To Cook
Place chicken drumsticks and a teaspoon of salt in six cups of boiling water and bring back to boil. Lower heat and simmer for 20 minutes with the lid on.
Remove chicken and set aside to cool down. Add cooked rice to the broth and boil until rice thickens into porridge, stirring the whole time.
Chop up the white section of the spring onion and thinly slice up the green part.
Saute the chopped onion and the white spring onion with oil until fragrant. Add julienned ginger and continue to saute until onion is caramelised. Turn off heat.
Remove meat from chicken drumsticks and coarsely chop up chicken. Return chicken pieces to rice congee. Add extra water to congee if it becomes too thick.
Taste test. Add remaining salt as necessary. Add pepper, stir through and remove from heat.
Serve congee garnished with caramelised onion, ginger and sliced onion.
Vegetables
Japanese Fried Noodle (Yakisoba)
To Prep
In a small bowl, mix all ingredients for sauce and set aside.
Prepare and slice all vegetables and meat.
To Cook
In a frying pan, heat oil on medium-high heat, and then add meat to cook for 2-3 mins.
Add onions, carrots and cabbage, and cook until almost tender. Then add spring onions and shitake mushrooms and cook for another 1 min. Season with black pepper and stir-fry to mix well.
In the meantime, prepare yakisoba or ramen noodles as per instructions on packaging. Before adding the yakisoba or ramen noodles to the frying pan, separate the noodles with your hands. Lower the heat to medium and add the yakisoba or ramen noodles. Pour yakisoba sauce over the noodles, and stir-fry to combine yakisoba or ramen noodles with ingredients.
Transfer yakisoba to plates and serve with benishouga (pickled red ginger) and aonori (dried green seaweed).
Note: Adjust the amount of yakisoba sauce used according to the amount of ingredients. Too much sauce will make your yakisoba soggy, while too little sauce will result in the lack of flavour.
Japanese Rice Balls (Onigiri)
To Cook
Cook rice in accordance to instructions.
Combine rice wine vinegar, sugar, salt and pour into rice with sesame seeds and mix well.
Cut the seaweed sheet into six strips. You may further cut the seaweed into any shape to decorate the onigiri.
Place 1/3 cup of rice over the centre of the cling wrap. Gather the ends of the cling wrap and squeeze to form a ball. To add filling, press an indent into the rice, add filling and mould the rice into a triangular shape or a ball.
Remove the cling wrap and cover the bottom of the onigiri with a seaweed strip.
Serve with Japanese soy sauce.
Vietnamese Fried Spring Rolls (Nem rán / Chả giò)
To Prep
Boil water and soak noodles for 30 mins.
Combine all the ingredients for the filling together to form a sticky mixture.
Chop the soaked mung bean noodles into shorter threads and combine with filling.
To roll the cha gio, place a piece of spring roll paper on a clean, wet kitchen towel. Place 1 heaped tablespoon of filling on the moist rice paper, fold the rice paper over the filling, tuck in the sides, then roll to form a cylinder about 3 inches long.
Seal the wrap by dabbing a finger in the corn starch and lining the end of the wrap.
To Cook
Heat oil over medium heat in a wok or a large frying pan. When the oil is smoking, gently place a few cha gio in the oil. Fry them slowly until they turn lightly brown. Drain the excess oil by lining them over some paper towels.
Serve immediately with dipping sauce.
Stir Fried Beef with Kai Lan
To Cook
Add 1 tsp each of corn starch, oil, and soy sauce to the beef in a bowl. Use your hands to massage these ingredients into the beef and set aside to marinate for 20 mins.
Heat a wok over high heat and add a tbsp of oil. When the oil starts to smoke, sear the beef for 30-60 secs, just until browned.
Remove from the wok and set aside.
Add 2 more tbsp of oil to the wok along with the ginger. Let the ginger caramelize for 15 secs.
Add the garlic and Chinese broccoli and stir fry for 1 min.
Add the beef, oyster sauce, soy sauce, salt, sugar, sesame oil, and hot beef stock then stir fry until mixed thoroughly.
Once the liquid comes to a boil, push the beef and vegetable away from the middle of the wok.
Stir in the corn starch slurry to thicken the sauce. Mix everything until the beef and vegetables are thoroughly coated.
Plate and serve over hot steamed rice.
Chicken Red Curry with Pumpkin (Gaeng Phed Gai Sai Fak Tong)
To Cook
Add some oil to the pot and fry the red curry paste until fragrant.
Add chicken and pumpkin and stir fry until chicken and pumpkin is halfway cooked through for approximately 10 mins. The pumpkins will turn soft which will add volume and thickness to the curry after boiling.
Pour in the can of coconut milk then stir to combine all of the herbs. You may add pumpkins now if you want whole chunks in your curry.
Boil until the chicken is cooked.
When cooked add the sweet basil leaves or kaffir lime leaves. Stir into mix and remove from heat.
Season to taste with fish sauce.
Japanese Pancake (Okonomiyaki)
To Prep
Partially freeze pork belly. Slice pork belly into thin pieces.
For the batter, combine and mix all ingredients in a large mixing bowl.
Add cabbage, spring onion, pickled ginger and calamari to batter mix.
To Cook
Heat oil in a non-stick pan over medium heat. Add 150ml of mix to frying pan, then 5-6 slices of pork belly. Cook okonomiyaki until bottom is golden brown. Flip over.
