Steamed Pork Patty With Dried Squid - 鱿鱼蒸肉饼

Growing up, my Mother was a stay-at-home Mom. So almost everyday, we enjoyed delicious home cooked meals. When I grew up, I noticed many people mentioning things like, "my Grandmother makes the best dumplings..", "my Mother makes the best chicken curry.." etc. But many wonderful homecooked recipes were lost because somewhere down the line, the recipe was not learnt, and thus lost forever. Such a waste!

I created a YouTube channel, CoKohKitchen comprising of me recreating my Mother's recipes and also some of my own recipes. Hoping that the trial and errors that we went through would not be lost. Hoping that someone, anyone, would be able to benefit from watching the videos. Maybe, one day, my own children would be able to learn a thing or two from there even if I'm not around.

My brother surprised me by asking me to make this dish for my YouTube channel. I didn't even know that he was subscribed to it. This is such a simple and humble dish that even I had forgotten all about it. But I did remember that it was one of his favourite dish growing up.

So I had to go ask the guru (a.k.a. Mommy) how to cook it. The problem with "Mom's recipes" is that it's always very vague. She can tell you the recipe, but because everything is agar-agar (estimated), it just doesn't turn out the way you want it to be. So a seemingly simple dish took me a few tries to master it, and to finally write it down.

Here are some things to take note for this recipe.

1. Buy big pieces of dried squids.

You can smell them. They should have a strong aroma. Smaller ones doesn't have any flavour. After soaking them, peel off the cuttlebone. This is a bone of the squid. It looks like a long piece of plastic. Use your fingers to feel the squid. If there's a lump in the middle, remove it. It's the eye or beak. Honestly I can't tell. It's tough and not for eating. Gross, I know. Sorry.

2. Pork
For best results, go to a butcher, choose a nice piece of pork belly. I find that meat that is darker pink have better flavour and more tender than the light pink ones. You can decide how fatty or lean you want it to be. At least 40% fats please. Ask your butcher to mince the meat to save you the effort. My Mother would go home and chop up the meat herself. You can do that too. DO NOT buy pre-minced meat. Yup, those packets of minced pork have no flavour and way too lean. The meat patty would turn up super dry and tough. Don't.

3. Always check seasoning
Don't blindly trust how other people season their food. When you are cooking for yourself, always, always check the seasoning. Everybody have different taste, so always under-season, taste it, and then gradually adjust according to your liking.

That said, here is the recipe.

half a piece of dried squid
2 pieces of dried scallop (conpoy)
280g Minced fatty pork
1/4 tsp salt
a dash of pepper
1/2 tsp sugar
1 tsp Chinese cooking wine
a pinch of Chicken powder (optional)
5 tbsp water

1. Rinse the dried squid and dried conpoy and soak it in cool water until it's soft. About 30-40 minutes.
2. Remove the squid bone and eye. Chop the squid and scallop finely.
3. Add chopped seafood into the pork and mix in all the seasoning.
4. Check seasoning by cooking a little of the meat and tasting it.
5. When you are happy with the seasoning, spread out the meat onto a plate and add in the water. (use the water from soaking the squid and scallop)
6. Steam for about 5 minutes.
7. Serve!

For a better understanding, check out the video for this recipe.

Dancing Crab

Wanted to eat something different for a change! Cobby once had a cohesion session with his colleagues at this restaurant, so he brought me here on our date day for lunch. I let him do the ordering and this is our lunch!

Combo Bag #02 - SGD$40.00
300g Prawns, 250g Mussels, 250g Clams,
Potatoes, Corn, Sausages with Dancing Crab Signature Sauce (Mild)

After a short wait, the waitress came with a plastic bag and unceremoniously dumped the contents onto the table!

I've never experience dining like this before. So fun! Disposable aprons and gloves were the only thing else on the table. So it's quite obvious how they want us to eat. All HANDS on deck! Hehehe..

First of all, the seafood was VERY fresh, very sweet and succulent. The crab meat was very meaty and the prawns were so delicious! The sausages in the mix was also surprisingly yummy. The sauce was not like our Singapore style chilli crab. It's more tomato base, herby and spicy! Surprisingly spicy really, and our order wasn't the most spicy choice! Respect! But I'm glad we didn't order one that was too spicy. I don't want the spice to overpower the sweetness of the seafood!

As much as I enjoyed the meal, it feels a little lacking in terms of substance. There were potatoes in the mix but I still don't feel very full after eating. In the end we ordered a serving of truffle fries, which was quite generous in proportion, so I felt better after having some carbs in me.

