Claypot glutinous rice

I have cooked both regular rice in claypot with lapcheong as well as glutinous rice with lapcheong using the Claypot function in my rice cooker. Both recipes work really well after a lot of research, trial and error. However, now I want to up the ante and cook glutinous rice in the claypot! I am avoiding adding raw meat (eg chicken) as that only increases the complexity - I want to prefect the rice portion first.

Easiest recipe and method by Leonard Lee where he cooks the raw chicken separately in a wok vs slightly more involved recipe where he cooks the chicken in the claypot. Both recipes use raw chicken but I will just use thinly sliced raw pork and lap cheong.

A bit too scorched?

Ingredients

4C glutinous rice (soaked for at least 3 to 4 hrs)

2.6C water (roughly 1C rice: 0.6C water)

30g rice wine

1 tsp sesame oil

300g meat (eg sliced chicken highs)

6 - 8 rehydrated shitake mushrooms, sliced

15g dried shrimp

minced garlic

Garnishing: 1-2 tsp sesame oil, sliced spring onions

Sauce

2 tbsp light soya

1.5 tsp sugar

1.5 tsp chicken stock powder

30ml shrimp soaking water

30ml mushroom soaking water

Dash of white pepper.

Green leafy eg chai xin or kai lan

Egg (optional)

Method

1. Soak dried shrimps in rice win for 15 mins. Set aside soaking wine liquid.

2. Soak dehydrated mushrooms for 1-2 hrs and slice thinly. Set aside soaking liquid.

3. Optionally, marinade the raw sliced pork. (oyster, dark soya light soya, corn starch, sugar, pepper)

4. Coat bottom with 1 tbsp of lard. Add the drained glutinous rice to claypot. Add the water and 30g of rice wine and 1 tsp sesame oil.

5. Bring to boil over heat. Stir once then turn to medium high and simmer, covered, for 8 to 12 mins (depending on amount of rice and water). You should see the lid stop 'bubbling' even though it may still be exuding steam.

6. In the mean time, cook the sauce. Then proceed to blanch the veg.

7. Once time is up, turn off the heat. Use chopstick to poke holes in the rice. Add the sliced pork and lap cheong carefully. Cover the lid and pour sesame soil or liquid lard around the rim. Turn the heat back up to high for 5 minutes to cook the raw ingredients. 

8. Once you hear sizzling sounds, it's ready for scorched rice. To produce the scorched rice, wear mitts and rotate the pot for 5 minutes on high. You will know it's done when you can smell the scorched rice fragrance.

9. Turn off the flame. If using egg, add it now. Cover for 2 minutes. Then serve by adding the sauce. Mix at the table.

Recipe feedback

- Initially I followed the same recipe as using rice (2 small C) and right off the back, could smell the smell of burnt rice! So I've adjusted the recipe to include 4 small C rice. 

IP Fu chok (beancurd skin with barley)

From Lookocherry with video. Traditionally uses gingko but I don't like gingko, so I've replaced with lotus seeds. Quantities are my estimation based on packet sizes or what's on hand.

Ingredients

½ C barley, washed and soaked for 15 mins

1 packet fu chok (make sure it's for dessert): break into little pieces, then wash and soak for 15 mins

100 to 200g rock sugar, to taste

1C lotus seeds, soaked in hot water for at least 1.5hr to rehydrate and then remove sprout removed

A few knotted pandan leaves

Method

1. Soak the barley and fu chok for 15 mins in room temp water and then discard the water.

2. In the IP, add the barley and fu chok. Cook using 'Manual' on High for 30 minutes. Allow to naturally release (otherwise it splatters everywhere and is very messy), about 40 minutes.

3. Remove the lid and note the fu chok still seems whole. However after boiling, it quickly breaks down. Add in the pandan leaves, the rock sugar and lotus seeds. Saute on high for 20 to 30 minutes until the lotus seeds are soft.

4. Serve hot or cold.

BBQ pork belly

Since trying this version of the BBQ pork belly, I found the skin easily too charred. Hence trying again with this video method by the famous DimSimLim. This recipe is also easy because there is no parboiling.

Ingredients

500g pork belly

5 spice powder

salt

white pepper

chicken powder

Splash of chinese cooking wine

Method

1. Using the spikes, poke holes in pork belly skin. Turn over to meat side and make some slits. 

2. Mix the powders in a bowl (no proportions were given but it looked like a lot of powder!) 

3. Score the meat. Dip the meat-side in the powders and be careful to avoid touching the skin. Rub the marinade into the meat.

