Been a long time yes?

Alrite folks? How's it been? I hope all is good in your land there.

I decided to upload some new photos of me food.... sigh, it has been a while yes? Well I hope that you'll enjoy the images and the thought of eating them. :)

Ok, first up, Crabs.... this is the Crab in Padang Sauce, its a spicy combi of taste that will leave a tender puzzled linger in your mouth, its slightly sour / sweet / spicy at the same time.

I also made some regular steam fish, pop it into the steamer but not before smuthering with shrooms / ginger / garlic / oyster sauce / chilli padi. Tin foil the dead aquatic animal and steam it for 30 mins, depending on how powerful your steamer is.... but when you hear that DING... you know that the finned creature is now ready to be consumed...... not under the sea..... IN THE TUMMY!

You know how when we go have DIM SUM.... its always NOT ENOUGH? Especially the steamed pork ribs? I mean, ribs, to me its the essence of life, ok, maybe so its money / car / watches / women..... but ribs... I get a real high thinking of ribs.... So! I thought, let's try this puppy and it was not hard at all!! I mean, the Mrs taught me how to do this and DANG! It's easy as 1-2-3.... huge portion and delish tasting dish to boot. And the best deal is that I can eat as much ribs as I want to!!! WOOOOOOOOO

This next dish is a fave of the Mrs... guys, c'mon, MARMITE?!?! VEG EXTRACT? Please... YULK! But hang on there! 2 teaspoons of Marmite + 2 teaspoons of good honey + 1 sachet of caster sugar + teaspoon of soy sauce.... mix it together and you have yourself a blistering sauce that is wicked. Taste test with the pinky (not the one that you dig your nose with please) and I am sure the Marmite taste is masked away very well? :)
Deep fry chicken parts first and make sure that they are de-skinned and have all the fat removed. You may want to pan fry them instead but deep fry is better. In high heat for 3 mins will be more than enough (after the oil is in the boil yes?) So just dap some oil into the frying pan and a teaspoon of chopped garlic and also some onions, 30 sec later.... plonk them fowl parts into the frying pan and start to infuse the garlic flavour with the chix. 1 minute later, you want to add the Marmite sauce into the frying pan and another 1 minute of mixing pan, make sure to reduce heat to 50% and cover the dish for 1 minute. You know what, prepare your tongue to be wow-ed by the glorious taste of cooked Marmite sauce... well actually its more honey and sugar to mask the damn, I mean ACQUIRED taste.

How can, in a typical Chinese meal, we not have the greens of life? Vegs. It was a generous helping of spinach and wolfberries. How shall i describe the taste? It's sweetness was natural, the firmness of the spinach was undestroyed by the control of fire and the overall lightness of the meal was a WeightWatcher's delight (I would know, cos I am trying to loose weight). As tasty as it is, all you need to do is to pour BOILING HOT water unto the veg for 30 sec (it's enough to render the veg - cooked to be honest) and then remove and let it rest. In a pan, you want oil and garlic. Till the pan is hot, add the veg into the pan, constantly moving them stalks and leaves........ 1-2 minutes later, you add the dried wolfberries (which had to be soaked in water 1st please!!) and with the watery content of the bowl, drip every single sweet drop of the mixture into the pan and continue to mix them together.
At this moment, you will be most likely to be thinking of your other half, just in an apron and dripping this sweet fruit suace unto themselves ... HOLD UP! Sorry all, that was what went inside MY mind...... back to cooking - in the pan, mixed well and all, cover the pan with a lid for 30 secs in high heat and sweet sensation of leaping veges..... its done!

Anyway guys, it's been sweel today writing about food again and as bad as my instructions are, I hope that they help you in a way? Part of cooking is the knowing how to cook it and the trial and error part soon becomes the past when you know now the how-to and the not-to. Enjoy all and till I cook again, hopefully in the very near month.

Practice for Tuesday

OK, so stingray is best eaten with sambal .... well not really. Today I decided to cook stingray but leans more to the French way of cooking.... with BUTTER! :)

Anyway, today's cooking is for my practice as some mates would like to take professional photos of me food and I was sooooo happy!! Come Tuesday, I would be able to make this even better.

