Assorted Hakka Abacus Seeds

This Hakka Abacus Seeds dish, where mashed yam is mixed with flour and shaped into round pellets that look like abacus seeds. The beads are usually stir fried with a simple sauce of minced garlic, shallot pork, dried shrimps, firm beancurd and shitake mushrooms.

My mother-in-law is a Hakka and she used to make this dish for us at least once a month. And after eating her version of abacus seeds, actually I had wanted to try it out very long ago. So after seeing the Pumpkin Abacus Seeds from MyCoffee blog. I decided to give this dish a try by making two different types of flavour in one go.


So for my Assorted Abacus Seeds, I had the traditional Hakka Yam beads as well as the Pumpkin beads from MyCoffee's blog. As for the side ingredients, I had include those that my mother-in-law used to put in. Finally, I had my own version of Assorted Hakka Abacus Seeds from Cuisine Paradise Kitchen......It tastes very Q and Spongy which my mum and hubby loves.....

Ingredients For Yam Abacus Seeds:(make about 30-35)
300g Yam, cut into small slices
100g - 150g Tapioca Flour
1/4 Teaspoon Pepper
1/4 Teaspoon Salt
1/2 Tablespoon Light Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Vegetable Oil
A Pot Of Ice Water

Methods:
1. Steam the yam slices until soft then mash it while still hot.
2. Slowly stir in tapioca flour till combined(you might not need all the flour, it all depend on the wetness of the mashed yam) then add in the rest of the seasoning and oil and knead into a smooth dough.
3. From small round balls and make a dent in each one with your thumb to from the abacus seed shape(about 2cm wide) and set aside.
4. Bring half pot of water to boil then cook the beads until float, remove and plunge into the pot of iced water(this is to stop the cooking process of the beads and make it more Q and spongy) for 1 - 2 minutes then drained and set aside.

Notes:
Do not put too many beads into the boiling water at one time, allow some room for them to float around.

Used the same ingredients and methods for the Pumpkin beads, replace the yam slices with pumpkin slices and you might need more tapicoa flour(about 200g-250g) because mashed pumpkin contains more moisture than the yam.

Ingredients For Side Fillings: (enough for 50-60 beads)
300g Pork Mince/Belly Pork
2 Pieces Of Small Firm Beancurds, shredded
4 Dried Mushroom, soaked till soften
50g Black Fungs, soaked till soften
50g Dried Shrimps, soaked till soften
5 Cloves Garlics, finely chopped
4 Shallots, finely sliced
Sauce:
100ml Of Water, from soaking mushroom
1/2 Teaspoon Chicken Stock Granules
1/2 Teaspoon Dark Soy Sauce
For Garnish:
1 Stalk Spring Onion, finely chopped
3-4 Small Chillies, finely sliced
1 Tablespoon Dried Shallot
Some Pepper

Methods:
1. Marinate the pork minced with 1 Tablespoon Fish Sauce, 1/2 Tablespoon Sesame Oil, 1/4 Teaspoon Pepper and 1 Teaspoon cornstarch, set aside in the fridge to marinate for about 30 minutes or more.
2. Shredded the soaked mushroom(reserved the water), black fungus and lightly pound the dried shrimp and set aside.
3. Preheat the pan with some oil then saute the shredded beancurd until golden brown, drained and set aside.
4. Add about 2 Tablespoons Of Oil in a pan, add in the sliced shallots and saute until slightly golden brown, add in garlic and pork mince.
5. Saute the pork until almost cooked then add in mushroom, black fungs, dried shrimp and continue to stir until fragrant and cooked through.
6. Next add in the beancurd and sauce upon boiling add in the cooked abacus beads and simmer for another 2 minutes on low heat.
7. Serve hot with garnish.

Hot & Fragrant Snapper

This is a very fragrant and appetizing dish that Tracy had introduce to us. It taste sort of like those Thai dishes because of the lime, kaffir lime leave and fish sauce. You need to blend all the ingredients to create a marinade sauce for the fish and allow it to marinate for a while before grilling it.

For my case, I used White Snapper fish and place it on some banana leaves and grilled until done. You had to serve this dish hot so that the aroma of the marinate will be great on the fish.


Ingredients:
2 Large Fresh Chillies, Roughly Chopped
5 Shallots, Peeled
5 Garlic Cloves, Peeled
2 Tablespoons Lime Juice
2 Tablespoons Thai Fish Sauce
1 Tablespoon Palm Sugar Or Molasses
4 - 6 Kaffir Lime Leaves, Rolled Into Cigarette Shapes And Finely Sliced
1 Trout, About 450g Each, Cleaned

Methods:
1. Wrap the chillies, shallots and garlic cloves in a foil package.
2. Place under a hot grill for 10 minutes, until the vegetables have softened.
3. As soon as the foil package is cool enough to handle, unwrap it and tip the contents into food process.
4. Mix the lime juice, fish sauce, sugar and lime leaves together.
5. Add 1 - 2 teaspoon of the lime juice mixture to the chilli mixture and blend till a paste.
6. Remove the chilli paste and stir well with the rest of the lime juice mixture.
7. With a teaspoon, stuff this paste inside the fish. Smear a little on the skin too.
8. Grill the fish for about 8 minutes on each side, until just cooked through.(the timing depends on the size and the thickness of the fish.)
9. Carefully lift the fish onto a platter. Serve with rice.

Notes:
I used 1 red and two green chilliles.(It all depend whether u want it to be hot or mild)
You can used any type of fish that you prefer like Seabass, Seabream or Snapper.

Prawn Pullao

Saw this easy to prepare one dish meal from Stefanie's Cumin & Coriander Blog where she introduce this Prawn Pullao recipe. It simple taste great with all those common spices that we can get from those Indian stall in our neighbourhood market area.


Instant of using basmati rice for this recipe, I just used the normal long rice grains that we commonly used at home. I can said the combination of spices for this dish was not very strong type, it's just nice for our family. And thanks to Tracy who introduce me to this web.....

Other than following the ingredients given from the site, I also add in some golden raisins to cook with the rice. Then upon serving, I spinkler some ready bought toasted cashew nut to increase the crunch of the dish. You can serve this with some chicken or mutton curry if you want so extra gravy to go with the rice.

Assorted Sweet Potato & Red Bean Rice

Sometime rather than a bowl of plain white rice, you can actually come up with different combination of ingredients to make it more tasty and interesting. For eg: This Assorted Sweet Potato & Red Bean Rice. The sweetness and aroma of the sweet potatoes together with some crunch of the red bean will sure made you wants to have a few more spoonful of it.

Sweet Potato are rich in dietary fiber, vitamin A, vitamin C, and vitamin B6. Sweet potato varieties with dark orange flesh are richer in Vitamin A.


Ingredients:
1 Cup Uncooked Brown Rice Mixture/Rice
100g Sweet Potatoes
50g Red Bean, soaked till soften

Methods:
1. Rinse the rice accordingly and soak with the cooking water for about 30 minutes.
2. Rinse red beans in a few changes of water then put it in a small pan cover with water lever above the bean, bring to boil and switch off the heat when it boiled.
3. Let it soaked for about 10 minutes, pour away the water, rinse and repeat the cooking process for about 3 times.(this is shorten the process of cooking the red beans, as well as remove the raw taste and smell of the beans)
4. When it's time to cook the rice, wash and peel the sweet potatoes then cut it into small cubes.
5. Add all the ingredients into the rice cooker, add water and cook until done.

Notes: If you prefer you can add in pumpkin instead of sweet potatoes.