Cookout! and other late posts.

This is a retrospective post on 2 events: making bread & butter pudding and our last cookout.

Bread and Butter:

The original recipe was for 6, but i did a half-recipe as a tester, and split it into 4 ramekins. This was the last ramekin! I think the pointy-tipped presentation is a winner, and the crunch when you bite into it is a delightful textural contrast to the rich, soft custard. The marmalade glaze could've been done better though, but i didnt' have my blowtorch with me. Next time i'll use better quality marmalade, and caramelise it into a crust.

Cookout!

Wang has already taken it upon himself to post pictures of my kitchen, so i'll not describe that. The cookout was totally impromptu - Wang was to come over to take photos of the pudding, and i decided an hour before that to try out a recipe that has been sitting in my mind for ages.

Pork belly in 3 different ways!

First, i cut the pork belly into thick slices. I was going to cut it into thin slices after that, but the plan backfired - it's near impossible to cut thawed meat properly (with my limited skills). After that, i soaked the meat in brine (salt, brown sugar, pepper, cumin, cinnamon). The brine was a success - the meat was soft, moist and flavourful.

After that, i planned to sear it, and make an apple sauce to go with it. There's something about rich, fatty pork and tart, sweet apples that is really good. Anyway, at this point in time, Chin arrived, to show the newbies how it's done.

First, he caramelised the apples on high heat, then he added more butter and sugar. He asked for cream, but all i had was milk. As a substitute, he used more butter and milk. The end product:

Sweet, tart rich goodness, without the heaviness!

The first slice of pork belly was cut into strips and panfried. The pan was degreased and a red-wine sauce made with the fond. Good stuff.

The second slice I browned off, and sauted. The apple sauce was drizzled over, and we fussed about presentation for ages.

The first plate:

Plain and unappealing.

This just wouldn't do. Chin rearranged the plate, and squared off the piece of pork. Second plate:

More colour and variety.

Just for kicks, we did it a third way:

A more conventional plating.

We agreed though, that the dish needs more colour and more vibrancy. There were a lot of yellows and browns, and not enough variation in colour to make it very appealing to eat. Texture-wise, the crunch of the bed of raw apples was a nice contrast to the chewy, moist pork, and the soft sweetness of the caramelised apples. The basil was sadly non-functional though.

The last piece of pork will stew in obscurity, for there are no pictures, and no more mention will be made of it.



Until next time,
T.

Manly Men acquire cave painting tool!

Or at least its modern equivalent.

I went through my cupboard the other day. Wow. The stuff in there was interesting. However, most interestingly, I have found a digital camera! =D So finally manly men will have pictorial documentation of adventures. It's a very old lumix, so I apologise for the rather crappy quality of the images...



So this is post-As notes pile. It looks deceptively little, but my shelf is rather deep and the actual amount notes I have are about twice as much.



I found my digital camera here! It was hiding in the PSU box. Massive book on the layer above is my SATs book.

Okay enough frivalous photos. I present to you my humble little kitchen:

This is my cooking area. Unbelievably small and claustrophobic.



By comparison, this is Terence's cooking area. His stove has a non-existent gradient function. It is either a hot enough to boil a monkey's bum, or off.



This is my fridge. It is incredibly empty, both because I eat so much and because my grandparents have gone back to China and so we are not cooking in the epic proportions they used to any more.

Being a typical Chinese household, we have our own little store of secret dried herbs and spices that can resuscitate a dying cow if necessary. Now, never before seen images of Wang's private store of secret ingredients, taken at the risk of ninjas sent by the Family slipping Eno into my drink. =D Another story for another day.



Rather messy =S But speaking of messy, one more frivolous photo, this time of my table. Haha i am seriously untidy.



I am rather spartan and surprisingly quite organised when it comes to my cooking area though. Partially because it is amazingly empty too. =S We cook and make do with just about anything we lay our hands on at home. Consequently, my ingredients area is extremely small and very poorly stocked. That also means every time I have food project I end up doing quite a lot of shopping because I usually do not have anything at all.



Hahaha. So that is it. A simple introduction to my cosy and rather claustrophobic working space =)

Peace,
Photography Meister Wang

Guilt trip

I feel rather embarrassed. My postmortem of the feast lies festering in the edit bin like an overcooked beef stew that's been on the boiler for the last 2 months. It's unbelievably repulsive and starting to smell. So I don't know. Should I go back to it? It's like watching a really bad movie. You start it but you really can't be bothered to finish it. Yet, some time later, you regret not finishing it and you feel like going back to it again, but you know it will be torturous and uncomfortable going through it again. Am I making any sense at all?

