Chinese oso bucco

I've heard a lot about this cut of meat. Very Italian and I had no idea how to cook it so have put off buying it till now. Even as it lay in my freezer, i still put it off because of the electricity needed to slow cook it. But as it turns our, it wasn't so bad. Downside is that it only serves 2, more pieces and I'm sure my cooking time and hence my electricity bill increases too! Woolies where I bought it from helpfully provided a Chinese inspired recipe but since I was out of hoisin, I had to improvise.

Ingredients
3 pieces osso bucco
1 tsp sweet chilli sauce (i used linghams because I find sweet chilli sauce too watery, but this made my stew rather spicy)
2 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp soya sauce
1 tbsp Chinese cooking wine
Grind of black pepper
1 tsp crushed ginger
1 tsp crushed garlic
1 small onion, chopped
3 potatoes, cubed
3 carrots, cubed
3 handfuls of barley
Approx 300ml water

Method
1) Brown the osso bucco in a bit of oil. When sufficiently browned, add the onion, garlic and ginger. If using a slow cooker, transfer to the cooker. Water should just cover everything but not submerge it.
2) Put in all the remaining ingredients. When it comes to a boil, skim off any scum.
3) Periodically stir and skim. Total cooking time is 2 hours on the slow cooker.
4) Serve garnished with cut chilli, on a bed of jasmine rice.

Minestrone soup

This is what I would call winter soup or 'everything also put leftover veg in fridge' soup. Yes, basically any leftover, less then stellar fresh veg can go in but some stalwarts which make the base of the soup that cannot be omitted are carrots, potatoes and onions. Everything else is variable.

This is also a slow cooker recipe so peeling the vegs aren't essential because everything will probably still fall apart, and the skin has all the nutrients. Dicing the hard vegs is important but again, they don't have to be diced too small because this is a slow cooker recipe and eventually, it's all going to be blitzed anyway.

Ingredients
¼ pumpkin
4 carrots, cubed
½ cabbage, shredded
3 potatoes, peeled and diced
½ cup barley
½ onion, diced
1 can of stewed tomatoes
1 tbsp chicken or veg stock cube or bullion (I used chicken Knorr powder)

Method
1) Pour all the vegs into the pot.
2) Pour enough water to cover everything.
3) Slow cook for approx 1 - 2 hours.
4) Blitz everything with a handheld blender. You can do this really roughly so you leave some texture behind rather than just a messy mess.
5) Can be drunk hot or kept for the next day and drunk cold if so inclined, maybe during summer?

Potato salad

Here are 3 different potato salads.

Japanese by Cooking with Dog: Potato Salad Recipe ポテトサラダ 作り方 レシピ - YouTube

Japanese by JustOneCookbook: http://www.justonecookbook.com/recipes/japanese-potato-salad/

Korean gamja salad by Maangchi: http://www.maangchi.com/recipe/gamja-salad

The cooking method differs slightly, and the resulting Korean gamja salad is a lot more like creamy ice cream texture and the egg isn't mashed either, whereas with the Japanese one, the potato isn't mashed, so you can almost see whole bits of egg and potato. Different presentation and mouth feel but otherwise, a same interpretation of the same fusion recipe. JOC follows the Korean one.

I decided to mash the egg yolk, carrots and potatoes, but chopped the egg white and cucumber, aka more Korean style.

Updated with picture of more Japanese style where everything is more whole.

Brekkie burrito wrap

Breakfast of champions, as Hungry Jack's always advertises. So easy to make at home - take that, Hungry Jacks!

Ingredients
1 to 2 tortilla per person (This recipe makes 3 wraps)
4 mushrooms, sliced
3 bacon strips
½ cup grated cheese
mayo (I used the Japanese version)
3 eggs

Method
1) Grill the bacon until the fat is rendered, then grill it to your level of crispiness/doneness. Set aside.
2) Using the fat from the bacon, do the sunny side up eggs and fry the mushroom slices.
3) To assemble tortilla wrap, place 1 tortilla on a square/rectangle of aluminium foil, shiny side inwards (in contact with the tortilla). Squish on the mayo, then place the bacon, egg on top and scatter on the mushrooms and cheese.

4) Gather both sides of the tortilla and roll it into a cigar shape. Repeat with the foil, be careful not to roll the foil into your wrap because you don't want to be eating foil! Secure the foil tightly on both ends of the burrito. This is an important step because you don't want the egg and cheese flowing out onto your hands when you eat the burrito!

5) In a 220 deg C preheated oven, grill the burrito for about 5 minutes. Tear (rather than unroll) the foil around the burrito, and hold on tightly to the 'cigar' to reveal its lovely gooey-ness and savour immediately!

Giam cai gai tong (Salted veg chicken soup)

Winter is finally here so it's time to whip out the soups and stews. This is traditionally cooked with duck but that's in short supply for me, so chicken will do. I checked the Internet and found a few recipes, with Noobcook looking the best, so here's my adaptation. I love my rice cooker because it doubles up as a slow cooker. Great because i can pop everything into the pot then forget about it as i go about my vacuuming and mopping and when I'm done, so is dinner!

