It had been quite some time since I last cooked at home. Previously, due to work commitments and irregular off days, cooking at home just doesn’t seem to make sense.

After I changed my job from fine-dining chef to becoming a ramen guy, my work-life balance is more like regular Joe next-door.  ‘A Noodle Story’ is located in the Central Business District meaning my working hours is not crazy like those of a chef. I still put in long hours, but my hours are pegged more to office hours with weekends and public holidays off.

My wife had been nagging, saying she did not get much chance to sample my cooking.

I love to cook for leisure and was thinking, “Why not I stay home and cook this weekend.”

Wet Market – An Introduction

Most people, especially youngster would prefer to make their purchases at supermarket for convenience and cleanliness. However, I prefer shopping for my ingredients in the neighbourhood wet market for numerous reasons. Besides the impeccable freshness of ingredients, there’s an amazing array of choices to choose – from live bull frogs, fresh meat, to a myriad of seasonal vegetables, eggs, dried goods, noodles and beans products.

At the wet market, I can purchase just the quantity I need; a small knob of old ginger, a few cloves of garlic, a handful of coriander, a bunch of scallions all for less than a dollar. If I were to buy from the supermarket, I would probably return home with standard pre-packed packages costing me at least several dollars more.

Another advantage in the wet market is the butchery services. You can ask the vendor to cut the meat into the size you want, or to gut and fillet the fish for you. And if you’re unsure which cut of meat is best for your dish, ask the butcher for some expert advice.

The best part of buying food from the wet market must be the fun of bargaining with the market vendors. It is also a good way to practise your negotiating skills. Any slight blemish on the goods is an excuse to lower the price. Another good time to haggle is when the vendors are about to close for the day and wouldn’t mind selling slightly cheaper to clear stock.

Wet Market – My Dishes

Here are some of the dishes I cooked on Saturday for my family. Only the ‘Imperial Herbal Chicken’ was left out as I forgot to take a photo of it.

Wok-fried french beans with minced pork in XO sauce.

Steamed egg custard with minced pork and spring onions.

Sautéed broccoli with sliced pork and shiitake mushrooms in oyster sauce.

Home-style braised sesame oil chicken.

Steamed red coral garoupa in superior light soy sauce with Chinese wolfberries.

Wet Market – My Bonus Recipe for Steam Fish

If you spent a huge amount of money buying a very fresh high-quality fish, all you need to do is to cook it as simple as possible. Just simply steam it accompanied with some light soy. So long as you do not overcook the fish, the end result will be gorgeous.

Steam Fish Recipe

1 medium size fish 600 – 800 grams, scaled and gutted

1 tablespoon cooking oil

10 grams coriander root, finely chopped

10 grams garlic, finely chopped

2 slices ginger

100 grams water

45 grams superior light soy sauce

3 teaspoons fine sugar

2 drops dark soy sauce

2 drops sesame oil

Coriander leaves and sliced scallions for garnish

Method:

1. Steam fish for 6 – 8 minutes depending on size until just barely cooked through.
2. Meanwhile, prepare the sauce. Heat up 1 tablespoon cooking oil and sauté chopped coriander root, chopped garlic, and ginger slices until fragrant.
3. Add water, light soy, sugar and dark soy and simmer for 5 minutes.
4. Strain the sauce and add the sesame oil.
5. Pour the sauce over steamed fish and garnish with coriander and scallions.
6. Serve immediately.

Go on and shop at the wet market as it is a trove of treasure waiting to be discovered.

It had always been my dream to have my own little place where I can serve warm, delicious food to happy guests. Today, I’m very happy to announce that I’m a step away from realizing that dream as we’re launching “A Noodle Story” soon. Please help to like our page at https://www.facebook.com/ANoodleStory to help spread the good news!!

A Noodle Story – Tired of eating noodles that can’t seem to get it right?

The reason to create A Noodle Story is simple: how many times had we being disappointed by the standard of noodles served in the market?

We ordered a bowl of noodles and it just doesn’t justify the price we paid for it at all. Noodles are soggy, ingredients are too little, meat is tough and dry, or the taste just sucks.

Sure, it is possible to get a bowl of delicious noodles but they are rare like diamonds. Furthermore, most of them are located either in cafe or restaurants, and they charge anything from $10 to $20 for a bowl of noodles.

A Noodle Story – Our Story

Ben and I started off as classmates in Shatec and we both shared immense passion to create the best dishes to make people happy. To do that, we needed to learn the culinary techniques and wonderful flavour combinations from the best masters, and hence began my journey working five years in the best restaurants in Singapore.

I have always love to eat noodles since young, so it comes very naturally to use noodles as a medium to create something special and delicious – an ultimate noodles dish and sell it at a price that seems like a fabulous value to our guests.

And we thought: Where better to reach the mass than at a food center. As you probably know, rental plays a major role in the final retail price. And here in Singapore, the rental is a killer. What we want to do is to make such gourmet quality food easily available to the common people. Not only to those privileged enough to fork out $200-$300 for a meal at a fine-dining restaurant.

