Pop Up Asian Chefs - “Food is our common ground, a universal experience.” - James Beard

“People who love to eat are always the best people.” – Julia Child
“Laughter is brightest in the place where the food is.” – Irish proverb

One of the best way of dispensing happiness is through making food and eating together. A couple of us have started this initiative/venture and if you like to cook and eat together, then let's do it together here in Lund, Sweden where we might be far away from our home country but we can still enjoy the fellowship and food!

Join us at our Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/popupasianchefs

I'm more active in Facebook than Blogger!

Yup, this is a confession. I need to find a better way to update my blog with the schedule of a mom of a 2 year old, Phd candidate and cooking aspirations!

I'm also at the stage where there are so many other (and very professional) cooking blogs and I need to find my USP. Maybe I can start cooking from my 30 over cookbooks that I haven't had time to try all! It will fill me up for quite a few years I suppose.

Despite all these brainworks, the kitchen is still kept busy and I always take a quick snap and upload to my Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Singlish-Swenglish/117779461576612 instead, if you would like to follow and also ask for the recipes or references! :) Like me on Facebook and you can manage the notifications from there.

Mapo Tofu eller Spicy Beancurd with minced sauce

Its been a long while and I have been feeling guilty about not updating the blog but I'm still here and cooking everyday! We were away in Singapore for a couple of months and I have been pampered by the ease of just buying what we want to eat or having my dear Dad cook meals for us that it was starting to become a habit.

However, now that we are back to reality (and Sweden), its home cooked meals most days now and this is one of those dishes that I have been cooking so often that I thought I must have post it up, but no, I haven't. It's a very good recipe from Fuschia Dunlop, who, if you haven't heard has a new cookbook called Every grain of Rice. Since I already had two of her cookbooks, I was quite wary that the recipes might repeat themselves but I was pleasantly surprised that there were plenty of new recipes, with just a few duplicates. I skipped the salted chilli and used a fresh chilli padi instead.

Ingredients
100g minced pork
½ teaspoon dark soy sauce
2 teaspoons Shaoxing wine
1 block (about 550g) firm tofu
1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic
2 soaked and drained dried shiitake mushroom, diced finely
1 chilli padi sliced finely (optional)
1 tablespoon chilli bean paste
1 teaspoon dried chilli flakes
150g water or stock
1 teaspoon potato flour mixed with 1 tablespoon cold water (for thickening the sauce)
3 spring onions, green part sliced finely
1 teaspoon sesame seed oil
3 tablespoon cooking oil
Sprinkle of roasted ground Szechuan pepper


Steps

1. Mix the pork with the dark soy sauce and Shaoxing wine and set aside.
2. Cut the tofu into large cubes and let it simmer gently for about 5 mins in a pot of salted water. This, according to my Chinese friend helps the tofu stays firm, I also think it flavours the tofu a bit making it more tasty. Drain and set aside.
   
   
   
   
3. Heat the wok over high heat until smoke rises and add the cooking oil, then the minced pork, stir-frying it until it separates and changed colour.
   
   
   
   
   
4. Add the garlic, mushrooms, chilli bean paste and stir fry until fragrant. 
5. Add in the chilli flakes and chilli padi and fry a little bit more.
6. Add the tofu into the wok and add in the water, along with a sprinkle of chicken stock granules if you are not using stock.
   
   
   
   
   
7. Reduce the heat and let it simmer until the sauce has reduced a bit with the tofu absorbing the goodness.
8. Add in potato flour mixture a little bit at a time until the gravy reach your desired consistency, then add in the spring onions and sesame seed oil and give it a quick stir.
9. Serve hot with a sprinkle of roasted ground Szechuan pepper.

Chee Cheong Fan (Steamed Rice Rolls)

About one more month before a long overdue visit back to Singapore! Meanwhile, this breakfast item was made using the recipe from My Kitchen Snippets. Rather than going through the trouble of making the sesame sauce which, to me is the most important part of chee cheong fan, I got my sister to bring me a bottle of this sesame sauce from Kwong Woh Hing. I highly recommend this for chee cheong fan sauce or if you like it on your niang tofu etc. It's not too expensive either but you have to order a certain amount before they deliver and it's not really available on normal stores. Their thick dark soy sauce is also perfect for half-boiled eggs.

Ingredients
150g rice flour
1½ tbsp wheat starch
2 tbsp cornstarch
1 tbsp Oil
450ml water
½ tsp salt
toasted sesame seeds
2 tablespoons of Kwong Woh Hing sesame sauce diluted with 1 tablespoon of hot water

Steps

1. Mix the dry ingredients together first in a bowl before adding the water, stirring it well so no lumps are formed. Add the salt and oil last and set aside for at least 30 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, prepare your steamer. For me, I use two lightly oiled metal plates that fits snugly on top of a steaming rack for my pot and interchange them while steaming. Always heat up the plate first in the steamer before pouring in the batter for about a minute. I have a small ladle that produces just the right thickness of chee cheong fan, so you might need to adjust accordingly for the right amount for the size of the plate you are using.
   