How simple is this dish to make:
- clean the stingray
- rub some salt on both sides of stingray
- sprinkle some herbs as well
- put a slice of butter on top of the stingray
- lace some olive oil as well
- dilute some honey and 2 tablespoons to be drizzled
- whack into a grill oven at 200 deg for 30 minutes and 250 deg for another 10 minutes for that crackle

Buttered Stingray with Honey and Herbs

In a shallow serving plate, lay the stingray in the center and just drip all the juices into the plate and you are done.

A glass of white wine accompanied this dish and on a cooling evening night was total bliss. Ahh.... it's a good Sunday evening :)

Eggs again and again and again....

I've got nothing much to say today. Still at home and just lazing around watching TV and will be swimming very soon.... need the sun to make me healthy although all my mates said I am now very tanned. Well rather be tanned than fair as a guy... to me that is!

Before going for the swim thou, the tummy asked for a small meal. I decided to pop my head in the fridge again and what else do I have but eggs?! I had 3 eggs yesterday, and the day before!! Really!? Is slimming this tasteless!? So I decided to party up the egg dish. I also found some leftover Old Chang Kee fried fish fillets.

Parma Cheese Egg Pouch

All you need to do is to mix and steam the following:
- 2 eggs beaten in an oiled bowl
- 1 tablespoon of parma cheese
- 1 teaspoon of soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon of full cream milk
- 2 tablespoons of water
- mix all together and put in a steamer for 10 minutes (cover the bowl in the steamer)

When done, use a teaspoon and pour that amount into the bowl and encricle the circumference of the egg for easy removal. In a shallow bowl, after carefully loosening the eggs, overturn it and place it unto the bowl. As a garnish, a splash of ground chilli, dried chilli, parsley, pepper. If it sounds tourblesome, trust me, it's not! :) All these care is required so that the eggy center does not break and for you to enjoy at the last minute.... it's worth it! You may want to company this with some toast.

OK!  The sun is back!!! time to cook myself. I can't find my babyoil for tanning thou... now, do I have enough olive oil....... yup... babi guling in human form = ME!

This is the wife's comfort food

Firstly, a big THANK YOU for all of you who come and visit my blog often enough to help me attain 500 hits!! Thank you very much for your support. :)

My Mrs is a simple person who likes simple things in life and that goes the same for her taste for food.
Tired and stressed out from work, she said she wanted something light and comforting. Well she likes kang kong and she also likes Szechaun soup and these are what I happen to have in the fridge :)

Sambal Belachan Kang Kong

This is really a simple dish:
- cut the kang kong into smaller strips ( we had 2 clusters)
- take ready made sambal belachan in the count of 2 tablespoons into a bowl
- add half a cup of water into the bowl
- plonk in a teaspoon of honey
- a tablespoon of soy sauce or more based on your preference
- broil the kang kong in boiling water for 1 minute
- in an oiled frying pan, add a teaspoon of chopped garlic
- add the kang kong now and cover the pan for 2 minutes
- stir the mixture together and at this time, add the sambal mixture and add cut chilli padi
- cover the pan again for another minute or so and done!

Home-made Szechuan Soup

I made this with what I had also and it's quite simple:
- 500ml of water into a pan
- 8 table spoons of dark vinegar (depends on your ability for sourness....I suck....geddit? ;p)
- 1 teaspoon of Tobasco
- 1 tablespoon of light soy sauce
- 1 beaten egg
- small bits of dried shrimps (put in bowl and add boiling water and leave for 3 minutes, it'll be done)
- wasabi seaweed bits
- tablespoon of corn flour (pre-mixed with water)

What you can add to make the soup better:
= strips of salted veg
= strips of carrots
= dried scallops
= chives

To make this soup, all you need to do is to whack all of thge ingerdients into the pot. Just leave the addition of the corn flour and beaten egg to the last minute! Simple yes?! :)

Into the mouth went down the soup and also the kang kong.... took me about 1 hour to make all but 1 minutes to finish all..... wow.... she is a whale shark in a body of an ikan bilis (asian anchovy). But yet she still looks like a chopstick! Damn.... I'm still on my diet!!

protein no carbs... just protein...

