Purple Sweet Potato Mantou - 紫番薯馒头

Mantou(馒头) often referred to as Chinese steamed bun or bread is a kind of traditional steamed bun origin from China. It is normally made with wheat flour, water and leavening agents that leaves it with soft and fluffy texture. But in modern days now, there are a lot of ready-made frozen mantou that comes in different varieties and flavours which you can purchase from the supermarkets.

But for us, we still prefer to make our own mantou using fresh ingredients and consume it straight from the steamer rack while it is still hot. We love the taste of the freshly homemade mantou where we could add in more ingredients such as pumpkin, dried fruits, sweet potato and etc to make it more tasty and vibrant in colour to enhance the taste and at the same time attracts kids’ attention too.

For this recipe, I am using some mashed Purple Sweet Potato to make this mantou which gives it a very lovely natural Pinkish-purple colour which you can see from the photos. Purple Sweet Potatoes are richly nutritious as they are fat-free and low in calories, high in fiber and great for people who are carbohydrate sensitive and most importantly it is loaded with antioxidants.

These are the dry ingredients and steps on how to make the mantou dough using mashed sweet potato:-

Ingredients: (make 8 3cm wide medium mantou)
120g Plain Flour
1/2 Teaspoon Baking Powder
2 1/2 Tablespoon Caster Sugar
140g Purple Sweet Potato, cooked & mashed
1 Tablespoon Vegetable Oil
1/2 Teaspoon of Dry Yeast
40ml Lukewarm Water
2 Tablespoon Roasted Black Sesame Seeds, optional


Here are the steps on rolling and dividing the sweet potato dough:-

Method:
1. Add dry yeast into the lukewarm water and give it a quick stir, set aside for about 5 minutes till bubbles appeared.
2. Sift plain flour and baking powder together in a big bowl with the caster sugar till combined.
3. Next slowly add in yeast water into the flour mixture and stir using a metal spoon or clean hand and follow by the mashed sweet potato till it forms soft dough.
4. Add in oil and give the dough a quick knead till well combine or till dough does not stick to your hand.
5. Set the dough aside in a lightly flour/oil bowl, covered with cling wrap and let it proof for about 20 minutes till the dough became slightly bigger.
6. Knead proof dough on a lightly floured work surface for a few second, flatten and roll into a rectangular shape, sprinkle some black sesame seeds on it, roll it up lengthwise into an oblong shape.
7. Repeat the process once or twice depends on your preference.
8. Roll the final dough into oblong shape, cut them into equal portions and coat the top of each slice of mantou with some extra black sesame seeds.
9. Place each shaped mantou on the steamer rack with greaseproof paper below and rest for another 10 minutes.
10. Sprinkle some water on the mantou before placing the steamer rack into the pot of boiling water and steam them over medium heat for about 8 - 10 minutes. (depending on the size of the mantou)
11. When done, removed and served hot/warm.

Note:

~ Lukewarm is about 36 - 37 degree Celsius

~ Rinse and cut the sweet potato into chunks, steam it over medium heat till soft (about 10 - 15 minutes), removed from heat and mashed it into paste form while hot and set aside for later use.

Indeed homemade Mantou is something quite quick and easy if you could get the hand out of it. Moreover you could also mix and match with different ingredients according to your own preference and this can be consider as a healthy snacks for both the adults and kids too. Sometime I would also make a bigger portion and keep some of it in the freezer so that I could re-heat/re-steam them for a quick snack anytime we feel like having our favourite mantou.

Tian Nan Xing Minced Pork Noodle

I seldom eat Minced Pork Noodles because my favourite noodle is Wanton Mee compared to either fishball or minced pork noodles. So when Misstamchiak(Maureen) invites me to go along with her for the search of local delight for her weekly food column I was very excited about it.

According to Maureen, there are roughly about 10 soup version of Minced Pork Noodles stalls around Bedok area. And I believe most of you would have heard or tried either one or two of the famous stalls located at Bedok North, Block 85 food centre. (for more information, you can refer to "Miss Tam Chiak's" website HERE)

But our food sourcing was not about that two well-known stalls at Block 85, instead we have a new location at Block 511, Bedok North Street 3 cooked food centers, "Tim Nan Xing Minced Pork Noodle".

This stall is now managed by the 3rd and 4th generation of the Chen’s family whom great-grandparent was origin from Fujian, China. According to the Chen’s there is no special recipe for this noodle, all they use are “genuine and fresh” ingredients to prepared a bowl of authentic and delicious noodles for their customers.

For those who have tried their noodle before, you would agreed that the soup broth is indeed very tasty and it goes well with their spongy noodles, homemade dumplings and other ingredients such as minced meat and meatballs. Here the minced meat is not those lumpy type but rather scattered loosely in the soup broth.

