Assam Pedas

Recently Rasa Malaysia made laksa penang which looks so mouth watering that I have to have something sour myself. Since making laksa is a bit too time consuming for me and not to mention that I dontv half of the ingredients, I decided to make Assam Pedas. I took the recipes from drNo and Jun and then changed them a lil bit according to wht I have and my level of malas-ness. Yes, this is the somewhat easy(/lazy)-edition of Assam Pedas.

1-2 piece of fish (anything except salmon)

1 cup water

daun kesum or polyganum leaves (thanks RM for the translation)

7-10 okra/ladyfinger/bendi

4-5 tablspoon tamarind juice (1tablespoon tamarind soup powder)

salt and sugar to taste

3 tbspoon vegetable oil

Blended ingredients;

2 shallots

1/2 red onion

1 garlic

2in ginger

10 tbspoon of sambal oelek (chili paste)

1 teaspoon of tumeric powder

2 teaspoons belacan

1. Heat the oil (medium heat) and add the blended ingredients. Stir for 5-6min

2. Put in the water and add the rest once its boil. Flip the fish one or twice.

3. Cover and simmer for 10min.

This is how I eat my assam pedas. With rice, cut tomatoes and cucumber for salad and sambal belacan. Not seen in the picture is the sweet soy sauce. I cant eat my rice without them!

Prawn Curry Kapitan

I made these a few weeks ago but only now I found the time to post the pic. Thank you Gert
for the recipe. Since I have lady finger and eggplant, I add them to my curry too. The only thing that I didn have then was the buah keras but it still turned out very good.

Sambal Tumis Udang

Yesterday I posted the pic of my nasi lemak. Gert and J.T. asked for the recipe. The first few times I made my sambal tumis, Iv always used dried chili but I find the dry chili here in the US to be too hot. So I have farina-ised it so its easier to make and tho stil hot/spicy, its not the kinda that would make u burn ur mouth/tongue for a week. Maybe just for a few hours. hehe! kidding lah. I sure do hope I dont forget any ingredients.

A. 10-15pcs prawn, de-veined
1/2 onion, sliced

B. 1 bottle of sambal oelek (theyr available at regular supermarket too)
5 fresh red chili
1 onion
3in ginger

vege oil (abt 1/4cup )
1/2cup water
1 teaspoon powdered tamarind (or 3tablespoon of fresh tamarind juice)
2 tablespoon salt
1 cup sugar

1. Grind all ingredients in B.

2. Heat up the oil in the wok (med high) and put the B ingredients in. Keep stirring for about 10min.

3. Add water, tamarind powder/juice, salt and sugar. Continue stirring for 4-5min. Taste and add salt/sugar if necessary.

4. Put in the prawn and sliced onion, stir a little a bit and cover for 3-4min.

5. Uncover, stir and taste. Let it set for another 3-4min and serve.

6. Enjoy!

When I made them last week, I made enough that I had the nasi lemak for 2 days and 2 nights straight. Im not kidding you. I did! I also put half of them in a tupperware and freeze them so the next time time I crave for nasi lemak, I dont have to trouble myself. All I have to do is, make the rice and re-heat my sambal tumis.

Chicken on a skewer a.k.a. Satay Ayam

I cheated. I know and im quite ashamed of it but hey! We live in an apartment and the only grill that we have is the electric grill, a x'mas gift from my in laws.

I use minimum ingredients to marinate the chicken. Ginger, shallot, onion, cardamom seeds, lemongrass, salt, sugar, honey and vege oil and tumeric powder. OK. Maybe not minimum but it did sound minimum when I was making them. :P

Just blend all the ingredients and marinate for at least 20hrs. You can do it in lesser time but I like to taste all the ingredients in the meat when i eat them thus the lonnnnngggg marinating time.

Shirley i.e. Meltingwok told me tht I can simply grill them on the electril grill that we have. Just dont forget to keep lathering them with oil and honey. Ialso made the ketupat and peanut sauce (not in pic).

Sweet and Sour Crab

I, like most Malaysian, just love seafood. Be it fish, squid, prawn, clams or snails. I dont however eat escargot. The only type of snails that I eat is "siput sedut" or balitong, as the chinese call them. What theyr called in English, I have no idea at all. It doesnt matter anyways since Michael dont eat seafood and I wudn know how to cook them either. hehe.

Anyways, when it comes to crabs, (it doesn matter what kind they are since im the type who's not fussy about their names) i like them in sweet and sour with a little bit of spiciness sauce. The basic ingredients for my sweet and sour crab would be shallot, garlic, ginger (to reduce the fishy smell) and chili paste and lastly an egg. to me, thts what make it sweet and sour crab.

Ingredients

1-2 crabs (cleaned and cut in 2-4 pieces)

• 3-4 red chilies
• 3 shallots
• 2 garlic
• 1inc ginger (pound or blended together)

3 tblspoon of vegetable oil, 4 tblspoon of ketchup, 1/2 cup water, salt, sugar and an egg.

Heat the oil in a wok or skillet and put in the blended ingredients. Stir until they'r fragrant. Add the water, ketchup and continue stirring. Put in the salt and sugar (to your liking) once its boiled. Add in the crab and flip them until theyr well coated with the sauce and cover for about 2-3 min. Lastly, break an egg and keep stirring/flipping the crabs until the egg is cooked.

