Prawn Tempura

Here’s another dish which I was sure I had posted a while ago but I don’t seem to have done so. Time to rectify.

I love making this, the prawns are so easy to throw together and yet you get a big "oooh and ahhh" factor when you serve them up.

The key to good tempura is a very light and lacey batter, this is not fish and chips Brit style, but what you want is a thin light coating on the prawns. To best achieve this you should:

• Make the batter up just before using, don’t let it stand around too long. Also don’t whisk it too much, lumpy is okay.

• Use VERY cold water and add a couple of ice cubes as well. The contrast of the very cold batter and very hot oil is explosive and that creates the lacey texture

• The batter mix will be quite runny, and will appear to only very thinly coat the prawns. This is perfect so don’t worry.

• If you want to substitute the cold water for cold beer or cold fizzy water as some recipes suggest please do. Apparently the bubbles also help to make a lighter batter but personally I’ve not been able to tell the difference.

Traditionally tempura is served with a dipping sauce made with something called ‘dashi’ which is a kind of stock made with dried fish flakes and seaweed. I have never been able to find this in Dubai (if any readers have come across it please do share) and so I use a made up sauce below.

This is a recipe for Prawn Tempura but obviously it is exactly the same for vegetable tempura.

You will need:

Lots of prawns, get the fishmonger to de-shell them but leave the tails on.
Lots of oil, at least 800ml. I tend to use peanut oil, but sunflower etc is okay.

For the batter:

1 egg yolk
125g plain flour
3 tbsp cornstarch
A pinch of baking soda
300ml really cold water
Ice cubes


For the dipping sauce

2 tbsp soya sauce
2 tbsp mirin or sherry
1 tbsp ketyap manis (Maestro Alexander explains what that is here )
And then you need to:

Add the dipping sauce ingredients together in a small saucepan and bring to a gentle simmer. Let gently bubble for 5 mins and then pour into a little bowl.

Add the oil to a wok and bring to a high heat. I turn my hob up to 8 (out of 10).

Make up the batter by adding the water (or beer) to the egg yolk and then mixing in the flour, cornstarch and baking soda. Add ice cubes, don’t over work and set to one side.

Wash, then dry the prawns. Dip into the batter, let the excess run off and carefully drop into the very hot oil. Don’t overcrowd the oil, do a couple at a time and don’t stir them around too much. The prawns will cook very quickly, certainly in less than 2 minutes. Remove gently, place on kitchen towel to drain a little and then arrange on a large platter for serving.

And that, as they say, is that!

Singapore Chicken Rice

In Singapore, conversations always turn to where the best place is to eat this perennial favorite. Originally from Hainan Island in China, this dish is all over Singapore. My personal favorite is Lau Pa Sat at Newton Circle (Circus). Quick and easy to make also.

INGREDIENTS

For the chicken

2 Kg boned chicken thighs

3 cloves garlic

2 (3 cm) pieces fresh ginger root, peeled

2 green onions

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons sesame oil

For the rice

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 tablespoon sesame oil

2 shallots, finely chopped

5 cloves garlic, minced

1 (3cm) piece fresh ginger root, peeled and chopped

250 ml chopped cilantro (coriander leaves)

500 ml cups chicken stock

1/2 teaspoon salt

400 ml long grain rice, rinsed and drained

Garnish

cilantro sprigs

sliced green onion

1 cucumber, thinly sliced

2 fresh tomatoes, chopped

Chili sauce to taste

DIRECTIONS

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Crush 3 cloves of garlic and 2 pieces of ginger, and add them to the pot. Tie the green onions into a knot, and place them in the pot along with 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Add the chicken

Bring to a boil, then cover and remove from heat. Let stand covered for 40 minutes While the chicken is cooking, heat the vegetable oil and 1 tablespoon of sesame oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Fry the shallots,

ginger, and garlic in the oil until fragrant. Add the coriander and rice, and cook, stirring until toasted. Pour in the chicken stock and season with salt. Bring to a boil, then cover and reduce heat to low. Simmer until rice is tender and 'steam holes' appear in the surface of the rice, about 20 minutes.

When the chicken is done, remove it from the pot, and place it under cold running water to tighten the juices. Rub the outside with sesame oil, and chop into pieces. Place pieces on a serving platter. Serve with the rice, and garnishes on the side.