Here at a noodles story, we are using modern techniques utilising our understanding of kitchen science to cook better food. Coupled with a creative re-engineering of local hawker favourites (think prawn mee and wonton mee merge into one dish) and given an innovative twist, we created this Singapore-style ramen.  This simple yet complicated dish is specially created to suit the local taste buds.

“Why simple and yet complicated?”

“Because the simplest dish to make is actually the most complicated as there is nothing to disguise it; whether in term of flavours or quality of ingredients. It’s either good or bad. ”

What this means is you can now get delicious gourmet quality noodles without burning a hole in your wallet. But be warned; there won’t be any pretty hostess greeting you when you arrive, there won’t also be a vase of pink roses to beautify the table while you chat. And most probably, you will need to carry the food to the table yourself. One thing for certain though, in spite of our limitations, we will serve you an ultimate noodles dish which you’ll never forget. This, we promise you at “A Noodle Story“!!

Season’s greetings! This year, I got a very special Christmas present from Santa. Although I’m Santa myself, I’m still very happy with my purchase. It was something I had always wanted for the cooking lab geek in me; an immersion circulator.

So what is it used for?

An immersion circulator, together with a vacuum packing machine allows you to perform sous vide cooking or what I call ‘culinary magic’. Sous vide is the French term for ‘under vacuum’. This technique basically means sealing food tightly in a food-grade plastic bag and immersing it into a hot water bath with the temperature and circulation of heat regulated by an immersion circulator.

At the core of this simple but ingenious cooking technique is the constant and controlled application of heat from the water bath to the food itself. If the temperature of the water bath is set to 65°C, there’s no way the temperature of the food in the bag will go beyond it. This means that you can’t overcook it!

Harold McGee, a prominent food scientist said a better term for sous vide would be ‘precision cooking’ and called it “one of the greatest culinary advance of modern times.”

Sous Vide Cooking – The Cooking Vessel

What I really want to share in this post is not to tell the world: “I bought an immersion circulator for Christmas.” The reason I wrote this post is to share my choice of container for holding the water bath.

As sous vide cooking is usually done at a lower temperature range of 40°C – 90°C, this means that it is usually cooked for a prolonged period of time; usually from hours to days. But this will also guarantee that your electrical bill will rocket to the sky if you choose the wrong choice of container for your water bath.

The immersion circulator is designed to be able to clamp to most cooking pot or container with a thin wall. But do really want to use a cooking pot as your water bath container knowing that most are made of metal? Metal is a very good conductor of heat (that is why cooking pots are made of metal) and it will transfer heat out of your water bath faster than anything else, making the immersion circulator working harder to maintain the set temperature.

Sous Vide Cooking – Search for Cooking Vessel

What we are looking for is something that is a good insulator. Something that minimizes heat lost and evaporation. The first thing that came to my mind is Styrofoam box. I happily found a suitable size and proceed to try it out. I switched it on over the night, and to my horror the next morning, water was leaking from the box. Apparently, the Styrofoam box couldn’t take the constant high heat.

What I need is something sturdier. So my search led me to a Cambro plastic container which is able to withstand heat up to 99°C. But that piece of Cambro is still not a good enough insulator; my wife will still be shocked at the electrical bill come end of the month. So I did something simple, I found a Styrofoam box that is just able to hold my Cambro snugly. Another additional  advantage of using Styrofoam is it is easy to cut the lid to custom-fit the immersion circulator. What I have now is a good sturdy container for a water bath that is insulated all around with a custom-fit insulated lid.

I proceed to test the insulating capabilities of my water bath. I heated the water till 67°C, switched the circulator off and cover it. After around an hour, the temperature dropped by only 1.2°C.

I guess my search for a water bath container ends here. Next to try out will probably be something that floats on the water to minimize evaporation. Till then…

Happy sous vide cooking!

For meat lovers, there are few pleasures in life that can rival the satisfaction from biting into a thick juicy slab of steak. How many times had we encountered dry, tough, and severly overcooked meat? But before we actually start to cook, we need to first understand the composition of meat and how they affect our cooking, the proteins’ reaction to temperature changes and so on. Meat is made up of three basic components: muscle fibres, connective tissues, and fat

Connective Tissues

Meat is form up from bundles of long muscle fibres which are connected and held together by connective tissues. Understanding connective tissues in meat is essential as they will determine the way you cook them so as not to end up with overcooked meat. Connective tissues in meat are real tough, and the wrong methods used to cook meat that are high in them will result in meat that is tough and chewy.

Connective tissues are most abundant in muscles that exercised and worked hard. That is why the legs of a cow are higher in connective tissues than its back. Older animals also tend to be higher in connective tissues, and they are much tougher compare to younger animals.

The two main connective tissues in living animals are elastin and collagen. Elastin, which cannot be broken down by heat should be removed by cutting it away, or breaking it up mechanically as in pounding or grinding. Fortunately, they account for only a small percentage of connective tissue in meat. The other major connective tissue, collagen, dissolves in heat to form gelatine. They are concentrated in the skin, bones, cartilage, and tendons of animals.