Ingredients

1.2 kg chicken drumsticks (6 drumsticks)

2 tomatoes, cubed

1 packet of salted veg (xiao bai cai) 250g approx?

1 tbsp minced ginger 

Enough water to cover 

2 carrots, cubed 

Method

1) Wash the salted veg to remove all the brine. I even soaked it for 5 mins just to remove more of the salt, then rinsed it again. I know some other more health conscious recipes soak it for ½ hour but the last time i tried that, there was no taste left at all! Maybe it varies from brand to brand, so to be safe, I tasted the veg to see whether it needed to be soaked longer.

2) Chuck everything into the pot, except the tomatoes. Pour enough water to cover. If I really dug into my Cantonese roots, at this point, I would scald the meat in boiling water and throw that away to remove any blood and other impurities. But since housework awaits, I did the next best thing, which was just to periodically skim off scum and oil. 

3) Slow cook for 1 to 2 hours. You could of course simmer this on the stove at a slow boil for a similar amount of time. 10 minutes from the end, add the tomatoes. Check for seasoning, it's unlikely that the soup will require more salt but you can add pepper.

4) Serve with rice.

Braised soya sauce pork

On my second attempt, success! I adapted the recipes from Here and it seemed to work quite well the difference being that I used the right cut of pork, belly pork instead of shoulder or twee bak, and left the skin on, which made it meltingly gelatinous. Both recipes didn't add tau pok which I consider to be essential. It is important to try to keep the pork belly whole. Altho it takes longer to cook, it keeps the pork moist during cooking.

Ingredients
1kg of belly pork
2 + 5 tbsp light soya sauce
2+ 10 tbsp dark soya sauce
2 tbsp Chinese cooking wine
1 tbsp ginger
1 tbsp garlic
1 tbsp 5 spice powder
5 cloves
4 star anise
1 cinnamon stick (i cheated using 1 tbsp cinnamon powder since I didn't have the stick version)
3 tbsp sugar
1 tau kwa, cubed
1 packet tau pok
6 eggs

Method
1) Marinade pork, preferably overnight, in 2 tbsp each of light soya, dark soya, 1 tbsp sugar and rice wine.
2) Transfer to a pot and put in another 5 tbsp light soya, 10 tbsp dark soya, 2 tbsp sugar and then all the other ingredients. Additional rice wine is optional. Add water, enough to cover.
3) Bring to a boil then simmer and skim off the fat and impurities. Simmer till cooked, approx 20 mins (my AMC pot needs only 10). Add in the tau pok and tau kwa in the last 5 minutes if using. Turn off the flame and let steep for about 45 minutes to absorb the flavours.
4) In another pot, boil the eggs. I bring the eggs up from cold water, eggs out of the fridge, then bring to a boil and turn off. The eggs steep for approx 6 minutes to get the shoyu squidgy egg consistency, but this needs to be peeled very very carefully. Otherwise, hard boiled eggs take about 10 minutes if steeping time, depending on your pot. (Yes, i used AMC again)
5) Add the carefully peeled eggs into the main pot at the same time as the toufu products. If using shoyu egg, only serve it but don't steep it in the sauce, otherwise the salt draws out the moisture and u end up with hard boiled egg, which kinda defeats the purpose and wastes your efforts. If adding in hard boiled eggs, you may need to periodically rotate the egg to get an even coloring.
6) Serve with warm rice.

Everything is still 'bek bek' because it hasn't had time to steep, but you get the idea!

Buttermilk grill pan waffles Mark II

I first tried Jamie Oliver's recipe, which I posted here. However, problem is that I don't have self-raising flour, so I substituted with baking powder. Unfortunately, that equates to 5 tsps of baking power, which as you can imagine, means a whole mouthful of baking soda - not a very pleasant taste. I also thought I'd give HCP a try and while it works, it doesn't have the ridges that grill pans have, so I'd probably go back to using a grill pan. I don't think it's anything wrong with Jamie's recipe but my substitution. Nonetheless, I thought I'd try another recipe.

From this blog who also got the idea from Jamie Oliver, but decided to use her own recipe. Problem is, her recipe uses buttermilk or yoghurt and if I'm going to substitute with things again...who knows what will happen?

From http://www.alwaysorderdessert.com/2012/08/grill-pan-waffles-how-to-make-waffles.html

Mint and honey mustard chicken

I've done a mustard honey recipe before but since I had tonnes of mint in the garden thanks to some fertiliser, insecticide and summer, I thought I might as well put it to good use.

Ingredients

400g chicken thigh, deboned and deskinned, cut into chunks

10 mushrooms, sliced

¼ cabbage sliced thinly (optional because this was in the fridge. U can put in chopped carrots too)

1 handful washed fresh mint leaves

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp grained mustard

2 tbsp honey

3 tbsp soya sauce

1 tbsp corn flour

½ cup water

1 tsp crushed garlic

1 tsp crushed ginger

Method

1) Using a food processor, blitz together the mint, honey, mustard and olive oil into a smooth paste.

