asian food – MAGPIE STREET

Rice is something that we always have at home, whether uncooked and stored in the pantry, or cooked and on the kitchen counter top or dining table. There’s usually a pot of steamed rice in the kitchen, waiting to be devoured at the next meal. But steamed rice can become a bit boring sometimes, so occasionally, we’d have something different, like Nasi Goreng.

Nasi Goreng is a very popular Indonesian dish. It is fried rice mixed with a bit of meat or veggies, so it can be a complete meal by itself, especially when seasoned perfectly. If you have cold cooked (not freshly cooked) rice in the house, that would be perfect for this dish, and if you have some bits of veggies in the fridge, you can prepare this dish for tonight’s dinner.

(Note: I’ve added a few substitution ideas, in case you do not have the fresh ingredients on hand, but have the preserved versions in your pantry.)

NASI GORENG

INGREDIENTS:
Olive oil
4 eggs, beaten lightly
1 brown onion, coarsely chopped
6 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
25g ginger, finely chopped (or a generous dash of ground ginger)
2 long red chillies, chopped (or a dash of ground cayenne pepper, to taste)
200g chicken fillet, sliced 1 inch squares or short strips
1 chicken cube
A handful of oyster mushrooms (or 184g can of champignon pieces and stems)
1/2 green capsicum, chopped coarsely
1/2 red capsicum, chopped coarsely
200g fresh baby corns, chopped coarsely
4 cups (cold) steamed jasmine rice
2 cups bean sprouts
3 green onions, sliced thinly
3 tablespoons soy sauce (or adjust to taste)
2 tablespoons kecap manis (or adjust to taste)

PROCEDURE:
In a wok, heat oil. Add egg to make a thin omelette. When cooked, remove omelette and let cool.

Saute brown onion, garlic, ginger and chilli. Add chicken and chicken cube, and stir fry until chicken is cooked. Add mushrooms, capsicums and corn and cook until tender.

Add rice, bean sprouts, green onion, soy sauce and kecap manis. Stir fry.

Cut omelette into strips. Add omelette strips to the mixture in the wok. Mix well. Remove from heat and serve hot.

Spring has come to Australia, and the chooks have felt it. To celebrate the warmer-than-winter season, they decided to lay lots of eggs!

Well, in fact, a bit too much so I decided it was high time to make this:

Whoops! Nope, not just that.

What I really meant was this…

One of the Philippines’ most favorite desserts, this baby is a good way of disposing those chooks’ eggs properly. Since it was the last Sunday was the last of the month, we had the traditional ward luncheon at church after the services and for that, I decided to make Leche Flan to share with the folks.

It’s really not that hard to do. The last time I made this dessert was way back in 2009 or 2010, yet when I made one last weekend, it was still as easy as ABC.

INGREDIENTS

5 whole eggs
1 can condensed milk
water
3 Tbsp powdered milk
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp vanilla
2-3 Tbsp raw sugar

PROCEDURE:

Preheat the oven to 180 degree Celsius. Fill half of a larger tray/pan with water and put that inside the oven for the water bath.

Beat eggs in a bowl. Add condensed milk, water and powdered milk. In other recipes, they use a can of evaporated milk. But because when I made this last Saturday evening, there was no evaporated milk at home, so I dissolved powdered milk in a can full of water (I used the emptied can of the condensed milk to measure) and used that as substitute. Add a teeny-weeny pinch of salt and a few drops of vanilla. Mix well by gently stirring, to avoid forming bubbles…although I think no matter how well I tried to mix it manually, you’d still come up with something like this:

Use a clean cheese cloth to strain the mixture. You can also use a fine wire strainer, like I did.

Straining will make your mixture, and thus, the flan, smoother.

Place sugar in a pan. You may add a bit of water to dissolve the sugar. Place the plan over low heat to caramelize the sugar, until it’s golden brown but not burnt.

Let the caramelized sugar rest for a while. Then pour into the pan the egg-milk mixture. Cover the pan with foil.

Now, use your oven mittens and very carefully place the pan of egg-milk mixture on the water bath inside the oven. Watch out that you don’t spill the water or the mixture or wet your mittens with the boiling water. Cook for 50 to 55 minutes, keeping the oven temperature at 180 degree Celsius.

Let the flan cool before turning it upside down on a plate to serve.

Tag: asian food

Nasi Goreng Recipe

Leche Flan Recipe