hunted clayfish, but you can only hunt them once a year, and a special hunting permised are required and only at certain river only.

Clayfish boiled in strong beer - Lousianna style

Also the Italian way...Clayfish pasta

Here´s a another way of how I like to eat my clay fish..

Clayfish Omelette

Wok raw shrimps with sambal chilly

Wok shrimps with peppers

30 Mintues meals

2011-02-06T22:10:00.001+01:00

Fabio often nagged about ketchap..so to make him quiet, I thought I try his recipe on how to make the "real" home-made tomatoes sauce from his previous Penne tonno e olive recipe.
I normally have only half hour to cook for dinner when I get home because Nelina is often hungry..you know she is growing like rocket!
Here are all the ingredients used for this meal...

I cut the sausage into smaller piece, fried them without oil on a medium frying pan..you will be surprise how much oil is "trapped" in one sausage!!! For half kg of sausage, I collected 70ml of pure fat!

While the sausage are working really hard trying to "burn" some fat,on the frying pan, I cut onions, pepper and leeks into smaller pieces.
When the sausage turn slightly brown, I placed it on a kitchen towel and left some oil from the sausage to fry the onion & vegetable. See, this is not only "lazy" way..too lazy to wash pan and also too stingy to use oil. But really there´s alot of flavours from the sausage oil, will be a sin to throw it away! It will add extra flavours to my dishes & sauce. When the vegetable is soft, I pour them into a plate & let it cool down.

To be honest, up till today, I still do not know how much pasta I should cook according to numbers of serving..Fabio, can you educate us on this please?
I cooked dry gomiti rigati in a large pasta pot with hot boiling water & a little olive oil & salt..while cooking I made the tomatoes sauce.
Again, I used the same pan with a little more of the oil from the sausage to fry the minced garlic for 1 min, I then add the fresh cherry & plums tomatoes and gently cooked it for another 10 min. I added some sugar & salt and of course I cheated...I add 1 tablespoon of tomatoes puree for the colours..we eat with our eyes remember? Colours is very important to me!

When the pasta is cooked, I pour the pasta into the tomatoes sauce and let them hang out for a while on the hot plate for flavours to penerate into pasta..then I pour lots of parmesan cheese into the warm pasta so it melt.
Now the pasta is ready!! I normally like to separate the fried vege because Nelina did´nt like pepper and leeks, but doing this she can choose not to add it to her dinner plate. Done! A meal prepared under 30 mintues!!!!! Buon appetito!

Lady Gaga ....art or statement?

2011-02-06T22:06:00.001+01:00

When I first saw Lady Gaga in this outfit, my first instinct was..hmmmm I can do this too!!!! Except that I will use the idea on my food!!!
I am not sure if this is art, or fashion, to me it´s just an attention-grabbing stunt. Who ever who thought about this idea..must be hungry!

Anyway, making dinner for me is often quite fun because I like challenge! Swedish normally will not spend more than half hour to prepare everyday dinner..to me, that´s a fantastic idea! Here´s is one dish I like to share that require only half hour to prepared.
Fish are normally sold frozen like I mentioned earlier..so just before I go to work, I will make sure I put out one packet of meat, fish or chicken to defrost for the whole day, by the time I get back, it´s perfectly defrosted! Here in Sweden, the indoor room temperature during winter is between 18 - 27 degree in most house.
For this fast & easy fish dish, I place some smoked cheese on the center of fish filér, I also seasoned it with a little pepper and lemon skin to get rid of the fishy smell. To make it easier to roll around bacon around the fish, I used toothpick to fasten the opening.

You dont have to be perfect to do this, just make sure you keep the cheese inside..but doing the toothpick, it make work easier for the bacon to go around the fish, top it with more cheese. You see I did not add any salt here? Yes, the bacon are normally quite salty, so you can quit using salt. The Swede normally add more salt because they prefer it more salty.

Pop the fish into the hot oven 225 degree and bake it for 25 mins.