2) Pour the marinade over the chicken, and together with the corn starch and soya sauce, mix everything together well. Leave to marinade for at least an hour.

3) In a wok, stir fry the aromatics (garlic and ginger) briefly till aromatic. Be careful not to burn.

4) Drain the chicken and stir fry the chicken till 75% cooked. Add the vegetables and stir fry again till well incorporated.

5) When the vegetables wilt, add the water. When the liquid comes to the boil, turn down to a simmer and cover with a lid. Simmer till cook, approximately 7 minutes.

6) Serve immediately with steamed rice.

5 spice Oxtail stew

I used to eat this quite often as a child. It was always delicious, and one of the best memories of childhood. I don't know the exact childhood recipe, but there is still a little glamour involved in eating  oxtail stew compared to eating plain boring beef stew, and this is the best beef-ish stew I've had in ages!

Ingredients
1kg oxtail (ensure at least one medium sized bone for each person)
250g stewing beef, cubed (there really isn't much meat on the ox tails after removing the bones)
3 bay leaves
1 tbsp black peppers
1 tbsp Szechuan peppers
1 tsp dried rosemary
1 tbsp 5 spice
3 star anise
3 cloves
3 sticks of cinnamon
1 l water
1 can stout (about 475ml)
1 cup flour
½ big onion
1 tsp crushed garlic
1 tsp crushed ginger
8 sticks of celery (sliced)
4 medium carrots (chopped into big cubes)
2 big potatoes or 2 medium ones (chopped into big cubes)
3 tbsp light soya sauce or salt to taste

Method
1) Using a freezer bag, pour in the oxtail, beef and flour and shake to coat.
2) Shake off the excess flour and sauté the beef pieces in a little oil in a screaming hot pan. Don't crowd the pan to ensure that the beef is nicely browned. Put the browned meat in a stewing pot. I prefer to use a slow cooker but it can also cook at a low heat (130 deg C) in the oven.
3) Sauté the onions slowly till caramelised, then add in the ginger and garlic and briefly sauté. Be careful not to burn the garlic. Place in the stewpot. Sauté the vegetables briefly till slightly softened. Pour into the stewpot.
4) Place all the herbs and spices, except the salt, into a stock bag and place it in the pot with the ginger and garlic.
5) Pour in the stout and top up with water to cover everything. Once the liquid comes to a boil, skim off the scum. Leave it it to cook for 6 hours. Periodically open to skim off the scum and oil.
6) 1 hour before it's ready, add the soya sauce. Adding it too early will cause the meat to stop tenderizing.
7) At the end, check for seasoning and serve with rice or crusty bread. If you can wait a day, leaving the stew to steep overnight will let the flavours develop.

Gluten free banana pancakes

Gluten free banana pancakes is a fancy name for banana omelettes. What they are, are essentially just bananas and eggs, hence, flour free and thus, gluten free.

Got the recipe from the internet but although it was touted as being so easy, it really isn't. Easy to prepare maybe, but difficult in cooking. Because there was no flour, it was difficult to turn over compared to pancakes, and i really had to make sure it was slightly more than golden brown before doing so. Because of the high sugar content of the bananas, it needed more oil than normal pancakes, so it meant I had to add oil to my non stick pan after each pancake and clean the pan of burnt sugars.

Difficult to perfect and come out with a flawless pancake that wasn't torn, but the taste is fantastic because it's naturally sweet and texture wise, it literally melts in the mouth.

Ingredients (serves 2)

2 bananas

2 eggs

Dash of cinnamon sugar

Dash of vanilla extract

Method 

1) Mash up the banana in a bowl. Try it get them as mashed up as possible and without as many big lumps as possible.

2) Lightly whisk up the eggs and incorporate into the mashed bananas. Add the cinnamon and vanilla.

3) Lightly oil and heat up a non stick pan and using an ice cream scoop, scoop the mixture into the centre, swirling the pan to get as best as circular shape as u can.

4) You have to be really patient. Start the flame on high and after 2 minutes, turn it down to medium. The smaller and flatter the pancakes (hence, no big banana lumps), the faster it cooks. I test where're it's ready to turn by using my spatula to touch the edges and trying to gently move it. If it's still stuck it's not yet ready to flip. It may need to be more golden brown than you're used to but not a worry, the browning is due to the caramelisation from the sugars in the banana, so it's not really burning, but this is also the reason I turn down the fire so it really won't burn!

5) When the edges shrink back slightly from the pan (about 5 minutes in total) gently use the spatula to slide under the pancake and flip over. Give it another 2 minutes. This is much longer than real pancakes!

6) Before cooking the next pancake, pour on more oil and also scrape away any burnt sugars. This reduces and catching of the next pancake on the pan, and unnecessary burning.

7) Serve with butter and more syrup if preferred.