A fellow Malaysian at Ohio Wagyu sent me some of his farm-raised wagyu beef. He flew the beef overnight to me, and when I received them, they were still ice cold and frozen. My favorite of all was the flank steak, which I used to make the ponzu and miso butter steak, and the leftover, I made them into Chinese ginger and scallion beef.
Ginger and scallion stir-fry is one of the very first Chinese recipes I learned when I first started cooking (you can read how I learn Chinese cooking and my journey to be a great cook in my cookbook introduction chapter). The combination of fresh ginger, scallion, a protein of your choice, with a light oyster-based sauce and a dose of wok hei (breath of wok) is always so inviting and delicious. The thought of a hot-off-the-wok ginger and scallion stir-fry always get me ravenously hungry.
Please find my simple and easy ginger and scallion beef Recipe after the jump. Enjoy!
(Click Page 2 for the Ginger and ScallionBeef Recipe)
I’d like to introduce you to chef Julie Yoon, who is a chef based in Orange County. As you all know, I am into Korean food and have been eating out at many Korean restaurants and also cooking Korean recipes at home. Whenever I shop at Korean food markets, I am always intrigued by Korean kimbap, which is about the same as Japanese sushi rolls (there are debates that the Koreans invented this type of rolls). Anyway, I invited Julie to teach us how to make kimbap, check out her delicious beef kimbap recipe including detailed step-by-step pictures. Please welcome Julie and remember to check out her wonderful blog.
Hey this is Julie from chefjulieyoon.com. I’m honored to be writing on Bee’s blog, but I’m all about simple gourmet cooking with a laid back attitude, so I’m not gonna lie. When Bee asked me if I could make kimbap for this entry, I nearly fainted. Kimbap has a lot of steps and ingredients, and is a little bit of a nuisance to make. This recipe is not for your Monday night after you get off of work type of dinner. I often forget this because kimbap is designed to be “travel-friendly food,” mainly taken on the road or to picnics. And you pop it into your mouth without giving it much thought. In fact if you walk into any Korean grocery store, you can easily buy a pack of freshly made kimbap, for just a few bucks. So by no means do people consider it “luxury food.”
Kimbap is the Korean version of the Japanese “maki, or rice rolls. The flavor comes from sesame oil and individually seasoned meats and veggies. But the one particular ingredient that is the heart of Kimbap is â€danmuji,” or bright yellow pickled radish you can find at the Korean grocery store in the refrigerated section. Also, everything is seasoned so well that you don’t need to dip it into any kind of sauce.
Maybe you’ve seen a Korean drama, where they show a mom waking up early at the crack of dawn to roll, slice, and pack these delicious bites for her kids. This is a labor of love, but once you have all the ingredients prepped, the assembling goes by pretty quickly, and it’s worth it because it’s like having a well balanced meal in every bite.
You can put all sorts of stuff in here, but in my recipe, I simply didn’t want to be bothered with too many ingredients, so I omitted some. In some recipes, you may find fish cake, imitation crab, or burdock root. But I wanted to keep it simple and just tackle the basics. I personally like to add julienned perilla (or sesame) leaves in mine instead of the spinach, which adds a burst of freshness. But to keep it as authentic as I could, I left it out, and saved it for my “Julie” version, which I’ll probably post on my blog sometime soon.
And lastly, before you run off and make this, I will leave you with one tip: season all the individual ingredients well, but don’t go nuts. The ingredient with the most flavor should be the marinated beef. The rice should be a tad bland, and everything together should be balanced, all in one bite. Talk about high maintenance, huh? But after you make kimbap, you’ll feel so successful and proud, so definitely give it a try. It’s perfect for a road trip, picnic, potluck, or party. Just be sure to eat it on the same day you make it. But if you do have leftovers, just refrigerate them. The next day, dip the pieces in egg and pan fry them. They’ll be as good as new, but with a tasty twist!
