When i got to know about Babe in the City – KL‘s Merdeka Open House yesterday, i knew i gotta participate even though the closing date was yesterday! :P

Not that i’m so dang patriotic or anything like that but you know, just for fun!

So first thing in the morning today, i rushed down to the wet market to get what i needed for the dish that i wanna cook, something really easy with least ingredients and work because everything is too last minute! Alas, wet market doesn’t sell meats on Monday!! :(

In the end, i had no choice but to go ahead to braise my fei yuk (pork belly) without much brouhaha… pig’s ears and chu cheong (intestines) just to name a few – i know i might have grossed quite many of you with internal parts like these! :P

For some strange reason, pork belly excites me. Even (pork) trotter can’t beat this. The many layers  – when done right, is really quite beautiful. Roasting, braising, even in the soup, pork belly is not only awesome to eat, it is actually quite pleasing to look at too!

But!

Truth be told… pork belly was never the highlight whenever my mother cooked us this dish when we were little. What the sisters and i really look forward to were actually the eggs and chu cheong! Fei yuk??!? Ewwwww… hahahaahaa!

I remember very clearly how the sisters and i would fight over the last piece of chu cheong — grrr.. still sulking over the fact that i couldn’t get any chu cheong today :( — . It was never enough to go around where as the fei yuk will always be there in the serving plate. Grin. I think the only person who ate up those fei yuk would be my daddy!

Of course, the eggs … needless to say, they usually disappeared before we even finished greeting our parents! Yes, in my family, it’s a must to greet the parents and my older siblings before eating. Because i have a huge family, the greeting can go on and on and on. ppsstt : i have 2 elder sisters, 1 brother and 2 younger sisters. Sometimes, out of courtesy and for the fun of it, i’d even greet my younger sisters! Heee. Guess that pretty much explains why the eggs can disappear aye? ^_^

Back home, we used to eat this with a bowl of plain porridge with stir fried long beans. It’s really quite something when we had it during the year end – cold and raining, under the dim lights with the rain went pitter patter pitter patter over our zinc roof – well, just some parts anyway, which my dad fixed up.

Aaahh..

How time flies. Sigh.

It’s funny how happy we were despite not owning anything fancy, no fancy books, no fancy toys, no fancy holidays, no fancy gadgets… but we were truly happy. We had dog(s), cats, hamsters, batu seremban (5 stones), our house gate which doubled as badminton net, foreign pen pals (mine were from UK and Greece) and our very own stamp books – huge collection too(!) to keep us occupied.

Then, happyness was going to the swimming pool on the weekend evening with my parents and siblings who can’t swim for nuts. All we did was pee wade around, splash and laugh whilst pretending to swim. :)

Lou Fei Yuk (Braised Pork Belly)

400-500g pork belly
4 pieces non-salted taukwa (bean curd)
6 hard-boiled eggs, peeled
2 star anise
4-5 cloves of garlic
3-4 tbsp dark soya sauce
3-4 tbsp light soya sauce
a pinch of salt
2-3 cups of pork-bone stock

1. In a pot of boiling water, throw in the whole chunk of pork belly for at least 10 seconds, this is to get rid of the unpleasant porky smell. Drain.
2. Using high heat, sautee pork belly all over to seal the juices. Stir in garlic till golden.
3. Add in taukwa, followed by star anise, dark soya sauce and light soya sauce, the stock and salt.
4. The eggs can be added in anytime now. Once the dish looks pretty much edible, you can taste and see if the seasoning is to your liking. Adjustments to be made here.
5. Cover and simmer for at least 45 minutes before serving.

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Hopefully the babe will be kind enough to accept my entry despite being 1 day late! *keeping both my fingers and toes crossed!*

* fei yuk = fatty meats but usually it refers pork belly

Many times, i whip up dishes based on, well… what i have in pantry!

