Dill Roasted Double Meat Strips with Buttered Brocolli Mash

In order to create a sense of sequence running in according to the festivals and special occasions, I really wanted to wait till all my pictures on my mooncake baking last week to come to me before I started to post again on my blog. However, it seems to be taking forever for my to get my hands on all of them. Hence I resorted to start straight away and leave that mooncake post to some other time, yet again, like last time.

Anyway, to start off again, I attempted to make a dish with two leftover meat in the fridge with a newly bought herb - dill seeds. This is the first time I have tried using dill and I really did not imagine how it would have tasted like, or look like, for that matter. The end result? Everyone was satisfied, they commented that the taste of dill was really mild, but its presence (smell) was undeniable, there was this mild flavour oozing out of the meat strips in every bite of it, so mild that as if it didn't exist, but when you get your mind over it, you suddenly realize, hey, that's not right, there is this special taste which is definitely not the taste of meat! That is how it is like, I tried my best to describe it, anyway, give it a try!

Ingredients:

about 300g of stir-fry pork and chicken breast fillet each, 2tbsp dark soy sauce, 2 tbsp oyster sauce, 1tbsp light soy sauce, 2 tbsp brown sugar, 1/2 cup Chinese shao xing cooking wine (or any sweet red wine, consider cherry), 5 garlic cloves, 1 tbsp vegetable oil, sea salt and pepper to taste, about 8 Shitake mushrooms (use more if desired), 3 tbsp dill seeds (lightly roasted), 1 broccoli, 2 tbsp butter.

Method:
1. Marinate the meat fillets and sliced mushroom with 2 tbsp of dill seeds, light and dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, wine, oil, sugar and salt and pepper for at least 15 minutes.
2. Roast 1/2 tbsp dill seeds in saucepan, melt butter together in the pan. On the other hand, steam the broccoli in a steamer until soft, mash the broccoli (or use a food blender for a finer texture) and add in the melted butter, mix well.
3. Roast the marinated ingredients for 40 minutes in a preheated oven at 220 degrees Celsius. Remove in between to turn the ingredients once. Done, remove from oven to cool before serving.
4. Lay meat on top of mashed broccoli, sprinkle with remaining roasted dill seeds.

Tags: Dill, Pork, Chicken Breast Fillet, Meat Strips, Broccoli, Mash, Butter

Cucumber Salad with Sweet and Sour Thai Chili Dressing

I've just installed Picasa 3 and found that it's collage feature has improved a lot since the last version (Picasa 2), it's simply amazing! With this I can post images which in unconventional ways, particularly refering to blogger.com's limited image features. =p

Anyway, done with the images and on with the dish, I tried another wild mix last night and the results were quite good, I thought that the flavour could be stronger, either by adding more sweetness or more of the sesame oil flavour, I'll definitely give it another try to enhance the flavours, but for now, I think it is quite presentable, at least my housemates like it. =)

Ingredients
1kg of fresh cucumber (thinly sliced using a skin peeler knife, soaked in cold water)
25g of seaweeds (soaked and rinsed thoroughly)
1 carrot (finely chopped)
2 stems celery (finely chopped, salted and leave aside)
3 cloves garlic (finely chopped)
3 tbsp sesame seeds (lightly toasted)
2 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsp sesame oil
2 tbsp sesame oil
1 tbsp sugar
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 tbsp lemon juice
generous amount of Thai chili sauce

1) Alright, it is nothing close to hard at all, when you are done preparing the cucumber, carrot and celery and toasted the sesame seeds, it is just a matter of mixing up the stuff.

2) On a heated dry wok, lightly toast the seaweed, add sugar and pepper to eliminate the fishy-smell. Add oil, stir in garlic and stir fry for a couple of minutes until fragrant. Stir in carrots and stir fry for another 3 minutes.

3) Turn to low heat, add celery and mix well, add salt and pepper to taste, followed by sesame oil and lemon juice. Done.

4) Set cucumber strips on plate, top with mixed ingredients, splash Thai sweet chili sauce generously on top, sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds, mix well before serving warm or cold.

Tags: Cucumber, Thai Chili, Salad

Sweet Potato and Basil Curry

The lazy gets lazier! Here is another lazy cook's dish with the standards and taste at a guaranteed excellence! lol Thanks again to the stockpile of sweet potato earlier from the week, this is yet another example of innovation with whatever that is available. Hahaha Alright, done with the self-praising, let's get into making the dish.