Crispy "Seaweed"

Alexander’s post below got me thinking about pak choy and a couple of things came to mind.

First of all we do have another pak choy recipe on the blog so check it out here .

Secondly the most common way the Chinese cook this vegetable is one of the most simplest, literally heat a wok over high heat, add 1 tbsp groundnut oil until smoking, throw in 3 chopped cloves of garlic and ½tsp sea salt, stir for 15secs, throw in roughly chopped pak choy, fry very quickly for 2 mins, tip out onto plate and serve.

Another recipe is for that old Chinese restaurant classic ‘Crispy Seaweed’, which isn’t seaweed at all but fried shredded pak choy. Thought I’d share.

You will need:

1kg pak choy
1 litre groundnut oil
1 tsp sea salt
2 tsp granulated sugar
50g lightly toasted pine nuts

And then you need to:

Heat an oven to 120C/250F

Wash and dry the pak choy thoroughly.

Remove the green leaves from the white stalks. Roll the green leaves up tightly and then finely shred them into thin ribbons. You can use the white stalks in a stir fry vegetable recipe.

Spread them out on a dry baking tray and place in the oven for about 10 mins. Remove and leave to cool.

Heat a wok over high heat, add the oil and when hot deep fry the greens in 3 or 4 batches. It will only take them about 30 seconds to turn crispy (don’t let them brown), remove immediately and place on kitchen towel to drain.

Once all cooked place into large bowl, sprinkle the salt and sugar and give it a good toss. Add the pine nuts and serve.

Pak Choi

I'm a sucker for pak choi (or bok Soy or whatever else you want to call it). You can sometimes find it lurking in Spinneys' local herbs section, although it's frequently a slightly sad version of what, when it's fresh, is a vibrant green and white, crunchy bunch of leafy wonder.

The Greenhouse Supermarket (of which I have written reams and no, no emolument has been received by the author in consideration) imports pak choi from Thailand twice a week and these days are frequently the signal for a treat - stir-fried pak choi. Achingly fresh, nestled in threes and fours in their sealed plastic wraps, these grand, vibrant kings of Asian greens will be joined in the pan by whatever else my schoolboy with pocket money visits yield - perhaps Thai broccoli, celery leaves or garlic flowers, a handful of zingy, fresh Thai basil and chopped coriander. I chop the pak choi up and throw in some garlic, half a large red onion, thinly sliced and usually have a sauce of wine, soy sauce, perhaps a little fish sauce, sugar and a teaspoon of cornflour. The vegetables are stir fried until they have just started to wilt, then the sauce goes in to thicken and finish.

I'll usually do something Asiatic to chicken breasts to go with this, marinating them in lemon grass, garlic, ginger and chili or something similar, before grilling them and serving them on a plate of steaming green, crispy and fresh-tasting pak choi.

Bali Chicken

This recipe is difficult, not because of the method of cookery or anything like that, but because of the distinctive and rare ingredient that ‘makes’ it. It’s kencur, the root of the resurrection lily and you’ll only generally find this very distinctive and camphorous little aromatic in Bali. So if a friend’s going there on holiday or you’re off yourselves, get a pack of kencur brought back for you and then pop it in the freezer – it freezes like a dream.

This is basically a marinade that's built around many of the ingredients in a Balinese spice mix, or basa genep. I've omitted candlenuts (macadamia), which are used in most Balinese cookery in one way or another, for reasons of sheer saturated fat content if nothing else.

The resulting grilled chicken breasts are uniquely Balinese in flavour and composition – Asian and yet mind-blowingly distinctive. If you're barbecuing, of course, you can use thighs, legs or anything as long as you lengthen the cooking times. The end result remains explosively aromatic.

This, playmates, is a dish that will stay in your memory long after its last, lingering Asiatic notes have played out their sensory threnody.

If you can't get kencur, I suppose you could try galangal instead, but it's really not the same... If you can, give it a scrub, but don't bother skinning it. The Balinese certainly don't!