Serve with potatis and salad!
I brought ready made potato gratang & baked it together with the fish..fast & easy...just POP EVERYTHING into oven and dinner is ready in 30 mins!!!

rock ..and Springrolls

2011-01-26T16:21:00.002+01:00

involtini primavera - springrolls

Let's spring-rolls !! As I said when I post about dumplings , one of my favorite Chinese food are spring-rolls.
One of my troubles was the wrappers, Is almost impossible to find it in the town where I live. Maybe somewhere in Turin is available, but I have no idea where to find it!
In an Italian website I find a recipe that suggest in this case how to prepare wrappers myself, so I tried this.
with 200 gr of white flour and some water, I prepared a simply dough , like the one of dumplings!
with this dough I made some flat wrappers as in the picture.

For the filling I had some cabbages , some leeks , some carrots and half onion plus some salt.

At this point I simply rolled the filling in many spring-rolls using the wrappers I made.

OK the shape is not perfect :-)

Now I had just to fry my spring-rolls .

After this I put spring-rolls on some cooking paper to adsorb the extra oil.

OK spring-rolls are ready!

I think the taste was quite good and enough similar to the one I ate at Chinese restaurant, next time I ll have just to add some salt to the flour pastry. It was a little to much sweet at the end!!

I have also in my mind some variations in fillings, I think this procedure is also good to try some "sofficini" like rolls. :-)

how much pasta ?

2011-01-26T15:25:00.000+01:00

how much pasta for person you need ?
It depend in kind of pasta, and in how much you are hungry!
Average quantity is about 90/100 gr. for each person. Consider that maybe someone will eat second portion !
Usually for a plate of pasta is enough to fit .. a plate of pasta at 70% . Pasta will grown boiling!

Ops! Maybe this post can be considered obvious :-)

how to stop with ketchup tunnell :-)

2011-01-18T12:14:00.004+01:00

If you are thinking to put ketchup in your pasta or noddles or what else that is not a French fry or hamburger , Stop!!! I have to suggest you almost 3 ways to do it without ketchups ;-)

First suggestion, this is how my grand-mum often do: with a concentrated tomatoes sauce, you can easy find it in tubes, can or tetra-pack and look like this:

The use is the same as ketchup, just put it in the same quantity ( or maybe a little more ).

Second option is a "passata" of tomatoes, usually this is available in bottles at mall , is much fresh than concentrated sauces. Is available also ready for pasta (with onions, olive, even minced meat or what else you like)

Last option is "do it yourself" with some fresh tomatoes , or a can of tomatoes pulp. Of course I prefer this , cos in prepared sauces there's always a large amount of chemical compound-preservative and strange ingredients to add colors or fake aroma with strange codes and labels (also available in best ketchups!! :-)) ).

The basic sauce is very easy , you just can put some olive oil in a little pot , add some salt , a pinch of sugar and the tomatoes (previously minced with a mincer) :-)))

Kill the dumpling!

2011-01-17T12:43:00.002+01:00

Homemade dumpling (1th test :-) )

When I go to Chinese restaurant there's two things are a must for me ! 1 th is the steamed dumplings.

In Italy also called "ravioli al vapore" .

2 Nd are spring rolls , in Italy called "involtino primavera".

Till some times ago I even though this kind of recipes are almost impossible to do at home!! Some magic recipe with exotic ingredients !

In last period I often hear from Estee that she prepared it with her Asian friends at their food "party" and dinner. Then I watched at uncle Phil blog a recipe about spring rolls. There s some difficult about it, I think here the particular "wrappers" are almost impossible to find. Estee suggest me to go to Asian shop. What you can do if you don't have Asian shops in your town ? Eh eh Thanks to INTERNET I find an Italian site that talk about involtini , they put recipe too. And much important for me, they explain in how to do wrappers yourself!! this is Italian way , if you don't have, do it yourself !! aahah

Another "Everest" recipe are sushi and tempura. I think I can try with tempura, for sushi I need to learn more about preparation. It looks very specific and very "perfect" food.