Ever had a very good short-ribs or lamb-shank before? The meat feels so smooth and slippery as if lubricated by jelly-like substances. That is tough collagen dissolved into gelatine.

Fat or Flavour?

Who says that fat is bad? Fat provides tenderness, juiciness, and flavour to meat. It is the over consumption of too much fat that is bad. Marbling is used to describe fat are intertwined in between meat, and is highly prized. What happens in cooking is that the intramuscular fats melts and lubricates the muscle fibres; so when you bite into it, it separates easily.

No More Overcooked Meat – Cooking it like a Pro

Anyone can throw a piece of meat into an oven to cook. Easy stuff. But it takes a person with skills and knowledge to know when to take it out of the oven at the right time, so as not to end up with overcooked meat.

Raw meat is soft and difficult to chew. When cooked just right, meat undergo some physical changes to become firmer, juicier, and easier to chew. When cooked for longer periods of time, its muscle fibres fall apart and break away easily.  Let’s take a look at the temperature effect on meat.

When heat is applied to meat, its proteins start to coagulate at around 50°C and its muscle fibres start to contract and become firmer. There is minimal water lost at this ‘rare’ stage. Meat is tender and juicy. As the temperature rises, the muscle fibres become tighter, and more water is squeezed out of it. Meat becomes progressively drier. When meat reaches 70°C, which is also the well-done stage, it is firm and dry and had already lost a lot of liquid. Further cooking for hours will break apart the muscle fibres making it soft, but the meat will still be dry unless there is enough gelatine lubricating the strands of muscle fibres.

We like our meat to be nicely tender and juicy. This means that we should never cook it beyond 70°C to avoid the full tightening of the muscle fibres and to minimise fluid loss. But as we learned earlier, meat from some parts of animals that worked hard are high in connective tissues. Even if the temperature does not exceed 70°C, the meat would still be tough because the collagen is not broken down. Collagen dissolves into gelatine during prolonged cooking at 70°C and above. At higher temperature, it dissolves even more rapidly. Therefore, it’s a fine balance between minimising protein coagulation and yet maximising collagen breakdown. There is no one size fits all method in cooking meat.

The trick here is to understand the different cuts of meat. Cuts of meat like the loin or the breasts, which contain minimal connective tissues; its core temperature should never exceed 70°C to maintain tenderness and juiciness.

Tougher cuts that are high in connective tissues like the legs and shoulders should be cooked long enough at 70°C or above to transform the tough collagen into gelatine. In a traditional braise or stew, cooking temperature is higher and will dissolve the collagen faster; but the internal temperature of the meat will usually exceed 70°C. Yes, the melted gelatine will lubricate the meat fibres making it smooth and succulent, but meat fibres will be tight and dry as it is severely overcooked! We can make it even better.

I personally prefer to slow-cook tough cuts at 65°C – 70°C using sous vide for its precision in cooking. When the immersion circulator heating the water bath is set to 65°C, the core temperature of the meat will never exceed 65°C. You can leave it in there as long as you like and the meat will still not be overcooked. We take the meat out when it is done, that is when enough collagen had dissolved into gelatine. How do we know if it is ready? Just by pressing lightly, we can determine if the meat is tender enough and will yield lightly to pressure. At such low temperature, it will take a long time, usually one to three days to dissolve the collagen. But the end results are worth it; meat that is tender, juicy, smooth and succulent.

To summarise, the core temperature of tender cuts of meat should be cooked just long enough to hit the range of 50°C – 65°C depending on your preferred doneness for tender, juicy meat. Tough cuts from the well exercised parts of animals should be cook at around 70°C for a prolonged period of time until the tough collagen had dissolved into gelatine. Any longer is detrimental as the gelatine will dissolved from the meat into the cooking liquid. This is good in making stock or sauces, but useless in meat cookery.

Table on Temperature Effects on Meat

No More Overcooked Meat – Flavour and Colour

Anybody like to eat boiled or steamed meat that is pale and flavourless? Not really. We generally prefer meat that is grilled or roasted because they look more appetising and also taste better. What happens is that at high temperatures above 120°C, meat undergoes complex changes called the Maillard reaction. In addition to browning the meat, this reaction also generates new complex flavours and aromas. The Maillard reaction will not occur in moist cooking methods as the temperature of water will never exceed 100°C. This is the reason why people sear their meat first before adding them into a stew; for a deeper colour and more meaty flavours.

However, with such high heat, it is very easy to overcook meat. The high heat at the surface of the meat will continue to conduct into the center of the meat. This “carry-over heat” will continue to cook the meat even after you stop cooking. The core temperature of a small piece of meat or steak can go up by 1°C – 2°C, while a larger roast can have a carry-over heat of as much as 5°C – 10°C. It all depends on how hot the surface temperature of the meat is. It takes only a minute or two to go from rare to well done on a thin piece of meat, therefore much care must be taken to prevent overcooking.

