Szechuan Chicken

This is one of my favorite things to cook for dinner when I forgot to plan or I just don't have a lot of time. It's great because all the ingredients are things that I always have on hand!

Usually I don't really measure and I just kind of wing it, but here is an approximate recipe:

Ingredients

Chicken

Cornstarch

Oil

Garlic

Soy Sauce

White Wine Vinegar (or normal White Vinegar)

Sugar

Water

Green Onions

Cayenne Pepper

Directions

Cut chicken into 1 inch cubes and lightly coat with corn starch

Heat some oil in a frying pan, add minced garlic (I like a lot)

Add chicken and fry until all sides are white

Add soy sauce (I would say for 1 lb of chicken it would be about 3-5 tablespoons)

Add vinegar (for the same amount of chicken 1-2 tablespoons)

Sprinkle with sugar

Add a couple of tablespoons of water. It just depends on how strong of a flavor you want and how runny you want the sauce.

Add diced green onions and cayenne pepper. You can make it as spicy as you want.

Anyways, I know these aren't very good directions, but it's really good so you should try it! Just serve it with some rice, it's delicious!

Scrumptious Seafood Soup

My own creation. Sorta. In Malaysia, there's this soup called Sea cucumber soup, which is expensive and not home-made usually. I love sea cucumber soup so super much and everytime I eat it at the restaurant, I would be paying attention to what ingredients the chefs used. I would try to cook the soup at home, substituting sea cucumber for other seafood, such as crab meat and shrimp. I love it so much I can eat it everyday! Now, let's see you have a try.

Ingredients:

-- 2 sticks of artificial crab meat (usually in a packet, it comes in 8 sticks), chopped finely.

--6 to 8 large shrimps, deveined and peeled, cut into small pieces.

--2-3 shiitake mushroom, soaked in a bowl of water til softened. Then, cut them into small pieces.

--About a cup of ground pork.

--2 cloves of garlic, diced.

--4 cups of water or more depending on how much soup you want to cook

--1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

--1 teaspoon of salt, or more, to taste.

--Some black pepper (optional)

--1 teaspoon of cornstarch with 2 tablespoon of water, mixed.

--1 egg, beaten.

Instructions:

1. Heat the oil on medium-high fire in a non-stick pot.

2. When the oil is warm (put your hand over the pot and if you can feel the heat, it's warm enough), stir in the garlic til they turn slightly brown.

3. Then, stir in the ground pork and stir-fry it til it's no longer pink.

4. Stir in the artificial crab meat, shrimp, and mushroom. Stir fry them for about 30 seconds.

5. Pour in the water and turn the heat up to high.

6. When the soup starts to boil, turn the heat down to medium and pour in the cornstarch mixture. Stir lightly and you will see that the soup has thickened.

7. Pour in the beaten egg and stir immediately and vigorously for a few seconds. Be careful not to spill or burn yourself.

8. Turn off the heat and season the soup with salt and pepper. If you use chicken granule, it's okay too.

Tips: 1. This soup needs your attention almost constantly. You have to be careful of the heat so as to not let the soup boil over. I had to remove my pot from the heat a few times because the soup was boiling over. to prevent that from happening, try cooking it at medium or medium-high fire and not let it boil too long after you pour in the cornstarch mixture.

Feedback and questions are always welcome. Happy Cooking!

Sharon ~

Mapo Tofu

So I tried to write about a dish on my iphone just the other day but for some reason iblogger quit on me and I didn't get to save what I was typing! Sorry for taking so long to blog about the things I cooked recently but I had been quite busy with school and had not been very diligent in cooking. Anyways, I have a few more posts coming up soon.

A couple of years ago I tried cooking a Sze Chuan (a province in China) dish called Mapo Tofu. I failed horribly. The tofu and ground pork turned out tasting pretty nasty for whatever reason I can't recall now. I ended up throwing the whole dish away because just the smell of it was enough to cause nausea. I never tried cooking it ever since, that is, until a few weeks ago I came across the Mapo tofu paste in a chinese shop in Provo, Utah. I decided since my cooking skill has improved since the failed attempt two years ago, I should redeem myself this time.

A couple of days ago, I finally took out the paste sitting in my pantry and used it. I was pretty nervous about it but it turned out to be DELICIOUS! My jaw dropped when I tried a tiny piece of tofu. It was a miracle!! My husband and mother-in-law loved it too.

On the side note, Mapo tofu is a great way to take away the blandness of the tofu. It's so worth the try.

Ingredients:

--A packet of Mapo tofu paste (there are many kinds. It doesn't matter which kind you use).

--A packet of extra firm tofu, drained and cut into 1 inch cubes.

--4 oz or a cup (if you must know the exact measurement, check the converter on the side) of ground pork.

--Some spring onion, chopped.

--A teaspoon of cornstarch with 2 tablespoon of warm water. (If the paste that you buy has already included a small bag of potato starch, then skip this).

--2 teaspoon of vegetable oil/ cooking oil

Instructions:

1. Heat the non-stick pan with the oil on medium-high fire.

2. Stir fry the ground pork til it starts to turn from red to brown.

3. Stir in the tofu and the packet of Mapo Tofu paste.

4. Stir fry for about 3 minutes.

5. Pour in the cornstarch (or potato starch) and stir the mixture.

6. Throw in the spring onion and stir fry for about 30 seconds.

7. When the paste is boiling, remove from heat.

Happy Cooking!! This is a must try!

Onion Beef

This dish I am going to share is one of my tried and true recipes. It's something I would bring to a potluck dinner and get praises from. It's also really easy to make.

All you need to have are (for marination):

--beef, chopped into bite size pieces.

--2 to 3 cloves of garlic, diced.

--1 teaspoon of soy sauce

--half teaspoon of garlic salt, if you don't have it, just use normal salt.