4. Spritz the meat with chinese cooking wine.

5. Make an aluminium foil tray to cover the meat but leaving the skin exposed. Put on the BBQ, direct heat. Cover the lid.

6. Cook for 45 mins at 180 deg then 20 mins at full blast (200 to 220 deg C).

7. Chop and serve with mustard.

Recipe

- This is probably the least active time and less clean up compared to the other crackling belly pork recipes

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AF Roasted pork belly

After this recipe which used the BBQ to avoid splattering the oven, here's one for the AF. But I'm not sure I want to splatter my AF either! From this video by CCherryleungg

Ingredients

500g pork belly

Method

1. Place pork belly skin side down into a shallow pan, with 1 inch of water. Water only covers the skin rather than all the meat, to avoid cooking the meat. The purpose is to soften the skin. 

2. After 5 minutes, remove and allow to cool down. Use a knife or similar to poke tiny holes in the skin. This will let the skin 'explode' and achieve the bubbly crispy skin.

3. On the meat side, cut slits and rub in five-spice powder and salt. 

4. Use cling film to protect the meat. Then use paper towels to rub and towel dry the skin. Brush on vinegar and cake in salt.

5. Leave uncovered in the fridge to air dry, at least 6 hrs or preferably overnight.

6. Next day, preheat to 185 deg C and cook skin side up for 30 mins.

7. Then turn up to 200 deg C for 20 mins, skin side up.

8. Allow to slightly cool before chopping up. Serve with yellow mustard. 

Note: Google suggests 3 stage: 200 deg C for 20 to 30 mins then 160 deg C for 30 to 40 mins, then 200 deg C for 5 to 10 mins if still not crackling.

Fried skinless crispy pork belly

I have been reading up on making crispy crackling and bored with the usual methods of drying the crackling and then roasting then finally grilling. I came across 3 recipes which I'll try in succession.

This method from Chinesefood0805 video uses boiling to get rid of excess oil and smell, and to soften, then frying in its own fat to crisp it up. Although the cooking time is longer, it saves on the prep and marinating time. It is also less greasy and as a bonus, you get a tub of rendered lard! The downside though is first there is no skin, and second, there is no marinate so needs to be eaten with some kind of sauce or salt/pepper.

Ingredients

500g belly pork, preferably skin removed

Method

1. Add pork belly to a pot (lay flat in a single layer) and pour enough water to cover.

2. Add salt and bring to a boil.

3. Skim foam, cover and turn down heat. Cover and simmer for 25 mins.

4. Drain, remove and pat very dry.

5. Warm up a pan on medium low heat. Without adding oil, lay in a single layer and cover. Allow oil to render out. Cover to prevent splatting.

6. Once the oil starts exuding out, flipping frequently to ensure even browning.

7. Chop into bite-size and serve with condiments eg mustard or five-spice salt.

Receipe feedback

- Because I used the belly with skin, the skin turned out be super chewy. So it does have to use skinless pork belly

- The frying was relatively painless because I used a wok with a cover but otherwise there would be a lot of splatter on the stove and surrounding.

- There was a lot of active time - from boiling the pork to then letting it slowly exude oil. Neither activity meant total set and forget, so total active time was about 2 hrs, because it took a lot time to render the fat at low heat. And at the end, it only produced 2 tbsp of lard!

- However the upside is that there is now a stock that can be used to cook soup eg ramen soup, and 2 tbsp of lard for next time.

- Despite frying the belly pork in its own oil, and despite having bigger pieces than the video, the meat came out tough and hard. It was also only mild crispy.

HK custard steamed bao

I don't really know what the difference is between this recipe and the one which involves more ingredients such as 3 flours and salted butter that i used here but until I have time to try both (and i'm not really a fan of making custard from scratch), I thought I'd give this recipe a try. It is by the same blogger who gave me this highly successful black sesame bao that only needed one proofing, so I'm more keen to try this recipe. This recipe by LinXianShen again.

Being so easy to wrap, my shape is perfect!

Filling is a bit dry rather than the runny custard I was expecting

Custard 

Ingredients

4 egg yolks

150ml milk

30g corn starch

30g normal flour

1 tbsp sugar

30g oil or lard

Method

1. Pour ingredients into a non-stick saucepan or pot. Stir on a small fire. Stir until it comes together and is workable and can be folded, much like a dough. It should not stick to the pan.