 It had been found that cooking proteins over high heat like grilling and frying will result in the creation of carcinogens. The darker the colour, the more carcinogens contained. But it should be fine as long as you are not having grilled or fried items for lunch and dinner every day. As with anything in life, moderation is the key.

No More Overcooked Meat – Techniques for Tender Meat

Here are two techniques which I frequently use to make meat tenderer before cooking; slicing technique and brining.

Meat is a bunch of long muscle fibres held together. Always slice meat across the grain of the meat fibres, as it takes more effort to bite and cut across long strands of fibres then shorter strands. If you slice along the grain of the fibres, the jaws will have to work harder to tear apart the long fibres.

I love to brine meat, especially poultry as it imparts added juiciness and flavour to the meat. Brining is basically soaking in a salt solution to allow osmosis to occur. What happens when you brine, is that the salt solution will diffuse into the meat together with any added flavouring from herbs and spices in the brine. Moisture loss during cooking is compensated by the moisture absorbed during brining. Thus the meat will be juicer than if you had not brined.

The strength of the brine and the length of brining will depend largely on the thickness and size of the meat. I recommend starting with a 5% salt solution and you can make your own adjustments to the strength of the brine and duration with experience.

Of course there are meat tenderizers out there. They are usually made from enzymes that break down proteins.  I personally do not use them as I feel it makes the surface of the meat overly mushy before the interior of the meat is penetrated. Chinese cuisine uses baking soda or sodium bicarbonate to marinate and tenderise meat which also works in a similar way.

With this article on meat cookery and techniques, The Chef Story hopes that there will be no more overcooked meat for you ever again.

There’s this dish on the current menu in the restaurant that requires little perfect cubes of daikon radish. Needless to say, I’m regularly left with a mountain of daikon trimmings. That set me thinking what I can do with all those extra daikon trimmings instead of going to waste.

“Why not make some carrot cake?” I exclaimed to myself.

Fried Carrot Cake – An Introduction to one of Singapore’s Favourite Street Food

Fried carrot cake (cai tow kway) is a local favourite very much enjoyed in Singapore. It’s a savoury dish that is cooked in either ‘black’ style or ‘white’ style and does not look like a normal cake at all. It is very much different from the western-style sweet carrot cake which is more like a dessert. Singaporeans eat this mouth-watering dish at any time of the day; whether it is for breakfast, lunch or supper.

The funny thing about fried carrot cake is there’s no carrot in it at all, and it doesn’t even look like a cake. It may seem like a joke, but there are absolutely zero carrots in it. The reason why this popular street food is named as fried carrot cake is because one of its main ingredients is daikon, which is literally translated into ‘white carrot’ in Chinese. Hence, the name carrot cake.

Secrets to Amazing Fried Carrot Cake – My Super Duper Ultra Wonderful Recipe

The cooking of fried carrot cake, or should I say daikon cake is split into two parts. First, is the making of the carrot cake itself.  The mixing and steaming of the carrot cake or more specifically, the ratio of rice flour to water is the crux of the recipe as that is the base for the whole dish. You get the texture of the cake right; everything else will fall into place. Get that wrong and your dog wouldn’t even want it for its supper.

The second part consists of frying the carrot cake with chopped garlic, eggs, preserved radish, and seasonings. Simple enough? Let’s get going…

Part I – Carrot Cake Recipe

200 grams rice flour

450 grams water

2 tablespoons cooking oil

200 grams grated daikon radish with its juices

20 grams chai po (preserved radish), rinsed briefly to remove saltiness and drained

450 grams water

8 grams salt

15 grams sugar

Method:

1. Grease a metal container, preferably rectangular, on all sides. This will be the container use to cook the cake batter.

2. Mix the 200 grams of rice flour with 450 grams water until you get a smooth batter. Set aside.

3. Heat up oil in a pan over medium heat.

4. Once hot, add the grated daikon and chai po and cook briefly for 2-3 minutes.

5. Add the 2nd part water, salt and sugar into the pan and bring to a boil.

6. Once the mixture boils, turn off the heat and whisk in the batter from step 1 until smooth.

7. Over a low heat, cook the mixture while stirring the batter continuously until the starch begins to gelatinize and thicken.

8. Once slightly thickened, remove immediately from heat and pour the mixture into a greased metal container and steam covered, for 20-30 minutes or until fully set.

9. Cool down completely and cut into desired size.

Part II – Frying the Carrot Cake

2 tablespoons cooking oil

1 piece Carrot cake, 10cm x 10cm (or any desired size)

1 teaspoon chopped garlic

1 tablespoon chai po (preserved radish), chopped

3 whole eggs, beaten

Fish sauce, to taste

White pepper powder, to taste

Sweet dark soya sauce, optional

Spring onions, finely sliced for garnish

Method:

1. Heat oil in a pan or wok until very hot.

2. Add in the carrot cake and using a spatula, cut it into bite-sized cubes.

3. Cook until the edges of the ‘carrot’ cake start to brown and add in the chopped garlic and chai po.(use more oil if necessary) Stir-fry until fragrant.

