ratatouille with pasta

Ratatouille doesn't go very well with pasta..at least, not what i made. perhaps I didn't follow the directions well eonugh but mine really didn't taste that great. i wonder what Remy would've thought of it...

if only we could get the best of all countries and make one super mega good country...

teriyaki chicken

this is simple and yummy with rice.

marinade your chicken in

5 TBSP japanese soy sauce
3TBSP mirin
1 TBSP sugar [mixed until dissolved]

overnight, then grill them until cooked. any sort of chicken can be used, it's usually breast fillet cubes on a stick but works just fine with drummets which are cheaper!

mamak at home in clayton

tonight gav and i made channa masala [chickpea curry] from scratch and had it with "cheat's roti" and instant teh tarik from a packet. the channa masala was quite easy to make, I used a recipe I got online that was really easy. The steps are simple enough- just fry up some cumin seeds till they "pop", then add the garlic, onion, chopped chilli, tomato paste, coriander powder, turmeric powder, garam masala, ginger, salt and chilli powder and cook till the oil comes to the top. I didn't quite see any oil coming to the top but when i felt that it was going to get burnt, i quickly tipped in the chopped fresh tomato and can of chickpeas and some water.

for the cheat's roti, we bought some coles home brand puff pastry from the freezer section and pan fried it on medium heat! just cut a big sheet into 4 and cook till golden brown. it requires a few flips to make sure neither side gets burnt.
it really did taste almost like real roti canai. seruiosly! try it if you don't believe me. they are made of esentially the same things anyway...roti consists of flour and ghee, puff pastry of flour and butter. we wiped the non stick pan with a little oil but I reckon that wasn't necessary as puff pastry is full of oil anyway. a few got slightly burnt so you have to watch it! probably not the healthiest thing around though. but it tasted good enough.

also, we baked a few chicken wings marinated in curry powder, salt and turmeric in our little toaster oven. the dry heat made the chicken skin crisp up and taste just like fried chicken from the local mamak...well, almost! all this and our instant teh tarik from a packet made us feel as if we were back home....

typical at home food

this above, is our "version" of auntie uma's ring of fire pasta. we didn't quite stick to her recipe coz we couldn't get cili padi here so we substituted with a jalapeno pepper that wasn't quite as hot. garlic and chopped chillis are fried in butter and oil, then i added ikan bilis chopped into tiny pieces. a food processor would've been useful but we didn't have one. then, slices of sausage are added [we used "hot continental" sausage. stir that around, then add cooked pasta, then salt, pepper, italian herbs and cheese. [we used shredded tasty cheese] we also added shredded carrot, a tomato and lettuce leaves and a crumbled sao cracker at the end. don't know why that was in the recipe!
it was interestingly...tasty. but i doubt i could recreate it. every stir fried pasta is unique....

this was our lunch. we thought we'd try something german so we got some don pork sausages. dont know what they are exactly but they were from a euro looking deli. the sauerkraut and gherkins were from a jar and i didn't like the sauerkraut that much. perhaps i'm just not used to it, and we tend to reject the unfamiliar..but still, it smelled so... bad! like something was rotting..
i loved the potato salad though, made with kipflers that are perfect for this coz they keep their shape. for the potato salad, i used mayo, basil, italian herbs, lotsa black pepper and 1/2 a chopped salted egg. [that gave it a bit of an interested twist...] yum.

our dinner last night, which is more typical of us malaysian chinese. rice, stir fried asian greens [choy sum] and simmered tofu with chicken pieces and other odd vegtables lying around such as carrot, mushroom or peas. i told my (anglo) clinical educator that stir fries are the easiest things to do and you could have a stir fry everyday and not get bored. i don't think she went for that idea but it's true. just look in your fridge, take out a protein, take some vegetables, cut them into uniform pieces and stir fry with oil, garlic and onion. then add your seasonings, the sky's the limit. soy sauce, salt, chili flakes, miso paste, sesame oil, lemon juice, oyster sauce, barbecue sauce...? 9/10 times it'll be good.

the black stuff is gav's bovril "soup".

gamjatang

I just discovered that you can boil soup in a rice cooker! did you know that? just press "cook" and it'll keep cooking until you stop it because the water's never gonna reach the level that would stop it automatically. so, in our newly obtained 2nd hand rice cooker that we got for $12,
we made this korean pork soup [gamjatang] but used pork fillet instead coz the pork ribs were too expensive. not a good move! because, for soups, it's always better to use pork with bones.

anyway, despite the meat being slightly tasteless, the soup was really tasty and we'd definitely make it again. some of the ingredients can only be found in korean grocery shops like the "doenjang" [bean paste], korean chilli flakes and korean anchovy sauce [somewhat similar to fish sauce but smells much more pungent! it's not as fiery hot as it looks, the red colour just comes from the chilli flakes.

it's perfect for a cold night but then again, even with hot weather we still like our hot steaming bowls of soup with rice. try it with kimchi on the side if possible.

instant kimchi jigae!

got this packet mix at the asian grocery at clayton [again] and all you need to do is prepare the ingredients, dump them all in and boil!
so, here we have chopped chilli, beef, mushrooms and tofu. and chinese cabbage to be put in just before serving coz they cook quickly.

sorry for the bad photo but it tasted pretty good with rice. perfect for a freezing cold night...

bakuteh pack

we bought a pack of "instant" bakuteh spices/herbs from "hong kong grocery" shop in clayton for $2. it was from malaysia, but somehow, for some inexplicable reason, it stated to use beef or chicken. which is quite silly, really! of course we used pork.
we boiled it up with some whole garlic in a ricecooker pot since we didn't have a proper soup pot. also, cooking on a hot place isn't a walk in the park!
it tasted pretty good, with tofu, mushrooms and lettuce leaves.