--a few dashes of black pepper

If you can, marinate all of the above items in a bowl overnight. If you are pressed for time, then just dump everything in a bowl, mix them well before you cook it.

You'll also need:

--half of an onion, chopped into small pieces.

--1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

Instructions:

1. Heat a tablespoon of oil in a saucepan on medium high fire.

2. When the oil is warm enough, stir fry the onion til it gets soft and slightly yellow-brown.

3. Dump in the marinated beef and just stir fry til the meat is cooked.

That's it! Very easy and delicious. It should only take about 10 minutes to cook this.

Have fun cooking!

Sharon

Tom Yam Pork and Veal Meatballs with Mushroom

Asian food is my favourite. Therefore, I love creating my own Asian food even though some of the original recipes are Western food. LOL. This dish was supposed to be tossed with creamy mushroom sauce. However, I choose to use Tom Yam. If you love some spicy and sour food, Tom Yam paste is good to go with.

Ingredients:

Pork and Veal Meatballs ( You can find it in Woolworth if you’re in Australia)

Mushrooms

Tom Yam paste (any Asian store)

1/3 cup of water

Chives

Let’s Cook:

1) Cook meatballs on a preheated frying pan with some cooking oil at medium heat until cooked thoroughly.

2) Add the mushrooms when the meatballs turn golden brown.

3) Add the cooked meatballs with Tom Yam paste and the 1/3 cup of water.

4) Make sure to continuously stir until boiling.

5) Top dish with chives and serve.

It is a simple dish. Hope you like it!!

There are many types of TomYam paste. Choose anyone if you don't have your preference.

Enjoy!

Ivy ~

Celery and Shrimp

I love seafood and shrimp is my favorite! I could eat shrimp all my life and not get tired of it. There are so many ways of cooking shrimp and they are all so tasty! Anyways, the recipe I am going to share today is one of my mom's. I used to eat this dish without ever thinking how she cooked it. So I tried really hard today to emulate the same recipe. Of course the taste is not exactly the same but it's close and it's as good :) *If you are allergic to shrimp...sorry!*

What you need:

-- 20 large shrimps, peeled and deveined (you can buy shrimps that are peeled and deveined in most grocery stores)

-- 1 cup of celery, washed and diced

--3 cloves of garlic, chopped

--1 teaspoon of garlic salt (or more if you like it saltier)

--1 teaspoon of corn starch

gravy:

Mix and stir the two items below in a bowl.

--2 cups of water (less if you want the gravy to be thicker)

--1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

Instructions:

1. Heat the saucepan over medium-high fire. Then, pour in the oil.

2. Stir in the garlic after the oil is heated. Fry for roughly 30 seconds.

3. Stir in the celery and fry for 1 minute.

4. Throw the shrimps in. Stir-fry them til the shrimps turn red.

5. Pour in the gravy and keep stirring til the gravy boils.

6. Turn the fire off and season with the garlic salt.

*Serve this dish with steam rice.

Happy cooking!

Sharon

Enjoy longevity!

Hi there,

Chicken and mushroom soup is perhaps one of my favorite food in the whole world. I get the worst case of nostalgia everytime I eat it. Most commonly, our family eat the soup with the Chinese long-life noodles. They go so well together. It's like yin and yang, the perfect harmony.

The reason why the noodles are called long-life noodles is, you guessed it, they are so long and the symbolize longevity. The more authentic ones are super thin, sun-dried, and rolled into coils. The Japanese called them "somen" and they eat them with sauce, not soup. Anyways, the long-life noodles are usually eaten during the Chinese New Year and birthdays. It is a tradition that my family and many other chinese have practiced for years and years. Give it a try, it's scrumptious.

p/s: The Chinese long-life noodles can be bought in China Town and the Japanese "somen" can be bought in most stores that sell Asian Foods.

Ingredients:

--2 pieces of ginger, chopped finely. (If you don't have the real ginger root, use the ground ginger powder--a few dashes of it is sufficient).

--3 boneless chicken fillets/2 boneless chicken breasts-->thawed and cut into bite size pieces or bigger.

--2 big bowls of water/350ml

--4 pieces of shitake mushroom, softened in some water

--1 tablespoon of cooking oil

--1 teaspoon of salt or more (some people like the soup saltier)

--1 coil of long-life noodles (per person)

Instructions:

1. Heat the pot over medium-high fire. Pour the oil into the pot and wait for it to heat.

2. When the oil is heated, turn the fire down to medium. Put in the chopped ginger and stir fry the ginger for roughly 30 seconds.

3. Throw the chicken pieces in and stir fry them for 1 minute.

4. Pour in the water and turn the fire up to high.

5. Throw in the shitake mushrooms.

6. Sprinkle in the soup salt and some MSG(just a tiny bit of MSG will make the soup tastier. It's okay to go without the MSG too.)

7. Wait for the soup to boil.

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8. To cook the long-life noodles, boil a pot of plain water.

9. When the water is boiled, throw in a couple coils of long-life noodle.

10. Let the noodles cook for about 30 seconds. Them, use a fork or chopsticks to separate the noodles.

11. When the noodles is soft, it is ready to be served in a large bowl.

12. Pour in the soup, chicken pieces, and mushroom onto the noodles. Serve hot.

Tips:

1. Don't cook the noodles for too long. When the noodles float to the surface of the water, it is basically ready. The longer you cook, the fatter the noodles get.

2. Most people cook the soup with chinese rice wine (it's more authentic). You can pour in a tablespoon or two of the wine while stir-frying the chicken.

3. For most Chinese food, you have to taste it to see if you have gotten the level of saltiness/taste you like.

4. Eat the chicken pieces with Soy Sauce. It always taste good on plain meat.

Happy Cooking!

Sharon