4. Pour the beaten eggs on top of the ‘carrot’ cake and wait until very well-browned on the bottom before flipping over to cook the other side. Same thing, cook until the other bottom is well browned.

5. Drizzle the fish sauce on the side of the pan to sizzle it and then mix into the carrot cake. This will give a nice wok’s breathe (wok hei) to the fried carrot cake.  Season with white pepper powder.

6. If you like your carrot cake to be ‘black’, mix in some sweet dark soya sauce.

7. Remove from pan and garnish with finely sliced spring onions.

8. Enjoy!!

There is another way to enjoy this lovely fried carrot cake besides cooking them with eggs. I also like the way they serve it in dim sum; crisp on the outside, while the inside is simply melt in the mouth.

It’s very easy, just deep-fry or pan-fry rectangles of the carrot cake until all sides are well-browned and crisp. It’s so damn delicious served with chai po or Chinese XO sauce. However, I would recommend mixing in some deep-fried dried shrimps (hae bi) and fried shallots into the carrot cake batter when steaming it to bring up the fried carrot cake’s flavours to another dimension.

I had been away for quite some time from The Chef Story as I’d been busier than a bee during the past two months overseeing the conceptualization of my new home. Now that it’s finally done, and with my internet connection up and running, I’m back again!

But before we delve into some cooking, I’m gonna side-tracked a little as I couldn’t resist showing some pictures of my sweet home.

Home-made Curry Puffs – An Introduction

I’d always like to know how to make the things I love to eat. From petite pineapple tarts, to beautiful little mooncakes; and now to satisfy my sudden craving of curry puffs – my virgin attempt at curry puffs.

For a new home, it’s good to start with some home-made goodies. And what’s better than some home-made curry puffs. You could argue, “I can always buy them on the streets, anyway they’re sold rather cheaply. (You can get three curry puffs for a dollar.) But to food enthusiasts like us (You should be, otherwise why are you even reading this far), it’s the supreme satisfaction of making it ourselves and tweaking the taste to our liking that gives us such a high.

Curry puffs are a Southeast Asian snack. It is basically curried potatoes with some chicken bits and hard-boiled egg enclosed in a flaky pastry. Of course there are many variations of the fillings; such as sardines, durian, yam, etc.

It’s my first attempt at it but the results were quite good. At least that’s what I felt; if I sold my curry puffs down the streets, well, I think people will buy them.

Home-made Curry Puffs – How to make it

There are two parts to making curry puffs; the pastry dough and the curried fillings. We will start with the pastry first as making it takes up more time. For the pastry, we will be doing a blitz puff pastry, meaning it is faster to make than a traditional puff pastry but doesn’t rise as much. You can also buy frozen puff pastry from the supermarket, but then in doing so, there’s no more fun in there.

For the blitz puff pastry, you will need to make flour and butter dough. The flour dough will enclose the butter dough. You will then need to roll it out and fold it, and repeat the process two more times for a grand total of three times so that there will be many layers of butter separating the dough which gives the pastry its characteristic flakiness when deep-fried.

Pastry Dough Recipe

Part A

200 grams plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

10 grams unsalted butter

110 grams water

Part B

100 grams plain flour

80 grams unsalted butter

Method:

1. To make Part A, the flour dough, sift the flour and salt until evenly distributed.

2. Rub the unsalted butter into the flour until it resembles fine crumbs.

3. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture, and add in the water all at once.

4. Using your hands, knead the mixture until it all comes together, leaving no residual flour. Roll the dough into a ball and keep covered in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. Do not overwork the dough.

5. To make Part B, the butter dough, simply cut the butter into small pieces and mix into the flour until everything comes together.

6. Roll in between two sheets of parchment paper to form a rectangle. Chill, covered in the refrigerator until needed.

7. Roll the flour dough into a rectangle larger than the butter dough rectangle. If it shrinks a lot, that means it needs to rest in the refrigerator longer to relax its gluten.

8. Place the butter dough inside the flour dough and wrapped it. It is important to fully enclose the butter and no butter should be exposed.

9. Before rolling, it is crucial the both dough be of equal consistency/hardness. Otherwise it is almost impossible to roll and fold the dough without the butter piercing through the flour dough or the flour dough cracking.

10. With the folded sides facing up, lightly roll up and down until you get a smooth even rectangle.

11. Fold the dough into thirds like a business letter.

12. Rotate the dough 90 degrees, and lightly roll up and down again. Fold the dough into thirds again.

13. Rotate the dough 90 degrees again, roll it and fold it one last time. There should be a total of 3 folds.

14. Wrap the dough and rest in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.

Curried Filling Recipe

Cooking oil, 2 tablespoon

1 large onion, finely chopped

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

Curry powder, as needed

Chilli powder, as needed

Turmeric powder, as needed

4 large potatoes, cut into small even cubes

Water or chicken stock, as needed

1/2 chicken breast, cut into bite-sized cubes

Salt and white pepper, to taste

Method:

1. Heat up the oil in a pan.

2. Sweat the chopped onions and garlic over low heat until fragrant, around 5 minutes.

3. Add 3 tablespoons of curry powder and 1 teaspoon each of chilli and turmeric powder and cook until fragrant. You can add more later if necessary.

