A Couple of Updates

I was at Cold Storage, The Gardens last weekend and oh my, they have increased the price of the scones! It's now RM3.00 for 3. I guess must be in anticipation for the sugar and flour price hike sighhh...

Next, I would like to announce that Normah of Hatter's Cafe & Bakerie will be selling her chocolates at Ekspo Beli Barangan Malaysia from 16 - 20 June 2010 at Dewan Tun Razak 3 & 4, Level 3 & 4, Putra World Trade Centre; 10.00am - 9.00pm. If you're there, do look out for her booth!

Happy Duan Wu Jie

**Non-Halal**

The Chinese are celebrating Duan Wu Jie aka Rice Dumpling aka Dragon Boat Festival today. Those who are celebrating this festival, Happy Duan Wu Jie to you and your family.



These rice dumplings (also known as tzung or bak chang) are made by PureGlutton and they're very delicious. Needless to say they contained lots of "liew" (ingredients). Since I don't know how to make them, you can check her recipe in her blog on how to make them. The recipe came with lots of pics! Oh yummm. She has offered to teach me and FBB how to make them so we're waiting patiently for it to happen :p. Thanks in advance!

Review: Tean's Gourmet Chicken Curry Paste

Time for a product review. This time Tean's Gourmet Chicken Curry Paste. I bought a packet of this after hearing my Malaysian friend who resides in Hong Kong raving of Tean's Gourmet ready made pastes. Can't remember how much but it's definitely less than RM5.



I read the instructions twice cos I can't believed it was so simple to cook up a pot of curry chicken. Gone were the days where we need to pound away the herbs and spices, perfect for busy couples who rushes home to cook dinner for the brood. It says there just need to cook the paste with 1.5kg of chicken pieces and potatoes. Add water and simmer till cooked before adding coconut milk!!! Right there on the packet, it mentioned 15 minutes to cook the chicken curry.



So instead of one whole chicken, I bought 3 pieces of chicken thigh, chopped and have the skin removed. I fried the paste first till a bit fragrant before adding the chicken pieces and potatoes. Stir a bit and added around 250ml water. I put on the lid and simmer on low heat for about 20 mins as my chicken pieces are larger in size. Poured in about 200ml fresh coconut milk (I've used this since it's my first time using this paste but next time I'll use yoghurt or evaporated milk). Once it come to a boil, I tasted the curry and it was perfect! No extra seasonings needed so I turned off the stove.

Served with rice or bread.



My verdict of this paste is the curry turned out fantastic. A bit hot according to my colleague when I brought the leftover for lunch. It's so hard to believe such a great pot of curry chicken came out from an instant paste. My only complaint is the curry is pretty oily but all I did was just scoop out the reddish oil from the surface and it was good to go. Highly recommended especially those who resides overseas and now I understand why so many people rave about the paste. I guess it would be good to check out the rest of the range later on.

Braised Pork Ribs with Leeks and Shallots served with Garlic and Ginger Fried Rice

**Non-Halal**




Most times I will try to keep our meals to be simple but yet striking a balance of having a little bit ot everything. Just like this time, we have a easy peasy braised pork ribs. The shallots gave the dish a sweetish caramalised taste with the addition of fragrant Chinese leeks which seems to be available even outside Chinese New Year season these days.

What I did was marinade pork ribs with a dash of fish sauce, white pepper and some corn flour for a couple of hours in the fridge. Just remove from fridge about 30 mins before cooking. I shallow fry the ribs in batches with some oil until they're lightly browned. Remove the ribs and set aside. Using the same pan, add some oil if needed. Add in a handful of peeled whole shallots and fry till the edges are slightly brown, remove and set aside. Then throw in sliced leeks and cook till soften a bit. Remove and set aside.

Still using the same pan as I liked to deglaze the fried sticky bits on the bottom of the pan, add a little oil if there's non left. Fry some minced soy bean paste till fragrant before adding back the shallots, leeks and ribs. Stir a bit before pouring just enough water to cover the ribs. Adjust the seasoning with a wee bit of sugar, salt is usually not necessary but do add some if you did not use enough soy bean paste. Simmer on low heat for about 45 mins.

