a szechuan feast

the red door

One of my colleague's dad is a head chef at a local szechuan restaurant located in a hotel. When the greedy foodies (including myself, of course) heard about that, we wasted no time in arranging a lunch for some of us gals from the office. So last Friday, the 7 of us headed for the restaurant, extremely excited with what laid ahead. We had high hopes of this lunch appointment as we hoped that the head chef would specially cook for us and... upgrade the portions.. and maybe even throw in a free dish or two.. or maybe even make an appearance at our table. And guess what, he did all that and more. He came by several times with a huge smile on his face, wanting to ply us with even more food. Well, at the end of it, we were stuffed beyond words, extremely satisfied and eternally grateful to Y and her exceptionally skilled and generous dad. If you are wondering why we could actually refuse the head chef's offer, well this is why - This is what we had.
(photos courtesy of Jo)

kung po prawns

drunken chicken and sliced pork with sweet and spicy sauce (served chilled)

the menu

Hot and sour soup

drunken chicken

sliced pork with sweet and spicy sauce

century egg
with smoked tea dressing

deep fried man tou (chinese buns)

kung po prawns

fried long beans with dried shrimp

xiao long pau
(steamed soup dumplings)

ma po toufu (silken tofu with fermented bean and chilli sauce)

a selection of desserts (mango pudding, honeydew sago and guilin gao (herbal jelly with honey))

bacon and avocado focaccia

On most days, we have our typical chinese-y dinner with rice, 2 dishes and maybe a soup. On others, we take a break from the usual and have some bread. This is our current favourite way to have a sandwich. The usual suspects of avocado and bacon appear prominently in our spread. Buying avocado in Singapore is tricky business. Its always difficult to locate a ripe and tender avo. Most often and not, I can't find one that's ready to eat. Forget the neighbourhood supermarket. Those you can get will probably double up as a baseball. I also like to marinate my tomatoes. This time round, I had cherry tomatoes which I marinated with basil, sea salt, cracked black pepper, olive oil and a splash of white wine vinegar. The acidity of the vinegar really brings out the natural sweetness of the tomatoes. I also had a handful of white button mushrooms that day. I roasted them with some rosemary, seasoned them and drizzled a good amount of olive oil in a baking tray. After 10 minutes, I took them out and splashed on some balsamic vinegar. Lastly, a good handful of mesclun salad. Those iceberg lettuces don't do justice to a good sandwich, so dump those. We like to tear our toasted focaccia and eat them in chunks rather than bite into them as a whole. Of course, don't forget the vino. We had Shaw and Smith's Sauvignon Blanc. Light and citrusy which was the perfect complement to our dinner.

almost salad pasta

I like to call this pasta the almost-salad pasta. It has more greens than strands of spaghetti. It's perfect if you're sick of heavy tomatoey meat or creamy sauces. No cover-ups. Just fresh ingredients coming through. I went to the market and found these lovely zucchinis that I couldn't resist. Likewise for the fat cherry tomatoes that were almost as big as plum ones. I also found a whole selection of herbs. In this pasta, I had Italian basil, dill and rosemary (from my window pot, yeh! yes, yes I'm growing my own herb!) So here's my recipe for my almost-salad pasta. For days when you just can't eat another mouth of sauce or animal.

Almost-salad pasta

cherry tomatoes and garlic cloves - slice off the tops of the cloves, leaving the skins. slice tomatoes into halves. Drizzle olive oil and season with sea salt and pepper. Roast them at low heat (about 120 degree Celsius) till they are soft, garlic is creamy and fragrant. About 40 minutes. zucchinis- ribbon them with a potato peeler. Discard the ribbons if its all skin. Discard the seeds in the core. herbs - wash and pick out the good bits. wash spags (or any type of pasta you like) like how you always do. fry - fry zucchinis ribbons in olive oil (if you have some from the roasting pan, that'll be great) till they are soft. add spags and cook through. If its too dry, add some prepacked chicken stock or water. Add herbs at the end. Season to taste. Assemble spags in the centre. Add more herbs as garnish. Scatter tomatoes and garlic all round.

craving for soup

 

vichyssoise

The other day, I was craving for soup. Creamy, decadent soup. I checked in on my fridge and found some leek. Not those local ones, but real fat aussie ones. I looked deeper and found some russet potatoes. Great. the perfect duo. Potato and leek. I decided to try making vichyssoise - chilled potato leek soup. I have seen recipes for it in countless cookbooks - traditional upperty french soup. I wanted to test it out on D. Will he take to cold soup? Well, if he hates it, i can always pop it in the microwave. Anyway this sophisticated sounding soup, unlike its pronunciation, is terribly easy to do.

I chopped up the leek (2 fat stalks) and sautéed them in oil. Take care not to burn or brown them, or you'll have brown bits in the creamy white soup. Once they are translucent, I added the peeled and cubed potatoes. (2 fat potatoes) Once they are slightly mushy, I added a splash of white wine (so happen had some) and chicken stock (didn't make my own, had some in a packet - though do make sure it's not seasoned). Add more water if you need to. The soup was simmered for about 15 minutes, till the potatoes were tender. Season with sea salt and some finely cracked black pepper. Cool the soup. And process the lot in a processor. If you have those stick processors which you can stick into your pot, all the better. Once smooth and creamy, refrigerate and go do your other dishes. I chopped up some young spring onions and dill (if you have chives, they'll look classier) and that's it.

