East-Meets-West Roast Chicken with Glutinous Rice Stuffing

This year for Christmas, it’s a simple dinner for two so once again, for the main course, I’ve decided to roast a chicken rather than a turkey. It’s simpler, cheaper, faster and may I also add my biased view, more juicy & yummy than a turkey. A large chicken is  more than enough for two, and with the planned leftovers, I can make roasted chicken with cheese pita bread and chicken noodles soup from the chicken carcass … that’s at least 3 meals in 1! So I’ll be experimenting with a few versions of roasted chicken, starting with this one, proceeding up to Christmas.

I got this recipe from last year’s 8 days (fyi, it’s our local entertainment magazine). Now and then, they feature recipes and for this particular one, I actually kept the issue for a year and remembered to make this dish during this time. The recipe is by Chef Willin Low from Wild Rocket Restaurant. What I love about this recipe is its touch of fushion. Instead of roasting the chicken with some potatoes and vegetables which everyone is familiar with, the main carbohydrates accompanier of the roast chicken is the glutinous rice stuffing. The glutinous rice is better known as lo mai kai in our region. In the words of Chef Willin “This is like a reverse lo mai kai with the rice inside the chicken. While the chicken is roasting, the rice absorbs all the juice”.

Please note that in the recipe below, the portion of the rice cooked is much more than needed for stuffing. If you want just enough rice for stuffing, half the ingredients for (A).  In my opinion, since it’s a bit of work to prepare the rice, it’s not much effort to cook more. For the leftovers, you can heat it up over the next few days as a meal on its own so that post that great Christmas feast, you can relax for the next few days and not bother about food or cooking. To simulate the process of the rice being stuffed in the cavity of the chicken, I place the leftover rice in an oven proof dish, drizzle a couple tablespoons of chicken broth, cover with aluminium foil (you don’t want the top to be dried out), and then I heat it up in the oven for about 8 minutes or till warm. Take the dish out, use a spoon to mix the rice evenly, and the result is moist and tender rice much like the one in the chicken stuffing. B told me that this lo mai kai, even the ones I reheated, was the best he has ever eaten

Ingredients
(Makes 1 roast chicken, serves 4)

Recipe from 8days magazine (Issue 948, Dec 18 2008) by Chef Willin Low, with slight modifications to the original recipe.

(A) Glutinous Rice (For Stuffing)
- 2 cups glutinous rice
- 10 dried shiitake mushrooms, soaked in water and sliced thinly or diced (reserve the water)
- 10-15 roasted diced chestnuts (or substitute with dried chestnuts), diced
- 2 tbsp roasted peanuts
- 1 tbsp dried shrimps (hai bee)
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 1/4 cup rice wine
- 1 tbsp light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
- 2 tsp sesame oil
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- 1 1/3 cup chicken stock

(B) Roast Chicken
- 1 whole chicken, neck and feet removed, cavity emptied
- 2 tbsp melted butter (I heat the butter in microwave for about a minute)
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1 lemon, juiced
- rosemary & thyme sprigs (2 each)
- sea salt and freshly cracked black pepper
- 1 bay leaf

Tools Needed
- pastry brush (for brushing and basting the chicken)
- a large oven-proof tray for roasting the chicken
- kitchen twig for trussing (optional)

Directions
Glutinous Rice Stuffing
1. Rinse rice and soak in water overnight, then rinse again till water runs clear. Sieve and set aside.
2. Fry mushrooms in veg oil till fragrant. Add wine, soy, sesame oil, salt, pepper and remove from heat. Add rice, chestnuts, peanuts and shrimps. Toss.
3. Add stock and return to stove. Bring to a simmer, stir, then reduce heat. Cover and cook for 20 minutes, then remove from heat. Stir to distribute the ingredients.
4. Sprinkle some of the water used to soak mushrooms just before stuffing so the rice doesn’t dry out in the oven.

