Chicken in caramel sauce
…while the Japanese teriyaki and the Vietnamese chicken in caramel sauce may appear similar, and even taste somewhat similar to the untrained diner, two dishes cannot be more unlike. While both have that sweet-salty flavor, Japanese teriyaki is sweetened with sake and mirin and salted with soy sauce, the Vietnamese chicken caramel is sweetened with sugar and salted with fish sauce. The only thing they have in common is the ginger.
Continue reading 'Chicken in caramel sauce' »
Asian coleslaw
The inspiration is from Videojug. I always thought that ALL THAT OLIVE OIL was necessary to make raw vegetables edible but it seems not. As long as the combination of vegetables is right and the dressing is good, a salad can be a wonderful thing. I modified the Videojug recipe, of course, to suit my preferences. Instead of white cabbage, I used Chinese cabbage (pechay baguio). I also changed the sugar-vinegar ratio in the dressing to 1:1.
Continue reading 'Asian coleslaw' »
Udon for breakfast
I rarely eat breakfast. I usually take two cups of coffee in the morning then eat somewhere between 9 and 10 which qualifies my first meal as brunch. One day last week when the kids’ packed school lunch consisted of stir-fried pork and vegetables, I decided that my brunch would be udon. I boiled some udon, tossed them with what was left of the stir fried dish and the result is what you see in the photo.
Continue reading 'Udon for breakfast' »
Chicken fillets with hoisin sauce
The original Chinese recipe is called Szechuan (Sichuan) Pork, so named probably because one of the primary ingredients of the dish is Sichuan peppercorns. I’ve used the same basic recipe on pork, fish and chicken and they were all good. I have to warn you though that I never used Sichuan peppercorns because I have not discovered where I can buy them.
Continue reading 'Chicken fillets with hoisin sauce' »
Fish egg soup with lemongrass and galangal
This is a simplified version of the Thai Tom Yam Kai Pa. By simplified, I mean I did not have some of the traditional ingredients so I just omitted them. I don’t know how much difference the omission of kaffir leaves and pickled bamboo made but my fish egg soup turned out very well — spicy, citrusy and, with the sprinkling of cilantro just before serving, wonderfully aromatic.
Continue reading 'Fish egg soup with lemongrass and galangal' »
Fish belly with black beans and chili
I wish I can write a decent introduction for this dish but it has a very short history — it’s a four-hour-old recipe. I can’t give it any lineage either since I am not sure if it’s Chinese, Malaysian, Singaporean, Thai, Indonesian or Filipino. For sure it would fall under the generic label of Southeast Asian cooking since all the ingredients are native to Southeast Asia.
Continue reading 'Fish belly with black beans and chili' »
Cold soba noodles
Originating from Japan, soba noodles are made with buckwheat flour. According to Wikipedia, because buckwheat easily falls apart when boiled, soba noodles often contain binders, usually wheat flour, but must contain at least 30% buckwheat flour to pass Japanese government standards.
Continue reading 'Cold soba noodles' »
Chicken satay
We were supposed to host a barbecue yesterday but our intended guests begged off at the last minute leaving us with a lot of chicken, pork and cocktail drink mixers. No problem. We mixed the drinks anyway, had our fill of Margaritas in our new Margarita glasses last night, and then we grilled the pork teriyaki and chicken satay for dinner tonight. In short, we cooked everything that we intended for the barbecue, including a large bowl of chicken and potato salad.
Continue reading 'Chicken satay' »