4. Add the potatoes cubes and a bit of water/stock here and there to moisten it if it’s too dry. Do not add too much liquid as the filling is supposed to be thick.

5. Stir frequently to avoid scorching at the base of the pan. As the potatoes are cooked, some of it will be mashed. This is perfectly fine.

6. When the potatoes are 90% cooked, add in the chicken cubes.

7. Now is the time to add more chilli powder or curry powder is you feel that it is not enough for you liking.

8. Season the filling with salt and pepper.

9. When everything is cooked through, removed from heat and keep chill until ready to wrap the curry puffs.

Now here’s the fun part; making the curry puffs. You will need the puff pastry dough, curried filling, and quartered hard-boiled eggs. Roll out the dough thinly, lightly flouring your work table as needed to prevent sticking and use a ring cutter to cut out rounds for your pastry. How thinly you want to roll the dough and how big a ring mould depends on your liking.

Place just enough curried filling which you think can hold inside your round puff pastry and put a quartered egg on top and fold it into half. Pleat the sides nicely so the fillings wont’ come out when you deep-fry it and you’re ready to go.

Heat up enough cooking oil over medium heat to around 160 degrees and deep-fry your home-made curry puffs until golden brown.

There you have it; your very own home-made curry puffs; definitely better than Old Chang Kee’s. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

One interesting aspect of Thai cuisine that it is home to some unusual dishes that you are unlikely to encounter at home. A walk around a city street or food market is likely to turn up dishes you haven’t even seen or heard of before. Of course there are items available in local Thai restaurants that are just different to Western ingredients and may just seem strange to us. What is certain is that there is never a dull dish and there’s always something new to discover. Here, we’ve put together a list of unusual Thai dishes that we have encountered on our travels around Thailand.

Unusual Thai Dishes – Nam phrik maengda

Maengda are giant water bugs that are eaten mainly in northern Thailand, either fried or just like it is. A type of chili sauce is made from these giant water bugs called Nam Phrik.

It is not uncommon to come across insects for eating in many markets, especially in Northern Thailand and Isan. Deep fried grasshoppers, crickets or silkworms and scorpions aren’t uncommon sights at an outdoor food market in Thailand. When done in local spices, they can be a great snack with beer or drinks.

Unusual Thai Dishes – Khanom chin nam ngiao

I’m told this dish tastes better than it sounds, however fermented noodles served with pork blood tofu in a sauce made from pork broth, pork blood and tomato, with chilis and dry fermented soy beans just doesn’t get the mouth watering for me. Of course, you should try everything once and I’m sure I’ll get the opportunity to review a bowl soon.

Unusual thai dishes – Laab Luead

This is a pork salad with raw pieces of pork with a topping of fresh pig’s blood. It isn’t the most appealing sounding dish but is very popular with the older people in Isaan. The question is do you have the stomach for it?

Unusual thai dishes – Goong Dten

Known as ‘Dancing Shrimps’, these fresh water shrimps are not only completely intact with their heads and legs but they are also still alive! So they literally wriggle their way to your stomach.

Unusual thai dishes – Ant Egg Soup

A spicy soup packed with vegetables with the special ingredient being expensive ant’s eggs. Separating ants and their eggs is not an easy task which usually leads to the ants being thrown in as well.

Unusual thai dishes – Pat Pet Noo Na

If you are looking to try a different kind of meat, this might be your kind of thing. You can get rice field rat barbecued and served with rice or on a skewer from a street vendor.

Author Bio

Jess Collins is a regular contributor to Spicy Buddha, a Thai food and travel site. Currently based in Koh Samui, the ladies responsible for Spicy Buddha are always up for a chat on Twitter @TheSpicyBuddha about cooking and getting the most out of a visit to Thailand. Give a try to these unusual Thai dishes next time you are there.

More than just cookbook apps, these chef apps tools will make you a better chef

The app market is glutted with simple recipe and cookbook apps of varying quality, but we’ve done the heavy lifting for you and tracked down chef apps targeted to professionals and serious amateurs, so you can get down to the stuff you really care about.