Roast Chicken
5. Brush chicken with melted butter, oil and lemon juice. Season with rosemary, thyme, salt and pepper.
6. Place a slice of lemon, a bay leaf, 1 rosemary, 1 thyme into the cavity and pack the cavity with the glutinous rice stuffing.
7. If you like to truss the chicken (it looks better but it’s optional), tie the two drumsticks together with kitchen twine. Roast at 220C for half hour, take out the bird and baste with its juices. Return the bird, roast at 200C for another 20 minutes to 30 minutes till chicken is cooked (you can baste once more in between if you like).
8. Remove from oven and garnish with cranberries, sauteed shiitake mushrooms, chestnuts, rocket and rosemary.

Cooking Tip:
The leftover juice in the roasting tray and the chicken bones can be used to make the best-ever chicken broth (another recipe coming up).

My plate of roast chicken with the glutinous rice stuffing (background: the recipe from 8 Days magazine)

These cranberries, pecans and orange muffins are ready for Christmas

I’m totally getting into the Christmas mood, first with the Christmas Biscuits, and now these muffins with a Christmas concoction of cranberries, pecans, raisins and orange. I really love the flavours of everything combined in this muffin, especially the surprising tinge of orange. Enjoy these muffins with a cuppa hot chocolate for breakfast, an afternoon tea party or tea time. If you have extras, freeze them in ziplock bags and toast them in the oven for a few minutes till they are warm whenever you want a muffin or two.

Ingredients
(Makes about 15 small muffins)

- 1/2 cups (150g) plain flour
- 1 1/2 eggs, beaten
- 1/2 tbsp baking powder
- 1 cup (150g) caster sugar
- grated zest of 1/2 unwaxed orange
- 40g pecans, finely chopped (set aside 10g)
- 50g cranberries (you can use fresh, frozen or dried), finely chopped (set aside 10g) - see cooking note 1
- 1/2 cup milk
- 65 gms butter, cut to small pieces and melted at room temperature  - see cooking note 2
- icing sugar (for decoration - optional)

You also need:
- sieve
- large bowl & wooden spoon
- disposable baking cases - see cooking note 3
- muffin baking tray

Directions
1. Sift flour, baking powder and sugar together, and mix well.
2. Add in milk, eggs and butter and stir until just blended (and lumpy). Be careful not to over mix as it will result in a tough texture.
3. Fold in the grated orange zest, raisins, 30g chopped pecans and 40g chopped cranberries into the mixture.
4. Place baking cases in muffin tins. Spoon the mixture into the cases (each about 2/3 filled). Top with a small amount of chopped pecans and chopped cranberries.
4. Bake for roughly 20 minutes in preheated oven of 200C (400F) or until slightly golden brown. Allow to rest for several minutes on a wire rack. Use a sieve to dust icing sugar over the muffins to decorate if desired.

Cooking Notes
1. I used dried cranberries which I bought from Phoon Huat, Singapore (”Red Man” brand).
2. A short cut I used to melt the butter quickly is to cut them to small pieces and pop them in the microwave for roughly 40 seconds. You need to adjust the time according to your microwave heat. Basically, you want them to resemble butter melted at room temperature (still kind of solid with the edges melted and runny), but you must NOT over heat the butter else the mixture will become oily and watery instead.
3. The silver baking cups I used are bought from Daiso, Singapore and they are labelled as “aluminium dish cup size 8 - 216 sheets” for S$2. If you use this particular baking case, line them with 2 outer layers of ordinary paper cases because the aluminium one on its own is too filmsy to hold the batter during baking. After baking, discard the outer sheets. Also, you have to reduce the baking time to roughly 17 minutes (till lightly golden brown) because these cases are quite small and hence the batter bakes faster.

The batter before baking

Star-shaped biscuits for Christmas

This is my first time making biscuits and it was fun! Christmas comes early in my household in the form of these adorable and simple-to-make biscuits. The dough can be kept in the fridge, tightly wrapped, for up to a week so you can prepare the dough in advance for Christmas; just cut them to shapes and bake in the oven for about 10 minutes whenever you want them. They make excellent gifts and tasty nibbles during this festive season. You can make these well-flavoured biscuits during any season and for any occasion - the Christmas shapes, white icing and silver balls really dress these biscuits for the year-end festivities.