At this point, I am feeling rather incompetent. So I shall not try anything adventurous. But I do feel obliged to share the following rant. I feel that for all our cooking adventures, the one thing we have failed to cover adequately is Chinese. I watched a television programmed where they talked very intelligently about how the Chinese, in China especially, are distancing themselves from their culture. Universities have taken a very western interpretation of art and literature, which is lamentable, really. I feel rather strongly about it, but that is really not relevant here. So, I shall try to fight back in my own little way, by dedicating the next series of posts to Chinese cuisine, from the exquisite delicacies of an Imperial Palace, to the simple peasant's dish that our grandfathers and grandmothers enjoyed.

Chinese cooking is fundamentally very different from the western style of cooking, in much the same as Chinese dining is different. The two main differences are variety and dish structure. You know what they say about us Chinese. If it has limbs and moves, we will eat it. And we will not just eat any part of it, we must eat the whole damn thing, or we shall feel an inexplicable sense of regret. Thus while various cuisines from other parts of the world may show a specificity to the produce of the native region and at most a few of its neighbours, Chinese cuisine is far more varied in scope. The point is not that the Chinese have had more exposure to variety. Rather it reflects the remarkable adaptability of our style of cooking.

On the second point, Chinese dish structure reflects the fact that Chinese cooking is and always has been a communal thing, as compared to many Western traditions. This difference is manifested in both senses of the word, in the structure of the plates and literally, dishes used to present the food, and the structure of each individual menu item. In terms of the cutlery and utensils, chopsticks are not the only difference. It is rare to find to find the plates so common in Western restaurant because in traditional Chinese homes, the only food personal each meal is a bowl of rice and the occasional bowl of soup, though both are usually taken from a bigger communal tub or bowl. Thus, dishes are also prepared with the concept of sharing in mind. A part of the art of preparing chinese food is dividing it into portions, whether it is slicing beef, dicing chicken or chopping vegetables.

A word, perhaps, at this time about the menu. Chinese menus typically do not follow any particularly structured presentation. There are distinctions within the menu, but these are more by type of food, i.e. cold dish, meat, vegetable, soup. So overall, a chinese gastronomical adventure is very much different from a western one if only because the food and flavours hit you in a deluge rather than through a well planned process. The primary impact of this is that chinese cooking is a lot more concerned with the big picture of flavours and hence less "specific" than western cooking.

Okay that wasn't exactly a marvelously insightful or well written piece. This weekend I shall attempt pork trotters soup! And I have found myself a digital camera! So expect pictures =D

Peace,
Wang the Slanty Eyed One.

We're back, from outer space!

Ok, the crap has ended, and we're back in the groove.

The cooking has started: wang's whipped up a dinner with chin, and i've just made astonishing bread and butter pudding. If i may say so myself, of course. Anyway, if you've been waiting, we'll start posting again soon - i'll do one by next weekend.

To keep you occupied, here is a food quest!

QUEST: Recreate the Ramly Burger.
for extra points: find out what 'ramly' means.

Notes: The only Ramly burger we're talking about is the 'special burger' - a patty of chicken or beef wrapped in egg. The other burger is just not 'special' enough. Heh.


Cheers!
Terence.

Spaghetti Pomodoro Strikes Back!

Howdy.

I recently spoke with an old friend who told me two things:

1) Don't brown your onions, sweat them. Yep, i know, but i hate the word. I've since changed it.

2) Put some garlic in there. Heck, put lots of garlic and sweat them with the onions.

I just tried it, and man, it is good. Also, i added a sprig of oregano.

It is good to grow your own herbs, though my basil plant is funny looking. I think it's got some kind of ant infestation. I might want to buy a pot of large-leaf basil - it's a really pretty plant, and the leaves just scream 'EAT ME!' Maybe i'll get a pot of thyme as well.

Cheers.
Terence


Yes, i know Wang has yet to post his Feast review. I will get him on to doing it.

HEARTY BREAKFAST WEEK! 23rd September 2007 to 29th September 2007!

Sorry for the double post. In line with the whole 1 interesting food topic a week thing, THIS WEEK IS HEARTY BREAKFAST WEEK!


It should have been HEARTY BREAKFAST DAY! But I figured that by the time everyone gets around to reading this, you'd have had breakfast already. That would have rather defeated the purpose and made HEARTY BREAKFAST DAY! an automatic failure. But never fear! Because wang is a problem-solver. He is a trouble-shooter, a problem-hunter, a dilemma-predator! He has seen fit to extend this interesting topic for a whole week to accommodate those of you who don't wake up at 3 in the morning to read this blog. Which should be just about everyone. o.O

Alright. So this week, observers of Hearty Breakfast Week must do 4 things to complete the quest! This is a bronze quest, so it's not compulsory. Completing this quest gives you +100 renown and +1000 healthy points!