I like to eat them with steamed white rice but you can eat them ala Fatty Crab (seafood reastaurant in Malaysia) which is with toast.

Malay Chicken Briyani

Nina asked me to post my way of making chicken briyani since she make hers from scratch. *respect* I can be pretty lazy when it comes to cooking. Back in KL, my fav place for briyani ayam madu (briyani with honey chicken) would be at Mahbub Restaurant in Bangsar. I can never have enough of their briyani ayam madu. If you're in KL, you should give it a try. Iv somehow managed to get all my friends addicted to that place!

Nowadays, (since I have to do the cooking myself!) I use Shan's briyani mix for both beef and chicken. Being a sucker for kicap manis (sweet soy sauce), I will always have chopped green chili in sweet soy sauce with my briyani. Im going to share with you how I make the malay chicken briyani.

Ingredients

1 cup basmati rice (rinsed)

1 3/4 cup water

2 tablespoon ghee oil (or vegetable oil)

half onion & 2" ginger (finely chopped)

4 spices - 3 cardamom seed, 1" cinnamon stick, 2 star anise seed, 3-4 cloves (rinsed)

4-5 pcs chicken

2 tablespoon shan's briyani mix

1 tablespoon adabi's briyani mix (optional)

Salt, sugar, pepper

Methods

Marinate the chicken with the briyani mixes for at least half an hour.

Heat up the ghee oil in a pot and add the 4-spices until aromatic. Add in the chopped onion & garlic and the chicken. Keep stirring for about 3-4min.

Add the rice and water and salt, sugar, pepper. Stir and let it boil. Cover and simmer for 25min.

Spicy Honey Chicken

There are 2 types of cooking that I can have day-after-day-after-day and they're sweet & sour and soy sauce. Be it chicken, beef, fish, crabs or any kinda seafood. Maybe because they'r just simply delicious or maybe because they'r so easy to make. The basic ingredients would be shallots, ginger and garlic. Lately I have been making a lot of spicy honey chicken since it's always a hit among my friends. As the name goes, chili paste is a must to get the spiciness. Not just cut chilies (for a simple sweet & sour) but the paste.

When i cook, there would be the easy (simply malas or not enuf time) or not so easy way of making them. Here, im gonna share the not so easy but not that difficult way of making it.You can use any parts of chicken or just chicken wings or the whole chicken even. Please do not run away and give up before you read the recipe and method. ;)

Ingredients

A.

10pcs of chicken (bone in)

3 teaspoon tumeric powder

1.5 teaspoon salt

B.

12 dried red chilies (soaked in hot water and deseeded)

5 shallots

3 garlic

2inc ginger

C.

4-spices (3 star anise seed,6 cloves,6 cardamon & 2in cinnamon stick), rinsed

7 tablespoon honey

2 tablespoon ketchup

1/2 cup water

salt

3 tablespoon oil

1/2 onion, sliced

Method

1. Marinate the chicken with tumeric powder and salt. Deep fry (slowly) them and keep aside.

2. Grind ingredients in B with a little bit of water.

3. Heat up the oil in the wok and add the 4-spices until fragrant and then add/stir-fry items B.

4. Add the rest of the items in C and continue stirring.

5. Keep tasting until you get the desired taste and lastly put the chicken in. Stir and serve.

Pisang goreng (Fried Banana)

Im already drooling just by typing those words. I can have pisang goreng everyday for breakfast and tea, just like i can have currypuff, nasi lemak, cekodok, kuih keria, pulut panggang and if I dont stop now, il be in deep trouble.

Among all those things that I mentioned earlier, pisang goreng is the easiest one to make. All that you need is plaintain (sliced about 1cm), vegetable oil and the batter. To make the batter, here's the ingredient: (which btw is the 1st time I use measurement!)

2 tablespoon of flour (multi-purpose)

1 tablespoon of tempura flour

A pinch of tumeric powder

A pinch of salt

12 tablespoon of cold water

Method

Heat the oil in a deep pan. Mix all the ingredients above into batter. Coat the plaintain with the batter and fry them when the oil is hot. Keep turning them until they are golden brown and serve. That's it. ;)

Pisang Palembang (banana in syrup)

I cudn remember what it was called until my cousin, Farah told me about it. So I changed the title fr sira pisang to pisang palembang. Thanks Farah. muah!

My first food posting. You would have probably known by now (fr my previous ranting on makan) that i love banana. Our last visit to albertson, i found a few plaintain much to my delight. I guess its a season thingy coz its been months since i last find them at the supermarket.

Anyways, i decided to make my fav dessert which is sira pisang or basically banana in syrup. All you need is:

1 banana or plaintain (sliced)

1 egg (beaten)

oil to fry

Syrup

2/3 cup sugar

1.5cup water

Firstly, boil the water and add sugar. Set it aside. Heat the oil. Dip the sliced banana in the egg and fry them until golden brown. Lastly, put the banana in the syrup.

You can have it hot or cold. I prefer mine cold/chilled so I will put them in the fridge for a few hours before enjoying them.