Cook the other side until it is thoroughly cooked and golden brown.
Flip the okonomiyaki again and place on a plate.
Top with tonkatsu sauce, mayonnaise, bonito flakes and yaki nori strips. Serve hot.
Watercress Soup (Sai Yong Choi Tong)
To Cook
Prepare the watercress by separating the leaves from the stalks.
Blanch the chicken carcasses in vigorously boiling water for 2-3 mins. Discard water and remove any impurities on the bones.
Blanch the pork in vigorously boiling water for about 10 mins, then discard water. Remove any impurities on the pork.
In a large pot, add the chicken carcasses, pork ribs, Chinese almonds, blacked eye peas and watercress stalks to 2l of water.
Turn on the heat to medium high and allow to boil for an hour.
After an hour, add the watercress leaves, red dates, and goji berries to the soup. Allow the soup to boil for at least another hour on medium heat.
Season with salt to taste. Serve hot.
Malaysian Hand-Torn Noodles (Hand-Torn Pan Mee)
To Make the Dough
Combine the flour and salt together in a bowl and mix well, before making a well in the centre of the flour and adding in the egg. Mix the ingredients together till clumps form and then add in the water.
Continue mixing until a dough forms. Add more water if required or more flour if the dough becomes too sticky.
Continue to knead the doughy until it becomes elastic. At this point, cover with cling wrap and set aside for an hour to soften.
After the hour has passed, remove the dough and divide in to 2 or 3 smaller sections to be handled easier.
Take 1 section of the dough and press the top side of the dough to form a lip. Continue to press this section to stretch it until you get a bite sized piece that is evenly thick and relatively thin.
When you have your desired noodle size, tear it off and set it aside under a damp towel to stop it from drying out.
Repeat until all of the dough has been used.
To Make the Broth
Add the anchovies and water in to a large pot over a high heat. When the stock begins to boil, reduce the heat, add in the salt and let simmer for 15 mins.
When the stock has finished simmering, remove the anchovies form the pot and reduce heat to low or remove from the heat until ready to cook the noodles.
To Cook the Meat and Mushroom Topping
Heat oil in a pan over high heat and when hot, add in the garlic and pork and fry until the meat is mostly cooked through.
Add in the mushrooms and continue to cook for a couple mins.
Reduce the heat and add in the rest of the meat ingredients. Stir well to evenly coat all of the ingredients before adding some water to balance the seasoning.
If the seasoning is good, remove from the heat and set aside.
To Cook the Noodles
Over a high heat, bring a pot of water to a rolling boil. If the stock was removed from the heat, return it to the stove and warm it up over a low heat.
Add the noodles in to the pot one batch at a time, making sure they have enough room to cook and won’t clump together.
Once the noodles begin to float to the surface, let them cook for further min before removing from the pot and setting aside.
Once you’re done with the noodles, add in any vegetables you want and blanch them before setting them aside to serve.
To Serve
Add the cooked noodles in to the broth to heat them up and then transfer a serving in to a bowl and top with the vegetables. Garnish with the cooked meat and mushroom, as well as fried anchovies and fried shallots.
Potato Croquettes (Begedil)
To Cook
Pan fry potatoes until cooked through and golden brown. Set aside.
Pan fry dried shrimps until it’s aromatic for approximately 3-5 minutes.
Mash potatoes up using a masher.
Dish into a bowl, add fried shrimps, parsley leaves, fried shallots, salt and pepper and mix well.
Shape into patties and coat over with egg.
Pan-fry or deep-fry on medium heat until golden brown on both sides.
Japanese Beef Rice Bowl (Gyudon)
To Prep
Cut and slice the onions in half and then thin lengthwise, from top to bottom (axis to axis).
Combine the soy sauce, sake, mirin and dashi into a bowl. Set aside.
To Cook
Heat the sesame oil in a large flat pan over high heat. Add the beef and cook, stirring frequently for about 2 minutes, until the beef browns slightly. Add the sugar and wait 10 seconds. Add the onion and cook, stirring constantly, for about 1 minute, until the onions begins to soften. Pour the liquid mixture into the pan. Simmer for about 5 minutes, until the ingredients cook through. While the gyudon is simmering, use a large spoon to skim off any scum and fat that appears on the surface.
While the ingredients are simmering, divide the rice among 4 large bowls. As soon as the gyudon is ready, spoon it over the rice and serve immediately. Season with shichimi togarashi and beni shoga, as desired.
Indonesian Grilled Fish in Banana Leaves (Pepes Ikan)
To Cook
Place the fish pieces into a blender or food processor and pulse for a few seconds, then add all the other ingredients, except the banana leaves and grind to a thick paste. Set aside.
To make the banana leaves flexible so you can fold easily, scald the banana leaves by pouring boiling water over them in a basin. Drain and place the leaves on a clean work surface. Scoop 3 heaped tablespoons of the fish mixture onto the centre each piece of banana leaf (or aluminium foil). With a firm hold, fold one side of the banana leaf over the other to form an elongated package. Then hold the ends of the banana leaves and fold in both corners to form a triangular tip. Seal package on both ends with toothpicks. Repeat until all the fish mixture is used up.
Grill each parcel directly over the hot charcoal or in a preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes, turning from time to time until the banana leaf wrapper is charred. Serve them hot.