Chinese Food Culture

Recently, there is a new takeout place near my neighborhood that sells all sorts of popular items—Korean BBQ ribs, japchae, chicken karaage, tonkatsu, coconut shrimp, etc. I have fallen in love with its coconut shrimp and have been packing them for lunch, at least twice a week. The coconut shrimp is unlike others that I have tried before—the shrimp has a juicy sweet taste that bursts in my mouth and the coating is crispy, airy, without being greasyâ€�

While I love going there for my coconut shrimp fix, it’s quite expensive as the $ 12 lunch box gets me only 4 shrimp. So, I decided to just make my own. I used Tiger shrimp, which is ideal for coconut shrimp because of the texture, but I find the frozen Tiger shrimp in the US pretty tasteless. To sweeten up my coconut shrimp, I added some sugar into the beaten egg, which is for the dipping of the coconut shrimp before coating with the panko and coconut flakes. To make the coconut shrimp extra crispy, I dipped the shrimp into the beaten egg and the coating twice. The end result is an amazing serving of coconut shrimp�”plump, juicy, crispy, with a tint of sweetness. I made spicy tartar sauce as the dipping sauce.

I asked my nanny to taste the goods, and she said that it�™s the BEST that she has ever tasted. She immediately asked for my coconut shrimp recipe. Try it yourself, coconut shrimp makes a great party food that is sure to please.

(Click Page 2 for Coconut Shrimp Recipe)

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Some cool dishes images:

Shrimp dish at Lei Garden


Image by eugene
One of the dishes at the rehearsal dinner at Lei Garden

Behind Dish


Image by yum9me
The back side of the huge satelite dish at the top of the mountain.

Day 228 – Dish


Image by brianjmatis
We don’t actually use DirecTV, but there’s a dish on the house.

October 25th, 2010 | 30-Minute Meals Recipes, Sponsorship | 3 Comments

During my childbirth confinement, I missed eating seafood so much, especially my favorite shrimp. So, there was no surprise that as soon as the confinement ended, I headed straight to my favorite seafood restaurant and had a feast of seafood meal. I have also resumed cooking, albeit in a small way as I am adjusting to motherhood and my new lifestyle. Needless to say, seafood has been a big part of my diet lately. It’s great to finally return to a normal diet, but time is scarce these days as I dedicate most of my time to my baby, so cooking elaborately and everything-from-scratch will have to take a back seat for the time being…

I think you might remember my Indonesian mie goreng (fried noodles) post not too long ago. After trying out World Foods mie goreng instant paste, I like their products so much that I’ve decided to work with them on a couple of new recipes.

I made this shrimp dish with World Foods Indochina Cambodian Pineapple Lemon Grass Stir-Fry Sauce.  As it’s an instant sauce, I dressed things up a bit—some coconut milk, bird’s eye chilies, and basil leaves to complete the taste. The dish took about 30 minutes to make and fit my tight schedules perfectly, and the big plus is that the end result is quite authentic and satisfying.

Tamarind prawn or assam prawn is a Malaysian-Nyonya recipe, one that I grew up consuming as my late mother produced a killer dish of assam prawn, or “assam heh/亚参虾” (in Hokkien dialect)!

Whilst most Nyonya recipes call for lengthy list of ingredients and tedious preparations, tamarind prawn (assam prawn) is surprisingly straightforward to make and takes only several ingredients: tamarind, sugar, and salt. Despite the simple Recipe, tamarind prawns (assam prawns) are impossibly delicious as the tamarind provides the prawns the bold and tart flavors while accentuating the briny sweet taste of prawns…(get tamarind prawn or assam prawn recipe after the jump)

I extremely suggest this tamarind prawn (assam prawn) recipe in case you adore prawns/shrimps and wish to venture into Nyonya cooking. It’ll the very best prawn dish you might have yet to savor!

TAMARIND PRAWN/ASSAM PRAWN (亚参虾) RECIPE

Elements:

8 oz shell-on prawns

one 1/2 tablespoons tamarind pulp

four tablespoons drinking water

1 teaspoon sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

three tablespoons cooking oil

System:

Combine the tamarind pulp with 4 tablespoons water. Extract the juice from the tamarind by pressing the pulp.

Remove the heads of the prawns. Devein the prawns by slitting the back. Rinse prawns with h2o and pat dry with paper towers. Add the tamarind juice and pulp, salt, and sugar in to the prawns and mix well with your hand. Marinate for 15 minutes. Get rid of the tamarind pulp before cooking.

Heat up a wok and add cooking oil. As soon as it’s heated, drop the prawns in to the wok and pan fry till cooked and slightly burnt. Dish out and serve instantly.

COOK�S NOTE:

Some recipes call for darkish soy sauce but I constantly do without the dim soy sauce as it is going to make the prawns too darkish in color, and hence less appealing in presentation. It is possible to also leave the heads on, for photography purposes, I had them heads off. You can also pan-fried the prawns with the tamarind pulp in case you wish.