1. The Professional Chef Apps (iPad)

This is the mother of all chef apps, produced by the Culinary Institute of America; in fact, this would be the only chef app you’d need, and we’d have a much shorter article, but for the $49.99 price tag. Despite the cost, it’s worth a look—it includes the official text of the CIA’s culinary degree program, along with over 100 videos to help you perfect your technique, quizzes and activities to help you internalize what you learn and 850 restaurant-quality recipes. If you think of it as the equivalent of an online cooking class from one of the top culinary schools in the country, it’s a steal. (Cost: $49.99)

2. Epicurious Chef Apps (Android, iPhone)

If you’re not ready to take the plunge with The Professional Chef, Epicurious is easily the best free app for chefs on the market. While the Professional Chef is clearly an educational app, Epicurious is more focused on recipes, with over 30,000 recipes from respected chefs and cookbooks. All their recipes are vetted by Epicurious staff, so there’s no rubbish content; and if you have a hard time keeping track of multiple time-sensitive items at once, each recipe has built-in timers for each step, so you can just wait for the beep. Also contains a shopping applet, so you’ll always have the right ingredients, and cycle through them while they’re still fresh. (Cost: free)

3. Mise en Place Chef Apps (iPhone)

This is a great app for chefs who struggle to stay organized. You can schedule all your upcoming meals, plan your grocery shopping, and set up your upcoming tasks so you can get all your prep work done right on time. While Epicurious and other recipe apps have general versions of what it offers, Mise en Place benefits from a narrow focus, allowing you to set alarms for time-consuming tasks like preparing stock or soaking beans days in advance. One of the best uses of Mise en Place is planning meals based on your leftovers and ingredients. Having your to-do list in an at-a-glance weekly and daily format can make ambitious meals a much easier proposition. (Cost: $2.99)

4. Michael Ruhlman’s Ratio Chef Apps (Android, iPhone)

Michael Ruhlman’s Ratio is a great app for anyone who likes a scientific approach to cooking. Ratio presents an interesting philosophy—instead of being a slave to recipes, understanding the basics of how ingredients interact can make it easy to create the textures and flavors you want in any dish. The benefit of this method is that, if you’re not getting the results you want from a given recipe, you’ll know how to fix it. It also makes it easier to scale your recipes for any number of people. The app allows you to connect with other chefs using this method anywhere you have wireless internet access. It might be an easier app to use if you’ve read the book, but the idea is simple enough. (Cost: $4.99)

5. Rick Bayless: Mexican Essentials Chef Apps (iPhone)

We include this chef apps primarily because several of the above apps neglect Mexican cuisine, and this app goes beyond recipes, providing instructional videos to refine your skills. It also includes vital facts about commonly-used ingredients for Mexican cuisine—where to find them, how long they keep, and how to get the most out of them. It’s a little light on the quantity of recipes—it only features 35—but they’re explained in loving detail, so you’ll know exactly how to bring them to life. (Cost: $2.99)

This guest article is contributed by Jane Johnson. She is a staff writer for GoingCellular, a popular site that provides cell phone news, commentary, reviews, chef apps and more.

We were strolling down Fisherman’s Wharf in noon time San Francisco, searching for this renowned bistro, famed for its Dungeness crab which I had narrowed down in a local food magazine when something caught my eyes…

Standing in front of me, I saw this signage with vivid pictures that immediately screamed – CRABS!! But what made me went inside Joe’s Crab Shack to peek a look were the scores of people going in and out of there; I could tell something special was going on there.

We took a lift up to the second floor which was where Joe’s Crab Shack was located and I was totally astonished when the lift doors opened…

The place was jam-packed till the brim with hungry people partaking in their crab indulgence. You could tell the place was very much alive and vibrant with happy faces. It was there and then that I decided, “To hell with that renowned bistro, I’m gonna have my crabby fix here at Joe’s Crab Shack.”

Joe’s Crab Shack – The Place

There were long queues of people waiting for their seats, but as there were only two of us, we were quickly ushered to an empty table without much waiting. I could tell that most of the diners were locals. I had previously mentioned before in Dim Sum Restaurant that if a joint is a favourite among the locals, you won’t go wrong following the crowd as it is most definitely the right crowd. As can be seen in the picture, there is a very nice view of the harbour from Joe’s Crab Shack.

I took some photos to share some of the many interesting pictures hanging around Joe’s crab shack. Some of them are downright lame but as long as it brought a smile to your face, who cares?

A young energetic guy with spikey hair and a million-watt smile introduced himself as our server and came to hand us the menu saying he will be back to take our orders.

I absolutely love crabs, and salivate at the sight of those yummy pictures with its huge portions of crabs. I couldn’t wait to gorge myself on them. The server came back in a jiffy and I placed my orders. Very polite and efficient service considered how busy Joe’s Crab Shack was.

The back of the menu also detailed how Joe’s crab shack came about with its story and timeline history. Interesting read while waiting for our food.

Out of the ordinary, all the floor staff lined up and a dance number was played. They jingled and danced to the beat amid cheers from the customers. They do a different dance number around every half an hour. It’s amazing in such a busy place, they could still find the time to dance and have fun. No wonder I could sense that energy when I first entered the place.

Joe’s Crab Shack – The Food

First to arrive were the calamari. I popped one into my mouth and you better believe it when I say it was one of the best goddamn calamari I ever had. It was meltingly tender and wonderfully flavourful. There were practically no resistance between my teeth when I chewed on those calamari. I never had calamari which was as tender as this, and this was coming from someone that loves squid and can be considered quite an authority on eating squids. The whole bucket of calamari vanished in an instance.

