Semi-home cooking

In one of my favourite TV channel - The Food Network, there is a programme titled "semi-home cooking". I love it because the host of the programme teaches you how to make use of ready made food from the supermarket to create your own dishes, hence, the title.

With the house almost empty and all my tools and equipments all gone, I have to make use of what I have learned from the programme to create food for the family...

Personalised turkey pot-pies for...

Ann and...


Kai

Great ideas from the TV...TV can be good!

A 'Love Breakfast'

It was Saturday morning and we had time to slowly enjoy our breakfast. I made use of this time to prepare a 'Love Breakfast'


A heart-shaped sunny-side up, honey-baked ham and bread.

I saw the heart-shaped egg ring while shopping at the outlets. It was really cute and bought them to make this wonderful breakfast.
It can also be used to make pancakes too.

While having breakfast, we looked out at our patio and realised we had visitors.


Papa was the first to spot them and he told Kai that there were birds sitting on our patio. Kai immediately identified them as robins. Like what I have always said, Kai has an eye for all the small creatures!

Dong Zhi (The arrival of winter)

Every year, on this day, my mother would go to the market to buy the pink and white glutinous rice flour to make tang yuan (glutinous rice ball). My mother believed that eating tang yuan, it signified the year coming to an end in a very auspicious and perfect way (yuan, yuan, man, man). Some Chinese also believed that the name of the dessert carried with it the meaning of reunion. Tang yuan sounded like tuan yuan which meant reunion.

In the past, family members would gather together to make the dessert to represent a family reunion. But in modern society, no one is free anymore to do such things and no one see any significance in eating this dessert.

Call me old-fashion or a traditionalist or anything you like. For me, any traditions or customs that are beneficial to the family, I think should be passed on. A reunion of family members, why not. This custom should be kept, in fact should be followed all the time.

I have always enjoyed eating tang yuan. Eating it during the cold months just brings so much warmth to the heart. Since learning to do this dessert myself, I have switched to making tang yuan from scratch, it tasted better and yes, it allowed me to passed on the tradition to my children.


Making my own glutinous rice dough. Little Ann helping me to shape into small balls


Ann was really good in shaping those balls. Almost all of them were of the same size.
After cooking, tang yuan with tau suan, my newly created combination and it tasted just great!

Roast leg of lamb

My mum always said that it is good to eat lamb in a cold weather.

I bought this leg of lamb from my favourite farmer's market. It was really a great piece of meat. Believe it or not, this was my first time roasting a lamb...


Modifed a recipe from this recipe book and with the help from my new toy, a meat thermometer....

I roasted a near-perfect leg of lamb....tadah....



In this cold winter, I tell you, I find so much comfort in cooking and eating.

Special breakfast

I now look forward to Saturday mornings. That's the day where Kai wakes up early and prepare breakfast for the family. It a great accomplishment for a 8 year-old-boy.


He may be playful at times, tough to handle but when it comes to cooking, he means business. See his serious look


Bacon and scrambled eggs for him and papa. Sunny side up with bacon and pita bread for me. As for little Ann, he made boiled egg

I will soon hand him some of my recipes. Kai is a smart boy and I know he will pick them up very fast.

Never knew....

The weather has been really cold. It is only autumn but kids are already wearing scarves, gloves, ear muffs, down jackets... to school. In this kind of weather, nothing beats a really nice, hot, homemade dessert.


'Tau suan' with lotus seeds (lian zi)

'Tau suan' is a Chinese dessert. It is made of mung beans cooked with rock sugar and the soup is thickened by adding corn starch to it. I have added lotus seeds to make it a healthier dessert.

Since coming to the US, I have learned to cook many local delights and I never knew that they were easy to make and most of all, they are cheap. Circumstances forced me out of the comfort shell. It is such a breeze, back home, when I feel like eating them, I just pay the money and I get to eat them. Here,when I want to eat, when I hunger for them, I am left with no choice but to do them myself. Thanks to my great cooking buddies who have helped to feed me!

True to the last bit, tough situations bring out the best in a person. This journey is indeed very worthwhile.

Bak kwa (Bar-b-q pork)

Fellow relocated mum shared this recipe with me. Homemade bak kwa. Well, at least we will have one Chinese New Year goody to eat when the festival arrives in end-January


I think it desperately needs more fats!

"Or-chian"

"Or-chian" is basically an egg omelette fried with sweet potato starch and topped with delicious oysters. It is my all-time favourite.

Back in Singapore, each time I stepped into a food-court, once I spotted the "or-chian" stall, it would be without a doubt, I would sure to order this dish. But it was so expensive to have it. For a $5 plate, I would be getting an ultra thin layer of omelette with lots of fried starch and probably just five small oysters.

