Steamed Chicken With Mui Choy - 梅菜鸡

Steamed Mui Choy with Pork Belly (梅菜扣肉) is one of the traditional Hakka dishes but here instead of using Pork Belly I have replaced pork with Chicken for a healthier version. Basically there are two types of Mui Choy (mustard green) which is either sweet or salty and you can easily get them from groceries stall selling salted fish and dry products in wet market or dried goods section in supermarket.

STEAMED CHICKEN WITH MUI CHOY
梅菜鸡

(Serves: 4   | Preparation: 10 minutes   | Cooking: 30 - 40 minutes)

Ingredients:
1/2 Portion Chicken (600g), cut into pieces
2 Stalks (150g - 200g) Sweet Mui Choy (甜梅菜)
3 Garlic Cloves, finely minced
2 Small Chilli, sliced

Seasoning:
1 - 1.5 Tablespoons Dark Soy Sauce
1 Tablespoon Cooking Wine
1 Teaspoon Sugar
1 Teaspoon Cornflour

Method:-
1. Rinse and wash mui choy (mustard green) for 2 - 3 rounds to get ride of the sand and dirt. Soak it in water for about 10 minutes, remove and squeeze it dry using kitchen paper towel.

2. Next cut mui choy into about 2" sections and set aside.

3. Marinate chicken with seasoning for about 5 minutes. Saute garlic with 1 tablespoon of oil till fragrant, stir in mui choy and continue to fry for another minute or two.

4. Add in marinated chicken pieces, and fry together with some sliced chilli till the surface of the chicken pieces are slight brown in colour.

5. Transfer the chicken mixture to a deep steaming plate and steam it over medium heat for about 30 - 40 minutes till chicken is tender.

Tip:
~ For easy cooking, you can SKIP steps 3 and 4. Just mix mui choy with marinated chicken and steamed it over medium heat till chicken is tender.

~ For savoury flavour, use half each of sweet and salty mui choy for this recipe.

For a quick and easy recipe to kick off your weekend cooking, perhaps you can start looking for mui choy (mustard green) to go with either pork or chicken to try out this dish.

Cook For Family - Our 3 Generations Cooking Together for the #CookForFamily Initiative

I am so thrilled to be among one of hundred bloggers who had being invited by Daniel, from Daniel's Food Diary to take part in this #CookForFamily initiative started by him. As we know, his main objective is to get more bloggers, and hopefully their fans and followers, to start cooking and having family bonding with their families.

As for myself, I always tried to cook at least 2 meals per days during weekdays and hopefully one on weekend, especially Sunday.  And to support this #CookForFamily initiative, even my 8 years old boy who often helps up in the kitchen (washing and cutting) also volunteer to cook simple dish for us.  Below you can see some of the shots and dishes that he had cooked under our supervision. Overall we had fun and laughter in the kitchen sharing our family bonding and cooking skill together which makes meal time a fun time too.

#CookForFamily

I love to have soup during my meals and I brew soup almost everyday. Out of all the different kinds of soup we usually had, herbal soup is one of our family favourite. Here I specially made this "Herbal Black Chicken Soup" for mum with added Dang Shen, Ginseng and Dried Longan to regulate blood chemistry, strengthen the body as well as circulate the Qi in the body.

(Serves: 4      | Preparation: 10 minutes        | Cooking: 60 minutes)

Ingredients:
1 Black Chicken (乌鸡) / Half Portion of Chicken (600g)
2 Pieces of Dried Ginseng(人渗)
5 Pieces of Dang Shen(党参), cut into halves
8 - 10 Pieces of Big Red Dates(红枣)
20g Dried Longan (龙眼干)
10g Wolfberries (枸杞)
1.8 Litres Boiling Water

Method:-

1. Rinse the dry herbs and set aside. Bring a pot of water to boil and blanch the prepared black chicken which had being trimmed and cleaned.

2. Meanwhile using a soup pot (i used a big claypot), bring 1.8 litres of water to boil and add in all the ingredients including the blanched black chicken.

