Bite On It!

I was told that pork liver is good for those who has lost blood during labor. Pork liver contains a rich source of iron which will help us to rebuild those lost blood cells. I was never a fan of pork intestines so this dish did not appeal to me in the very beginning but I ate it because of it ‘purpose’.

My mom told me it is tough to find good liver these days as the pigs are no longer being fed on organic food like ages ago. However, mom advised that I should look for those that are bright and shinny liver if I wanted to buy them as these are fresher. Never go for those dark and dull in color ones.

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Ingredients

• 300g Pork liver (sliced thinly)
• 1 pkt Holland peas/sweet peas/snap peas
• 80g Old ginger
• Sesame seed oil
• Light soy sauce
• Corn flour for marinade

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Methods

1. Marinade sliced pork liver with some corn flour and light soy sauce, set aside.
2. In a wok or frying pan, heat up 4tbsp of sesame seed oil and saute the old ginger strips until fragrant.
3. Toss in the Holland peas and gently stir them for a few minutes.
4. When the peas are about 70% cooked, pour in the marinaded pork liver slices and stir gently until 90% cooked.
5. Sprinkle some light soy sauce over before lifting them up and serve.

Though confinement is only for 30 or 40 days, it is still very important to have variations as it can be very boring to be eating the same few dishes day in day out for that one month period. During my first confinement, I had almost the same dishes everyday since both my mom and myself were not too sure which ingredient can be eaten at which period. Since this is our second time, things have sure improved.

The only thing is, this time we make it very simple since my mom has to take care of Darrius and my nephew. Therefore, I told her to cook all the simplest dishes she can think of beside the few which I requested. Here is another dish which I really like…

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Ingredients

• 300g Pork (the face section which is very smooth and tender) - sliced thinly
• 50g Ginger - thin strips
• 2-3 stalks Spring onions
• Corn flour + water solution (to marinade sliced pork)
• 3tbl Sesame seed oil
• Light soy sauce for taste

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Method

1. Heat up wok with sesame seed oil and saute the ginger till fragrant.
2. Toss in marinated sliced pork and stir till 70% cook. Add in spring onion which has been cut into 2″ sections.
3. Sprinkle some light soy sauce and stir till well mixed before serving.

Wow! It has been 2 months since I last posted anything here! My sincere apology!

Well, currently I am 2 weeks post natal and I am still on confinement. There are still a lot of adjustment needed juggling 2 kids now and in another 2 weeks, I will be on my own when I return home to Penang. I can’t imagine my days ahead!

I count my blessings as my mom is helping me with my confinement now so I know I am in good hands. This time we decided to do it as simple as possible since my mom is baby sitting my nephew and also helping me to care for Darrius as I am not allowed to do heavy chores. One of the things I enjoyed during this period is of course those yummy confinement food which we can’t really consume when we are not in confinement! As most of these dishes are rated as ‘extremely heaty’ during normal days, some of us only can take them once in a while while not in confinement.

Since I don’t get to eat these special dishes all the time, I just want to share it with those of you who are looking for some simple yet delicious confinement dishes which you can incorporate into your confinement menu especially for those of you who did not engage a confinement lady to help. One of my favorite is this peppered pork dish which I have been having almost any other day!

The other reason why I prefer to have pepper over ginger is because my baby is suffering from newborn jaundice and I was ‘advised’ by some to limit my ginger intake for the first 10 days post natal.

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Ingredients

• 200g Pork loin (Sliced thinly and slightly knocked with the back of a cleaver)
• 10g Peppercorns (crushed)
• 3tbsp  Sesame seed oil
• Light soy sauce for taste
• Corn starch
• 1tbsp Glutinous rice wine (optional)

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Methods

1. Cut the pork loin into thin slices, knocked with the back of cleaver and marinade with the crushed peppercorns, some light soy sauce and some glutinous rice wine for 15 minutes.
2. Heat up sesame seed oil in frying pan, sprinkle some corn starch onto the sliced marinated pork before frying on medium low heat till cook.

Gosh! It has certainly been a loooong while since my last post here. I hardly go into the kitchen when my morning sickness started to kick in in early May. It was so bad that my hubby has to take over the cooking for almost 4 months. In those months we only have simple meals with steamed fish and soup only. The rest of the time I only munch on bread and dry biscuits as anything that has weird taste/smell made me feel like throwing up.

Now I am 32 weeks along and things has certainly got better. In fact I have been feasting quite a bit about 2 months… yeah, getting back! I’ve also took back the kitchen for a while but due to some traveling the past 2 months, I did not cook as much but rather enjoying all the unhealthy outside food…

Though I took back the kitchen, I did not do much new dishes or have the interest to experiment with new ingredients. And my Darrius is also not so cooperative and has been a little pain as he refused to eat by himself. Thus, I have to feed him almost every meal. So, to make life easier, I only can think of doing all the simple yet healthy dishes.

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Ingredients

• 200-300g Pork meat (use pork belly) - minced
• 3-4 Water chestnuts - coarsely chopped
• 2″ strip of Dried cuttlefish - coarsely chopped
• 3 Chinese mushrooms- coarsely chopped
• 1tsp Oil
• 1tbsp Corn flour
• 1.5tbsp Light soy sauce
• Dash of pepper
• Water

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Method

1. Mix minced meat with water chestnuts, dried cuttlefish and Chinese mushrooms  together with corn flour, oil, soy sauce and pepper. When well mixed, put it in a light curve dish and flatten the surface.
2. Pour some some water to nicely cover the top, add some light soy sauce to give some color and put into the steamer on medium heat for about 12-15 minutes or till cooked.

One funny thing about pregnant women is they tend to have food cravings! It is one thing that no medical experts can explain why pregnant women have such needs. Well, this is one thing I could not dispute either as I do have different cravings at different time of my pregnancy.

Recently I started to have cravings too (you should be able to guess why!!!) and I just want to have my kind of ‘comfort’ food. Though the morning sickness has yet to kicks in but I have been thinking a lot about food that I will hardly want to cook or eat on normal days.

Besides craving for Asam Laksa this time, I just wanted to eat something ‘warm’ and with lots of ginger. I’m not too sure if it is good to consume too much ginger during the early stage of pregnancy since there are no proofs/evidences that they are. I don’t cook food with too much ginger everyday so guess it should be fine.

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Ingredients

• 200g Lean pork loin (Yuk-Ngan in Cantonese) - sliced thinly
• 50g Old ginger (you can use young ginger too so not that heaty) - sliced thinly
• 1 Tomato (optional) - remove seeds
• 1tsp Garlic (optional) - finely chopped
• 1.5L Water
• 1.5tsp Corn flour
• 1tbsp Fish sauce for marinade
• Pepper for marinade
• Oil for marinade (soften the meat)
• Salt for taste

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Methods

1. Marinade pork slices with corn flour, fish sauce, pepper and oil and leave for at least 30 minutes prior to cooking.
2. Heat up wok/medium sized pot with a little oil and saute the sliced ginger till fragrant before adding in the chopped garlic as it gets burnt quicker. If you can’t stand the smell of garlic, you can omit it.
3. When both ginger and garlic are well sauteed, add in the water, cover and brings it to boil.
4. Add in the sliced pork and stir so they will not stick to each other before adding in the tomato.
5. When it started to boil, add in salt/fish sauce to taste.