The Not-Stupid Instant Noodle

I used to eat a lot of instant noodle especially when I was in school and uni. Back then, we dont have kitchen so instant noodle was usually made using boiled water poured into a tupperware or something with no other ingredients thus I called it mee bodoh (stupid noodle). heheh.

I do still like to eat instant noodle and my fav brand would be maggi mee. Be it chicken flavor or curry or assam laksa. Unfortunately the asian store that I usually frequent dont carry that brand so I just settled with the regular ramen noodle. :(

Speaking of chicken flavor maggi mee, I would crack and egg and eat it with tomato sos (ketchup) but I hardly do that anymore here since the taste of the ketshup is not the same as maggi tomato sos. if there's anything that Im particular about, it would be the tomato sos (maggi), chili sos (lingham) and sweet soy sos (habhal). Of all 3, only 1 is available here that is lingham chili sos.

Geez, do I ramble a lot today or what? lol. I think im in a wrong blog. Should have rambled on the other side. ;) But then again, there's no recipe for this not-stupid noodle. As you can clearly see from the pic, I just add an egg and some vegies into my noodle and cut chili with soy sauce on the side.

How do you enjoy your instant noodle?

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Butter Prawns Recipe

I love butter prawn but never knew how to make them. That is until My Kitchen Snippet post it on her blog and boy was I happy! If only I had known how easy it is to make them much much earlier, I could have impressed my mom with my cooking talent. lol!

Here is my version of the recipe which I mostly just copy and paste with a little bit of different ingredients since I used whatever was available in my fridge and I add/subtract stuff that I like to have more/less.

500gm fresh prawns

3 tbsp corn flour

2 tbsp butter

1/2 can evaporated milk (I didn have any so i used 1/4 cup milk instead)

1 cloves of garlic - chopped

2 sprigs curry leaves (whc was given to me by Gert! tq dear!)

1-2 tsp chopped chilli

1 tsp sugar

Salt and pepper to taste

1. Coat the prawns with cornflour. In a pan of hot oil, stir fry the prawns till it turned pink in colour. Dish up and set aside.

2. Melt butter in a pan. Stir fry garlic until lightly brown. Add in the milk.

3. Stir fry till it dries up and formed granules.

4. Then add in sugar, salt and pepper, curry leaves and chilli and fry till fragrant.

5. Add in prawns and mixed well.

I made these twice and used 2 different pan. 1st with non-stick pan while the 2nd time with stainless steel. The result? Well, Using non-stick pan is so much easier and the milk when its drying up dont stick to the pan unlike using stainless stain. So, if you have non-stick pan, use it when you want to make butter prawn. The picture is off the 1st batch.

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Roti John

Roti John is basically meat sauce on rolls. Roti means bread in Malay. Please dont ask me why its called Roti John though. lol. Its something that you could get from the street vendor just like the Ramly burger stalls back in Malaysia. The first and only time I made this was when my friends and I went to Port Dickson for a weekend. We went for 1 night but being kiasu, we bought enough food to last for at least 4 days. There were so much food left especially burger meat, buns/rolls, eggs and etc. that's when I decided to make Roti John myself.

This recipe however, is using the leftover spaghetti sauce. Very simple and easy to make yet very filling and good. If I may say so myself. Thank you! ;)

Roti John

Leftover spaghetti sauce (depending on how many rolls you're making)

1 egg (to be used with up to 2 rolls)

Salt and pepper to taste - optional

6-in roll (i used hotdog bun)

1. In a bowl, mix the spaghetti sauce and egg. Add salt and pepper to taste.

2. Heat a pan on medium high with a little bit of butter and pour the mix into the shape of the rolls. 10-15sec

3. Place the roll on top of the sauce. If the sauce keeps 'running', use a spatula to slowly push it under the rolls. 2-3min.

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Satay

1-1.5lb boneless and skinless chicken breast (cubed & thinly sliced abt an inch sq)

6in ginger

10 shallot

10 cloves garlic

1/2 medium size onion

1/4-1/3 cup cardamom seeds

4-5 sticks lemongrass

1/4 cup sugar

1.5 tblspoon salt

2 tblspoon honey

4 tablspoon vege oil

2-3 tblspoon turmeric powder

Wooden skewer

1. Blend all the ingredients well and marinate the chicken for at least overnight.

2. Thread 3-4 pieces of chicken on each skewer

3. Start grilling

Note :

1. Soak the wooden skewer for about 20-30min before using.

2. When grilling, keep basting each side with a mix of oil and honey using the end of a lemongrass stalk. Just pound the end a little bit to get that 'brush' look.

3. The best way to grill satay is of course to use the charcoal grill. Nothing beats that. But if you're like me where charcoal grilling is considered an 'open-buring' thus deemed unsafe, electric or gas grill is the next best thing.

4. Use medium heat when grilling or else you will get uncooked meat in the middle.

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Clam Fettucine with Wine Sauce

1/2lb clams

2in ginger - thinly sliced

1 tablespoon olive oil

1.5 cup white wine

1/2 cup water

Tomato - cubed

Salt, pepper & sugar

Cooked fettucine

1. Sauteed the thinly sliced ginger with some olive oil, add abt 1.5 cup of white wine and half-cup water until it boils.