3. When the mixture comes to boil again, lower the heat and simmer over the lowest heat for at least an hour (careful of the heat and don't let the soup dried up). Alternatively,

4. You can transfer the soup to a slow-cooker and cook it on AUTO mode for about 2 hours.

5. Serve warm before meal or at night before sleep. This soup has a natural sweetness due to the herbs used so usually I won't add in extra seasoning or salt.

Stir-fry Celery With Sea Cucumber is one of my favourite vegetable dish which mum always cooked for us. And here for the #CookForFamily post, she prepared this dish especially for me while I take care of the herbal soup section.

(Serves: 4        | Preparation: 10 minutes         | Cooking: 6 minutes)

Ingredients:
2 Sticks of Celery
1 Small Red Capsicum, sliced
5 Fresh Shiitake Mushroom, sliced
1 Packet of Sweet Peas
2 Pieces of Sea Cucumber, sliced
2 - 3 Slices of Ginger
Some Chicken Stock Powder for seasoning

Method:-

1. Using a vegetable peeler, remove the outer skin of the celery and cut it into thick slices. Set aside.

2. Saute ginger with 1/2 tablespoon of cooking oil till fragrant, add in celery and mushrooms, toss for a 30 seconds in the Happy Call Pan (HCP).

3. Next add in the remaining ingredients such as red capsicum, sweet peas and sea cucumber.

4. Add in the seasonings and give it a quick stir, cover the pan and let it simmer on low heat for 3 minutes.

5. Drizzle some cooking wine, stir to mix well and dish up to serve.

My little boy on the other hand also volunteer to join us with the #CookForFamily task where he marinated the chicken wings using Wokkingmum's "Grilled Chicken Wings with Fermented Beancurd" recipe. He choose this recipe because he knows that both grandma and I love fermented beancurd which we always had it with our porridge.

Recipe adapted from Wokkingmum website HERE.

(Make: 12 Chicken Wings    | Preparation: 5 minutes   | Cooking: 25 - 30 minutes)

Ingredients:
12 Chicken Wings, halved
2 Tablespoons of sauce from Fermented Beancurd
1.5 Pieced of Fermented Beancurd
1 Tablespoon Sugar
1 Teaspoon Cooking Wine

Method:-

1. Using the back of the spoon mashed fermented beancurd and mix it with the sauce.

2. Next stir in sugar till well mixed.

3. Marinate chicken wings with the mixture together with some cooking wine for at least an hour before cooking.

4. Arrange marinated chicken wings on baking tray which is lined with baking paper, grill in the preheated 220 Degree Celsius oven for about 25 - 30 minutes or chicken is cooked.

As mum love fish compared to meat, I always tried to incorporate at least 1 dish with fish whenever she comes over for dinner. Here we have a simple steamed fish dish using Threadfin fish head and ready pack Portuguese sauce. To success remember to get fresh fish head, steamed it to just done (do not over cooked), drizzle with some Portuguese sauce and steamed for another 1 minutes.

SOME OF THE MEALS WE COOKED IN JULY

All these photos (except the one with my boy doing cooking) are taken from my daily Instagram shots which I have shared online.

Any simple dish will bring a smile on your loved ones face. In fact it can be just a bowl of instant noodle with an egg or even simple ham and cheese sandwiches for breakfast. For me it is more of the thoughts, loves and bonding time together that counts rather than the expensive ingredients or time spent on preparing the meals.

Photo credited to Daniel from Daniel Food Diary

So from today onwards, let's start to prepare something simple for your family as as head start and don't use the excuse that you can't cook or u are too busy. I am sure frying an sunny egg or boiling a hard boiled egg that served with bread and beverages won't even take up more than 15 minutes of your time a day.

Homemade Fan Choy (饭菜) aka Steamed Rice

Fan Choy (饭菜) is a common breakfast or tea time item which can be found from those stalls selling steamed bao (包) and dim sum. It is a one dish meal which consists of rice that steamed together with char siew (barbecued meat) and hard-boiled egg or sometime with other ingredients such as stewed mushrooms.