(Click Page 2 for the Beef Kimbap Recipe and the step-by-step pictures by Julie)
Other than food blogging and writing my cookbook (releasing Sept 10, this Saturday), I also develop recipes for my online client INSING.com, the content portal owned by Singtel, Singapore. Recently, I made a Cantonese beef stew recipe for them which is so good that I have to share with you here on Rasa Malaysia.
This Cantonese beef stew is inspired by the lamb stew that I had a couple of years ago in Hong Kong. Whenever it’s winter time or the weather is cold, lamb stew is a popular dish for the denizens in Hong Kong as lamb is a “heaty” meat and the clay pot stew complement it to give warmth to the body. As I am not a big fan of lamb, I made the stew with beef and the result is equally delectable.
Believe or not, it’s already September and in no time, weather is going to cool down so this Cantonese beef stew recipe will come in handy if you wish to try it out. The Recipe is in metric measurement, to convert, please use the conversion tool.
(Click on Page 2 for the Cantonese BeefStew Recipe)
I haven’t posted Malaysian recipes for a while, so much so that sometimes I question myself if my blog’s name still fits its recent content. Malaysian food is my native cuisine and the passion, love, and enthusiasm I have will never change. Truth be told, I’ve been trying to save my Malaysian recipes, for the possible opportunity to work on a Malaysian cookbook in the future.
As most of you know, my Chinese cookbook will be released in Fall 2011 (most likely in September). I had wanted to write a Malaysian cookbook, sharing recipes and dishes that define the enormously diverse and scrumptious but underrated cuisine. Malaysian food is the unsung hero of Asian cuisines, as pointed out by Guardian UK recently. It’s too bad that the publishers in the US are not keen on a niche and somewhat unknown Malaysian cookbook. With the recent praises in the US media about Malaysian cuisine, such as Saveur 100 about kaya—a quintessential Malaysian concoction of coconut and egg jam, I hope that one day I’ll be able to shop for a deal to get a Malaysian cookbook published here in the United States.
Anyway, I digress…
Dagingmasak kicap or soy sauce beef is one of the beef dishes I often make at home. It’s an easy Malay Recipe but the taste is absolutely delicious. It takes only a few ingredients—a tender cut of beef, soy sauce, and sweet soy sauce. I use shallots as an aromatic but onion is equally fine. I love drizzling the sauce over my steamed white rice, with a side of sambal belacan for a truly homey Malaysian meal. Do try out this soy sauce beef recipe!
8 oz beef flap meat, cut into pieces
2 shallots, sliced thinly (or 1/4 onion, sliced)
2 tablespoons oil
3 tablespoons kicap/kecap manis (sweet soy sauce)
1 1/2 teaspoon soy sauce or to taste
Method:
Rinse the beef with water and cut it across the grain into pieces. Pat dry and set aside.
Heat up a wok with the oil. When the oil is heated, add the shallots and stir fry until aromatic or when the shallots turn light brown. Add the beef into the wok and stir for a few times. Add the sweet soy sauce and soy sauce and stir to blend well with the beef. Cook for a few minutes or until the beef is cooked through. Dish out and serve immediately.
November 1st, 2010 | JapaneseRecipes, Sponsorship | 1 Comment
This is the second installment of Mizkan, Bringing Flavor to Life campaign on Rasa Malaysia. (Please check out the Salmon TeriyakiRecipe and the Mizkan landing page.) The featured recipe today is Japanese beef rolls and enoki mushroom with Ponzu sauce.
One of the defining characteristics of Japanese cuisine is its emphasis on visual presentation, and this recipe delivers just that. This is often my go-to recipe whenever I have a party, or whenever I wish to impress my guests. These beef rolls are best served as an appetizer as your guests take in sips of wine and mingle around. They certainly have that WOW factor and absolutely delicious¦
This beef roll recipe is inspired by the popular beef tataki, or sliced seared beef prepared using the tataki cooking technique. Traditionally, tataki-style beef are prepared using a Japanese mesh grill tray over charcoal fire, with only the surface of the beef cooked. Then, the meat is plunged into a bowl of cold water to stop the beef from cooking. For my beef roll recipe, I adapted and simplified the cooking method so everyone can attempt it easily at home. I prefer my beef cooked so I used a non-stick pan and seared the beef until slightly charred on the surface.