First, you must publicly extol the virtues of having a nice wholesome breakfast or evangelise this worthy cause in some other way. If you can get 3 other people to observe Hearty Breakfast Week, you get +100 renown bonus and +10 respect. If you can get more than 5 people to observe Hearty Breakfast Week, you'll receive a special prize¹!

Second, you must try at least 2 interesting types of breakfast from a continent other than your own. You may choose to incorporate it as part of your standard breakfast if it is inconvenient or difficult to change to a different cuisine entirely. The 2 must be different in style and content from what you are currently having already. Check the wikipedia article on breakfasts for a brief summary of what everyone else in the world is eating. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakfast#Typical_breakfasts_by_world_regions

Third, you must come up with 2 of your own breakfast sets. One of them should be as complete as possible and must be truly satisfying. This means no skimping on ingredients or prep work, even if it means waking up half an hour earlier to prepare ingredients! It has to be an absolutely delightful meal. The second should be an easy to prepare meal that you can enjoy and prepare every morning before you go to school but is still nutritious, sumptuous and most importantly HEARTY! This one should be inexpensive and really easy to do. Bonus points if you can make parts of it edible on the go. Once you have come up with these, don't be selfish! Share it with your friends who are malnourished and sickly in the mornings. Better yet, prepare parts of it for your friends and share the love!

Last but not least, no skimping on your own breakfasts! Make sure you take time to enjoy it and savour the wholesomeness and pleasure of a Hearty Breakfast.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day so make the best of it.

Eat well and prosper,
Breakfast Meister Wang.

¹Terms and conditions apply.

Prep.

Feast is today! So far, it's looking promising. We're within budget and the taste tests went well. Nonetheless, one should never overlook the importance of doing prep work. As they say, it's 1% inspiration, 99% chinese labour working at minimum wage 18 hours a day. Good thing about slave labour is that it's equally crappy every day of the week!

I like to have clear objectives in mind for stuff that I do. So these are the 3 things I will be focusing on this time.

1. Planning and organisation, both before and during the process
2. Control and fine tuning of seasoning
3. Consistency of quality as scale increases

Not exactly aiming to get myself a Diplome de Cuisine from Le Cordon Bleu, but even Neil Armstrong started with one small step!

So later on, I'll be doing the side dishes, the salad and the fish. Terence is handling the mains, ribs and pasta. We'll be attempting the chips together, because it's revolutionary and new! :O I bought Dijon mustard and some feta today. My kitchen is indeed getting more and more westernised. Oh well.

Here's to a heart feast!
Friar (Read: Fryer. Get it?) Wang.

Simple but tasty: Spaghetti pomodoro

Lately, I've been trying to make simple, tasty things that are real fast. So, it's back to the real basics: Spaghetti with Tomato Sauce. It takes about 10 minutes to prep, 10 to cook. maybe 10 to eat, and another 10 to clean up. All in all, it makes a quick lunch or snack.

So far, I've only been using basic ingredients, and very few spices. The the results have been surprisingly good. Jamie's right: Mr Basil and Mr Tomato are good friends! Can't stand the baby talk though it's pretty funny. My favourite line is: We're from Jamie's little Chick-Chicks...

Spaghetti Pomodoro
For 1 person:

Quarter of an onion, thinly sliced
1 clove garlic, thinly sliced
1 or 2 Tomatoes, cut into large slices
Salt and Pepper
Olive Oil
2 Basil Leaves
Spaghetti, as much as you really want to eat.

Heat the olive oil in a small saucepan. Sweat your onions (I hate that word-sweat, not onions). Season with salt and pepper. Add the tomatoes. Cook until tomatoes are soft, but still hold their shape, about 5 minutes. Season again.

As you heat the olive oil, set a pan of salted water on the boil. When boiling, cook spaghetti until al dente - maybe 5-7 minutes, follow instructions on the packet, or when the spaghetti has lightened in colour. Drain spaghetti when done and put into the saucepan with the tomato sauce.

Tear up the basil leaves and mix them with the spaghetti and sauce, then sprinkle a few shreds on top to garnish. Serve with a grater and some parmesan.

Mm.
Terence.

We Eat!

Another round of food at my place. Tentatively, here's the menu.