Anyway first try is with dumplings, first consideration about my result, is the shape. Honestly I didn't made the right shape for it , I have to try again and again ;-)

In my mind I have our Italian ravioli shape, or even the regional agnolotti.

Following a Chinese blog , with the recipe , I was very surprised about the preparation. I have my way to think , for example I immediately saw two differences. No salt, in the knead and no red of egg. Italian homemade pasta in knead have always some salt and often the red of some eggs (it depending of quantity of flour).

For the recipe I needed pork meat and leeks , but I didn't had it so I put beef meat and spinachs . (Red and green at last isn't it ? Same colors .. :-)) meat for meat and veggy for veggy ..)

Another funny things , is that to remember the word "dumpling" I had some difficult , I don't know why, but I kept to think to it as "ravioli" in my mind!!

Later I put also some pictures about preparation of "my" dumpling!

The taste at the end was quite good for me, I find it enough similar to the one I ate at Chinese restaurant! Parents enjoy it too...

Any comments and suggestion in preparing it are welcome!!

If some Asian people read this , please forgive me to kill the dumplings ;-)

Crostata ai mirtilli ( Blueberries tart pie )

2011-01-14T11:52:00.000+01:00


Crostata ai mirtilli ( Blueberries tart pie )

When I went in a national park near Stockholm Blueberries there was a group of Indians tourists too, they was very noisy and they appear exited as a children for everything ! A very funny memory is when one of them saw some blueberry plant and he start jumping shouting "blùbbery! bluùberry!!" :-))

Anyway this kind of "crostata" tart pie is one of my favourite, maybe just the apple pie or fruits pie can be better for me.

Sometimes ago a friend ask to prepare a pie , so after some research on the web about an easy recipe I tried with this pie. When I was kid mum prepared this pie and usually I made the up stripes of dough.
Nowadays mum get lazy and if I want to eat this pie , ( this often happen recently :-)) ) I have to prepare it myself , the prepared one that you find at mall are not the same!

Ingredients:

400 g of white flour

3 eggs

100 g of sugar

100 g of butter

1 grated lemon skin

200 g of blueberry marmelade

The preparation is quite easy:

Let melt the butter in a little pot (or in the microwave).

Mix the flour with the sugar, add the eggs, the melted butter and the grated lemon skin.

Knead it for about 10 minutes. (if the pastry appear too much watered add some flour)

Let the dough in the fridge for half hour.

After this divide the dough in two parts (65% for the base of pie and 35% for the decorative stripes )

Start to warm the oven , it must be at 180 degree (Celsius!!)

Cover with some olive oil a middle pie dish (is also good do this with some butter and grated bread or flour)

Stretch the dough in the pie dish, cover it with the marmelade and then decorate with stripes made with the other part of dough. make a web with the stripes over the marmelade.

You can choose the kind of marmalade you prefer. (also chocolate cream like nutella is good !)

Cook the pie in the oven for 40 minutes. Let it cold and enjoy it. ;-)

Risotto alle lenticchie ( Rice with lentils )

2011-01-13T19:39:00.001+01:00

Risotto alle lenticchie ( Rice and lentils )

This risotto is quite fast to prepare, and easy to do. I think is a very good recipe for winter days. Lentils taste is quite good with rice.

Ingredients for 3 persons:
4 fists of rice
3 fists of lentils
1 garlic clove
olive oil
salt

Here in Turin people say that lentils can call coins and money, (maybe cos the shape of lentil is similar to a coin) , anyway I never get rich after eat lentils :-))
First thing to do is put lentils in a pot with water, add a pinch of salt and put it on low fire and let in cook for about half hour.

Prepare a large pan with some olive oil (sunflowers oil are also good) , mince the garlic in little pieces. (If you like you can also add half onion minced!)
Fry it for a couple of minutes, till the garlic will be golden.

In this recipe I'll boil the rice like how we do with pasta. So put water in a big pasta pot and let it boil.
When the water is boiling add half fist of salt.