Two of the most important components of this recipe is the marinade and the serving sauce. For the marinade, I used Mizkan (Bonito Flavored) Soup Base and Mizkan HONTERI Mirin Seasoning, and for the serving, I drizzled the beef rolls with Mizkan AJIPON® Ponzu Citrus Seasoned Soy Sauce. I especially love the Ponzu sauce as it adds a citrusy flavor to the beef rolls and complements the taste beautifully.
Ponzu has become more common due to the increased popularity of Japanese cuisine. Nowadays, you can easily find Ponzu at regular grocery stores here in the United States. There are many brands of Ponzu available, but Mizkan AJIPON® Ponzu is the best, in all honesty. I am saying this not because I am working with Mizkan, but because I have another bottle of Ponzu by another Japanese manufacturer in my pantry. After a side-by-side taste test, Mizkan AJIPON® Ponzu is a clear winner.
Do try out this Japanese beef rolls recipe. It’s really quite a treat.
Japanese BeefRolls with Ponzu
Makes about 12 rolls
Ingredients:
12 oz beef flap meat or flank steak
6 oz enokimushrooms, ends trimmed
1 teaspoon butter
Oil, for pan-searing 1/2 tablespoon white and black sesame seeds, optional
1/2 cup Mizkan AJIPON® Ponzu Citrus Seasoned Soy Sauce
Method:
Slice the beef (across the grain) thinly to 3-inch by 5-inch pieces.
Marinate the beef slices with Mizkan (Bonito Flavored) Soup Base, Mizkan HONTERI Mirin Seasoning and sake for an hour.
Heat up the butter in a non-stick pan over medium heat. Add the enoki mushrooms to the pan and cook for about 1 minute or until they are just done. (Do not overcook the enoki mushrooms, they should remain somewhat crunchy.)
Heat up the pan over medium heat. Grease the pan with some oil. Pan-sear the beef slices until both surfaces are slightly charred. Remove the beef from the heat.
In a serving dish, roll the beef with some enoki mushrooms and secure it with a toothpick. Drizzle some Mizkan AJIPON® Ponzu Citrus Seasoned Soy Sauce over the beef roll and topped with some sesame seeds. Serve immediately.
I am done with my confinement but am a little overwhelmed at the moment. Please enjoy this guest post by Beyond Kimchee, a fabulous Korean food blog that I recently discovered. Authored by Hyegyoung (aka Holly), a native of South Korea, Beyond Kimchee is a chronicle of Holly’s recipes and the food she prepares for her two kids and husband. If you love Korean food, you ought to check it out as the step-by-step picture instructions on her site are absolutely awesome and makes learning Korean food so much more fun and easier! Welcome to Rasa Malaysia, Holly. (Please click on the image above to view the step-by-step cooking guide.)
It is so exciting to see more and more people trying Korean recipes in their homes these days. I was blown away to see how many Galbi or Kimchee recipes are on the web when I first thought of having my own Korean food blog about 6 months ago. Some recipes are very excellent and some, well€¦ I had to raise my eyebrow. I must have been hibernating in the cave all these years while Korean Bulgogi Taco swiped the valley of California, or Kimchee stew had become an addictive to some of those K-pop lovers.
Korean food is earthy and somewhat rustic I would say. There’s no exotic ingredients and you don’t need special tools or gadgets to create wonderful meals. Your knife and hands are your best friends in the kitchen. The biggest challenge I face every time I organize my recipes into my blog is converting a little bit of this into tablespoons, and a little bit of that into teaspoons. Most Korean home cooks don’t use measuring cups or spoons. I bet that goes same to other Asian home cooks as well. We just trust our senses and finger tips, don’t we?