Pumpkin Chips with Fennel Pesto
Wang's Caesar Salad
Spaghetti with 3 Mushrooms.
Hickory Smoked Baby Back Ribs.
Fish, Simply Grilled with Lemon and Sea Salt
Faii's Apple Pie with Ice Cream.

I still think there's a bit of a disjoint in the menu caused by the ribs, but i'm actually really excited about the ribs, and i don't really want to give them up. We've also come up with a tentative work order:

Saturday:

: Soak ribs in brine. Prepare Rub.
: Rub ribs all over, store overnight.

Sunday:
: Get the coals fired. Pull ribs from fridge.
: Rake coals, get ribs onto grill.
: Turn ribs periodically every half hour.
: Do nothing, drink beer, play poker.
: Prepwork: Prepare drinks, and chill.
Prepare pumpkin to fry.
Prepare salad.
Chop onions and mushrooms.
Do last-minute whatevers.
: Chill, drink beer. Act like nothing's happened.
: Guys arrive.
Start frying pumpkin chips.
: Food starts. Pumpkin chips appear. Baste ribs.
: Salad appears. Take ribs off BBQ. Let rest.
: Cut them suckers up! Serve with BBQ sauce.
: Put fish on grill.
: Fish.
: Pie!

And we're done.

Terence.

Celebrating Salad Day!

My salad day sucked.

Tried to have some 'ingenuity in the kitchen' but i guess my inspiration came at the expense of memory.

Let's just say, forgetting to season your vinaigrette (hmmmm, spelling looks weird) is a recipe for disaster. Tried something with avocado, tomatoes, and iceberg lettuce. Didn't have much else. Troubleshooting hints please (apart from 'Season with salt and pepper'.

For 1 person:

Do what you need to do with the salad leaves, chop up the tomato, slice your avocado into rough cubes. Set aside first.

Chop half a clove of garlic up finely. Smear it across your chopping board with the flat of your knife, and salt it. Then smear the bugger again. You should have a paste. Go ahead and dump this into the salad bowl.

Crush up some herbs. I used rosemary, a bit of oregano. Dump this into the salad bowl. Then drizzle about 3 tbsp of olive oil into the mix. Stir it around, let the garlic paste dissolve into it. Add 1 tbsp of red wine vinegar and mix, mix, mix!

SEASON WITH SALT AND PEPPER.

Toss the veggies in, and toss the veggies about.

Garnish with some parmesan cheese if you like.


Eew. Didn't taste too good now, did it?


-Salad Day Failure,
Terence.

SALAD DAYS - A review

So today was salad day and to give you a brief rundown of the excitingly healthy and nourishing things that happened today, I present you Vertumnus, Roman God of seasons, change and plant growth, as well as gardens and fruit trees! Here he is, rendered as a sumptuous mixed salad by Arcimboldo.

Quite a flattering portrait wouldn't you say?

Alright. Enough gay banter. I tried 2 salad recipes today. Good old Cesar salad with croutons and a broiled pepper salad that Terence, the other manlyman, suggested. Over last week, I also tried an avocado and prawn salad which the master chef Jerome has qlaerly mastered. I guess what they say about trusting a fat cook is true. Sorry phatboi! You aer t3h ownz!

The avocado and prawn thing, and the pepper thing was not really spectacular. Maybe I'll feature them some other time, when I level up skillz in making those salads. My favourite of the lot was definitely the Caesar Salad. When prepared well, this dish is simple, elegant and delicious. It is truly a beauty to prepare and serve. Here's what I did.

Ingredients

• 2 large crisp heads romaine lettuce
  
• 2 large cloves garlic pressed
• Sea salt
• ¾ cup olive oil
• 2 cups unseasoned toasted croutons
• 1 lemon
• 2 eggs
• ¼ cup (1 ounce) Parmesan cheese, grated
• Ground peppercorns
  
• Worcestershire sauce

Before you begin, you should prepare the garlic oil. Place the pressed garlics into a jar of extra virgin olive oil and shake well to combine. Let it stand at room temperature for several hours, preferably overnight.

Romaine lettuce is preferred. It has a sweeter and crisper quality than iceberg. However, if you're in a pinch, iceberg lettuce would suffice as well. Then you will realise how much potential this delicious salad has if you had the best ingredients possible. About 3 to 5 leaves a person is a good estimate if you're preparing this as a main dish. For the smaller leaves, you'll want to leave them as they are. In any case, you won't want to cut or process the leaves too much, because ideally, they should be picked up by hand.