Ingredients

• 900g (4) chicken breasts
• 1 tbsp kencur, washed
• 1” fresh ginger, chopped
• 1 large red chilli, deseeded and roughly chopped
• 6 cloves garlic, chopped
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ tsp black pepper
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 tbsp palm sugar (date syrup or ‘dibs’ will do)
• ½ tsp powdered turmeric
• 100ml lime juice

In a small blender bowl, mix all the spices and lime juice but not the turmeric and then whizz them to a smooth, slightly watery pulp. Put the turmeric in a roomy bowl, add the whizzed stuff and then stir in the chicken breasts. I’ve laid it out this way purely because turmeric is so messy and stains every utensil, and your fingers, yellow.

Let the chicken marinate at least an hour, then grill it, basting with marinade, for about 5-7 minutes each side so that it has just firmed up, started to brown and is cooked through.

Serve with rice and salad and perhaps a spoon of mayonnaise blended with red chilli.

Pak Choy with Chinese Mushrooms in Oyster Sauce

This is a great side dish and accompaniment to something like the Kung Po chicken. It takes about 2 minutes to cook as well so it is perfect.

You will need:

1 head of long pak choy
50g dried Chinese mushrooms (you can buy these in Spinneys)
2 tbsp oyster sauce
3 tbsp soaking liquid from mushrooms
Salt
2 cloves garlic finely chopped
Small knob of fresh ginger, finely chopped.


And then you need to:

Lay the whole head of pak choy lengthways on a chopping board. Chop off the root end so all the stalks separate and then slice them through every 3cm into chunks.

If you are using baby pak choy you will probably only need to make one or two slices.

Discard the root end.

Wash very well and spin dry.

Place the mushrooms in a deep bowl and cover with boiling water. Put a plate or lid over them and leave to soak for at least 30minutes. Preferably longer.

Once done, remove the mushrooms (reserve the liquid), squeeze dry and cut into largish pieces. Discard the central stem as that will still be very hard.

Heat a wok over medium high heat with 1 tbsp groundnut oil until smoking. Throw in the garlic and ginger immediately followed by the chopped pak choy. Sprinkle with a little coarse sea salt, and give it all a very good stir.

Add the mushrooms, the oyster sauce and the mushroom soaking liquid and stir fry for about 1 minute. Tip out straightaway onto a warmed serving platter.

“Kung Po” Chicken – Chicken with Cashew Nuts version 2

This is a slightly different version of Chicken with cashews nuts from the one I posted earlier.

In fact the tastes between the two recipes are very different and due in main to something called Chinese Black Vinegar or Chinkiang vinegar. I am lucky enough to have a bottle of this at home which I bought from a Chinese supermarket quite a long time ago. If you don’t have it, or can’t find it, substitute it with balsamic vinegar.



This version is certainly the more ‘authentic’ of the two.

You will need:

400g chicken breast, diced into bite sized pieces
100g raw cashew nuts
1 red pepper (or green, or both), deseeded and cut into 1cm squares
1 onion, quartered, chopped into big pieces
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 knob of fresh ginger, chopped fine
5 or more Kashmiri chillis, or other dried ones (about 10g)
2tbsp dry sherry
3 spring onions, chopped into 2cm long segments


For the seasoning:

1 tsp sugar
1 tsp cornstarch
1 tbsp dark soy sauce


For the Sauce

2 tsp cornstarch
4 tbsp good chicken stock
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp Chinese Black Vinegar
1 tbsp dark soy sauce


And then you need to:

The presentation of the food is quite important in these sorts of dishes so when you chop the chicken try and cut the breasts into equal sized smallish (1 cm) cubes.

The dried chillis do not impart much heat, they give a slightly smoky flavour to the dish and they do of course add quite a bit to the presentation. If you want a bit more heat blast add a finely chopped Thai chilli as well at the same time as you throw in the onions and garlic.

Place the chopped chicken in glass bowl with the seasoning ingredients. Give it a good mix to make sure everything is coated and leave to marinade for about 15 minutes.

Add all the sauce ingredients together in a small bowl and mix.

Either in a dry wok or in a hot (200C/400F) oven roast the cashew nuts. In the oven this will take about 5 minutes only. Once the nuts have browned nicely put to one side.

