The Big Foodies

Tiong Shan Porridge

2010-02-09T01:21:00.003+08:00

I paid the famous Tiong Shan porridge on New Bridge road (Keong Saik) a visit for supper last Thursday. In spite of its reputation, the frog porridge was a huge disappointment. Perhaps my friend ordered wrongly because my frog porridge was simply served altogether in a claypot, unlike all the other times I've eaten frog porridge at Geylang where the frog is served separately from the porridge. Fortunately, the pig liver porridge was good. The gravy was delicious though the liver was quite tough (overcooked). Thus, on the whole, I'll still say Tiong Shan Porridge was way under my expectations.

The Stall

Pig Liver Porridge (猪肝粥)

Frog Porridge (田鸡粥)

Overall Experience:

4/10

Chinese New Year endeavours: Kueh Bangkit

2010-02-01T04:30:00.003+08:00

Edited on 09 Feb 2010 with more pictures.
- posted by Sissy R.

I remember helping my parents to bake this Chinese New Year must-have when I was young. We churned out trays after trays because my parents sold them and they were so good, old customers returned and new customers asked about it every year. We sisters loved to do the mixing of flour and green liquid mixture then rolling out the dough and cutting out shapes using the cookie cutter.

Then I guess my parents got busy and we stopped making them. Over the years (at least a decade), we contemplated doing kueh bangkit several times for our own consumption but was hindered by the thought of cleaning after frying the tapioca flour. That is until 2 days ago. We thought, 'Hey, since our kitchen is already so dirty after frying the cashew nuts and we have to clean it anyway, no harm dirtying it a bit more frying the flour.' I can't believe we just thought of this when we have been doing our cashews every year for, again, at least a decade.

But as luck would have it, Dad's recipe is lost somewhere in the house so this is my first attempt at this recipe. It turned out pretty well (melt-in-your-mouth) although it's still a far cry from my dad's. If you need a comparison: Mine's good, but his is phenomenal.

Anyway, today's fairly successful attempt must also be credited to my Dad for his help, experience and advice in frying the flour, squeezing the grated coconut and telling me if the dough was dry/wet enough, and Sissy S for her awesome niap-ing skills.

Ingredients:
Approximately 440g of fried tapioca flour (This amount includes those for dusting.)
3 pandan leaves cut into small pieces
60g margarine
130g castor sugar
2 egg yolks
Approximately 200ml of coconut milk

1. Fry the flour with pandan leaves over low heat, stirring constantly. This is to remove moisture from the flour. Dad fried 1.5kg of flour for about 45 minutes. The flour should be very light (weight-wise) after frying.
2. Leave the flour to cool overnight.
3. Cream margarine with yolk and sugar till sugar dissolves.

4. Add in 150ml of coconut milk and mix well. Divide the mixture into portions that after mixing with flour is just right for one time of rolling out and cutting.

5. Add flour into one portion of mixture slowly until a non-sticky dough is formed. If dough is too dry, add coconut milk a little at a time.

6. Flour the rolling surface, rolling pin, cookie cutters, pincher and baking tray.
7. Roll the dough to a thickness of about 0.5cm. Use cookie cutters to cut into shapes and a pincher to pinch desired designs.
8. Put it in a preheated oven at 150 degrees for about 10 to 15 minutes. I personally don't like too white kueh bangkit so I take it out when it is just going to turn a little brown.
9. Allow to cool before storing.

Pointers:
1. Icing sugar is recommended but I used castor sugar and it turned out alright.
2. I used fresh coconut milk. This amount came from approximately 2 coconuts. Squeeze the grated coconuts without adding any water.
3. The addition of too much coconut milk will result in dry and crispy kueh bangkit. At the same time, no water should be added during the entire process.
4. The dough tends to dry out very fast so it's better to portion the liquid and flour and mix them in another bowl.
5. For dusting, we wrap some flour in a cloth, band it with a rubber band such that it's like a loose wanton, and use it to pat wherever.

6. An optional step is to leave the kueh bangkit aside just before baking to dry the dough for better raising. I haven't tried this though.
7. Feel free to place the kueh bangkit very close to each other on the baking tray as they expand very little lengthwise.

8. Some people remove moisture from the flour by microwaving or putting it in the oven to reduce clean-up. I haven't tried it though.

Chicken Masala

2010-01-18T01:44:00.005+08:00

My parents have been cooking for the extended family during the weekends for a while now but I have always been too lazy to stand by Dad or Mom to learn how to cook the dishes or take photos of the finished product. Usually, it's the latter. And since a food entry without a picture borders on unacceptable, I shan't go there.

But people have been reminding me about how dead this blog is, so I finally decided to pick up the camera and take this extremely unflattering picture (it is actually very yummy) of the chicken masala that Dad cooked for Saturday's dinner.

Ingredients:
2 small chickens, chopped
6 cloves of garlic, peeled
12 shallots, peeled
2 thick slices of ginger
A handful of uncooked cashew nuts
Approximately 2 tbs of curry chicken masala powder
A little chilli chicken masala powder (Optional - we add for extra spiciness)

Grind garlic, shallots, and ginger together. Then, grind the cashew nuts separately.

Fry garlic, shallots and ginger paste until fragrant. Then, add the cashew nuts paste and allow it to cook till fragrant. Add the masala powder(s). In goes the chicken, mix well. Add enough hot water to cover the chicken pieces and allow it to simmer. Dish when the chicken is cooked and the gravy has reduced till it is just able to coat all the chicken pieces and a little more.