I am thrilled to post as a guest blogger on Bee’s the famous “Rasa Malaysia”. I have been a fan of her blog and thrilled for the opportunity to be part of it. The Recipe I am introducing is called â€Bean Sprout Beef Rice Bowl with Chive Sauce”. Wow, what a long name! Let’s just call it “Bean sprout rice”. That’s what we call in Korea. This is quite common dish among Koreans and everyone loves it. It is basically part of Bibimbop family but you only need one vegetable, the bean sprouts. It is simple (regardless of the long list), easy, budget friendly, and most of all, it’s delicious!
Ground beef is seasoned in basic Bulgogi marinade. Bean sprouts are cooked in a little bit of water with dried anchovies and sea kelp reserving the broth afterward. Rice should be soaked in the water for 30 minutes and cooked later in the reserved bean sprout broth. Make the chive dressing with given ingredients and you are set to go.
May I give a serving suggestion how to eat this? Like Bibimbop you need to mix in everything in the large bowl. Bibimbop mixing is an important step!
I have to confess that after the photo shot of this dish I dumped everything into a bigger mixing bowl, drizzled more sesame oil and mixed all in until they get nicely incorporated. The taste? Well, all I can say is, Mmmmmmmm¦, Goooooood!
Enjoy!
P.S : Any questions on the recipes, ingredients, or just simply want to say, hi…?
“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you
1 package(16oz) soy bean sprouts cleaned and preferably tails removed 5-6 dried large anchovies, head and black gills removed
2-3 dried sea kelp
1 1/2 C short grain white rice, preferably Korean or Japanese
1/2 lb ground beef
Chive Dressing
3-4 Tbsp chopped Asian chives or regular chives or green onion
2 Tbsp Korean chili flakes
1/2 green chili seeded and chopped
1/2 red chili seeded and chopped, optional
1 garlic finely minced
4-5 Tbsp low sodium soy sauce
Ł Tbsp sesame oil
1 Tbsp roasted sesame seeds
dashes of black pepper
Soak the rice in the water for 30 minutes and drain. Set aside. Prepare the beef in the marinade and chill until ready to cook.
Meanwhile place bean sprouts in a pot with dried anchovies and sea kelp on the bottom with 1 cup of water. Cover with lid and cook over medium high heat until the steam comes out, reduce heat to low, continue to cook for another 6 minutes. Do not peak. You need to keep the pot covered. Drain the bean sprouts and reserve the broth from them. You will need 1 1/2 cup of the broth. If not enough, add water to fill in. Discard the anchovies and sea kelp. Set aside the bean sprouts covered.
Cook the rice in a rice cooker or heavy bottom pot with the reserved broth. Cook the beef in a pan until browned. No need oil.Make the dressing by mixing all the ingredients.
Place cooked hot rice in a big individual bowl, top with beef and bean sprouts, and the chive dressing (about 1 1/2 Tbsp or more per person). Drizzle more sesame oil in you wish. Mix everything very well until they get nicely incorporated. Serve with some Kimchee as a side if you have.
I am certain numerous of my readers in Malaysia and Singapore have been wondering why haven’t I posted a beef rendang or “rendang daging” recipe? Excellent news, the wait is finally above and here is my recipe of arguably the most well-known beef dish in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore.
Beef rendang is of Indonesian origin–a much-celebrated Recipe from the Minangkabau ethnic group of Indonesia–and often served at ceremonial occasions and to honored guests. After spending hours making my beef rendang, I totally realize why. Beef rendang is not your daily beef dish that a single can whip up in a jiffy, the time–not to mention patience and dedication–alone is possibly a principal obstacle for most individuals. If you must know, it took me nearly 3 hours to concoct a pot of this aromatic and extraordinarily scrumptious beef rendang. For those of you who have never tried beef rendang, I can only describe it as “a rich and tender coconut beef stew which is explosively flavorful,” one that is certain to win you around in the event you taste it…
I believe beef rendang was introduced to Malaysia when the Minangkabau settlers from Sumatra migrated to the southern part on the Malay peninsula throughout the era in the Melaka Sultanate, but I could be wrong. In any case, beef rendang can be a very common dish for many Malaysians, especially the Malay community.