2. Add the clam and cubed tomatos, cover for about 3-4min. Uncover, add salt, sugar and pepper to taste and stir for another 1-2min.

3. Pour on top of cooked fettuccine.

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Sweet & Sour Tilapia

Sweet and sour is basically the easiest cooking style you can make. It is great with chicken, beef, seafood or even eggs.

I usually use tilapia since it's the only whole fish that I can find at the regular supermarket. For other kind of fish, I would have to go to the asian store.

Sweet & Sour Tilapia

1 whole tilapia (for easier frying, cut it into 2 pieces)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon turmeric

vege oil for deep frying

For the sauce:

2 shallots

1-2 garlic

1" ginger

1/2 medium onion (sliced abt 1/2cm thick)

1 red chili (sliced)

1 large tomato, quartered (I used 5-7 grape tomatoes)

1/4 cup ketchup

2 tablespoon vege oil

1/3 cup water

1 tablespoon flour for thickening (optional)

Salt and sugar to taste

Scallion (for garnishing)

1. Covered the fish with salt and turmeric and deep fry it. If you dont have a fryer, use a wok or deep pan. Once its brown, leave it aside.

2. Thinly sliced shallot,garlic and ginger or pound using mortar and pestle.

3. In a pan, heat the oil with medium heat and sauteed the shallot, garlic and ginger. (abt 1min)

4. Add the water, ketchup, salt and sugar. Turn the heat up to medium-high. Stir. (2min)

5. If the gravy looks diluted, mix the flour (or cornstarch) with a little bit of water and add to the gravy. Continue stirring.

6. Add the rest of the ingredients and taste.

7. You can either add the fish into the gravy or pour the gravy onto the fish on a plate. Garnish with the chopped scallion.

8. Served with a plate of warm white rice.

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Beef Briyani

Briyani is among the food that can be eaten for lunch and/or dinner. Its primarily a South Asian dish made from a mixture of spices. that is according to wikipedia. Malaysia being a multi-cultural, multi-racial and all kind of multi is blessed to have this as one of our staple meals. ;) It is not that cheap though if you compare it to let say, Nasi Lemak or Char Keoy Teow. 4 years ago, a plate of briyani rice with a piece of chicken, 1 papadom and cucumber salad cost RM8-9 (USD2.5-2.8) while you can get NL or CKT for around RM4-5 (USD1.25-1.6). I think that is because for briyani, you must use basmati rice which is pretty expensive in Malaysia.

My personal favourite briyani joint back home would definitely be Restaurant Mahbub in Bangsar, KL. Like any other briyani places, they have varieties of dishes to go with the briyani rice which is just plain (no meat) from varieties of chicken to beef to mutton to seafood.

For a creature of habit like me, everytime I go, my choice would always be briyani rice with honey chicken (theirs is just to die for!), papadum, cut green chili and extra sauce! I have posted Malay Chicken Briyani in my previous post so now I am posting the beef version. (according to me, of course!). The real briyani required the using of yogurt but since we hardly have any at home, I just dont use it and they still turned out good.

Beef Briyani

1 cup basmati rice (rinsed)

1 3/4 cup water
Salt and sugar to taste

2 tablespoon ghee oil (or vegetable oil)
Half of an onion & 2" ginger (finely chopped)
4 spices - 3 cardamom seed, 1" cinnamon stick, 2 star anise seed, 3-4 cloves (rinsed)
1/4-1/2 lb beef (cubed then thinly sliced/cut)

2 tablespoon shan's beef briyani mix (they're pretty spicy so dont go crazy over the amount ok?)

1. Marinate the meat with the briyani mix for at least half an hour.
2. Heat up the ghee oil in a pot and add the 4-spices until aromatic.
3. Add in the chopped onion & garlic and meat. Keep stirring for about 3-4min.
4. Add the rice, water, salt and sugar. Stir and let it boil.

5. Cover and simmer for 25-27min.
6. Served hot, garnish with fried shallot/onion

p.s. The pictures showed how I normally enjoy my briyani. Not shown is a dash of sweet soy sauce (kicap manis). Yes, I admit that im such a soy sauce addict. lol!

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Fluffy Cream Puff

Feast your eyes with the pictures for now. I will come back for the recipe ok?

As promised yesterday, here is the recipe taken from allrecipes.com and joyofbaking.com.

Fluffy Cream Puff

1/2 cup butter (1 stick)

1 cup water

1 cup flour

4 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Filling

1 box (1.34oz / 38g) instant vanilla pudding mix

1 cup heavy whipping cream

1/2 cup cold milk

Preheat oven to 425F

1. Prepare the filling according to the box. Let it chilled in the fridge.

2. Boil water and butter on medium heat.

3. Stir in flour and salt until misture forms a ball.

4. Transfer to a mixing bowl and using the electric mixer, beat in eggs for 2-3 min.

5. Line baking sheet with parchment paper

6. Spoon 12 mounds of dough onto the sheet. I used a heap spoonful and place them 2in apart.

7. Bake them for 20min.

8. Take them out and using a toothpick, poke a small hole on the side to let the steam off and prevent deflation.

For the filling, you can either split and fill them with the pudding mixture or piped it in using the piping bag. As you can see from the pictures, I piped it in for easier storage and its also easier to eat. ;)

To serve, just dust some confectioners (powdered) sugar and enjoy!

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