Honestly.... i actually hate to do the daily run, swim and sauna. it's painful!!! but thats slimming i guess?
Still, last weekend, we decided to eat something light and cardless! so we decided on seafood again. No fats but i am sure my cholesterol has spiked up faster than petrol prices here in singapore.

Anyway.. here was the spread that we had and they are all either grilled / steamed / boiled / lightly stir fried.

Egg panckes with shrooms and ham drizzled with teriyaki sauce.

Broccs with diced prawns and xo sauce and 3 eggs laced freckled with salted fish

Squid and shrooms melody with black pepper

Grilled sambal stingray

All simple dishes and cheap too. Our muscle head friend was there to lend his tummy and all the food was killed within 30 minutes. No carbs slogan stayed true and we did not feel hungry even by dinner time. But truth be told, i still have my carbs... once a week. Sigh, food is cheap to eat but damn!! do i hate the slimming process!!! arrggghhhhhhhhh

Under the Seaaaaaaa..........

Hey Folks..... a quick update on what went down the tummy just now.
The Mrs naturally jumped for joy and whilst I was blasting Bad Romance Remix... she came skipping up the stairs and looked at the food like little girl in a Barbie shop.

Gastromically speaking....... I did GOOD today... :)

Garlic + Ginger with Milk Gravy Greens

Drunk + Spicy Glass Prawns

Salt + Pepper Fried Squid

Grilled Sambal (Chilli) Crayfish

Ok guys.... I guess this is it for tonight. The Mrs just burped and DAMNNNN did it smell foul!? -_-

you want SEAFOOD? I'll GIVE you SEAFOOD!!!

Well maybe not in that an angry a tone but you get the drift... :)

The Mrs was hopping around mad with request of yet another seafood meal. My burnt pocket smelling its ashes, I give in. If you know my wife, she has a face that the word 'NO' cannot be given to. So unwillingly, willingly I agreed to cook that seafood dinner for her tonight.

Prawns in XO again she said..... she IS an alcoholic actually... WHAHAH but hey... what can I say? She is my wife afterall... I just need to hide all the alcohol in the house, but her nose, trained to sniff out the slightest even of alcohol, will be able to find out where the stash is hidden. So I'm not even going to try.

Uncooked... yes, these are just the prep pictures, but I know they will turn out great! Well, I hope they do or else, I have deproved. Next is Crayfish with Sambal sauce. These puppies will be grilled and then served with thier own juices. Simple enough preping - mixture of sambal + honey + soy sauce + garlic + a bit of water and there your have the dressing, simply laced all over the crayfish and let the marinate get into them buggers and grill..... you'll be crayfish heaven.

Squid, I love squid... LOVE. I decided to strip these suckers down and no more pigments on them but just the white, fair sexy meat of the tentacled wonder. I cut them to size and diamond cut them. Give this a slight dash of oil and let them rest. Later, they will be dipped into a batter of egg + flour + water + dash of sugar. Quick fried in DAMN HOT OIL.... and then removed and cooked again with salt + pepper over high heat with a LITTLE.. and I do mean LITTLE bit of oil and toss these suckers until the smell of burnt salt + pepper fills the air.

This rice dish is a simple dish. The tenticles of the squid, I sliced them and added them into a rice cooker with garlic, teaspoon of the following - soy sauce and chinese black vinegar. A drop of sesame oil, 1 sliced chilli padi and add a table spoon of white wine. Let the rice cook on its own and when you hear the 'click' of the rice cooker, you know it's done!

Sprinkle chilli flakes, dried chives and dried garlic bits. Serving? What serving? You see the spoon? Right, pick it up and open your mouth. There you go... now scoop the rice and shove the spoon into your mouth. Now, tell me..... you mentioned serving style? Not all is about serving it nicely, sometimes, it's all about enjoying what you have in front of you... :)

I'll post the cooked results of the above mentioned food. Well, I have tried the prawns before, but the other 2 dishes? Fingers crossed, they will turn out as per my normal standard.... EDIBLE!