You can cook this using your slow cooker. Dish up and serve hot. I served them with a simple Garlic and Ginger Fried Rice.

To cook  the rice, scrambled some eggs and set aside. Fry ginger and garlic in oil till fragrant and lightly browned before adding the frozen vegetables (can omit this actually). Stir and add in some salt. Pour in day old rice and mix well. Sprinkle in some soy sauce for some colour and taste; and also some pepper. Add in the eggs and mix well. Dish up and serve.

Note: The black seeds and brown bits are not sesame seeds but are flax seeds as I've used multi-grain rice.

Review: Thong Lung Sang Seafood Restaurant

**Non-Halal**


My mother suggested we eat here on Mother's Day as we ran late and can't afford to travel so far to eat Hokkien and Hock Chew food. She mentioned the name Lung Kee but the English signage stated Thong Lung Sang Seafood Restaurant. This restaurant started off as a dai chow near FRIM and shifted to current location sometime back. Business must have been really good when they now occupied 2 shoplots and they have loads of table on the 5 foot way and also at the empty space beside the shops.

The 5 of us have to sit outside since the air-cond section were for pre-booked tables. Luckily it wasn't a hot day that evening. We let mother to dictate the dishes and she came out with this 2 Styles Pork Ribs (RM32). One style have deep fried ribs coated with creamy mayo and the other is sweet sourish. Both are equally nice.



We also have a 2 Styles Homemade Tofu (RM22) which is their signature dish. The middle portion have a thick slab of smooth homemade eggy tofu, deep fried and topped with a mince meat sauce. The pieces of tofu surrounding this are battered and deep fried mashed tofu, I gathered have pieces of fish paste mixed inside. This dish was BoiBoi's fave.



We picked a Stir-Fried Sweet Potato Shoots in Sambal Belachan and it was delivered full of wok-hei (breath of a wok). Good stuff here!



Lastly a firm favourite, Cheung Tzing Fei Chau (Steamed Tilapia in Bean Sauce, RM22). The sauce here is made extra fragrant with the usage of deep fried lard pieces! Do I need to elaborate further?!



My mother said they specialised in lala dishes here but it's too bad they were all sold out. Next time, perhaps. All in I paid RM94.10 for all the dishes with 3 bowls of rice and a pot of King Tea (Char Wong). Seems reasonable to me and now I understand why the place is jam packed.

Thong Lung Sang Seafood Restaurant
B-G-17 Jalan Metro Perdana 1,
Taman Usahawan Kepong,
52100 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: (+6012) 2312138; (+603) 6259 4816
Business Hours: 11.30am to 12 midnight
Map

Kampung Cuisine With Rohani Jelani @ Bayan Indah

Last Saturday, I must be the happiest gal on earth!!! Excuse me a sec, I just have to let this out... I finally met my culinary idol - Rohani Jelani!!! :p

In case you don't know, Rohani used to develop recipes and the food stylist for Her World magazine back in the 90s. I painstakingly tore the recipe pages and have them all filed up, yes I still have them all! Actually I knew about her setting up cooking classes in her home in Kampung Sungai Penchala (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) after she left Her World but just like FBB, I never got round to sign up for a class until boo_licious and I received an email from Li-Hsian extending an invitation to attend one, plus got us to rope in some food bloggers along. How can we say NO right? Heh... but too bad boo_licious can't attend.

With that, Alice (Jom Makan! Good Food Trek), Audrey (Audrey Cooks), Chris (PureGlutton), FBB (FatBoyBakes), Jon (A Lil' Fat Monkey), Meena (AWOL) and myself headed over to Bayan Indah for few hours of fun in the huge open kitchen.

Rohani has since moved out of her home and turned the place into a modern styled kampung resort which she named it Bayan Indah. Within the one acre land, there's the two-storey bungalow with lots of wide and tall glass windows to let natural light shines in and for occupants to absorb in the lush greeneries; a fish pond amongst fruit trees, flower shrubs and herbs; a single-storey bungalow occupied by her helpers and an standalone structure which used to be the carpenter's workshop for private meetings or events.