Ingredients
(make about 12 10-cm stars)
Credits: Recipe from Christmas Treats to Make & Give by Linda Collister

A) For making the biscuits
- 75g unsalted butter, melted at room temperature
- 50g caster sugar
- finely grated zest of 1/2 unwaxed lemon
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 40g cream cheese
- 150g plain flour
- a pinch of salt
- 1/2 tsp ground mixed spice (see cooking note 2)

B) For decorating (optional)
- edible silver balls aka dragée (see cooking note 3)
- writing icing pen (see cooking note 3)

Tools needed:

- Christmas-shaped biscuit cutter (such as star) (see cooking note 3)
- flat baking tray
- a surface (preferably wooden) for rolling out the dough
- roller pin, sift and large bowl

Directions
1. Beat the butter with the sugar and lemon zest using a wooden spoon or electric hand mixer.
2. Add lemon juice and cream cheese. Sift in the flour, salt, mixed spice and work in.
3. When thoroughly combined, remove the dough from the bowl, shape into a ball and wrap in clingfilm. Chill until firm, about 30 minutes. The dough can be kept in the fridge, tightly wrapped, for up to a week.
4. Remove the dough from the fridge, unwrap and roll out on a lightly floured work surface until 5mm thick.
5. Dip the biscuit cutter in flour and cut out shapes. Gather up the trimmings and re-roll, then cut out more shapes.
6. Arrange slightly apart on the baking trays. Bake for 12-15 minutes in preheated oven of 180C (350F) until just turning golden brown at the edges.
7. Remove from the oven, leave to cool for 3 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack until completely cold.
8. If desired, decorate with writing icing pen and edible silver balls. Store in an airtight container and eat within 5 days.

Cooking Notes:
1. If using as a Christmas tree decoration, use a skewer to make a small hole at the top of each shape large enough to thread a ribbon through at step 5. After the biscuits are baked and decorated, thread with ribbons. Not recommended to be used as a decoration piece in Singapore due to our high humidity.
2.  Mixed spice is a traditional British blend of sweet spices, similar to America’s pumpkin pie spice.  I couldn’t find this mixed spice blend in Singapore so I made an easy home version by combining spices using the following ratio: 1 tbsp ground cinnamon: 1 tsp ground nutmeg: 1/2 tsp allspice. Store excess in a bottle for future use.
3. Where to find supplies in Singapore - I bought the edible silver balls (labelled “dragees”, “Red Man” brand) at Phoon Huat/Cold Storage, “Cake Mate” icing pen (decorating gel - white) at Cold Storage and Christmas-shapes cookie cutters at Daiso & Phoon Huat.

Sparkling Raspberry Lemonade

It’s less than a month to Christmas and it’s time to share some festive recipes, starting with this sparkling raspberry drink. You can serve this drink anytime of the year, just that the addition of chopped raspberries gives the lemonade such a lovely red hue that it somehow reminds me of Christmas. I use my base lemonade recipe, but decided to use soda water instead of plain water to make this drink more bubbly and fun. I think this is a really nice drink to have when you have guests, they are just so pretty to look at, yummy to drink, and go well with all kinds of food you serve.

Ingredients
(makes a pitcher of about 700ml)
- Juice of 1 to 1 1/2 lemon (depending on how sour you like)
- Sugar syrup: ½ cup caster sugar, dissolved in just enough boiling water to dissolve the sugar
- 1 can of chilled soda water (about 330ml)
- 5 raspberries, chopped
- Lemon slices

Directions
1.       Combine lemon juice and sugar syrup in a pitcher with a lid. Chill in the fridge.
2.       Just before serving, pour soda water into the pitcher, add chopped berries, lemon slices and if you like, ice cubes.

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More festive recipes coming up, do stay tuned!

Another simple recipe to share. I had these pumpkin smoothies served in little winnie-the-pooh short glasses with my pumpkin muffins. This is a perfect use for any leftover pumpkin you have after all the festive cooking. Healthy, sweet and totally yummy!

Ingredients
(Serves 2)
- 100g pumpkin flesh, cut to small pieces
- 150g vanilla ice cream
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1 tsp honey
- 1 tsp cinnamon powder
- marshmallows and cinnamon/nutmeg powder (garnishing)

Directions
1. In a blender, grate pumpkin flesh to a fine puree.
2. Add the rest of the ingredients except garnishing ingredients.
3. Process till everything is well blended to a fine consistency.
4. Garnish with some marshmallows and cinnamon powder if you wish.