Overall an enjoyable meal. The combo was delicious but I suggest ordering it with something else to make it a more filling meal.
http://www.dancingcrab.com.sg/

Mother-in-law's Pa Mee version 2

My hubby's dialect is Heng Hwa (兴化), which is a little known sub group of the Hokkien clan. In order not to disrespect their tradition, I would say this is a modified version of their Pa-Mee (打面). They always sing praises of their grandmother's pa-mee, but since their grandmother is no longer around, I can only judge by my Mother-in-law's version of the noodles, which is pretty good. Too bad I can't taste the original version!

I previously did a post of this noodles and here it is. But as the time pass, I tweaked it a little here and there, adding ingredients to pump up the flavour in nutritional factor for my babies. Also, I watched the way my MIL cook this dish and copied accordingly.

Now here is the updated version. Hope you like it, cause I sure do!

Prawn Noodles Soup with Prime Ribs - 虾面排骨汤

I've been "collecting" prawn shells for a couple of weeks now. Each time I cook a prawn dish like my sambal prawn I would keep the shells in a plastic bag and chuck it into the freezer. So when my little freezer compartment is running out of space from all the little bags of shells, I know it's time to try out the prawn noodle recipe! The original recipe is from My Wok Life, but I tweaked it a little here and there.

20 medium – large prawns

Section A
Minimum double the amount of prawn shells and head (the more the merrier!)
50 grams of dried anchovies aka ikan bilis (Chinese translation: 江鱼仔)
2 teaspoon of brown sugar

Section B
300 grams of prime pork ribs
3 cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon of salt
1 star anise (八角)
4 dried cloves (丁香)
1 teaspoon of ground white pepper
5 cups of water (about 1000 – 1200ml)

Seasoning
1 tablespoon of dark soy sauce
3 tablespoons of light soy sauce

yellow noodles, kway teow
Kangkong vegetables, bean sprout and sliced fish cakes (optional)

Garnish:
Fried shallot
Fresh chillies, julienned

TO MAKE THE SOUP
1. To make the pork ribs nice and tender, boil Section B for about 30mins.
2. While the ribs are cooking, stir fry Section A with a tiny bit of oil in a deep wok. Alot of juices would come out of the shells. Just keep tossing them until they are fragrant and all the juices have dried up.
3. Pour everything in the wok into the ribs soup. There will be a layer of dried up prawn juices coated on the wok. That where all the flavours are so don't waste it! Ladle some pork rib soup back into the wok, stir the wok clean and pour the liquid back into the pot of pork and shell soup.
4. Boil the pot of soup. I use a pressure cooker, so 45mins to and hour would be fine. For regular pots, boil the soup for at least 1-2 hours in low heat. Make sure the soup don't dry out.
5. When the soup is done, season the soup accordingly. It's ok to over season just a little because the noodles are bland. Blanch the prawns in the ready soup and set aside for later use.

Assembly!
1. Blanch the preferred amount of noodles and vegetables in a pot of boiling water and put into a waiting bowl.
2. Add other ingredients like prawns and fish cakes and pork ribs.
3. Ladle soup from the pot and pour into bowl through a sieve to catch any shells.
4. Garnish with fried shallots, garlic and fresh cut chillies!

Cereal Butter Prawns 麦片虾

I have to say this is one of those dish that I'm very proud of. I guess cereal butter prawns is the kind of dish you would pay to enjoy at a restaurant and never imagine that you could do it in your very own kitchen.

I just happened to have a can of Nestum All Family Cereal at home. I add it to my hot drink sometimes during tea break, but I was taking so long to finish the can so I thought I use it for cooking too. Cereal Butter Prawn was the first (and only) dish I can think of! There are plenty of websites teaching this dish but I chose a YouTube video of the popular "auntie" day time talk show, 黄金年华, cooked by a popular tze char restaurant chef.

The recipe was surprisingly simple, and I'm sure anyone can do it at home.

(A)
8pcs of Prawns, trimmed and butterfly-ed
1 tbsp plain flour
1/2 a beaten egg

(B)
3 tbsp Butter
Curry leaves (a few pcs)
Chilli padi (2-3 pcs, cut) (I didn't add due to my child)

(C)
100g Cereal
2 tbsp Icing sugar
2 tbsp Milk powder
1 tsp MSG (I use chicken stock powder)

1. Mix (A) together and deep fry in hot oil until the prawns are cooked and golden. Drain and set aside.
2. Using low heat, (B) melt butter in wok and add in chilli and curry leaves.
3. Mix (C) together and stir fry in butter mixture. Stir frying constantly as cereal mix will burn easily.
4. When cereal mix has turned slightly brown, which only takes a minute or two, switch off the fire and reintroduce the prawn to the cereal. Toss the prawns to coat it with the crispy yummy cereal and serve immediately.