May's Happy Gula Melaka Agar-Agar

Oh yummy!

Yes, I'm back!

After a super tiring final semester I'm starting to do serious cooking once again! Yay!

So yes, I thought it'd be nice to start off again with a simple recipe.

I love gula melaka. I mean, which Malaysian/Singaporean doesn't? And amazingly, we can actually get good quality gula Melaka here in Melbourne at good Asian grocery stores.

Vat you need:

One block of Gula Melaka/palm sugar (tip: buy the gula melaka made in Indonesia)
A few pandan leaves
1-2 packets of agar-agar powder, Swallow brand. Try to get the original flavour.
200 ml of coconut milk

How now brown cow?

1. Follow instructions on the agar-agar packet. Use about 700-900 ml (depending on how erm, hard you want your agar-agar to be) of water to dissolve the agar-agar powder.

2. Once the powder dissolves, throw in the whole block to gula melaka. If you've used just 1 packet of agar-agar powder, only use half the block of gula melaka, less you want to die of a diabetic attack.

3. Under a very low fire, stand by your little pot and dissolve the sugar. This may take a while. Be patient and talk to your agar-agar.

4. While dissolving the gula melaka, take about 4-5 pandan leaves and knot it. Chuck it into the agar-agar mixture. This gives out wonderful aroma.

5. Once the gula melaka is dissolved and the mixture is at a boiling point, mix in 200 ml of coconut milk. Do not stop stirring.

6. Bring the mixture to boil.

7. At this point your home would smell of nothing but gula melaka. Heaven. Remove pandan leaves and pour out mixture into trays. Remove some of the coconut froth. Leave aside until cool.

8. Place agar-agar into fridge. Serve cold. Yum.

Tags: gula melaka palm sugar dessert agar agar jello budget recipe

Heaven Bestows Land with Abundant Harvest

Yo! Wassup Babes & Dudes!!! I know I should be profusely apologizing to Noel for being MIA for so long, but what the heck, I guess I’ll just try to redeem myself by putting up new recipes for 2006. So here we go… Alright, my New Year resolution (you absolutely know that this never works, but since everyone does it anyway)… is to kick my bad habit of trying out recipes and not grabbing the cam before I shove into my mouth (or others for that matter). I’m counting you guys to keep me straight on this resolution, so keep supporting us!

Okay, to be true to the spirit of traditional Chinese culinary, I shall be naming my dishes using traditional, flowery language (just thought I oughta warn ya).

Heaven Bestows Land with Abundant Harvest (aka Sliced Pork and Greens)

This dish is so simple to make. It’ll blow your mind!

Ingredients:

2 tablespoon of Teriyaki marinade (or teriyaki sauce)

2 tablespoon of Oyster sauce

2 tablespoon of water

1 teaspoon Corn flour

Sugar (to taste)

Carrots (julienne)

Long beans (sliced diagonally)

Garlic (you can put more if you prefer, but I’d recommend minimum of 2 cloves)

1-2 tablespoon of finely grated ginger (then again, adding more causes no one harm)

2 Scallions (aka spring onions)

Pork fillet (for 4 servings I’d recommend 200g- 250g of meat)

1 tablespoon of sesame oil

Cooking instructions:

1. Preparing the sauce: First, combine these ingredients in a bowl. Add the teriyaki sauce, oyster sauce, water and corn flour in a bowl. Also, add a pinch of sugar for flavouring. Mix well and put it aside. Note: if using teriyaki sauce that is watery rather than thick, add more corn flour to create a thicker sauce.
2. Next, mince the garlic and finely grate 1-2 tablespoon worth of ginger. Cut the scallions diagonally into 4-inch pieces. Put it aside as well.
3. Slice the pork fillets into thin slices (we really want them to cook fast). Heat up about 2-3 tablespoons of oil into a frying pan and swirl the oil around the inside of the pan to prevent the meat from sticking. Stir fry the meat until its brown or almost cooked. Be careful not to overcook it otherwise the meat will be tough. Dish out the cooked meat and put it aside.
4. Reheat the pan and add 2 tablespoons of oil and sesame oil. Stir the two oils. When the oil is reasonable hot, stir fry the garlic and shredded ginger for 1 minute. Add the scallions, green beans, carrots and stir fry it for a minute or two until it’s soften slightly. Throw in the pre-cooked meat and sauce and simmer it until the meat is done. Dish it out and ©Walah! you have your mouth-watering dish that smells just like the one served by that restaurant just down the road.

Tags: pork stir fry budget recipe

Number Three part 2&3

I bet you thought i had forgotten...haha...i just decided i should do a two for one day...you know... buy one get one free?

so here are the remaining lamb recipes...

feast your eyes on the lamb cutlets at the bottom of the plate (or 4 to 8 o'clock of my rosemary clock) from the picture of the previous post...and you'll see one of my favourite yet all so simple recipes i stole from mum :

sour spicy lamb

what you need ar?

marinade :
1tbs soy sauce per cutlet
1 clove chopped garlic per cutlet
1 ts pepper per cutlet (again...Sarawak pepper is highly recommended...and yes...there is a difference as testified by everyone who has tested my food...haha)

sauce?
so simple...decide how much sauce you want...divide that amount into two parts...one part tomato sauce and one part chilli sauce...but bear in mind to get good quality chilli sauce...none of those sweet chilli ones hor and those that are actually hot hor.

how leh?

just marinade the lamb for at least half an hour , grill and then fry with sauce over high heat so the sauce sticks...but make sure you don't burn your lamb .

now...look at the lamb rack...the one that occupies the 12 to 4 o'clock partition of my rosemary clock and you will see sweet chilli mint lamb rack

what you need ar?

marinade :
1 tbs sweet chilli sauce (preferably the thai one) per cutlet in rack
1/2 ts of fresh mint leaves chopped per cutlet in rack
a touch of fresh rosemary
1/4 ts ground black pepper per cutlet in rack

sauce?
even simpler...almost identical to the marinade but simpler...just decide how much you want...and heat that amount of sweet chilli sauce over low heat in a pan...add freshly chopped mint leaves to desired taste...or if you're lazy , just make more marinde and heat the leftovers as the sauce.

how leh?

lamb racks take a bit longer to cook/grill (obviously)...i suggest as with all my grillings to set the oven at 180 degrees celsius for 4 minutes per side and then raise to 220 degrees celsius till desired doneness. serve with hot sauce :)

coming up...beef recipes next week :)

Tags: sour spicy lamb sarawak pepper budget recipe