Heat the wok over medium high heat, add about 1 tbsp of ground nut oil and when it is very hot throw in the dried chillis. Give them a quick flick, and then add the onions, the garlic and the ginger. Fry very quickly for no more than 30 seconds and then add the chicken. With the cornstarch in the marinade it will likely stick a bit to the bottom, don’t worry, keep stirring and flicking and scraping the yummy bits off.

After about 30 seconds add the dry sherry.

Keep stir frying until all the sherry has evaporated, which will only take a minute.

Add the red pepper and the sauce ingredients. Keep giving it a really good stir, for about another minute.

Once the sauce is lovely and thick, add the spring onions and the cashews give them a couple of good flicks around the wok, and then tip the whole lot onto a large warmed serving platter.

Serve straightaway.

From the time you’ve heated the wok to the time you tip out the food it should take you less than five minutes. The Chinese are the true masters of fast food.

Pork Soong

A soong makes a smashing starter for Asian meals: it’s communal eating at its best and great for breaking the ice. The idea is to cook up a warm meat filling and then serve this alongside a mixture of leaves and fresh herbs so that diners can select their own flavour combinations, taking a lettuce leaf and folding this around the herbs and a spoon of soong before popping the whole parcel neatly into the old bouche. BTW - a chicken soong recipe can be found lurking here.

Hot, aromatic and dark: this soong is ridiculously moreish, so you might be better off just doubling the ingredients. This quantity makes a light starter for four but will leave people begging for more...

Ingredients

• 300g minced pork
• 1 large Indian red onion, finely chopped
• 100g mushroom, finely chopped
• 2 tbsp oil

Marinade

• 30ml dark soy sauce
• 2 cloves garlic, grated
• 2 cm fresh ginger, grated
• 50ml white wine
• 1 tsp runny honey

Sauce

• 50ml sherry or sweet wine
• 1 lime, grated zest & juice
• 1 tsp cornflour

Leaves

• Iceberg (and/or other) lettuce
• Bunches of hot basil, coriander, mint, dill etc

Mix the marinade ingredients and then marinate the minced pork in this for an hour or more. Fry the onion to soften, adding the mushroom. When this is going well, add the pork. Fry this up, stirring, for a couple of minutes and then mix together the sauce ingredients and add this, stirring, to the mixture. Stir fry for a further minute and then serve it up warm with the selection of mixed lettuce and fresh herbs. It can be left and reheated if you like.

Lawar

This is a Balinese festive dish, served at major family celebrations and all the best restaurants. It is, in its native state, a pretty complex recipe and I’ve had to make all sorts of terrible compromises to bring it to the modern Western(ish) kitchen. All I can do is ask for forgiveness.

The biggest compromise is to neglect the kencur, the most commonly used spice in Balinese cooking. The root of the resurrection lily, a distant cousin of ginger and galangal, the smell of kencur is ubiquitous in Bali - there's nothing quite like it anywhere else in the world and you can’t get it outside of Indonesia.

Long beans, as has been said before, can be got at most supermarkets. If not, use French or dwarf beans. Blanch 'em for 10 seconds in boiling, salted water and plunge into ice water to keep 'em green.

I’ve also simplified the mixture of pastes used a little without, I hope, messing it all up beyond recognition.

The end result is a delicious, unique and unusual salad to go alongside any Asian meal or to have as a starter, perhaps with some green leaves or a little cool rice.

Ingredients

• 1 chicken breast (@125g), minced
• 12 long beans, blanched and cut into 0.5cm pieces
• ½ onion, finely chopped
• 1 large red chilli, deseeded and thinly sliced on its length
• 1 tbsp grated coconut, toasted
• 2 tbsp coconut milk
• ½ tsp crushed black pepper

Marinade

• 1 lemongrass, finely chopped
  
• ½ red onion, finely chopped
• 3cm galangal, grated
• 1 birds eye chilli, chopped
  
• 1 lime, zest and juice
• 2cm fresh ginger, grated
• ½ tsp powdered turmeric
• 1 tsp salt

I like to mince my own chicken with a knife, but the weight above of pre-minced chicken will do just fine. Mix the chicken with the marinade ingredients and leave it for a while to settle in – a couple of hours would be good.

Pan fry the coconut in a dry pan to toast it. Reserve this. Using the same pan and a splash of oil, fry off the ½ finely chopped onion to soften and then brown (but not burn). Reserve this.