Pumpkin Smoothie

These are the pumpkin muffins which I had with my pumpkin smoothie.

An egg-tremely fast and simple fried rice to whip up with a minimal of ingredients. All you need is some overnight refrigerated rice, eggs and some basic ingredients in your pantry and bravo! … you can whip up this fried rice in no time at all.

Ingredients
(serves 2)

- 2 cups cooked rice, refrigerated
- 1 egg, beaten, seasoned with a bit of light soy sauce
- 1 1/2 tbsp oil
- 5 cloves of garlic, minced
- 3 shallots, minced
- spring onions, chopped (garnishing)
- sea salt

Directions
- Heat oil and fry garlic & shallots till fragrant.
- Add cooked rice, use turner to flatten the rice balls so that they are separated.
- Add egg evenly, use high heat to fry the rice (or else it will be soggy) till rice mixture is dry. Season with salt and garnish with chopped spring onions.

A simple vegetable juice recipe for a busy mid-weekday. When I saw these cute looking red radishes at Bollywood Veggies (picture below), I couldn’t resist buying some. Finally decided to make fruit juice out of them because it’s easy and also nutritious. One seldom see radishes being added in a fruit juice and I guess it’s because their taste can be quite sharp & spicy when consumed raw. The trick is not to add too many radishes, and blend them with cherry tomatoes and carrots as their natural sweetness will balance out the overall taste.

Beautiful red radishes I bought from Bollywood Veggies - so fresh they still have their leaves on

According to this site, “Radishes can be beneficial to our health as they are sources of Potassium, Magnesium, Vitamin C, Iron sulphur and Amylase. Radish juice has been used for treating skin conditions, asthma and sinus problems.” I just think that it is yummy, so when it’s also healthy, I think that’s a great bonus

Ingredients
(Makes 1 glass about 250 ml)
- 1 to 2 carrots, peeled and cut to chunks
- 15 cherry tomatoes (can substitute with normal tomatoes)
- 2 red radishes (can substitute with other types of radishes, about 70g), peeled and cut to chunks

Directions
1. Just blend everything in a fruit juice extractor and consume as soon as possible.

My friend, Rian, who is an Indonesian Chinese, taught me how to make this delicious and spicy vegetable stir fry. I think IndoChine cuisine is similar in some ways to the Chinese/Malay food in Singapore, because we have influences from various ethnic races so our food is also spicy. You can substitute sweet potato leaves with kangkong (kangkung) if you like. I cut the stems to smaller pieces because I think it’s easier to eat them cut, and this was inspired by the delicious stir fry vegetables I had at Bollywood Veggies. The result is a wonderful balance between salty and spicy. This goes really well with rice.

Ingredients
(Serves 2-3)
- 200g sweet potato leaves 番薯叶 (I use the “baby” type but you can use the regular type too)
- 1 large red chilli, sliced
- 3 cloves garlic, chopped finely
- 1 tsp light soy sauce
- 2 tbsp vegetable/olive oil
- 1/4 cup water
- 2 shallots, sliced finely

(A) For pounding (See step 2)
- 1 tbsp salted soya beans (aka dou jiang, ‘tauco’, ‘tao cheow‘, 豆酱)
- 3 chilli padi (bird’s eye chilli), sliced
- 3 shallots, finely chopped
- 1/2 tsp brown sugar
- 1/2 tbsp shrimp paste (belacan)

Directions
1. Trim the stem ends of the sweet potato leaves, then cut to separate the sweet potato leaves and the stems. Slice the stems to about 2-3cm lengths and set aside.
2. Pound the ingredients in (A) using a mortar and pestle.
3. Heat oil in pan, fry the sliced shallots, sliced large chilli and minced garlic till fragrant.
4. Add the pounded ingredients prepared in step 2 and stir fry for a minute till fragrant (see cooking note 2).
5. Increase to high heat, add the stems and stir fry for a minute or two.
6. Add leaves, water and light soy sauce. Stir fry till the leaves have just wilted and cooked.