Ingredients to start off with: heaps of sweet potatoes (cut into medium-large chunks), tandoori curry paste (or any curry paste that you like, and can be purchased from the Asian stores, feel free to pull together your own mix of herbs to make the curry, it is something I often do myself), 1 large Spanish red onion (finely chopped), 1 can tomato puree, about 400g (again you can dice your own tomatoes, but I am trying to make things easier for lazy cooks), 3 cloves garlic (finely chopped), 1/2 cup milk (can use coconut milk or yogurt, anything goes). 2 tbsp vegetable oil, 3 stems of basil leafs (take the leafs only, coarsely chopped), salt and pepper to taste.

Method: Start of by heating oil in a wok or pot, add in the chopped garlic and onions and stir fry until fragrant, add some sugar and salt to brown the onions. Add the curry paste and tomato puree, mix well and bring to boil. Stir in the milk, bring to boil again before adding the sweet potato chunks. Add water to cover the sweet potatoes, turn to medium-high heat and braise with closed lid for 10-20 minutes or until the sweet potatoes are soft enough (to own preference). Remove lid, season to preferred taste, turn off heat, stir in basil leafs, leave to sit for a couple of minutes prior to serving. There's saying that curries taste better after sitting overnights, the same applies here if you plan to keep the dish for another day.

Serve with rice, noodle or pasta, just beware of the carbohydrate intake! lol

Roasted Sweet Potato Salad

We had a stockpile of sweet potato earlier this week and I thought it was too common to just roast the sweet potato and eat it as it is (though it is delicious). Hence I figured this salad to put the dish into our dinner's menu.

Ingredients
Heaps of sweet potato (cleaned and coarsely chopped into medium-large chunks)
2 stems of fresh celery (finely chopped)
5 tbsp of golden syrup
4 tbsp mayonnaise
dash of hot paprika or chili powder
shredded mozzarella cheese (as much as you like!)
salt and pepper to taste
lemon juice

Method
1. Roast the sweet potato in a preheated oven for at least 45 minutes at 240 degrees Celsius. Meanwhile, prepare the celery and rinse in cold water until use. After the first round of roasting, remove sweet potato from oven, leave to rest for a while, add the golden syrup and mix well using spoons. Roast for another 10-15 minutes or until the sweet potatoes are really soft. The golden syrup should give the sweet potatoes a light coat of crust.

2. Upon removal from oven, mix all the ingredients together and the dish is ready to serve. This is important as the cheese needs the heat from the sweet potato to be melted.

Tags: Sweet potato, Salad, Mozzarella Cheese, Roast

Pumpkin and Cumin Seeds Stew

This is a dish that I should have published by the end of last month, but as usual, laziness is king...lol At times, laziness takes over in cooking as well, so basically you can label this dish a 'lazy' dish as well. Simple steps with simple ingredients, at least from my point of view XD.

Ingredients
1/4 of Pumpkin, coarsely chopped into chunks
250g minced pork (other mince is fine as well)
about 5 stems of garlic sprouts (cut to desired lengths)
4 cloves garlic(finely chopped)
3 tbsp vegetable oil
about 4 tbsp of cumin seeds

Seasoning
light soy sauce
Thai sweet chili sauce
chili or paprika powder
salt and pepper to taste
oyster sauce
Brown sugar

Method
1. Heat oil in a wok or pot, stir fry the chopped garlic until fragrant, stir in 2tbsp of cumin seeds and 2 tbsp chili powder, sautee until the cumin seed's flavour is released, add minced pork at this point, followed by light soy sauce, salt and pepper to taste, continue to stir fry until the minced pork turns brown.

2. Stir in the pumpkin chunks, mix well, add water to cover the pumpkin, close with lid and bring to boil. Remove lid upon boiling, mix well and check if the pumpkin chunks have to started to soften, add 2 tbsp of oyster sauce, 1tbsp of sugar and another round of light soy sauce, salt and pepper to taste. Close lid, turn to medium heat and braise for about 10-15 minutes.

3. Remove lid, pumpkin should be soft by now, otherwise continue to braise. Turn to high heat, add chopped garlic sprouts and stir fry for another 3-5 minutes. Done.

4. Turn off heat, stir in 2-3tbsp That sweet chili sauce, toast the remaining cumin seeds prior to sprinkling on top of dish. Serve hot or warm.