I haven’t had visitor bloggers on Rasa Malaysia for a whilst, and am incredibly pleased to have Trissa of Trissalicious like a visitor writer nowadays. Trissa is one of my recipe testers and definitely one of the most trusted ones (thanks so a lot for your aid!). Her passion in foods could be observed on her gorgeous food blog Trissalicious. In this post, Trissa shares a classic Filipino recipe—Shrimp Sinigang. I have constantly wanted to understand much more about Filipino cuisine, and Shrimp Sinigang is very high on my list. Imagine massive, fresh, succulent shrimp swimming in a savory, sweet, and sour broth…the thought of it immediately sets my mouth watering. Please give your warmest welcome to Trissalicious.

Pucker up with Shrimp Sinigang…

Sour, salty, with a hint of sweet and bitter, Sinigang is 1 with the Philippine�™s most loved dishes. In truth, the late Doreen Fernandez, who was probably the most respected food writers inside Philippines once argued that sinigang, as opposed to adobo ought to be regarded as the national dish in the Philippines, after all, Filipinos are the champion lovers of sourness…

Sinigang can be a soup whose flavor is soured with fruits abundant inside Philippines like tamarind, guava, green mangoes or bilimbi (kamias).
The dish is quickly adaptable depending on what protein is on hand, but most regularly manufactured with pork, beef, or prawns. The soup is also wealthy in vegetables that are simply accessible inside the Philippines like daikon, eggplants, snake beans and water spinach.

Despite sinigang becoming one of my favorite comfort foods, I’m embarrassed to admit that I’ve constantly employed a mix to create it. Each and every time my parents visit from the Philippines they bring me a care package which contains packets of “instant sinigang mix”. So it was absolutely using a mix of excitement and apprehension that I attempted this dish from scratch. To make that signature sourness I chose tamarind. As being a fruit it is quite challenging to come by overseas but tamarind pulp is readily available in Asian groceries. To produce the base from the soup, tamarind pulp is soaked in hot water for several minutes and then mashed, strained and added to your pot.

Sinigang is in no way complete with out a bowl of steaming white rice and what we refer to as sawsawan, a dipping sauce made with fish sauce, calamansi and a bit of chili. Together, with the rice, you’ve got a full dish.

I am grateful to Bee for giving me this opportunity to share with you a dish that is distinct to your Filipino palate and yet appeals to everyone else. What started out like a quest to create sinigang from scratch has created me much more proud than ever of my wonderful cuisine.

Sour, salty, which has a hint of candy and bitter… this dish takes me back on the Philippines every single single time.

Tau Hu Ky, or fried shrimp wrapped with bean curd skin is really a must-have appetizer for me whenever I go to Vietnamese restaurants. The reasons are really obvious:

1) I love bean curd items, specially bean curd skins;

2) I live to eat shrimp (check my recipe index and you’ll know what I mean);

3) Bean curd skins shrimp deep fried to oily golden glory, need I say far more?

I believe Tau Hu Ky is the Vietnamese adaptation of a similar Chinese appetizer 鲜虾腐皮卷 or fried shrimp rolls which are commonly obtainable as dim sum.

Although I adore the Chinese version (come with a black vinegar dipping sauce), I also adore Vietnamese Tau Hu Ky. The primary difference may be the texture of the filling: Tau Hu Ky uses ground shrimp emulsion instead of chopped shrimp. Egg whites are added to the filling to make it fluffy and light…

Now, I am calling your attention to that little basil leaf on the plate! That’s my first ever herb garden in a pot. Straight from Home Depot, I hope this pretty plant will flourish in my hands. The idea of being able to pluck the leaves for garnishing and cooking is too exciting.Anyway, here could be the recipe for Tau Hu Ky, adapted from my Vietnamese Cha Tom hors d’oeuvres.

Enjoy and have a excellent weekend!

July 17th, 2010 | | No Comments

Vietnamese BBQ  Shrimp Vermicelli or Bun Tom Heo Nuong is one of my favorite Vietnamese bun dishes. If you have tried Vietnamese food, I am sure you are familiar with bun, or dry rice vermicelli in nuoc cham (fish sauce) and topped with either grilled pork (thit), BBQ shrimp, sugarcane shrimp (chao tom), cha gio, tau hu ky, or a combination of them. I love Vietnamese bun because it’s not only tasty, but very healthy as it’s not greasy and comes with all sorts of vegetables and herbs. Every bite is refreshing and appetizing; a noodle dish that is both filling and satisfying…

Summer is in high gear now so I made some BBQ shrimp and turn them into this BBQ shrimp vermicelli. It’s really quite easy to make. All you have to do is gather your fresh vegetables:  cabbage, carrots, bean sprouts, cilantro, and mint leaves. (You can also add herbs such as perilla and Asian basil leaves, if you like.) For the rice vermicelli, you can get them dry at Asian markets. Please take note you will need rice sticks, which are slightly “fatter” than rice vermicelli. The packaging has Vietnamese and it will say “Bun” and the English label is “Rice Sticks.” For the fish sauce or nuoc cham, I have a great recipe that goes well with the vermicelli, as well as other Vietnamese recipes on this site.

If you love Asian noodles, this is a great dish to try. As I mentioned above, you can have a few toppings if you want—shrimp, pork, cha gio, tau hu ky, etc. Regardless of your choice, it’s absolutely pleasing to the palate.

If you love Vietnamese food, do check out my collections of popular Vietnamese recipes.