If you know of any tasty minced pork noodles stall that you used to frequent, do drop me a note/comment to share with us why you love that stall so that more people could get a chance to try it out too.

Tian Nan Xing Minced Pork Noodle
Block 511 Bedok North Street 3
#01-10
Kaki Bukit 511 Market and Food Centre
Singapore 460511

Opening Hours:
7.00am to 1.30pm; 5.30pm to 1.30am
(Closed on every 1st & 15th day of the Lunar Calender)

Chicken, Longan and Burdock Soup

Remember my "Seah's Emperor Herbs Chicken" post which I have posted in late October. This is part II of the post on how I used the other half of the chicken which I have mentioned in that post about cooking this "Longan Burdock Soup".

This is another version of my "burdock" soup which use chicken parts for those who prefer chicken flavour soup. But if you are interested about the recipe using pork muscle on the Double-Boiled Pork Muscle with Burdock Soup you can always refer to the link HERE.

These are the ingredients and steps for making the chicken soup:-

Ingredients:-
1/2 Portion of Chicken, about 500g
200g of Burdock(牛蒡), cut into sections
10g of Yuzhu(玉竹)
10g of Dried Longan(桂圆肉)
6 - 8 Red Dates(红枣)
1/2 Tablespoon of Wolfberries(枸杞子)2
1.2 Litre of Water

Method:
1. Rinse the herbs and set a side while preparing the chicken.
2. Clean, trim and rinse the chicken, cut it into halves or quarters then blanched it in boiling water for about 3 - 5 minutes. Remove and rinse well.
3. Bring 1.2 Litre of water to boil in a big pot, add in all the herbs and let it simmer on medium low heat for about 5 minutes before adding the chicken.
4. When the mixture comes to boil again after adding the chicken, transfer the mixture to a slow cooker and cook it on AUTO mode for about 2 - 2.5 hours.
5. Serve it warm before meal or together with steam rice.

Burdock is a root vegetables that is high in fibre, low in calories and contain moderate source of iron and calcium which is good for the body. With adding of dried Longan to this soup it nourishes the heart and the spleen and at the same time works well for treating tensions, palpitation, insomnia and forgetfulness which makes this a great soup for the whole family.

Green Bean Soup With Sweet Potato

Green Bean Soup is one of the common local dessert that can be easily found in most households or dessert stalls at the food centres. For us, we love to add in some chunks of sweet potato and serve it with drizzle of both or either coconut milk or gula malaka syrup. The aroma and taste of the gula melaka blends perfectly into this dessert which makes you definitely go for a second helping.

I have heard from some Chinese physician that Green Beans (绿豆; Mung Beans) can clear Heat; ease mental stress; reduce blood glucose level and stimulate the secretion of body fluid. This is the reason why most of our parents or grandparents always love to prepare some green bean soup for the family during hot weather to cool down our body heat.

These are the ingredients and steps on how to prepare my version of green bean soup :-

Ingredients: (serves 4)
150g Green Bean(绿豆)
1 Medium Size Orange Sweet Potato
50g Sago
10 - 15 Pre-packed Ginkgo Nut, optional
1.5 Litre Water
1 Bundle of Pandan Leave
Rock Sugar/brown sugar to Taste

Optional Toppings:
Some Coconut Milk
Some Gula Malaka Syrup

Method:
1. Rinse a few times and remove any dirt or spoilt green beans from the pool then set them aside and bring a pot of 1.5 litre of water to boil.
2. Next remove the outer skin of the sweet potato, cut it into chunks and add them together with the green beans into the boiling water.
3. Rinse the pre-packed ginkgo nut and remove any greenish pith in the middle of the nut then marinate it with about 1 tablespoon of castor sugar and set aside.
4. When the green bean mixture comes to boil again, lower the heat and let it simmer over medium low heat till the bean begins to soften or cracks open. (takes about 15 minutes or so)
5. Add in the rinse sago, marinated ginkgo nut and pandan leave then continue to simmer till the sago becomes transparent.
6. Removed the pandan leave, add in rock sugar to taste.

Note:

~ You can add in more water if you prefer more soupy dessert.

~ You can make some Gula Melaka sugar by boiling 2 part sugar to 1 part water till the sugar completely dissolved, sieved away any residues, cool and you can kept it in the fridge in a glass bottle till further usage.

I guess it all depend on individual taste and preference while preparing the green bean soup. Some might just like the traditional way of adding sago while others might prefer adding some glutinous rice or even extra chunks of sweet potato to make it a quick meal. No matter which methods, I am sure there is always one prefect recipe from each household. If you do prepared green bean soup at home, perhaps you can share with us some of your ingredients and tips too :p