Bite On It!

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.

When I was preggy with Darrius, I had the worst morning sickness that made me lose almost 10kg during the first 4 months. I can hardly eat anything as I will purge after 30 minutes. It was a terrible feeling!

I have to stay with my mom most of the time as PiggyBeng was unable to take care of me while he is way for work so we agreed that it is best for me to stay with my parents so my mom can see to my needs. It was the best decision as my mom pampered me with all the healthy and yummy food she prepared for me.

From that time I learned this very simple dish that she used to cook for me when she saw nice and fresh lady’s fingers in the market. Some people referred it as okra but we  normally call it lady’s fingers. What my mom will do is just put them in a dish and let them steam inside the rice cooker with a little soy sauce and I can swear it tasted so good!

As I am getting one little fussy eater soon, I decided to make some modifications. I know Darrius loves sourish food (he told me he loves Asam Laksa!) so instead of just soy sauce, I chopped some garlic and saute it with chopped chilli and add some lemon sauce to the soy sauce and it turned out great! Ended up, Darrius wanted to drink the sauce but spitted out the lady’s fingers complaining that they have too many seeds!

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Ingredients

• 200-300g Lady’s fingers or Okra (cut away the head and tail)
• 1tbsp Chopped garlic
• 1tsp Chopped red chili
• Light soy sauce
• Lemon juice

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Methods

1. Steam the lady’s fingers for 5-7 minutes or till soft.
2. In a wok, heat up a little oil and saute the garlic and chili.
3. In a small bowl, add light soy sauce with lemon juice (add some water if you want to have more sauce) and pour over the sauteed garlic and chili, stir for a while till it boils and gently pour onto the steamed lady’s fingers.

All of us just recovered from a terrible flu earlier so I am still preparing simple dishes which are mild and don’t require much frying. In fact I did a lot of steaming which is less oily and less heaty too.

This dish is one one of my childhood favorite too. When I was working, I normally cook simple dishes like this that require very little preparation time since it will be so late when I reach home but I always yearn for home cooked food, that I will troubled myself even after a tired day in the office.

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Ingredients

• 200g Minced pork (not too fatty but can’t be too lean either)
• 1-2 slices Preserved Mustard or Ham-choi (finely chopped)
• 1-2 tsp Corn starch (to hold the minced pork and preserved mustard together)
• Salt or light soy sauce for taste
• A  few drops of oil (to make the meat smoother)
• Water

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Methods

1. Add minced pork and finely chopped preserved mustard together with 1-tsp corn starch.
2. Add in some salt to taste and placed it on a not too deep set plate. Smothen the top and add some water before sending it to steam.
3. Steam till the suace (water) starts to boil or you can poke the centre with a chopstick after 10 minutes in steamer to make sure the meat is thoroughly cooked.

I have 2 over-ripe banana sitting on my table and I really wanted to use them to make banana cake but 2 is not enough for the recipe I have so what shall I do? Another was, I was lazy to bring out the mixer coz I already going to have some cupcake projects later in the week… excuses.. excuses…

Then I remember I came across a few sites about making steam cakes and I thought, why not? So I went to google about ‘Steamed Banana Cakes’ and first on the list was from Chow Times.

Was extremely happy that the ingredients called for the recipe are so easy! Save me lots of time and electricity too! And of course they are less oily (no butter) and not heaty at all! The only thing that needs to compromise is of course the texture and taste… got to eat them fresh!

I took the opportunity to try out my silicon cups… just to test them if they can take the heat… and yes they did! The cakes turn out to be quite springy… like sponge… hehheehe

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Ingredients

• 2 ripe banana, mashed (if you have large banana, use one will do)
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon oil
• 2 teaspoons water
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 cup icing sugar (I used brown sugar)
• 100g (close to 1 cup) all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons of semi-sweet chocolate chips or raisins (optional)

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Methods

1. Mashed the bananas and leave aside.
2. Mix the rest of the ingredients in another mixing bowl and it is well mixed add in the mashed banana.
3. Heat up the steamer and steam till all the banana cupcakes are cooked which is around 10-15 minutes.

This is another of my favorite dish which I have modified from the more ‘difficult’ version. A relative taught me how to make the Emperor Chicken which uses plastic and foil to wrap up before sending it to steam.

I find the usage of plastic (the glass paper used for craft) is not a healthy choice as we are not sure if they are considered as food grade. Hence, I omitted it. Steaming the chicken the way I’m doing it now does not compromise the taste that much and it is a more healthy alternative.

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Ingredients

• 1/2 Kampung chicken (farm run chicken) - cut into small pieces
• A few slices of Dang Gui (Angelica sinensis)
• A few slices of Yuk Chok (dried polygonatum)
• 1tbsp Wolfberries (Goji berries)
• Salt
• Water

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Methods

1. Wash, clean and rub some salt to the chicken and place in a deep set plate.
2. Place all the herbal ingredients all over the plate and add in enough water to cover the chicken pieces.
3. Steam for 15-20 minutes until chicken are thoroughly cooked. Serve.