From the photos in this post you can see that our homemade Fan Choy is loaded with lots of ingredients as compared to those selling from store bought. This makes it a plus point for homecook dishes whereby we are assured that fresh ingredients are being used as well as we can load it with more stuffing of our choice. So here is my mum's version of easy homemade Fan Choy which she had taught me. It is so easy that it can be done within 30 minutes with 3 key ingredients such as cooked rice, char siew and hard-boiled egg.

FAN CHOY
饭菜

When compare Fan Choy with Lor Mai Gai (糯米鸡）, I still prefer Fan Choy because of it's fragrant char siew sauce and hard-boiled egg. So for my very own homemade Fan Choy, I have added extra portion of char siew and egg as compared to those store bought.

(Make: 6 (4" round)   |  Preparation: 10 minutes  |  Cooking: 20 minutes)

Ingredients:
2 Cup Uncooked Rice
3 Hardboiled Egg, shelled and halved
200g Char Siew, sliced
1/2 Cup Char Siew Sauce
1/2 Teaspoon Dark Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Hot Water
Some Stewed Shiitake Mushroom, optional
1/4 Cube Chicken Stock Cubes, optional
1 Knot Of Pandan Leaves, optional

Method:-

1. Rinse and cook the rice in rice cooker as per normal by adding in optional pandan leaves and chicken stock cubes for flavour and taste.

2. Mix about 2 tablespoons of hot water with the char siew sauce(obtain from the stall where you buy the char siew) and dark soy sauce to dilute it and set aside.

3. Meanwhile distribute the ingredients (char siew, egg and mushrooms [if using]) evenly in each aluminum foil cases together with 1 - 2 teaspoons of dilute char siew sauce while waiting for the rice to be cooked.

4. When the rice is done, remove the pandan leaves, fluff it with a fork and slowly drizzle in the char siew sauce, mix well according to your preference. (you might not need all the sauce)

5. Divide the rice equally among the prepared aluminum foil cases, steam it on a steamer rack for 5 - 8 minutes on medium heat and served hot/warm.

6. You can keep the fan choy(without steaming) in an air-tight container in the fridge for 2 - 3 days. To eat, just reheat it in the microwave oven or steam it for 5 minutes before eating.

NOTE:-
~ The key to make delicious "fan choy" lies on the char siew and char siew sauce used. So try to grab some decent char siew (a little fat makes it taste better) from your favourite stall and also request for some of the special char siew sauce to enhance the colour and flavour of your fan choy.

For those who have emailed me asking for the Fan Choy recipe, I hope this quick and easy version will enable you to prepare your favourite Fan Choy especially for those are staying overseas. If Char Siew is not available at your area, perhaps you can try making some from "Rasamalaysia"(recipe) or "Maameemoomoo"(recipe) and use them for making Fan Choy.

COME AND JOIN US @ #CookForFamily

Recently Daniel from Daniel’s Food Diary has started a little bloggers’ initiative called #CookForFamily. The purpose of #CookForFamily is to encourage family member(s) to get together to prepare any simple homecook dishes in the month of July to promote goodness of healthy home cook food as well as create family bonding time whereby everyone gets to eat together.

If you are keen in joining us for this #CookForFamily, you can refer to Daniel's post over at this link HERE or HERE for more details. Hope to see you onboard soon!

{With Recipe} Eat With Your Family Day!

As most of us has read from newspapers or online media(s), the Singapore government has designated last Friday, May 25, as Eat With Your Family Day. This is to urge people to strengthen family ties through the "simple act of sitting down and taking a meal together" more frequently despite of each other busy schedules.

The annual "Eat With Your Family Day", is always falls on a Friday before the start of the mid-year school break for students. And this event is not only about food and eating but it also about relationship building and enjoying relationship as 'a family that eats together stays together’. In order to show supports to this annual event, some of the participated companies also allows their employees to leave work at 5pm on the last Friday on school term in May to have dinner with their family in order to promote strong family ties.