Cool, creamy and decadent. Craving satisfied.  

my no.1 comfort food

 

My favourite brekkie. My favourite in-between-meals filler. My favourite supper treat. A bowl of cold cold fresh milk with fruit loops and honey stars. Not too much cereal, I like to see them float about. Too much cereal and the milk gets too sweet or too warm. I like to gobble it down quickly to retain all its crunchiness and coldness. This is my ultimate comfort food choice. Somehow the chocolates and ice creams do not do it for me enough. It's the humble bowl of sugar-coated cereals which hits the right spot for me. Whatever the mood, after a bowl of this, I instantly feel rejuvenated and revitalized to face the world. I am fed, hear me roar!

What is your ultimate comfort food choice?

green mango salad with shrimps

Here's a simple salad that's really easy to do. It looks sophisticated but it's just a combination of a couple of key ingredients. As it is a Thai salad you can't do without fish sauce, chilli padi (bird's eye chilli) coriander, lemongrass and lime.

I boiled the peeled shrimps briefly in boiling water for about 30 seconds and I left them in the fridge. I chopped up some shallots and fried them till crisp. Using the shallot oil for my dressing, I combined lime juice, fish sauce, sugar, chopped coriander root and lemongrass and a few dashes of bottled thai chilli sauce together with the fragrant oil. The green mango was julienned. I dressed the mango, sprinkled some toasted peanuts and placed the shrimps on top. I cut some chilli padi and coriander sprigs to garnish and I was set.

Just perfect for a gloomy rainy day.

sick of the bird

Many a times we get really sick of eating out. Eating greasy food. Eating MSG-laden food. Eating a whole lot of meat. We don't really fancy pork that much and beef (there's not much beef in hawker fare only beef hor fun or beef stir fry) So D and I have been eating way too much chicken, and we are pretty much sick of it. We eat chicken everything - roasted chicken, chicken stew, chicken rice, chicken stir-fry, chicken satay, smoked chicken. Oh man. I'm sick of the the poor bird. I just can't take another bite. So these days I like to cook veggie-based pasta. Very lightly done with only extra virgin olive oil, sea salt and pepper. No cheese and no heavy meaty tomato sauces. Here's one we had some time ago. The chickpeas give off this robust meaty bite which I simply love. The chopped walnuts which I quickly toasted in my toaster oven before tossing in, gives off a smoky nutty flavour. I like to use a lot of coriander sprigs in my cooking. It's fresh and lifts off any pasta beautifully and looks wonderful. We had a sauvignon blanc with it which was a perfect complement. Here's a recipe for my chickpea spaghetti. Good on Fridays or when your vegan friends drop by unexpectedly.. or simply great to use if you're sick of the poor bird.

Spaghetti with chickpeas & walnuts (for 2)

A can of chickpeas, a handful of dried pasta, a bunch of coriander, a handful of walnuts (toasted briefly), half a brown onion (chopped), oilve oil, salt and pepper.

Boil pasta till al dente. Fry onions in olive oil till fragrant and translucent. Add chickpeas and some of the briny liquid from the can. Add pasta. Add walnuts. Season to taste. Sprinkle coriander sprigs. Serve.

majestically sinful

peking duck, foie gras and wasabi prawn

drunken chicken

As I mentioned in the last post, the food wasn't exactly mind-blowing, but nevertheless, it was still exquisite. In all, we each ordered 4 courses. The portions were small but it was rich, so I definitely had enough. It is after all a Chinese restaurant, so tea was served throughout, which was something I liked. I ordered jasmine which really cut through the richness of the dishes.

The service was extremely attentive, except that we had to switch to using Mandarin after a waitress didn't understand D when he asked for the wine list. My tiny tea cup was topped up so frequently I felt quite bad about the poor waitress coming to my table every 3 minutes or so.

I particularly enjoyed the foie gras appetiser we had. I did my homework of course. I read online reviews about their signature dishes, so I knew exactly what to order. Here's our pick for the night. Pan-seared foie gras with peking duck on marinated jellyfish with tempura-ed prawn with wasabi-mayo dressing and diced mango. It just doesn't get anymore sinful and delightful than that. I savoured every bite of the rich and opulent dish. Every bite was distinct from the other. Crispy. Sweet. Creamy. Tangy. Crunchy. Sour. Spicy. D was speechless.

We also had the drunken chicken (which was way too salty) but a nice touch was that they were boneless winglets. Also, they were served on metal spoons which were bent spirally. Pretty unique. We also had a battered softshell crab with lime-cream sauce. The tangy creamy sauce went really well with the light-as-feather batter of the crab. My only complaint was that it was served in a very dark coloured (almost black) ceramic bowl, making it really hard to see the what we were digging at. Overall, we enjoyed that much more than the chicken dish. We both had lamb for main course. The honey sauce was a little gooey but the carrot cake was melt-in-the-mouth heavenly. D found his cutlet a little too done for his liking. I quite like mine pink and not bloody.

As for dessert, we had warm almond milk with papaya (which D thought was very ordinary and not worth the price) and fried durian ice cream with mango sauce. The latter scored well for novelty but didn't go down to well with us. The taste of the durian overpowered the mango sauce and the ice cream wasn't creamy and smooth enough, which would be something you would expect from a restaurant like this one.

All said, I enjoyed my dinner. I like modern takes on traditional dishes. I like Asian influences in my food. Did I mentioned we made reservations for April?

lamb cutlet served with fried carrot cake

deed fried durian ice cream with mango sauce