The poached prawns on ice with bay seasoning came right after. Prawns were well-cooked and the bay seasoning was flavourful providing that intense umami hit to the palate.

I ordered the Dungeness Crab in Joe’s famous BBQ style and the Fire-grilled Snow Crab. They came in buckets with corn and baked potatoes at the side.  I ignored the sides and dug straight into the crabs and devoured them greedily. The crabs were delicious and I never regret dining at Joe’s Crab Shack instead of that so-called famous bistro featured in the local food magazine. The crabs were nicely cooked; but I prefer the fire-grilled style to the BBQ which I found a tad too salty.

I’m not a big fan of corn, but when my wife told me to try saying it was damn good, I couldn’t resist. It was real good, sweet and juicy. Very delicious.

On the whole, we had a great experience at Joe’s Crab Shack. The food was brilliant. Service was friendly and fun, and the bill was not shocking. I would say it’s a beautiful meal in an accidental restaurant.

Joe’s Crab Shack is what good food should be – delicious, happy and fun.

In the past decade, there has been an up going trend among chefs in the usage of culinary foam made famous by Ferran Adria of elBulli fame. There are two schools of thoughts among chefs regarding food such as culinary foam. On one side, the old guards believe food should be wholesome, natural, with minimal meddling around with. The other school, which proclaim itself as “progressive cuisine”, embraces all things new that would help in the advancement of gastronomy. Stuffs which not look out of place in a scientific laboratory like a centrifuge, rotary evaporator, test tubes and liquid nitrogen are becoming the norm in such experimental kitchens.

We are not here to debate who is right. I believe that as long as such modern techniques contributes something to the dish and makes it even better, it has served its purpose. Putting culinary foam must make sense to the food, and not just for the sake of putting some little foam here and there just because it looks pretty.

Today, we will talk about the science of culinary foam, its usages, and maybe show a recipe or two on it.

Culinary Foam – The science of culinary foam

Why do we use culinary foam?

Culinary foam is like a sauce thickened by air. For me, I use culinary foam when I want to impart a light aromatic flavour to the food when a liquid sauce will be pooling unsightly all around the plate. It also lends a unique contrast to the textures of the food. As an added bonus is, it’s visually exciting.

Making culinary foam is very easy. You just blend or whisk the liquid at high speed, and hey presto… there you get it. But wait… after a few seconds it simply disappears…

Making culinary foam is easy, maintaining or stabilizing it is the harder part which takes some scientific knowledge. To make culinary foam, you need to introduce bubbles into the liquid by means of agitating it, there are many methods of doing it such as – blending it at high speed in a blender, whisking it hard enough, pumping it with gas in a whipping canister, or even using a fish tank pump to create bubbles.

The bubbles created will be very short-lived and highly unstable if there is no stabilizer to hold them in place. The bubbles generated will quickly coalesce and burst. Pure water does not provide bubble stability, and you should be very much concern if your drinking water is able to hold bubbles!

As chefs, we need to hold culinary foam until the food gets to the dining room and reaches the guests. We do this by introducing a surfactant into the liquid so as to coat the surface of air bubbles and water, and create a thin barrier between surrounding bubbles to prevent them coalescing. There are many edible stabilizers or surfactant which can temporarily stabilize culinary foams in the kitchen. Common stabilizers are proteins from eggs, lecithin, gelatine, and emulsified fat.

Culinary Foam – Video on making culinary foam

In this video, I demonstrated by using water as the base liquid as it is neutral. As can be seen in the video, I tried blending just the water itself but the bubbles won’t hold. I then add de-oiled lecithin powder, which is a surfactant into the water and blend again. This time, the culinary foam came out beautifully. I then aromatised it by grating some lime zest over it

You can use other liquid like juices, tea, and herb-infused liquid instead of water. The possibilities are endless. But do take note that the base liquid needs to be very intense as the air incorporated will dilute its flavour. Lecithin works well only in a non-fat environment. So if your base liquid contains any fat, other surfactants such as protein, gelatine, hydrocolloids, sucro, or emulsified fat should be used instead.

The photo above is the culinary foam in the video after ten minutes. As can be seen, it still holds its shape beautifully.

Culinary Foam – Recipes to try:

Lime Air

225 grams lime juice

275 grams water

1.5 gram lecithin (0.3%)

Combine the three ingredients and use a hand-held mixer on the surface of the liquid; allow to stabilise for one minute and collect the air that has form on top.

Recipe by Texturas elBulli

Tea Air

500 grams milk

100 grams muscovado sugar

10 grams Earl Gray tea

5 grams lecithin (0.83%)

Bring milk and sugar to the boil, infuse tea for four minutes. Strain, add lecithin, and froth with a hand-held blender. Allow to stabilise for one minute and collect the air that has form on top.

Recipe by The Chef Story.

Now that you know how culinary foam is made, try playing around with it to add some excitement to your food.