2. Wrap with plastic wrap and it should touch the surface so the custard doesn't form a skin. Chill for at least 3 hours.

3. Divide into 10 portions and roll into balls.

Bao (makes 10)

Ingredients

400g flour (normal or bao flour)

5g sugar

4g yeast

200ml warm water

(Note: My flour package was 500g so I added in the extra 100g with 50g milk, which makes extra 2 kosong bao)

Method

1. Pour ingredients into a mixing bowl. With a pair of chopsticks, stir until the dough comes together into a claggy ball.

2. Knead until smooth, about 10 to 15 mins. Form a ball and tuck underneath to promote a smooth surface, 

3. Roll out into a rectangle, around ½ inch thick. Use a cutter to cut out circles of around 5cm diameter. [Alternatively, divide into 10 portions, roll into balls, then using the usual bao method to roll out a disc with thinner edges than at the centre.]

4. Wrap each custard ball in the disc and crimp together using bao wrapping technique. Turn it seam facing downwards. With palms, use a cupping motion to create a rounder ball.

5. Place each bao straight onto parchment into the steamer. Allow to proof for around 25 mins until the baos expand to about 1.5 times. Press a finger gently on the bao surface and the indentation should spring back.

6. Place the steamer on top of a wok of room temp water and turn up the flame to maximum. Steam for 15 minutes then turn off the fire and leave covered for 3 minutes. Serve immediately.

Recipe feedback

- Again another great recipe from LinXianShen! The filling is the BEST, so easy to wrap. However, it is very dry, but perhaps that is the cha chan ting type of custard bao.

- The dough isn't as pliable as the black sesame bao even though it's pretty much the same recipe but I still did about 13 to 14 minutes of kneading, this time in 29 deg weather compared to 23 deg weather. Maybe that makes all the difference. 

Summer yeasted Mantou and Bao (后酵母 method）

This mantou dough XiaoHong uses a different method with single proof by adding the yeast AFTER the dough has been kneaded. 

Ingredients

500g bao or regular flour

270g warm water

5g instant yeast + 5g water

Method

1. Mix the flour and water and knead until a dough forms. Cover and allow to rest for 15 minutes. The dough already comes out smooth.

2. In a small bowl, add 5g of instant yeast to 5g water. Mix until combined and bloomed.

3. Create a well in the dough and pour in. Slowly pull and fold from outside in and knead until combined for about 2 minutes.

4. Roll into a log and divide into around 10 pieces. Flatted and continue kneading and then form balls.

5. Place in a steamer lined with paper. Cover and allow to proof until 1.5 to 2x, until the dough springs back when gently depressed with a thumb.

6. With the steamer on top, turn on the flame to high and steam for 15 minutes. Turn off the fire and allow to rest for 3 minutes. The bao should be fluffy and moist.

Similarly the empty bao version by Little Goose Food  almost mixes the yeast in afterwards. This video describes a better method of making tall beautiful buns.

Ingredients

250g just boiled water

500g bao or regular flour

3g yeast

Method (makes 6)

1. Into the hot water, grab a handful of flour and put into the water. Use chopsticks to stir into paste.

2. Add the remaining flour and stir with chopsticks. This will yield a claggy dough. Use hands to gather into a ball. The hot water will break the gluten structures to make the buns more soft and bouncy.

3. Cover to rest for 10 mins.

4. Once it's relaxed, knead for 10 to 15 minutes until the surface is smooth. 

5. Press it flat into a rectangle and make an indentation in the centre. Add the yeast into the centre. Add around 1 to 2 tbsp of water just to dissolve the yeast. Roll up the dough and knead until the yeast is well incorporated, around 5 minutes. Using this method, it's easy to form a dough with a smooth surface.

6. Roll into a log and divide into 6 pieces. Knead each piece to release the gas, and form a ball with your palm. Then, roll to form a tall cone.

7. Place directly into the steamer onto parchment. Cover and allow to rest until 1.5x or until a finger indentation on the surface springs back.

8. Start a wok with water on high. Only when the water is rapidly boiling, put the steamer on top and steam for 15 minutes. Turn off the flame and rest for 3 minutes.

Similarly Chui Jie uses this recipe for summer. This recipe has 5g yeast with 250g water and 500g flour. She kneads 3x for around 5 minutes each, but rests in between each kneading. The dough is easier to knead than 15 mins upfront. She says using this method of adding yeast later, all the buns rise at the same time to the same size. She also starts the steaming from cold water.