Lentils must be ready now, add lentils in the large pan and let it fry for a couples of minutes, mixing it with a spoon.

Keep the water where you cooked the lentils and add it in the pasta pot water. It will gave colour and lentils taste to the rice!

Add the rice in the boiling water and let it cook for about 14 minutes.

When the rice is ready add it in the large pan and mix it with a spoon.

The rice with lentils is ready!!
Enjoy it! :-)

Bagna Cauda (hot sauce)

2011-01-12T18:57:00.003+01:00

Today is the last day off , I took some days off after "befana" public holiday. So I decided to prepare the bagna calda, literally hot sauce.
This is a tradictional food of Turin , in dialet is called bagna cauda. Is very good in winter time and as the name suggest is better to serve it very hot.
Writing this post I put also Metallica black album, you know.. I needed something strong cos there s a lot of garlic in the recipe. :-)

Origin of this dishes are from middleages, I read that farmers made it to celebrate the broach of new wine. I read also that people of piedmont and turin originally made it adding to Anchovies and oil from genoa to the garlic and milk from farms near turin.
In france there's a similar recipe called "anchoiade" but they use water and lemon instead of milk .
Turin is very near to France and we have some tradictional food in common or similar.

Ingredient for 4 persons :
Anchovies 150g (under salt kind)
Garlic 7 big cloves
Extra-virgin olive oil (half glass)
milk (1 glass)
some butter (50 g)
some milk cream (is optional if you like it more creamy)
Varius kind of vegetables.

Clean the Anchovies with some red wine and trow the fishbone.
(Sometimes I use also under oil Anchovies, but under salt kind is better.)

After this clean the garlic pieces from the skin, this is a job quite boring. :-)

Cut Garlic in little pieces and put it in a large pot.

Add the milk (must be enough to cover garlic).

Left the garlic resting in the milk for at least one hour , this is important if you don't want to kill people around you just with a breath for about 2 days. After this the garlic wil be softer and it will loose his "power".
Put the olive oil and the butter in a little pot and warm it till the butter will be totally melted.

Now you can cook the garlic: middle - low fire will be ok.
Add the milk cream now if you like. The milk cream will make it much creamy (of course). This is optional and is not from the original recipe I think.
Mix the milk and garlic with a spoon, it will need about 20 - 30 minutes to be cooked. After 20 minutes try to squeeze a piece of garlic with a fork. If it will squeeze easy and it will appear soft is done.
Now you can decide: you can squeeze all the garlic with the fork (more tradictional) or you can take an handy mincer :-) and mince it all . I always use the mincer :-))
It will make a fabulous cream of milk and garlic. You can also put this in a water gun and use during Halloween night to get candies . :-)

Is time to add the oil with butter mealted, add it and mix with the spoon , keep cooking it with the fire low.
Add the Anchovies and keep mixing till the Anchovies will be totally melted.

The bagna calda is ready. We have particular plates called "fujot" with the place for a candle , the candle will keep the sauce warm. You can put veggy in the sauce and enjoy it!!

The vegetables:
What ever is in season and suits your fancy, traditionally one would expect:

Raw, cut into strips or bite-sized pieces:

2 cardoons (if these are not available where you live substitute 3-4 sticks white celery)
2 yellow bell peppers
A head of Savoy cabbage

Cooked and cut into bite-sized pieces:

2 baked beets
2 roasted bell peppers
5 roasted onions
A head of cauliflower, steamed and broken into florets
6 potatoes, steamed
6 carrots, steamed

This is probably a very healty food cos of garlic (that's a natural antibiotic ) cos of Anchovies and because of a lot of vegetables.

If tonight you ll have to fight with vampires this is probably the best dish to protect you, just a breath and they ll fall down like flies .. :-)
But if you want to kiss someone don't eat it!!