   
   
3. Steam the batter for about 2-3 minutes (cover it with the pot cover), then remove it and let it cool before rolling up the rice sheet.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
4. Slices/cut it with scissors, pour over the sesame seed sauce and some fried shallots and some toasted sesame seeds if preferred.
   
   
   
    
   

Spicy Stewed Chicken with Potatoes

You know there are certain dishes you cook so that you can just soak your rice with the gravy? Well, this is one of those. If you don't like it spicy, you can skip the dried chili or add more if you like it. This is nicer with chicken drumsticks or thighs because the meat is considered not as 'tough' as breast meat. I like to cook such one pot dish nowadays because time is of the essence when taking care of an active baby, but when I still missed the goodness of simple Chinese dishes.

Ingredients

4-5 drumsticks

Thumbsize ginger, sliced thinly

3-4 potatoes, peeled and quartered

3 dried chilli

1 tablespoon dark soy sauce

2-3 tablespoons oyster sauce

Steps

1. Heat up 2-3 tablespoons of cooking oil and brown the potatoes first, scoop it up and set aside.
2. Add the ginger slices and stir fry until fragrant. Add the chicken next to brown it and then the dried chilli.
   
   
   
3. Pour the dark soy sauce over and stir fry it well, then add in the potatoes and oyster sauce and pour enough water to cover the ingredients. Let it come to a boil then turn it down to simmer until the potatoes is tender and chicken is cooked through and falling slightly away from the bones.
4. Taste to check the seasoning, add some light soy sauce or sugar to taste if you prefer. Serve it with plenty of gravy with rice :)
   
   
   

Thai Grilled Chicken

I never imagined a simple ingredient such as the coriander root can make such a difference to a marinade. Yes, that is the secret to this super-delicious grilled chicken shared by a very generous lady Nuk from her chef sister. She made this for one of our gatherings and I immediately begged her for the recipe, with measurements that is. And so, here it is to be shared with all you readers :). Just a note, I marinade this for two nights in a fridge, so the flavours really seeps into the chicken, but one night would be enough too.

Ingredients

1-1.5kg fresh chicken, cut into four parts

Coriander root (2-3)

4 garlic cloves

Freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoon oyster sauce

2 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt

3-4 tablespoons coconut milk, for basting the chicken while grilling it

Steps

1. Clean and cut the chicken into four parts, you may cut it even smaller if desired, but it might make the basting a bit more challenging ;)
2. Pound the garlic, coriander and black pepper together in a mortar, then add the rest of the ingredients except coconut milk and mix well.
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. Rub it well into the chicken pieces and leave to marinade overnight.
   
   
   
4. Take the chicken out of the fridge 30 minutes before grilling in the oven preheated to 180°C. Remove the garlic and coriander pieces and pat dry the chicken pieces before placing it skin side up on a aluminum lined tray.
   
   
   
   
5. Bake for about 45 minutes, using the coconut milk mixed with the remaining marinade, basting every 15 minutes.
6. For the last 5-10 minutes, turn up the oven temperature to 225°C if you like the skin brown and crispy, but keep a close watch on it otherwise it will burn easily at this point.
7. Traditionally, this is served with som tum and sticky rice. In our household, it just went very well with some hot rice and chili :)
   
    

Salted Vegetable Seafood Soup

When I was working in Singapore, I used to like to 'tabao' or pack food back to the office so I can enjoy my lunch without joining the lunch crowd with a book. A little bit anti-social I must admit but lunch crowds in Singapore are quite a turn-off sometimes. One of my favourite item to tabao is a soup with some rice, and there was this stall in a coffeeshop at the end of Killiney Road that sells fish soup with rice that comes with a side of sambal and fried anchovies and egg. It was quite value-for-money too although the stall owner can be a bit 'cold' at times. So fast forward to life in Sweden now where there's no coffee shop to buy food from, this is a home-made version which is, besides knowing exactly what goes into the food is that you get to decide what 'liao' / ingredients to put in. And no extra charges for more vegetables or chilli!;)

Ingredients (serves 2 or a greedy one person)

1 block of tofu

1 tomato

Half a carrot

Half a packet of salted vegetable or 'suan cai'

Choice of seafood (prawns, fishballs, fish roll or fish cake)

Choice of meat (chicken or pork or fish slices)

A thumb size knob of ginger

1 preserved sour plum (left-most in picture, you use it for steaming fish or cooking salted vegetable duck soup too)

Half a cube of ikan billis stock with enough water for a big bowl of soup or use home-made stock if you have

Pepper and fried shallots for garnish

Steps

1. Cut the tofu and tomatoes into quarters and slice the pork, ginger, carrots and salted vegetable.
   
2. Bring your stock or water with stock cube to boil before adding all the ingredients and let it simmer for about 10-15 minutes until all the ingredients are cooked through and tender. Adjust seasoning if required.
   
3. As an alternative, you can turn this into a noodle soup by adding noodles or vermicilli into the soup. Otherwise, serve it hot with rice along with a side of chili padi.