3-flour Custard bao redux

This blog is littered with bao disasters, including this custard creamed bao that went so wrong (dense, raw and ugly and collapsed, using single proofing) I never tried custard or creamed corn-fillings again. I had also tried a milk bao that used 2 flours (cake and plain) but needed 2 proofings of about an hr each. It was nothing to write home about but relatively easy to work with. There was also a char siu bao dough that used normal flour, wheat starch, vinegered water with baking power but despite all that work, it looked ugly. While easy to work with, it was too stretchy and tore easily, and instead of rising, it grew sideways and was too flat. 

This recipe by Ruyi attempts to remedy all these attempts which uses 3 flours, oil and baking powder in an attempt to create fluffy dim sum bao. The video is particularly helpful with how to wrap and shape so that the buns come out round and smooth.

Ingredients

Custard filling

3 room temp egg yolks, try to remove as much white as possible

150ml milk

75g sugar

20g cake flour

50g salted butter (it must be salted or the butter will separate from the custard)

1. Whisk the egg yolks then add sugar and whisk till pale.

2. Add the cake flour and mix well then set aside.

3. Heat up the salted butter and milk on medium heat and stir once in a while until small bubbles form. Do not boil. Remove from the stove.

4. Quickly whisk the yolk mixture and slowly drizzling in half the scaled milk in a steady stream. Continue to whisk and pour back into the pot and back onto a medium heat.

5. Once the mixture starts to thicken, switch to low heat. Continue to whisk until lump and remove into a bowl. Cover with cling film right onto the custard to prevent it forming a skin.

6. Fridge for min 3 hrs or even overnight.

Alternatively just make instant custard filling

170ml milk

3 tbsp custard powder

2½ tbsp sugar

1. Combine the custard powder, milk and sugar in a pot. Bring to a boil but stirring constantly otherwise it will boil over.

2. Alternatively use a microwave at small increments at 50 to 80% power otherwise it boils over, been there done that! 1min 30s at 1000W.

3. Also keep in the cover and keep in the fridge for at least 3 hours or best overnight. 

Dough (makes 10)

160g superfine (9.5% protein)/HK/Bao flour (normal flour will yield a chewier dough)

40g cake flour

30g wheat starch

45g icing sugar

½ tsp baking powder

¾ tsp instant yeast

130ml room temp water

30ml veg oil

1. In a large bowl, add all the ingredients except the oil. Use a chopstick to ensure all the ingredients are combined.

2. Add the cooking oil in 3 batches and knead in until dough feels smooth, about 10 mins.

3. Divide the dough into 30 equal portions of around 43-44g each. Cover with damp towel and rest for 5 minutes.

4. Roll out one ball at a time with a thicker centre. Flatten to around 9.5 cm disc.

5. Divide the custard into 10 balls and roll each roughly into a ball.

6. In the centre of each dough disc, flatten the custard into the centre and cupping your hand, use a spoon to push the filing into the 'cup' formed by your hand. Pleat to seal and turn over onto the table. Using your sides of your palms, cup and rotate to form a round ball with a smooth surface.

7. Transfer to a lined steaming rack. Allow to proof until 1.5 to 2x. When depressed gently, the dough should spring back.

8. Place straight onto a steamer and turn on to high heat and steam for 15 minutes from room temp. Once done, turn off the fire and leave covered for another 10 minutes.

9, Best served warm but remove from the water to avoid getting soggy.

10. Keep in the fridge and steam for 10 minutes on high heat to reheat. Else store in the freezer and steam on high heat from frozen for 15 minutes. Custard sld be eaten when the bao is warm otherwise it is hard.

Black sesame bao with black sesame filling

I last tried a black sesame bao here with minimal kneading but both the dough and filling were too wet making it too hard to work with; and again here as a black sesame mantou that was also a very wet dough. This is a recipe with minimal kneading and proofing by LinXianShen.

Filling (makes 1 cereal bowl volume of filling)

100g roasted black sesame powder

15g glutinous rice flour

40g white sugar

20g lard

250g water

1. Put in a pot and on low fire, heat until it bubbles and turns into a sticky slurry (still quite liquidy). 

2. Put in the fridge to harden.

Bao dough (makes 10)

400g bao or regular flour

25g roasted black sesame powder

1 tbsp sugar

4g instant yeast

½ C of warm milk (use more or less as needed)

1. Combine with a chopstick until no more dry flour.

2. Roll into a dough. Knead for about 10 to 15 minutes until smooth.

3. Roll out into an oblong, about ½ inch thick. Use a 4 or 5" cutter to stamp out circles.

4. Using about 2 chinese tablespoons of cold filling, encase in the bao skin. Make into round buns and place in a steaming basket.