No beef rendang is made exactly the same. If you’re willing to spend time inside the kitchen preparing the spice paste, toasting the grated coconut to make golden-hued “kerisik” (toasted coconut in Malay language), and then patiently cook and stew the meat around extremely low heat so as to dry up the liquid and make the meat tender, you will be rewarded handsomely. Like I did with my beef rendang.
Another fact about beef rendang that I absolutely have to share with you: it only gets much better with time, so much to ensure that the Minangkabaus save them for months as the complex taste and flavor develop above time. For daily home cooks, I will advise you to serve them once the beef rendang is done, but save some leftover as it only gets better overnight.
For those of you who wish to learn far more about beef rendang, check out this article on Wikipedia, or you can just feast your eyes with my beef rendang photos above, and try my beef rendang recipe.
Recently, I am trying to incorporate iron-rich foods into my diet. This beef teriyaki is one of the uncomplicated beef dishes that I’ve made.
There’s really no must introduce teriyaki as this is likely a single of probably the most well-known imports from Japanese cuisine, other than sushi and tempura. (Previously, My Cooking Hut shared her chicken teriyaki recipe on Rasa Malaysia.)
I cheated and pan-fried my beef on a skillet (traditionally, it must be grilled for a deeper and smokier flavor), and then lacquered the sweet and savory yakitori sauce on top the beef prior to serving. This beef teriyakiRecipe not probably the most authentic way to make it, but it is one that’s best for my busy schedules lately.
Recently, I am trying to incorporate iron-rich foods into my diet. This beef teriyaki is one of the simple beef dishes that I’ve made.
There is really no need to introduce teriyaki as this is probably one of the most well-known imports from Japanese cuisine, other than sushi and tempura. (Previously, My Cooking Hut shared her chicken teriyaki recipe on Rasa Malaysia.)
I cheated and pan-fried my beef on a skillet (traditionally, it should be grilled for a deeper and smokier flavor), and then lacquered the sweet and savory yakitori sauce on top the beef before serving. This beef teriyakiRecipe not the most authentic way to make it, but it’s one that’s perfect for my busy schedules lately.
White sesame seeds
Some chopped scallions, optional
Method:
Slice the beef into thin pieces, across the grain. Marinate the beef with the Marinade, for about 20 minutes.
Mix all the ingredients in the Teriyaki Sauce. Heat up a small sauce pan and prepare the sauce. As soon as the sauce starts to bubble, remove it from the heat.
Add some oil to your skillet and pan-fry the beef, until slightly charred. Transfer the beef to a serving ware, and add the Teriyaki Sauce on top. Serve immediately.
Cook’s Note:
I used beef flap meat and sliced them into thin pieces because I was pan-frying. For grilling, please use beef tenderloin. Cut the beef crosswise into strips after grilling, like how they are commonly served in the Japanese restaurants.
The teriyaki sauce recipe is adapted from No Recipes.
Recently, I am trying to incorporate iron-rich foods into my diet. This beef teriyaki is 1 of the easy beef dishes that I’ve made.
There’s really no need to introduce teriyaki as this is probably a single on the most well-known imports from Japanese cuisine, other than sushi and tempura. (Previously, My Cooking Hut shared her chicken teriyaki recipe on Rasa Malaysia.)
I cheated and pan-fried my beef on a skillet (traditionally, it really should be grilled for a deeper and smokier flavor), and then lacquered the sweet and savory yakitori sauce on top the beef prior to serving. This beef teriyakiRecipe not the most authentic way to make it, but it’s one that’s ideal for my busy schedules lately.