With a little more oil, fry off the marinated chicken, stirring. It will cook quickly, in 3-4 minutes. Put it to one side to cool down a little. And now mix everything together: beans, chicken, chilli, coconut, coconut milk and then the cool chicken mixture.

Aromatic Asian Soup Noodles

Most Oriental cultures have some version of this dish of steaming hot, aromatic broth with bits of vegetables and noodles swimming around. I suppose the most famous would be the Vietnamese “pho”. This is a very regular feature in the HMHB household for a quick mid-week dish that takes about 20 mins to throw together and is deeply satisfying and very filling.

The list of ingredients looks ominous but it is not meant to be. There are no hard and fast rules here, just throw in what you have, skip some of the ingredients, add others if you wish, this dish can handle a lot of playing around with so let loose!

You will need for the stock:

2 litres good homemade chicken stock
1 carrot, chopped in half
3 stalks celery with leaves
Bunch fresh coriander
6 kaffir lime leaves
2 stalks lemongrass, bashed flat and cut into small lengths
1 knob ginger peeled
3 cloves garlic crushed (no need to peel)
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp fish sauce
1 heaped tsp caster sugar
100ml mirin or sherry


You will also need:

225g dry egg noodles
12 cooked prawns or bits of roasted chicken. Or both
8 cherry tomatoes
4 stalks pak choy
1 chilli, chopped fine
1 spring onion finely chopped

(you can add mushrooms, bean sprouts, finely chopped cooked pork, choy sum, chinese cabbage, broccoli, you can sprinkle on crushed peanuts, add a squeeze of lime juice.......)



And then you need to:


Get four large deep bowls lined up ready to go.

Chop the thicker end of the celery stalks into shortish lengths and throw into a big stock pot. Finely chopped the thinner ends with all the leaves and divided equally between the four bowls.

Chop off the roots and the stems of the coriander and throw into the stock pot. Finely chop the coriander leaves and divide equally between the four bowls.

Add all the other stock ingredients to the pot and bring to a boil. Once boiling turn down to a simmer and leave cooking quietly for about 15mins. The kitchen will fill with the most divine smells.

Once the stock has simmered for a while strain the stock and pour back into the stock pot. Taste for seasoning and then bring back to a simmer.

Bring a pot of water to the boil and throw in the egg noodles. Cook for 3 mins only, drain and divide equally between the four bowls.

Wash and then chop the stalks of the pak choy into smallish lengths. Put the dark green leafy bits straight into the soup bowls and quickly blanch the thicker white ends in the stock. Remove and divide between the bowls.

Chop the tomatoes in half and divide between the bowls. Divide the prawns and/or chicken, the chilli and the spring onions between the bowls.

Ladle the stock into the bowls, sprinkle a few chopped coriander leaves on top and away you go. Absolutely yummy and so very, very easy.

Crab and Coconut Salad - Asian Flavours

This is a fabulous summery dish. You can quite easily substitute the crab for large cooked prawns if you so wish but it won’t be nearly as good. So there.

You will need:

200ml tin of coconut cream
1 tsp fish sauce
200g fresh picked crab, with some big pieces preferably
1 stalk lemongrass, outer leaves pulled off and the centre sliced very finely
2 spring onions chopped fine
4 kaffir lime leaves, chopped very fine
Small handful chopped fresh coriander
Small handful chopped fresh mint
1 Thai chilli, chopped fine. More if you wish
2 tsp fresh lime juice
1 tbsp roasted peanuts. Coarsely ground in mortar & pestle
2 shallots, thinly sliced into rings and fried until crisp


And then you need to:

Warm the coconut cream in a small saucepan over a low heat with the fish sauce (nam pla), don’t boil it just heat it through. When cooled add the crab meat and stir gently.

Put all the other ingredients (except peanuts and fried shallots) in a big bowl and mix them around. Add the crab/coconut mixture and give it a gentle stir. You may find this easier to serve on four individual bowls instead of one big one, that way you can make sure no greedy bastard takes all the good bits of the crab!

Sprinkle the peanuts and the fried shallots over the top and serve.