Cooking Notes:
1. The large chilli is for colour while the smaller chilli padi is for spiciness.
2. When frying the chilli paste, make sure your kitchen is well ventilated because the fumes from cooking the paste can be stinging.
3. It is important to stir fry the vegetables in high heat so that they have a nice crunchy bite when cooked.

Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay may be known to be mean, but he also makes a mean meal of scrambled eggs as well. I saw his recipe at lifehacker which also comes with a youtube video demonstrating how he does his scrambled eggs. I tried the recipe and it sure was a winner - the scrambled eggs are of a nice velvety and creamy consistency. He uses interesting techniques such as only whisking the eggs in the pan and seasoning them only at the end - who would have guess that these are the secrets to perfect scrambled eggs?

Ingredients
(serves 2)
- 4 eggs (see cooking note 1)
- 1/2 tbsp crème fraîche (see cooking note 2)
- small knob of butter (roughly 20g)
- chopped chives
- sea salt and freshly cracked pepper

Directions
1. Break eggs in a saucepan and add butter. Do not whisk the eggs or season them at this point.
2. Turn on the flame and whisk the eggs in the pan using the spatula.
3. Keep stirring the egg mixture, and as soon as it starts to thicken a little, get it off the heat and continue stirring.
4. Alternate between stirring the eggs while they are on and off the heat, repeat a few times (about 3-4) until the scrambled eggs are of the right consistency (creamy and fluffy).
5. Take the eggs off the heat, mix in crème fraîche to cool it down, season with salt and pepper and fold in some chopped chives.

Gordon Ramsay’s Perfect Scrambled Eggs Tips:
- Whisk the eggs only when they are in the pan.
- Give the eggs a break from the heat once they get going, so they can combine and avoid drying out.
- Season the eggs right at the end. If you season them in the beginning, the salt will break down the eggs and they will turn watery.

Cooking Tips:
1. The original recipe calls for 3 eggs per person, I reduce it to 2 eggs per person to suit my preference.
2. If you cannot find crème fraîche (I saw it at Cold Storage Centrepoint Singapore, but quite expensive), you can substitute with fresh cream, thickened cream, heavy cream or sour cream.
3. I had my scrambled eggs with parmesan toast. To do this, mix equal amount of butter and grated parmesan cheese, spread the mixture over my baguette and toast it in the oven till its warm.

Drunken prawns (醉虾) is a dish which is unbelievably cheap and easy to prepare at home, but if you were to order it at the restaurant, be prepared to pay at least three times (but usually more) more than it would cost you to prepare it at home. Seafood is always so expensive when it is ordered outside.

If you think that it’s cruel to use live prawns, you can substitute with non-live ones. In my opinion, the key to delicious drunken prawns is to “marinade” them when they are still alive.  My (unproven) theory of why Chinese restaurants use live prawns, is that the prawns will ingest some of the wine, hence the wine aroma is deep within the prawns, else the aroma of the Chinese wine is kind of on the surface only. In the case of live prawns, I think the taste is more distinct and sweeter.

If you are looking for affordable live prawns in Singapore, refer to this post

Ingredients
(Serves 2)

- 10 live prawns (some call them shrimps)
- 3 tbsp Chinese wine (Hua Diao Jiu 花雕酒 or Shao Xing Jiu 绍兴酒)
- a handful of wolfberries
- 3 thick spring onion stalks (the bottom white part)
- 3 to 5 slices of ginger
- spring onions (cut to wispy thin strips) and coriander

Directions
1. Place prawns in a deep vessel with lid (I use my 4.2l slow cooker pot).
2. Drizzle 2 tbsp Chinese wine over prawns and close the lid (because the prawns will jump :P)
3. Wait till the prawns have stopped jumping. This will take about 10 minutes or more.
4. Trim the feelers off the prawns, arrange them in a single layer on a steaming plate that has a bit of depth. Pour the marinating wine over.
5. Place spring onions stalks, ginger and wolfberries on top. Drizzle one more tbsp Chinese wine over the ingredients.
6. Steam till the prawns turn completely red (this takes only a few minutes - do not over cook).  Garnish with spring onions strips and coriander.

“Marinating” the prawns “敬酒”