Rendang puff

We've always been a big fan of curry puff and I've always made them with a simple version of chicken curry. This time round, the smart Alec suggested that I made it with the beef rendang that we have frozen from our last Nasi Lemak rendezvous. I gotta admit I was sceptical at first and gave him a dirty look at his suggestion. But then the idea can't be bad since it saves me the work of having to cook the filling. All I had to do was to buy some puff pastry (we got Edmond's reduced fat and its really good with less fat) and dice some hard boiled eggs and wrap up those little babies. Follow the baking instructions that comes with the pastry and that's it.
The result was FANTABULOUS!!! I'd go for this anytime as opposed to our firm favourite of chicken curry puff, sorry Chicky, this round goes to Beef Rendang Puff!

Stir Fry Asparagus with scallops

Finally, I have some greens to post in my blog! After all veges are the most uninteresting food to write about for me that is. This is a simple quick stir fry dish which is quite yummy for those who loves asparagus and/or scallops.

Some scallops-Lightly pan fried with some oil

Asparagus

Minced garlic-1 tsp

Chicken granules-1tsp

A dash of soya sauce

A dash of chinese cooking wine

1 tsp of sugar

Heat some oil and saute garlic till browned and add in the asparagus and all the seasonings. Add about 1/4 cup of water and cover wok and leave to simmer. Depending on the asparagus age, the older it is, the longer you'd have to cook it. When its almost done, add in the scallops and give it a good toss and yup its ready! For a good stir fry vege dish, i think the most important is 'wok hei' meaning lots of heat from the wok, so if you have a cooking hob that gives big flames, I'd say 80% of the battle has been won :)

Cockels in tauchu sauce

This isn't exactly the same type of cockles we get in Malaysia, but i miss cockles so anything named cockles is good enough for me to try.

Ingredients:

1 kg of live cockles

1 inch ginger

6 garlic cloves minced

spring onions

Big red chilli's

2 tbsp of taucu

2 tbsp of sugar

2 tbsp of sugar

2 tbsp of Chinese cooking wine

Corn flour water

Heat up some oil in the wok till smoking, add in ginger and garlic and saute till fragrant. Add in the cockles and seasoning and some water enough to simmer the cockles, cover wok and let it cook till all the cockles have opened up. These took me about 8 minutes, stubborn cockles. Dish up the cockle without the sauce first so that it doesn't overcook, thicken the sauce with corn flour water and add in the chopped spring onions and chills and dish up together with the cockles. X'cuse me presentation, should have cleaned the sides of the plate hehe..

Sweet & sour crab

I've never cooked crabs in my life, let alone thought that I'd ever cook it. I promised to make my parents dinner for their 32nd anniversary so i had to make something nice, it was going to be crab meat in tauhu at first but i couldn't find any ready crab meat and there were some mud crabs for sale, so i got some and decided to make this dish.

Quick flip through the Hawkers fare cook book to check on the ingredients for this dish, turned out simple enough. Most recipes calls for deep frying of the crabs before cooking, but i flagged that cause its too messy and unhealthy since we're so upping the cholesterol factor in this dinner.

Ingredients:-

Crabs-800gm

Ginger julienned - about 1 inch

6 cloves garlic

2 big red chilli's

4 chili padi-flag this if you're not into hot food

4 tbsp of diced spring onions

4tbsp of tomato sauce

3 tbsp of chili sauce

2 tbsp vinegar

1 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp sugar or to taste

1 tsp salt

1 egg

corn flour water

water to simmer

Heat some oil till smoking hot in the wok and then add in ginger, garlic, chilli's, spring onions and saute till fragrant. Add in crabs and all the seasonings and some water enough to simmer the crabs in, cover wok and let it cook for 4 minutes. Give it a taste and adjust to your liking, if you desire it to be more sour, add in more tomato sauce/vinegar. Thicken with corn flour water and turn off flames before adding in the beaten egg, give it a good stir. By turning off the flame before adding in the egg, this will ensure that the egg's not overcooked and it'll provide the sauce with a smooth silky finish. Enjoy my steaming hot Sweet Sour crabs!