The next key ingredient is the croutons. You could settle with those lousy expensive and utter silly crap they sell in bakeries and supermarkets. OR, you could make your own. Now doesn't that sound like a wonderful idea? This is what I did. I kinda improvised because my kitchen is not exactly adapted to western cooking, but the results are still absolutely delicious. First, cube a few slices of sourdough bread available at the same lousy bakeries and supermarkets. Sprinkle some salt on them and let them dry out in a hot oven with the garlic oil at around 180-200 degrees. Take the pan out every 2-3 minutes and toss the bread cubes and baste them in the garlic oil until they reach a nice golden brown. Take them out once you reach a nice golden brown sheen on them. You'll want them crunchy on the outside, but soft on the inside. They are simply delectable like that.

About 15 minutes before serving, squeeze the lemons into a pitcher. Then boil the eggs for a minute. Grate the cheese into another nice little bowl and arrange all of these on a tray along with the rest of the olive oil, the croutons, pepper grinder, salt and Worcestershire. Have large dinner plates chilled, arrange the lettuce in the largest salad bowl you can find and you are ready to go. To prepare the dressing, first pour 4 tablespoons of garlic oil over the leaves and give them a few rolling tosses. Try to avoid bruising it (or yourself) as you go along, but a few injuries are probably unavoidable >< Sprinkle on ¼ teaspoon of salt, 2 teaspoon of pepper, 2 more spoonfuls of oil, and give another toss. Pour on the lemon juice, 6 drops of Worcestershire, and break in the eggs. Toss twice, sprinkle on the cheese. Toss once, then sprinkle on the croutons and give two final tosses. That's it! A delicious salad is ready to serve!

The salad has a very wholesome flavour about it. Many other recipes call for vinegar or anchovies or others. I didn't use them mainly because it was too inconvenient to lay my hands on them. Like Mr. Cardini, I simply improvised with what I had on hand, proving once again that a little ingenuity in the kitchen goes a long way. Now go have a healthy food, or the salad hunter will come after you and consume your soul!

The evil one is on the hunt.

Be healthy and prosper,
Salad Meister Wang.

SALAD DAYS: 16th September 2007 - 22nd September 2007

I DECLARE TODAY SALAD DAY!

Sam Peckinpah had his Salad Day, so why can't manlymen?

So for salad day, everyone is obliged to eat a leaf of healthy food! Preferably uncooked and with a generous splosh (a word I made up because it rolls off the tongue nicely) of dressing. I recommend Russian, but I'm weird that way.

To whet your appetite, I present to you images of nice and healthy salads shamelessly stolen off the wikimedia foundation!

Here's a nice and wholesome Cold Meat Salad. It gets 8 for featuring meat! God knows we can do with a nice cold sausage now. That and the olive oil drizzle to go with the raspberry.















How about a nice salad platter with cheese and broiled peppers? This one gets a 7 because it looks cute and because I can identify the cheese. Lol. Try guessing it yourself! Answer is at the bottom of the page. Don't peek! Even if I don't know, the great pink unicorn in the sky would and he frowns upon such deceit.



This next one is just an ordinary green salad. Not very impressive. Even the cutlery is quite plain. Plus, the image is titled "SaladShy.jpg" No one likes a coy salad. We want our salads proud and loud! If you have it flaunt it! What's the point of being firm and supple if you're just going to hide behind the celery? We want dressing that is provocative, definitive, strong, aggressive. Sexy but not necessarily raunchy. Coquettish but not too slutty. If you want to be demure, you should have considered being a soup or a bouillabaisse or something like that. I heard cabbage cucumber stews are doing well. Bugger off and take your diffident ways with you. This one gets a 2.5. Only saving grace is the pretty little orange flower.



That's all the pictures I could find on the wikipedia article on salads, unfortunately. So that's the end of my introduction to salad days.

I feel obliged to deal with the fact that yes, indeed, the term salad days does refer to a period of youthful innocence blah blah and all that crap. Bollocks. Food is food. Food should not mix with sex. Except if you're experimenting with *censored*. But that's another story for another time.

For those of you who tried the little guessing game, good for you! The answer is of course, Greek feta. It doesn't have veins, so it's not a blue. It has a nice white solid structure, so it's probably a curd cheese. The slightly grainy texture suggests maybe brynzda, but in the context of the salad and the serving manner (small cubes), feta is a better answer.

Be healthy and prosper!
Salad Meister Wang.

Initial Doubts

Now why would anyone want to read a food blog by some teenage prats who can't tell a cabbage from a lettuce?

I must admit, I'm having some initial doubts about this blog, but we'll see how it goes. I guess this blog is just somewhere where I'll post pictures and recipes that I've done. Hopefully I get some constructive comments that'll help me on. Alright then.

Here goes nothing.
Terence.