Penne tonno e olive

2011-01-11T16:31:00.007+01:00


*Penne Tonno e Olive* (pasta with tuna and olives sauce)

Today at lunch I prepared this 'easy' pasta with home made sauce , the sauce was with tomatoes (a must!) , tuna and olives. this kind of pasta is called "penne" I like this kind of pasta very much. Usually I prepare this when I don't have a lot of time , anyway today I put more attention and care in sauce. mm this cos I was thinking about this article too :-) I think also it was a good start for this blog, something typical and easy to prepare.

Ingredients:
olive oil
garlic 1 piece
half onion
about 10 olives
100 g of tuna
a can of tomatoes in pulp
1 - 2 fresh tomato
salt , a tea spoon
a little pinch of sugar
a little pinch of red hot pepper
parmesan chees
penne pasta :-) usually I take flat plate of penne for each person.

Cut the onion and the piece of garlic in little pieces as in the picture .

Put some olive oil in a pot , then add onion and garlic pieces and the pinch of red hot pepper, put the pot in a low fire and let it get golden.

Add the olives , the tuna and mix it with a spoon for half minute . (Save 3 olives and the fresh tomato in a plate, you ll need it later) At this point add the tomatoes pulp in the pot, the teaspoon of salt and I add half teaspoon of sugar. ( few sugar is optional, it will cut the acidity of tomatoes!! Have you ever seen godfather movie ? They prepared sauce with a few sugar too :-)) but this is not a menace! )
Mix it all, with a spoon , let it go for about 15 minutes on middle - low fire.
Start to prepare also the water for pasta, in pasta pot put water and put it on fire.

The sauce is almost done, at this point I took an handy mincer and I mince the sauce to obtain a creamy sauce.
I put a cover on the pot and I let it go for 5-10 minutes more with low fire ,
aa don't forget, how the hell kitchen chef often say "taste it" :-) if it need more salt or similar.
Water for pasta must be boiling now, add a spoon of salt in boiling water.
Penne usually take 11 minutes to be ready.
While penne is cooking we have last duty..
We still have the fresh tomato and some olive remember?
At this point I took the fresh tomato and I cut it in little cubes, I took also some olive and cut in little pieces.

Ok penne must be ready now , put it on a plate , add the sauce , add parmesan cheese and decorate with pieces of fresh tomato and olive!!

I have also another fastest recipe to make penne and tuna sauce, I called this "survival pasta", very fast to prepare and done in 15 - 20 minutes maybe good material for another post in future.

Do you like penne ? I hope you enjoy it! ;-)

Little presentation about me..

2011-01-10T17:59:00.000+01:00

OK I'm not so good in presentations :-) , shortly , my name is Fabio and I live in Italy. My home town is not so far from Turin in the north west of Italy.

One of my passion is food, I like to experiment how to cook and of course I like to eat food!!
Maybe you re asking yourself <why a murder, why this title for a food blog?> ..

The answer is simply.. I see that in each culture there's different way to prepare food .. In my life I visited and eat in France, Spain, Ireland , Sweden, Poland and the far place I went was Kenya . (To tell the true I didn't travel a lot but I love also watch food show at TV..)

When I traveled and ate in a different country my attention is often captured by good food (of course) , but sometimes there s something totally different , something that make me think <omg , how they can eat this?>
.. in some other occasion you can see your favorite food , killed!

For example when I knew that in Sweden they put ketchup in pasta, my first reaction was.. <hey , that's a Murder> so if you eat each kind of pasta, thinking something like "I'm eating Italian food!!"

...please don't add ketchup to pasta ;-) I mean nobody in Italy eat pasta with ketchup, if he's ok anyway. I wont make a list of food murders, but I'm not a chef , I just cook as hobby , so maybe something you ll see here about food .. will appear like a murder. :-)

..another murder is probably my English ;-) (I apologize for my mistakes in English, by fortune spell-checks work very good nowadays)
I just want to practice also this language and I like to share my experience with people.

I like also think that maybe someone at the other side of the world will read this . This will be great: to share cooking and food experience so far .
Anyway I hope everyone will see this blog will enjoy it,

ciao ;-)