STEAMED EGG WITH HUAI SHAN AND LOTUS ROOT

Although our family often eats together during most of the mealtime, but in order to support and promote this event, I have made a new "Steamed Egg" dish using Huai Shan And Lotus Root instead of the usual minced meat, seafood or century egg.

(Serves: 2-3        | Preparation: 5 minutes       | Cooking: 15 minutes)

Ingredients:
100g of Fresh Huai Shan, grated/jubilee
50g Fresh Lotus Roots, thinly sliced
2 Egg(55g) Each,
50ml Drinking Water
1/2 Tablespoon Wolfberries
Dash of Sesame Oil
1/4 Teaspoon Salt

Method:-

1. Remove the outer skin of the huai shan, rinse and pat dry. Using a grater to either grate or shred it like what shown on the above picture. (squeeze off any liquid from the grated huai shan and set aside)

2. Next repeat the same procedure using a slice grater to cut thin slices off from the lotus root. (If you don't have any slice grater, you can use knife to cut thin slices from the lotus root too)

3. First arrange half the amount of huai shan in the steaming bowl, cover it with a layer of lotus root then top with the remaining huai shan before arrange the rest of the louts root on it.

4.Whisk the egg in another bowl together with dash of sesame oil and salt plus 50ml of water till combined.

5. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve gently over the prepared steaming bowl with huai shan and lotus roots.

6. Arrange the wolfberries on the lotus root, cover the dish with cling wrap or aluminum foil. Steam the egg custard over medium high heat for about 15 minutes.

7. To test if the egg mixture is cooked, insert a chopstick or skewer into the mixture, if clear liquid flows out means it is cooked. Remove and serve with steamed rice.

This is how my "Steamed Egg With Huai Shan and Lotus Root" look when scoop out from the dish. It has a combination of soft custard like egg plus a bit of crunch from the lotus root and huai shan. Perhaps if you prefer a more thicker egg like dish, you can increase the number of egg to 3 and water to 70ml to have a firm steamed egg dish.

This is one of our family favourite vegetable dish, "Stir-fry Broccoli And Cauliflower with Walnuts". As each of us have our own preference, I decided to combine both broccoli and cauliflower together so that we could pick up what we like. Adding of either walnuts of pine nuts for this dish gives it a nutty flavour and as well as enhance the texture of the dish with some crunchy bites.

Hope you would like my quick and simple homecook dishes. Remember even a simple dish makes a happy family when everyone gets to sit and eat together at least once or twice a week. If proper mealtime is impossible, try to start off with breakfast, tea-break or even supper.

[2-In-1 Dishes] Recipes Using IKEA 365+ Pot plus Stabil Steamer

Preparing meals in the kitchen can be one of the most "headache" household chores for modern working mothers/ladies. The thoughts of having to clean up the greasy kitchen top, cooking utensils, floor and etc always make it a "OFF MODE" no matter how enthusiastic or simple the meal(s) can be.

For me, even though I might love to experiment different dishes or bakes in the kitchen, still I would always go for simple and easy to prepare recipes with either steamed or oven baked method if I am not using my reliable Happy Call Pan.

IKEA always has a wide range of kitchen products such as cookwares, ovenwares, utensils, food storage and etc. And recently I have just got a set of this 365+ Pot,  boiling insert as well as steamer insert to replace my old soup pot in order to help me reduce the time in preparing quick and healthier meals within 30 minutes to an hour.

For more information and prices of the above-mentioned, please refer to the review HERE.

HUAI SHAN, LOTU ROOTS AND SWEETCORN CHICKEN SOUP

As you can see from the photo above, I have use the IKEA 365+ pot to boil soup and stack up the Stabil steamer insert half way through in order to steam the egg dish while I could continue to boil the soup at the same time. And by the end of 30 - 35 minutes,  we able to enjoy simple and yet delicious homecook food without any hassle or greasy kitchen floor. (less washing to be done too)

(Serves: 2-3             | Preparation: 10 minutes            | Cooking: 30 minutes)

Ingredients:
2 Chicken Drumsticks, skin removed
150g Huai Shan, skin removed
150g Lotus Root, skin removed, sliced
1 Sweet Corn, Cut into section, halved
100g Pumpkin(optional), skin removed cut into thick wedges
6 Big Red Dates
Some Fresh Gingko Nuts, Optional

Method:-

1. Fill the IKEA 365+ pot with water to about 1.5 litre mark and bring it to boil.  At the meantime blanched chicken in another saucepan for about 2 - 3 minutes, remove and rinse well. Set aside.