For our daily dinner, i hardly cook using recipe book. Most of the time, i’ll just stare at the fridge and ideas come. This squid dish was created during one of those times. It’s really quite anyhow but we love it!

On another note, have you wondered how in the world the squid dishes outside taste so wonderfully tender? For sometime, i never knew and the family had to make do with some very chewy squid. :P Well, now i do and i’d love to share this s-called insider secret with ya! ;)

No Recipe Squid

2 medium size squid, cleaned and cut
1 tomato, into 4
fish gravy, to taste
4 tbsp olive oil
2 limes, halved, for juice

To blend :

2 tbsp dried prawns
6 dried chili
3 cloves garlic
4 shallots

1. Heat oil.  Using high heat, stir in the blended ingredients. Fry till golden and fragrant. Palm off the tomatoes into the wok.
2. Right before adding the squid in, turn down the fire to rather low heat (yes, this is the secret! :P) and stir fry till the squid curls and no longer translucent.  Add in fish gravy, roughly just 1-2 tsp.
3. Squeeze some lime juice all over the squid dish just before serving.

ps : if u like it spicy, just chop up 2 chili padi and throw it in ;)

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Submitting this to Muhibbah Malaysian Monday, hosted by 3 Hungry Tummies and Test with Skewer.

I know not many people like this stinky beans but i really really do!

On days i cook this dish, this is all i ever need to go with my 2 bowls of rice – i don’t normally do 2 bowls but with petai, it’s an absolute exception!

Coming from Malaysia, my family and most friends i know dig this very much. Sadly, no one shares this love of mine in Singapore, except my ever-so-reliable helper — it’s not called stinky beans for nothing sadly :( — Without her around in a couple of years time down the road, i’ll probably not cook this again. It’s really no fun to eat alone no matter how much i love the food :(

Sambal Petai with Fried Ikan Bilis

To blend :

4 cloves of garlic
4-5 shallots
4-6 dry chili
2 buah keras

1. Blend the above

To cook :

1 big onion (i usually julien it)
1 packet of petai
1 tub of cili boh (chili paste)
14 big prawns
2-3 tsp belacan
1 tbsp sugar
1-2 tbsp of asam water (tamarind juice)
a handful of ikan bilis – deep fried

Method :
1. brown the blended paste in hot oil
2. stir in onion and saute
3. add chili boh + belacan
4. add petai
5. add prawns
6. add sugar
7. add tamarind juice. (testing time. at this point of time, if i find the dish is lacking of anything, i’d add them.)
8. when all are good, turn off fire.
9. add ikan bilis just before serving, ideally 5-10 mins after turning off fire to prevent ikan bilis from being soggy and not crunchy anymore.

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Submitting this to Muhibbah Malaysian Monday, hosted by 3 Hungry Tummies and Test with Skewer.

Feeling unsatiated, i went on and made my own quesadilla on the weekend.

Of course, weekend dinner equates to hungry boys (young and old) + crazy house, which simply means photography is absolute a no-no. But stubborn me went ahead and snapped a few before diving into these quesadillas.

So here it is, my anyhow quesadilla which was made with no recipe and completely based on what i thought was O.K.  Pardon the style-less, ugly photos that were taken at night in a very bad lighting condition. Grin. Yes, i’m shameless when it comes to posting bad photos! :P

I felt like kidney beans again so kidney beans it was!

Time was not on my side so my ingredients for the quesadilla were the simplest ever : sauteed minced beef with tomato paste + fried kidney beans + a dallop of sour cream + lotsa mozarrella cheese!

Being a first-timer with no recipe, i actually put the quesadilla to grill in the oven for the cheese to melt for a couple of minutes before folding it. Alas, i realized i was being very silly, only after the whole grilling affair! I should have dry-fry them on the non-stick pans!

Ahhh-doiiiiii!

Oh well.. never mind. Plenty of next timeS! ;)

Plus, they were utterly awesome… so grill or dry-fry, it doesn’t really matter but i bet dry-fry would rock more!