5. Cover and proof for 20 mins.

6. Turn on the flame to high (water from room temp) and steam for 13 mins. Turn off the fire and leave covered for 3 mins.

Recipe feedback

- Compared to the previous black sesame bao, this recipe is perfect! The filling amount is just enough and the dough is very workable. Shows that you don't need oil in the dough to make it pliable.

- Only issue is I forgot to roast and grind the sesame BEFORE making the filling (so I put it in the food processor after cooking), and also couldn't be bothered to grind the white sesame seeds (I ran out of black) for the dough. It turned out well because it gave the bao some crunch!

- I thought the lack of proofing time would make the bao hard but i was wrong! I really hand kneaded for 15 minutes with all my newfound arm power and then rested for maybe 10 mins while I prepared the steamer and washed up, before wrapping and forming the baos. Also, the bao only got 20 minutes at the end to proof, so I was worried cos they hardly seemed to have grown in size. Steaming at full heat really caused it to poof up so much that they all stuck together and to my steamer!

- Tip - really roll out the dough as large as possible (leaving the centre thicker) cos the filling is very liquid even after being in the fridge for 6 hours. The tip of cupping the palm to hold the dough and then 'applying' the filling onto the dough worked; then pleat, crimp and seal as per usual bao technique. Even though I then turned the seam over onto the parchment and the shape wasn't totally round, bao came out ok and didn't look too weird with the pleats underneath.

Chocolate burnt basque cheesecake

From my favourite auntie Kathrine Kwa's collection. My previous 2 recipe attempts either were too much work because no beater was used, or used a blender but then the air caused it to rise too fast and then it looked ugly (but correct basque look!). Both recipes used a high temperature (230deg C) so it would rise and brown nicely (but have to watch like a hawk) while the inside remains jiggly. However due to that high temp, they would crack too. Hence this recipe uses a lower temperature more akin to baking Japanese-style souffle cheesecake sans water bath, but baked for longer and without switching off the oven (to prevent falling and cracking). Will this yield more consistent and pretty results?

I also decided to revert to JOC's method of slowly blending everything in to incorporate as little air as possible, hoping if there is less air, it won't collapse as dramatically. Her recipe kept it almost like a baked custard and used corn starch but because I didn't beat it at all so substituted cake flour to give it more structure.

Ingredients

500g cream cheese (2 packets Philly), softened

120g sugar

5 eggs

250ml whipping cream (she used 200ml but I only had a 250ml pack)

250g melted dark chocolate (70% cocoa)

10g cocoa powder

10g cake flour 

Pinch of salt

Method

1. Prepare a 8 inch pan in the traditional basque method with foil and 2 layers of crumpled parchment. 

2 Meanwhile, melt choc bar over bain marie or in microwave on small increments. 

3. Next, melt in the cream cheese.

4. Once incorporated, add the sugar and stir until well combined.

5. Switch of the heat. I kept in the bain marie because this recipe has no oil so I was afraid it would harden. Add eggs one at a time and beat well after each. Make sure to only add the next egg when the previous one has been combined, otherwise it becomes hard to keep it lump free once more liquid goes in.

6. Transfer to a bigger mixing bowl if needed. Add in the whipping cream in and beat lightly, but don't overbeat and incorporate too much air.

7. Lastly add the melted chocolate and use a spatula to stir in. Once mostly combined, you can return to the beater at low speed.

8. Sift in the cocoa and cake flour, and pinch of salt.

9. Pour into a lined 8" cake tin. Lightly tap on the countertop to dispel bubbles.

10. Bake on the middle shelf at 220 deg C for 30 mins. Grill with upper heat for 2 to 3 mins until top is darker.

11. Remove from oven and leave in tin for 10 mins to cool so it doesn't crack or shrink. Top sld still be slightly jiggly.

12. Once slightly cooled, remove from tin but do not remove the paper. Continue to let it come to room temp. Chill in fridge for at least 6 hrs or best overnight.

13. To cut cleanly, use a knife dipped in warm water and wipe after each cut with damp towel.

Feedback

- Even though the temp was lowered by 10 deg C, it still cracked! But I believe this had more to do with the basque-style of lining the tin with crumpled parchment and my cake 'caught' on the craggy edges and tore itself.

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