An Oregano Dinner

That day my friends stayed over, I made them dinner!

Yes, I’m incredibly bossy in the kitchen, so me flying solo meant we could still keep our friendship. hahaha, I’m exaggerating!

To give them some credit for the dinner, Kwoky did help with buying the groceries, and Esther helped with mincing the garlic! hahaa, I’m such an awesome friend i know.

I made Brocoli w Fried garlic, Grilled Salmon with herbs, Sautéed White Button Mushrooms, and Sautéed Potatoes with herbs.

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Garlic on Oil

Firstly, the Brocoli. This dish is easy, basically you boil the Brocoli, or blanch whatever you like and set them aside. Then you fry the minced garlic on oil, until slightly golden brown, make sure they do not over brown, or it gets really bitter.

Then you just drizzle the Garlic and oil all over the Brocoli, right before serving.

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Grilled Salmon

For the herb rub, all I did was to put a liberal amount of salt, pepper and Oregano flakes in a saucer, mix them up to make the rub. Then on the washed and dried Salmon, I rubbed it on.

The mistake I made here was to put the butter on the side as in the picture. The salmon could have looked better when cooked if I had mixed the Herb rub with the butter, and slather all over the salmon, that way the salmon would cook nicely brown all over, but it was nice nonetheless.

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Sautéed Mushrooms

For this, I first fried some minced garlic over oil, and then added the sliced White Button Mushrooms to sweat. You could replace garlic with onion too.

I didn’t like this dish as much as I hoped, because I thought the smell of the mushroom was too strong. I love eating mushrooms so I do not understand why I felt that way. Lets just hope it’s because I cooked it, and I feel I could have done better, haha.

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Sautéed Potatoes

This has to be mu favorite dish of the night. Although least expected, which is why I’m even more happy with it.

For this you would want the skin on, for the extra fragrance and crisp, so either buy cleaned ones, or potatoes with smooth skin. You can choose to boil the mini potatoes, or the normal sized ones, it’s just different with cooking time, and the amount of cuts to make.

I parboiled the potatoes. cut then into smaller cubes, and threw them onto the oiled saucepan.

Here is the tricky part (more of how I’m going to explain it)

I took a small slab of butter, and dumped it on the saucepan, in the middle of the potatoes, and to it I sprinkled salt, pepper and oregano flakes. mixed it up as the butter melted, and stirred everything together. This step helped coat the potatoes with the seasoning, and the end product smelled lightly of oregano, and tasted amazing.

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You could use any other type of Herb as long as you liked it. See how i practically use Oregano for this whole dinner?

That’s what I love about cooking western dinner! you should try it too!

Caramel!

Hello! So a few days ago, my friends came over for a sleepover.

Esther brought along some Kernels to pop, to snack on for the movie. We decided to make Caramel, since mixing the Kernels with butter and sugar before dunking into the microwave didn’t give us much of a result.

So yes, everything was just unplanned and awesome!

So making the Caramel is easy, we didn’t have any recipe or proper amounts to follow, all we knew is that we needed sugar and butter, so I just threw what I had into a pot, and it went over the fire.

If you haven’t made Caramel before, you need to be aware of the ‘Phases’ it goes through while on the fire.

Phase 1

Just normal melting and incorporating.

Phase 2

Bubbling/ boiling.

The 3rd Phase was scary, the sugar started to crystallize and separate from the butter.

Then the 4th Phase, the crystalized sugar browned, and eventually everything started to get together again, to give us….

CARAMEL!

Last phase

 

So yes, unfortunately I have no recipe for this, except that you use Sugar, Butter and a pinch of salt which is optional.

To make the Popcorn, you pop em in the microwave, and then drizzle the Caramel while it’s still piping hot all over it.

Caramel Popcorn!

And then, the awesome part- Caramel Chips with Chocolate.

We made another batch of Caramel, and smeared it on a tin tray (covered with tracing paper). Then we threw on Chocolate, my chocolate came in a huge block, so Esther helped shave it, you can also rub the chocolate as a whole over, it was melted because the Caramel was very hot.

Chocolate Shavings

Eventually, everything cools and hardens, you crack em up or cut up nicely. And indulge!

Caramel chips with Chocolate!

Malaysia Boleh!

WARNING: THIS POST IS JUST FOOD PORN, SCROLL DOWN AT YOUR OWN RISK.

 

So, I have the most picky eater for an uncle. I’m not complaining though, because every time I’m in PJ (Petaling Jaya, where my aunt lives) I surely get to eat good food, that on top of whatever I already love, and eat whenever I’m there- religiously.

If there is one thing i learnt from eating in Malaysia, it’s that food has to be cooked in generous amount of lard to taste good. I know its unhealthy and all, but really if you eat moderately and excercise, WHY THE HELL NOT?

Thais the difference here you see. In Singapore, the best- lets say Chicken Rice- is famous because the chicken is cooked well, with nice and tender meat, and the rice is fragrant and not too oily. But hell, in Malaysia, it’s because they use Kampong Chicken, and cook it with the right type and amount of sauces to give you the best TASTING Chicken rice. Good food in Singapore is healthy, and fairly nice. But in Malaysia, it’s just FUCKING AWESOME. You know?

These are the food I eat every time I’m there, of course there are a few missing because we didn’t have too much time. So maybe I’ll post it the next time I’m there.

Prawn Mee

Only soup version available, with the choice of bee hoon or mee. The soup is packed with goodness, and that’s all you can ask for really. Why bother with real prawn meat when the soup just taste like MSG? You drink the soup, and you know how many prawn heads were used to stew it. It sounds disgusting, but like I said in one of my post, prawn heads are magical.

Char Kway Teow

This is the ‘real’ FRIED Kway Teow, not the stewed nonsense we get in Singapore. Here, the hawkers will douse the Kway Teow in some stock to simmer for a while and reduce before serving, sure you’d use lesser oil that way. But WHAT FOR? if it isn’t going to taste awesome?

This version is oily yet fragrant and awesome, with springy prawns and tonnes of bean sprouts.

Satay

I don’t know much about Satay, but one thing I gotta say, is how THICK this is. The ones we get in Singapore for double the price is half its size. Ridiculous aye?

Lor Mai Gai

This is totally different from Singapore. Ou’s here is minced meat (I bet with lotsa flour) over over-peppered glutinous rice. This however, has pieces of meat and mushroom, and the rice is actually cooked with proper sauce, probably from stir-frying the chicken. Goodness in the morning.

Clay-pot Lou Shu Fun

This comes in a clay pot, sizzling. But I was too eager to dig in, so this is the only picture I’ve got. Cooked with fried lard, and nice sauce. It’s exremely tasty, and worth the extra rounds.

Curry Mee

This is the BEST curry mee I’ve had in my whole life. The soup is wholesome, and everything was just a match made in heaven. Nothing beats it really. Trust me, I’ve had so many curry mee, and non is near this. Worth waking up at 9am in the morning after only 7 hours ( imma pig I know) of sleep.

It's awesome ingredients

Roasted Char Siew

Char Siew in Msia is different, its glazed in honey and roasted to perfection. Not like Singapore’s overly colored Charsiew. This was succulent, sweet and juicy at the same time. The ones we have here are just dry and red. Creepy.

Wanton Soup

Blanched Bean Sprouts w Oyster Sauce mix

Kway Teow Soup

Hainanese Chicken

The above four pictures, are all from the same place. Simple but delish. Springy prawns from the Wantons, and tender Chicken. It’s just good. You know? Not everything has to be put into words right?