Vietnamese Salad with Chicken / “Goi Ga”

We are very good friends with an English/Vietnamese couple and I have been pestering her for ages to teach me some Vietnamese dishes. Well finally I was obviously becoming too annoying and so invited me around last week and showed me two delicious recipes. She has also promised me a demonstration on Vietnamese spring rolls (both the cooked and uncooked types) and I can’t wait.

We were very regular visitors to a cheap and cheerful Vietnamese restaurant in Hong Kong called Perfume River and I was always surprised, and in fact I still am, about how both Thai and Vietnamese food share a lot of the same basic ingredients but how different their foods are.

Anyway, dear readers, I am going to share with you one of the recipes today and the others will follow.

I cannot help myself and I have already played around a little bit with her recipe and so this is my plagiarised version which may or may not be as good as the original.

Ingredients (for four)

300g chicken breast
5 carrots, peeled
5 small local cucumbers, washed, halved lengthways and seeds scraped out. Don’t peel.
2 red (Spanish) onions
A good sized handful of fresh coriander
A good sized handful of fresh mint
50g raw peanuts, roasted for five minutes then roughly crushed in mortar and pestle
2 cloves garlic
50g shallots, peeled and roughly chopped
2 tsp oyster sauce
2 tsp light soy sauce
Also salt, pepper, sugar, oil


For the pickling mixture:

200ml white (or rice) vinegar
200ml water
2 tbsp sugar
4 tsp fish sauce


For the dressing:

200ml boiled water from the kettle
2 tbsp granulated sugar
2 cloves garlic, chopped fine
2 Thai chillis, chopped fine (or more if you are brave)
2 tbsp fish sauce (nam pla)
2 tsp fresh lime juice


As with a lot of Asian salads, actually Asian food in general, the hard work and the time is in the preparation, the assembling of the salad is a work of minutes.

Place the chicken fillets on a wooden board, cover with cling film and using a rolling pin gently bash it to flatten and thin it slightly. Don’t go mad!

Place chicken into a shallow dish and sprinkle with salt, pepper, 1 tsp brown sugar, 2 tsp oyster sauce and 2 tsp light soy sauce, chopped garlic. Leave to marinade for 45 minutes.

In a saucepan put the pickling mixture ingredients, bring to a gentle boil, stir to make sure all the sugar has dissolved, remove from heat and set to one side to cool down.

Using a potato peeler or a mandolin on the thinnest setting cut into very thin strips the carrots, cucumber and the onions.

Put them into a glass bowl and pour the cooled pickling liquid on. Give it a very good stir and set to one side for at least 45 minutes. Give it another good stir every ten minutes or so to make sure all the vegetables get a good soaking.

Make the dressing by combining boiled water with the sugar and stirring until dissolved, then add the rest of the ingredients. Set to one side to cool.

Take a clean tea towel and place about a quarter of the chopped vegetables (carrot, cucumber and onions) in the middle. Fold the towel and giving it a number of very tight twists squeeze out as much liquid as you can. Tip the squeezed vegetables onto a large flat platter, and repeat until all the vegetables are done.

In a small frying pan with about 1 tbsp groundnut oil (no one said Vietnamese salads were healthy) fry the chopped shallots until nicely browned and a little bit crispy. Do be careful here, there is an incredibly fine line between brown and crispy and burnt!

Wash and chop very fine the mint and coriander (it will look like a lot but don’t worry) and spread on top of the vegetables.

Get a grill or a griddle pan nice and hot and quickly cook the chicken. It won’t take long as they are quite thin. Once cooked chop into small pieces and spread on top of the rest of the salad ingredients.

Spoon the cooked shallots on top, no need to drain.

Pour the dressing all over the salad and serve.

Now here are a couple of other thoughts that I have:

Chinese cabbage would be great in this, after all being pickled is the best way to treat this vegetable as any Korean will tell you!

I also think some Chinese vermicelli noodles would be good. I would boil them as per instructions, refresh under cold water, drain and then put down on the platter first before placing all the other ingredients on top.

The chicken could very easily be substituted with prawns and / or pork. In fact I think this would be a great salad with left-over turkey.