Gina, my wonderful chef friend has provided once again, a fuss-free recipe for the dish. However, the difficult part was searching for the sweet potato flour in this American country. I searched three Asian grocers before I finally found something close to it. And with my frozen oysters, I fried up a storm. Hubby and I had a marvelous time eating them. The good thing about home-cooked "or-chian" is that you can add in more oysters. Do you know that oysters are an ideal food for inclusion in low-cholesterol diets. Making a healthier choice, use vegetable oil and topped it with plenty of coriander leaves, a bacteria-killing greens!


This is not the real sweet potato flour but the ingredients had it included


Presenting..."or chian". The right chilli sauce for dipping was missing but it really didn't matter anymore

All things small and yummy

I just have a sudden urge to want to eat dim sum. Wikipedia defines dim sum as a Chinese cuisine which involves a wide range of light dishes served alongside Chinese tea.

Of course, with the limited amount of ingredients available, it is impossible to have the full range. Instead I made just two types. The radish cake or 'lor-bak-ko' which has been Kai's favourite dim sum dish since he was a toddler.

I remember when he was just two years old, we were at NZ for holiday. We went into a dim-sum restaurant for lunch. By the time we were there, it was almost closing and they have ran out of the radish cake, Kai burst out crying and and the boss found him so cute, in that such a young child, would have such hunger for a simple dish. Guess what, the boss actually went into the kitchen and specially made some for him. Great service! Going that extra mile for his little customer.



This is a simple radish cake recipe shared by my culinary master, Gina

The other dish is 'mua chee'. This dish usually does not appear in the dim sum menu but it is a light snack enjoyed by many Singaporeans. Gina also has a great recipe for it. (Gina, what am I going to do without all your fabulous recipes :))


It's made of glutinous rice with grounded peanuts and sugar sprinkled on it. The nuts should be much finer than this but I don't have a food blender so using a rolling pin and my hands, I 'grinded' them. Great work-out!

Stewed lamb for a cold day

My mother often referred to lamb as a "heaty" meat. So when the weather turned cold, she would roast her leg of lamb, a favoruite in our family. Eat it with mint sauce, it not only warmed the body, it warmed the soul too. Mum is very good with her roasted leg of lamb. I have yet to master that skill but for her, everyone praised her for roasting the perfect lamb!

Most mothers would discouraged their daughters from taking lamb during their pregnancy. This is because they fear that when the baby is born, he will have epilepsy. You see, in Chinese, the term 'epilepsy' has the word 'lamb' in it. It is more superstitious than scientific. My mother, on the other hand, would encouraged me to eat more. I remembered just before heading to the hospital to give birth to Kai, mum made me the famous Hainanese lamb soup. She told me that it would be advisable to keep the womb warm for the baby. Mother's explanation made more sense...but to me, it just another wonderful dish to eat and enjoy!

As the weather turned cold over here, I made stewed lamb to keep everyone warm. This wasn't the ususal lamb stew. It was just lamb stewed till tender and cover with the gravy left over during stewing.

With lamb bought from the farm, rosemary from my garden and some gloves of garlic and I have a dish of stewed leg of lamb.

It was stewed till the meat just slipped off from the bone of the leg of the lamb. Yum...mi!

The odd couple

During our farmstay, the farmer's wife baked this delicious chocolate cake. The best thing about the cake was it had zucchini added into it. Hmm...it was really an odd combination if you were to think about it - chocolate and zucchini. When talked about zucchini, we often thought of Japanese food, to add that into a cake, was really odd. But honestly, the cake was really great!

I came home and decided to give it a try.

Most kids do not like their greens, likewise for Kai and Ann. I do not know how they define their taste. Kai loves broccoli only(most kids hate that because of their perculiar taste and smell) and Ann loves carrots only. So, when the farmer's wife came up with this cake, I was most pleased. Although zucchini was added to it, you couldn't see it, you couldn't smell it and you most certainly, couldn't taste it. According to the farmer's wife, the zucchini gave the cake extra moisture and made it soft and fluffy, most acceptable by kids.

Ann, especially, loves them to bits. So, you see, it is really not too difficult to add extra nutrients to a seemingly unhealthy dessert. Bake it at home, cut down on the sugar level, add some dark chocolate - you get a very healthy sinful chocolate cake!


...presenting the odd couple - zucchini chocolate cupcake.

Food and fruit

I love food. I love experimenting with them, I love eating them and I thank God that my soulmate is also a food adventurer. Other than prawns which he is allergic to, he is game for everything. I have friends who love to bring me along for their makan (eating) sessions because their hubbies are not as adverturous as them.
Ann has picked up this 'foodie adventure', as for Kai, he is slowly coming along, though not as fast as his sister but he has indeed made progress. Now, he loves squid, prawns, salmon and that's a great improvement from someone who only eats meat!

I stressed alot on eating together as a family at the table. The dinning table is where the family gathers and thoughts, feelings, jokes, stories...are shared. Here, in the US, we could all sit and eat together for dinner every evening. Back in Singapore, we could only do it every weekend because of our different schedules. Kai didn't get home till 7pm daily, by then, Ann would have taken her dinner already. Inspite of the different meal times, the kids know that when the family is together at home, it means, eating together at the dinning table. This practice, I have no intention to change and I pray that the kids will carry on with them when they have their own families.