Breakfast at Mag's

2009-12-31T04:21:00.006+08:00

What a way to end the year - my very first home-cooked/pot luck breakfast gathering with friends.

Ingredients
Apples, peeled and cut into small pieces (We usually use medium-sized Fuji apples.)
Lemon juice
Cinnamon powder
Raisins (Or any other dried fruits. In this case, I added dried cranberries.)
Oatmeal or bread crumbs
Sugar
Butter

Put some butter into the sauce pan and add the apples. Let it cook under small to medium heat. When the apples pieces start to reduce in volume, add the lemon juice, cinnamon powder, and sugar according to your preference. Finally, when the apples are almost cooked, add just enough oatmeal to soak up the remaining juice in the pan.

When the apples are cooked, they should be soft on the outside but still crunchy on the inside. We usually use this as filling for apple pie.

Christmas Eve dinner party

2009-12-26T02:01:00.009+08:00

Not quite the Christmas celebration we usually have, this year we had a potluck party at our place.

On the menu were:
1. Roasted chicken
2. Cheese and chocolate fondue
3. Salad with vinegar and mustard dressing
4. Bacon with tomato skewers
5. Aglio olio pasta
6. Honey baked ham with cranberry sauce
7. Christmas log cake
8. Fruit cocktail
9. Ice wine

The first five dishes were prepared by Sissy S and I and we should have pictures of all of them but in our excitement to see how they tasted, some went into our stomach before anyone could say 'Wait! You haven't snapped a picture of it!'. The truth is, no one actually remembered. Well, I guess food always come first, snapping can come later.

Out came the ice wine at the strike of midnight and we clinked, or rather peng (sound of plastic hitting plastic) plastic cups with one another. Oh what a sweet start to a very merry Christmas!

Simple Cheese Fondue

Serves 6 to 8

Ingredients
3 tbsp of butter
1 tbsp of flour
Approximately 200g of cheddar cheese
Approximately 1.5 cup of milk
Salt and pepper to taste
A few drops of Worcestershire sauce

Melt butter in pot then add flour. Add milk and when it is starting to boil, add the cheese. After all the cheese is melted and well-mixed, add the salt, pepper, and Worcestershire sauce.

Lastly, pour the cheese mixture into the fondue pot to be served. We usually serve this with cherry tomatoes, cucumber and carrot sticks, toasted bread, sausages or ham, and prawns.

The proportions here are all estimates and done according to taste. We used a cheddar cheese block instead of grated cheese on our second try but it didn't melt as easily as the grated ones. Hence, using grated cheese is recommended.

Bacon and Tomato Skewers

Ingredients
Back bacon
Cherry tomatoes

Wash cherry tomatoes and skewers. Wrap cherry tomatoes with bacon strips, and arrange them on skewers. Heat oven at 200 degrees celcius and roast the bacon and tomato skewers till the bacon strips are golden brown.

Serve hot.

Salad with Vinegar and Mustard Dressing

Ingredients
Mixed greens (We used baby romaine lettuce, butterhead lettuce, and lollo rosso lettuce)
Dried tomatoes
Balsamic vinegar
Dijon mustard
Lemon juice

Wash and dry salad greens. Mix the vinegar, mustard, and lemon juice in a bowl according to taste. Add the dressing and toss the salad greens just before serving.

Baby Honey Baked Ham

This was bought and served with cranberry jam.

Prawning

2009-12-24T06:00:00.004+08:00

Location: Bishan Park (Asian Golf Academy - Sin Ming Road, opposite Toyota / City Cab Service Centre. About 5mins bus ride from AMK / Bishan MRT.)

Cost: $15/hr $25/2hrs $30/3hrs

Catch rate: Good. Considering the fact that we're not professionals (:

Crowd: There were many people but there was enough room for everyone because of the number of ponds (4 downstairs and at least 2 upstairs).

Facilities: Baits are provided (Chicken Heart), Fishing rod (size 6 hook worked well), BBQ pits are available.

Overall experience: 7.5/10

This was how I spent the first 5 hours of my Christmas Eve, prawning with good friends. It was awesome (:

Christmas Ham

2009-12-24T00:38:00.005+08:00

Ingredients
Around 1kg of smoked boneless gammon
Onions
Leek
Celery
Carrots
A bay leaf
Black pepper
A sprig of thyme
3 tbsp of dry mustard powder
200g of dark muscovado sugar

Cover the smoked gammon with cold water and add your favourite aromatics. Onions, leeks, celery, carrots, black pepper, a sprig of thyme and a bay leaf was used in this case.

After two hours of simmering, remove the meat and allow it to cool. The remaining stock makes great soup.

Carefully remove the rind. It should come away easily but be ready to help it along with a sharp knife.

Cut a cris-cross pattern into the fat, trying to avoid going through to the meat. Stud with a few cloves. Though they're decorative they're really pungent so go easy.

Mix three tablespoons of dry mustard powder with 200g of dark muscovado sugar and let down to a gritty paste with some hot water.

Paint the treacly mess onto the ham, working it well into the cuts on the surface. Foil line your oven dish if you don't want it glued up with epoxy - strength toffee then bang the whole lot in a very hot oven for half an hour. Basting occasionally. Watch for burning.

Allow to cool before slicing and serve with homemade piccalilli.

Credits: How to cook a Christmas ham

Presenting the 3 sissys.

2009-12-23T15:26:00.007+08:00

From left : Sissy S , Sissy T, Sissy R
By the way, those are apples on our heads.