2. When the water comes to boil in the soup pot, add in all ingredients except pumpkin(add only at the last 10 - 15 minutes of cooking time), put the lid(don't worry it would not overflow due to the steam vent ventilation) on and let it boil on medium heat for about 3 minutes, lower the heat and simmer the soup mixture for 30 minutes and season to taste with salt before serving.

OR

3. Simmer the soup for about 15 minutes, remove the lid, drop in the pumpkin and stack up the STABIL Steamer insert on top, place the prepared steamed egg mixture and steamed on medium low heat for 13 - 15 minutes till done.

STEAMED EGG WITH MINCED MEAT

There are quiet a few ways which you can prepared this steamed egg dish using different ingredients which you prefer. Example:- you can do a seafood steamed egg using fish fillet or flower crab(recipe), firm tofu(recipe), ginseng(recipe), salted and century egg plus many other combinations.  For this recipe, I am preparing my mum's version of  "Steamed Egg with Minced Meat and Century Egg" which she always prepared for us.

(Make: 5" x 5" Square          | Preparation: 5 minutes |           Cooking: 13 - 15 minutes)

Ingredients:
2 (55g) Egg
1 Century Egg, cut into small cubes
1.5 Tablespoon Marinated Minced Meat, optional
100ml Drinking Water
1/2 Tablespoon Of Wolfberries
Some Chopped Spring Onion, Chilli and Shallot Oil

Method:-

1. If you are using minced meat, spread the mixture evenly at the base of the steaming bowl/plate.

2. Lightly whisk/beat the eggs in a bowl, add in 100ml of drinking water and continue to beat till combined.

3. Using a strainer, strain the egg mixture into the prepared steaming bowl. Scatter wolfberries on top, using heatproof cling wrap cover the top of the bowl leaving a small gap at one of the corner to prevent water droplets during steaming.

4. Place the bowl on the steamer rack, cover the lid and steam on medium low heat together with the soup(below) for about 13 - 15(with meat) minutes.

5. Remove the steamed egg together with the steamer and garnish egg dish with some extra chopped spring onion, shallot oil and chilli. Serve together with soup and steamed rice.

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Note:-

~ If you are not using marinated minced meat, add about 1/2 teaspoon of chicken stock powder into your egg mixture at step 2 to season your dish.

STEAMED EGG CAKE

(Ji Dan Gao - 鸡蛋糕)

Steamed Egg Cake can be consider as one of the easiest and yet tricky traditional steamed cake which requires a few simple ingredients such as Eggs, Flour, Sugar and carbonated Beverage like Cream Soda or 7-Up that act as a leavening agent for the cake.

(Makes: 14 cupcake size      | Preparation: 15 minutes     | Cooking Time: 25 minutes)

Ingredients:
3 (55g) Eggs
160g Caster Sugar
170g Cake Flour Or All Purpose Plain Flour
1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
60ml 7-Up or Cream Soda
1/2 - 3/4 Teaspoon of Pandan Paste, optional

Method:-

1. Please refer to my previous Steamed Egg Cake post for the step-by-step preparation method HERE.

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Tips:-
~ Adding extra pandan leaves in the boiling water will enhance the aroma and flavour of the steamed cake.

~ By adding 1/2 - 3/4 Teaspoon of Pandan Paste to the cake batter will help to enhance the colour as well as get ride of the strong "egg" smell/taste from the steamed egg cake, leaving in jade green in colour with fragrant pandan(also known as screwpine) aroma.

Lastly I hope you would find this post useful if you do own a stock pot with steamer rack so that at least you can have an idea on how to prepare more than 1 dish at the same time to maximum the usage of time and the cookware. Till then, cya on the next post.