I am so thankful that this trip to the US has given me many, and I really mean, many opportunties to try out new recipes, new kind of food and taste some of the freshest and juiciest fruits.


Shanghai wok-cooked pork ribs. This, I learned from a cookbook. Being away from home, staying in a western country, to be able to cook and eat Asian, somehow, brings a warm comfort to the heart. And yes, they have very fresh pork here.


I didn't bake this. This is call a shoofly pie. I have seen this many times and I am always curious about how this pie will taste like and it has such a cute name, 'shoofly'. I decided to try and bought one from an Amish farm market. It's homebaked and yes, it taste really, really good...and it has an interesting story.


Fat, juicy and really sweet watermelon and yes, from the farmers' market. See how hubby cut them up so nicely.

So friends, life is more than just 3-minutes noodles and microwave food. Make time and cook a meal. Sometimes, the results are good, sometimes, they are bad. I have burnt many food and many times, set off the fire alarm here. I have known some great chefs who once, could only cook rice from a rice-cooker. All it takes, is just the willingness to learn and to try and of course, taking the first step.

Take time out and make a good meal with your loved ones. Like what Chick-fil-A founder said, "food is essential to life, so make it good."!

Quiche roll?

One of the good thing about summer vacation is that I have the time to experiment with food and the kids love surprises waiting for them at meal times.

I made this simple dish for lunch...


I fried bacon with onions, sprinkled mozzarella cheese and using fillo pastry, rolled them into spring rolls...


Baked in the oven for about 15 minutes. When bite into it, you get that chewy and chessy taste...


The kids simply love it to bits especially the light and crispy skin.

Kai came up with a name for it, "quiche roll". Not exactly quiche because there were no egg and milk custard but it's a good name! We'll stick to it!

Cupcakes with legs?

Can cupcakes have legs?

The kids and I baked our cupcakes with legs...


Ann was in charge of mixing and scooping the mixture into the cups...


...then Kai (just look at how much he has grown) put them into the oven to bake...


...there you have it, cup cakes with legs. The kids were excited and were giggling non-stop when the cupcakes were brought out. Yummy dark chocolate cupcakes. De-li-cious!!!

The good thing about baking your own cakes is that you can control the amount of ingredients you put into it. Most cakes that are sold outside have a very high level of sugar content. When doing your own baking, expecially for kids, cut down on the sugar and add healthier ingredients such as dark chocolates instead of milk chocolates and of course, take away the icing. Medical studies have shown that dark chocolates actually help to lower high blood pressure and they are great antioxidants. However, that doesn't mean you have dark chocolates for three meals. In everything, eat in moderation!

Farm fresh food

One thing which I really enjoy doing here in US is the ability to buy farm fresh food. It is a new experience altogether - to walk into a farm to buy fresh fruits, vegetables and meat. Yes, they are all bred, grown and harvested from the farm and immediately put out for sale.

For anyone who enjoys cooking and eating, this kind of marketing is pure enjoyment. You have to experience it to enjoy it. The taste of farm fresh food is very different from food bought from supermarket.

Back at home, I pay high prices to buy overseas food which do not taste as good. Example, strawberries and cherries are very expensive in Singapore but they are rarely sweet.


I have never seen so many types of chillies in my life, let alone, taste them. When I finally saw them in the farm, I bought a little of everything to try.
Life is about experimenting with new things that includes eating!


I simply saute them with onions. Gosh, they taste so good. The sweet taste of sauteed onions blend so well with the spiciness of the chillies.
The taste is just nice. Saute basically means to cook food quickly with a little oil in a frying pan.


Fresh plums and giant-sized peaches. Fat and juicy corn. Where we are staying is known as the corn belt. We get really good corn. Yellow ones, bi-colour ones....we have them all.

Bean sprouts with salted fish

When we were in New York City, seeing the Lims off. I spotted two very basic but much loved ingredients for making a simple local dish. The 'tau-geh' (bean sprouts) and the salted fish. These are easily available in any wet market in Singapore. The 'tau-geh' auntie at the market would give me a huge bundle for just S$0.30!

It is really a very simple dish to do. Just 3 simple steps:-

1)Vegetable oil to fry with some chopped up garlic.
2)Throw in the sliced up salted fish.
3)Lastly, throw in the bean sprouts.
Add chillies (optional)

Fry them for less than 5 minutes and you get a nice comfort dish!


That night, we had 'dou ya chow sian yu' (bean sprouts fried with salted fish) for dinner. It was simply heavenly.

Homemade potato chips

I finally got to make my own potato chips. It was fun and most of all, healthy!


Bought this slicer from Wal-mart for $10 and it came with 3 different types of blades...


one of the blades could slice anything till it becomes paper thin. Look at the potato!


Shallow fry with corn oil...


There you have it, homemade, no salt, corn-oil fried potato chips!