This is everybody's dream house where tropical fruit trees and herbs are aplenty, and I spotted a large pot of rosemary too which is sooo fragrant! The herbs needed for our class were plucked straight from the garden, super fresh I tell ya.

The kitchen and dining area are located on the ground floor whilst the upper level is where the 4 bedrooms and living area are located. There are quite a number of nooks and corners where one can do their reading. There are quite a lot of books on the shelves but mostly cook books, of course. I guess I don't need to describe how beautiful the place is, just let the pics do all the talking.





As all of us have picked Kampung Cuisine, Rohani and Li-Hsian have pre-arranged with us via emails on our choice of dishes and they grouped us up accordingly. Before we start our class, Rohani briefed us over some delish cake, pastries, and coffee/tea. Rohani is so fun to be with. She's so down to earth and her witty comments got us cracking every now and then. With our banters, the briefing went on quite long, plus it's not helping when we camwhore every now and then LOL. She hasn't have a class where ALL the students kept on shooting non-stop, not even when we're in the midst of cooking.



Since there were 7 of us, I partnered with Meena to cook up Ayam Percik (spiced, grilled chicken), Nasi Kerabu (herb rice salad) and Masak Air Cekur Manis Dengan Ubi Keledek (green vegetable and sweet potato soup). Later on Meena took on the task to make some Onde-onde (glutinous rice balls filled with palm sugar) with some help from FBB and Jon. Funny how Rohani could tell which were the balls were made by FBB :p







The "AhPa" and "son" team cooked up a storm of Ayam Percik, Masak Air Cekur Manis using pumpkin instead of sweet potatoes and Masak Lemak Udang Dengan Nenas (prawn and pineapple curry).



The team of 3 very experienced cooks - Audrey, Alice and Chris, were entasked to come up with Kerabu Jantung Pisang (banana flower salad), Ayam Percik, Nasi Kerabu and Masak Lemak Udang Dengan Nenas.





Together with Rohani's explanation and prep work plus cleaning by her team of helpers, we managed to quickly cook up our dishes. Every now and then, Rohani checked on us and gave us many useful tips and tricks along as we go. It was very very informative indeed as cook books don't tell you everything. We learnt to cut our dry chillies diagonally so that it's easier to remove the seeds, how to bundle and slice the ulams, how to devine prawns and remove their "brains" and loads of other tips.

Check out this video on how to slice the ulams into hair like strands...





We finally got down and savour the dishes we have laboured over. They're all so delicious and best of all Rohani made it so easy that I can wipe off my fear of recipes with long list of ingredients. Err actually her recipes are not long at all for Malay dishes, I'm so glad :p


* the hands photo stolen from FBB



Thank you so much to Li-Hsian, Rohani, Wati and her team of assistants for having us, the crazy bunch of food bloggers, at Bayan Indah. We're looking forward to another session with Rohani, soon... very soon!





Check what others have to say about this class:
Audrey Cooks
FBB
PureGlutton

If you're interested with the classes or book a stay at Bayan Indah, drop Rohani a mail at rohani@bayanindah.com.

Review: Cold Storage's Scones

When you're too lazy (like me), or lack of equipments or *cough cough* skills to churn out a batch of delicious and fluffy scones, do not fret. You can head to the nearest Cold Storage's bakery to grab a packet of scones just like this...

Only RM2.39 for 3 fairly large round pieces... you'll get buttery and fluffy scones with lots of raisins in there. Mind you they really tasted quite good and for that price, I'm not complaining after tasting expensive and horrible scones especially in Cameron Highlands. Just need to slap on some butter or clotted cream and strawberry jam!

Last week, I so happened to check out the Cold Storage's bakery at KLCC and I found breads and pastries from Riche Montana (can be found at South City Plaza where they have nice stuff but quite heavy on the pocket) and Mrs MacGregor. Very surprisingly indeed. Well time is indeed changing!

p/s: The comments will be moderated from today onwards cos I can't stand anymore spams from Japanese/Chinese/Law Firm!!!