Tags: Pumpkin, Cumin seeds, stew, pork, garlic sprouts

Crunchy Lettuce Seaweed Salad

A few days back I was trying to make something new out of one the most common vegetables available, the easiest way is obviously to stir-fry the Chinese way, but I think you'll just get sick of it when you have too much of it, or too much of anything for that matter. Anyway, this was what I came out with, an experiment with some corriander powder I found from the storage cabinet and sort of fusion of East and West, as always. lol

Ingredients:
1 whole iceberg lettuce (rinsed and cleaned thoroughly, roughly chop and leave aside to dry)
25g of finely sliced seaweed (rinse and clean thoroughly leave aside to dry)
3 tbsp white sesame (lightly toasted and set aside)
4 cloves garlic (finely chopped)
3 tbsp cooking oil
3 tbsp corriander powder
1 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp dark vinegar
salt and pepper to taste

Method:
1. Heat oil in a wok, add in chopped garlic and stir fry till fragrant, stir in the sliced seaweed at this point, stir-fry for another 3 minutes.
2. Add all the seasoning, give the ingredients a good mix, add some water to dilute the gravy (around 1/2 to 1 cup of water), bring to boil and turn to lowest heat.
3. Stir in the chopped lettuce and mix the ingredients, adding water bit by bit if it turns out too dry. Turn off heat, stir in the toasted sesame as well, done, serve warm or cold.

Whacky Pumpkin Curry Pasta

Yesterday's nice-sunny Sunday was spent with Connie as she wanted to learn something to make for her other friends on the coming week. That said, the whole cooking experience began from buying the ingredients itself. We had to walk our way up to Randwick to get the ingredients, though I think that with the final product, the ingredients could have all been bought around Kingsford area. Anyway, not that I'm complaining as Connie's a good company. By the time we got back to her place, it was already 2pm, far behind schedule as we spent too much time hovering around, hence we had to pull a quickie before it gets too late and the meal end up as a dinner instead. So quickly, we manage to pull the dish off in 45, faster than I thought as I was expecting no less than an hour, but the outcome was pretty good as well...

This time around I decided to throw a bit of West into a wholesome of East, i.e. the pasta base with the Thai curry, which was really aromatic, I should have remembered the brand though, so that everyone else can get their hands on it. Anyway here are the ingredients:

300-500g pasta (any type will do, boil in water until desired softness)
1 large red Spanish onion (finely chopped)
3 cloves garlic (finely chopped)
50g shitake mushroom (chopped, rinsed, seasoned with sugar, salt and dry Basil)
about 300-500g pumpkin (any type will do, you can use butternut as well, coarsely chopped)
2tbsp Thai red hot curry paste (or more for those spice fans, you can use panang curry or yellow curry as well)
about 300g small washed potatoes
200g of tuna flakes
100g of diced tomatoes (just use the canned ones for those who are lazy, they come with the tomato sauce as well)
5tbsp vegetable oil
about 1 cup of milk (you can use coconut milk as well)
grated Parmasen cheese for finishing
salt and pepper to taste
half a bunch of Australian corriander (or use any herb that you like, basil and curry leafs are good options as well)

The methodology is simple, it's like making a curry dish, but add in more of the tomato to make it more subtle. Start of by poaching the chopped pumpkin and potatoes in salted water until the pumpkin are soft and tender, the potatoes will be further cooked in the curry later, so don't worry about them.
Meanwhile, dry-fry (or called toast) the chopped onions and shitake mushroom on a medium-high heat, add in sugar and salt when the ingredients start to dry, followed by vegetable oil and turning to high heat, saute for about 5 minutes or until the onions start to brown. Add in the garlic, saute until fragrant and add in curry paste, followed by diced tomato and half a cup of milk, mix well and simmer until it boils.

Add in the half-poached potatoes and the remaining milk upon boiling, leave to simmer. Meanwhile, mash the poached pumpkin evenly add some salt and pepper to taste. Done with that, add in the tuna flakes into the sauce and mix well, add seasoning to taste and bring to boil again on medium-low heat, add in the mashed pumpkin at last (so that much of the sweetness is retained), turn to low-heat and mix well. Done, serve with pasta, coarsely chopped herbs and finish off with grated Parmesan cheese.

Last note, feel free to add more water to make the sauce more diluted than the dry-pasty version that I like, and you could also substitute the tuna flakes with any other meat, preferably of stronger aroma, like minced beef or pork, or even herb-seasoned sausages, but make sure to pre-roast them to intensify the flavours.