Bite On It!

During this confinement, I get to drink more soup than my previous one. I told my mom that I wish to try food that I did not get to eat the last time and was glad that my mom was so accommodating!

Besides the shallots and lemongrass soup I had, my mom also boiled some black beans with chicken feet soup. The great thing is, the whole family can enjoy this soup together!

One thing I like about KL is, some of the wet markets around my mom’s place has got good stuff selling. There is this poultry stall at the Yulek wet market which my mom frequent has really nice chickens. I like the size of their chicken wings and chicken feet… always in L or XL size as compared to those in Penang… always in S or M size!

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Ingredients

• 300g Black beans (you can put more if you like)
• 10sets Chicken feet
• 10pcs Red dates (optional)
• 2L Water
• Salt for taste

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Method

1. Dry pan fry the black beans until you can see the husk starting to break up. Lift up and set aside.
2. Boil water and put in all the ingredients and boil for at least 2 hours. Add salt for taste but if it is for confinement, usually we omit the salt.

Supposedly the Malaysian Northern regions have very fresh and juicy beansprouts especially in Perak. My mom used to buy 2kg back to KL each time we went back to our hometown near Ipoh. If you’ve been to Ipoh, their Nga-Choi-Kai or Chicken with bean sprouts is one famous dish. People will order a plate of stir-fried bean sprouts to go with their chicken rice/noodles. Normally we have to pay at least RM4 a plate but if we do it ourselves, it is less than RM1.

We folks in Penang do not get to have such good quality bean sprouts all the time. We do get them occasionally but not all the time. Most of the time we get the longer and skinner type/species. My PiggyBeng loves bean sprouts regardless of their size.

One of the weekend he bought a big pack home but he forgotten about it after keeping them in the fridge. I was looking for ingredients to cook a few days later saw them and some are about rot so decided to quickly cook them. I was lucky I still have my last bit of Kurau salted fish with me.

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Ingredients

• 100-150g Bean sprouts (if you have the time, pluck away the roots)
• 3pips Garlic - coarsely chopped
• 1/2 Carrot - cut into thin strips
• 1″x2″ Salted fish (preferably Kurau) - sliced thinly
• 1 Red chili - cut into think strips
• 1 stalk Spring onions/Coriander leaf - cut into 2″ long sections
• Pepper & light soy sauce for taste

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Methods

1. Heat up wok with some oil and light pan fry the sliced salted fish till fragrant, lift up and set aside.
2. Add some more oil to the walk and saute the garlic till fragrant before stir fry the carrot strips for 2 minutes, toss in the chili and fry for another minute before tossing in the bean sprouts and fry for 2-3 minutes.
3. Sprinklesome pepper and some light soy sauce to taste before tossing in the spring onions or coriander leaf.
4. Lastly add in the salted fish and mix well before serving.

This is one of my favorite dish which I learned from my mom many years back. I am not too sure if this dish is from Hakka, Hokkien or Cantonese influence as we are a mix of the three. What I like about this dish is the varieties of ingredients used and of course it is extremely yummy and appetizing but required a little more work.

Previously, like some 20 years ago, we can get really good ‘tau-kua’ or a type of bean curd which is harder than the normal tofu. They used to be yellow in color and has a very fragrant smell. However, I can’t seem to find this particular ‘tau-kua’ anymore. Though they are still selling the same thing but the taste and texture is completely different.

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Ingredients

• 200g French beans (cut into small piece of 1.5cm)
• 2pcs ‘Tau-kua’ - hard bean curd
• 150g Lean pork or pork belly (not too fatty ones) - cubed
• 2pcs Red chilies
• 150g Raw peanut (toasted with skin removed)
• 10g Preserved black beans
• 3 cloves Garlic (minced)

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Methods

1. Heat up wok with some oil and lightly fry the French beans and tau-kua separately. Lift them up and put aside.
2. Add some more oil into the wok and stir-fry the pork cubes until 50% cook. Lift up and put aside.
3. If the wok has not enough oil, add a little bit more and saute the garlic, add in the red chilies (squares) and stir for a while before throwing in the preserved black beans and continue to stir.
4. Add in the pork cubes, French beans and tau-kua and stir further for another few minutes till the pork is thoroughly cooked.
5. Before you life them up, throw in the roasted peanuts and stir.

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This is another emergency recipe that I’ve came out with. Like what I’ve mentioned before, I will buy beans (long-beans, French beans, Snake beans) to keep almost every week for those ‘just in case I don’t know what to cook’ occasion. At such time, I will rummaged throw my fridge for stuff that I can use and these beans always come in very handy as they are so versatile.

You can stir-fry, braised, boil, steam and even fried them! The possibilities are endless if you have the creativity to use them. The other reasons why I like to buy and keep them as they have a slightly longer shelf life as compared to other vegetables if you keep them in the right way.

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Ingredients

• 200g French beans (cut into 4cm strips)
• 1″ square Salted fish (use the Kurau/Cod fish type) - sliced
• 2 cloves Garlic (finely chopped)

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Methods

1. Heat up wok with some oil and lightly fry the French beans till about 70% cook. Lift up and put aside.
2. Add more oil into the wok and saute the salted fish slices till it turns sandy, put on one side of the wok.
3. With the balance oil in the wok, saute the garlic till fragrant before mixing with the salted fish and stir.
4. Throw in the fried French beans and stir well for a few minutes before serving.

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Sometimes I do get really lazy to do much cooking. These are the days where I will just cook the simplest dish… fry eggs! There are times when I have a little of this and that left over from some other cooking adventure and they are about to go to the bin but I will try to used them and not let it to waste.

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Ingredients

• 5 strands Longbeans (sliced thinly)
• 1 Red chili (sliced thinly)
• 3 Eggs (medium)
• Salt and pepper for taste

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Methods

1. Heat up a non-stick wok with 1 tbsp of oil and fry the longbeans lightly till it started to turn golden brown on some.
2. Throw on the chili and stir for a while till it’s soft.
3. Beat the eggs and add in salt and pepper to taste and pour onto the fried longbeans and chili. Let the beaten egg spread around the wok but lifting the wok and let the egg flow but still leave a thicker layer at the centre.
4. Let the egg omelette fr on small fire till it turn slightly golden brown before serving.