I would also like to try substituting the crushed nuts with toasted rice. In a dry frying pan put about 1 tbsp uncooked rice and over a medium heat cook until nice and brown. Place in mortar & pestle and grind until you are left with a pretty coarse powder. Sprinkle over the salad instead of the nuts.

I would like to add this dish to my BBQ repertoire. It would be nice to have the whole salad prepared and on the table, then to quickly BBQ the chicken, chopped it up, throw it on top, spoon on the dressing and serve straightaway.

Enjoy!

Bean Sprout Salad

Ever walk past those little bags of green bean shoots in Spinneys and wonder what on earth you're expected to do with them? Try this, then. I tend to chop the vegetables relatively finely, but not too much for this quick and simple but nevertheless pleasant salad. The bean sprouts add a nice crunch and nutty flavour. Slide a couple of grilled chicken breasts marinated in a handful of Asian things (you know, bit of red chilli, some lime juice, dash of nam pla, scattering of chopped lemon grass and a shave of ginger and garlic) alongside this and, just to finish off, a pile of white, steaming rice. If you're feeling terribly arty, slip a sneaky thread of rujak over things when they're all plated up. And there’s dinner for two neatly out of the way…

Ingredients

1 medium red onion, chopped
4 tomatoes, deseeded & chopped
¼ cucumber, chopped
2 cups bean sprouts
2 red peppers, chopped

Vinaigrette
2 tbsp vinegar
4 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp olive oil
1 red chili, chopped (no seeds!)
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 tsp salt

Mix the salad ingredients and blend the vinaigrette ingredients (best shaken in a bottle or shaker) and then toss the salad and vinaigrette.

Sichuan "Kung Po" Chicken with Cashews

I haven't done a Chinese, so to speak, for a little while so I thought I should rectify that.

This is a pretty big favourite in the HMHB household and when you see how easy it is to do I am sure it will be in yours too!

With all Chinese food the work is in the preparation, the actual cooking time is very short, and as things all happen pretty quick once the wok is ready it is best to be well prepared; have everything chopped up in little bowls, the sauces all on standby, ladle in hand, beer in the other and all will be sorted.

Ingredients (for four)

400g chicken breast
100g raw cashew nuts
1 red pepper, cut into 1cm squares
1 onion, quartered
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 small knob of fresh ginger, chopped fine
5 or more Kashmiri chillis, or other dried ones.
1 egg white
4 tsp dry sherry
2 tsp sesame oil
2 tsp cornstarch
150ml good chicken stock
1 tbsp chilli bean sauce
1 tbsp hoisin sauce
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp tomato puree
3 spring onions, chopped into 2cm long segments
Fresh coriander, washed and chopped

The presentation of the food is quite important in these sorts of dishes so when you chop the chicken try and cut the breasts into equal sized smallish (1 cm) cubes.

The dried chillis do not impart much heat, they give a slightly smoky flavour to the dish and they do of course add quite a bit to the presentation. If you want a bit more blast add a chopped Thai chilli as well at the same time as you throw in the onions and garlic.

Place the chopped chicken in glass bowl with sesame oil, egg white, cornstarch and sherry. Give it a good mix to make sure everything is coated and leave to marinade for at least 30 minutes.

Either in a dry wok or in a hot (200C/400F) oven roast the cashew nuts. In the oven this will take about 5 minutes only. Once the nuts have browned nicely put to one side.

Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil and then tip the chicken and the marinade in. Blanch the chicken for about 3 minutes, give it a stir occasionally and then drain. If you have ever wondered how in some Chinese dishes the chicken retains a sort of silky texture and remains very moist inside this is how it is done. The Chinese call this ‘velveting’ and it works a treat.

Heat the wok over medium high heat, add about 1 tbsp of ground nut oil and when it is hot throw in the dried chillis. Give them a quick flick, and then add the onions, the garlic and the ginger. Fry quickly for about 30 seconds and then add the stock, the chilli bean paste, the hoisin sauce, the tomato puree and the sugar. Give another very quick stir and add the red pepper.

You can add other vegetables if you want at this stage to make it slightly more substantial. Water chestnuts are delicious, but I quite often add a small handful of mangetout or sugarsnap peas. It’s your call.

Tip in the chicken and cook for about another 30 seconds or so. Add the spring onions and the cashews give them a couple of good flicks around the wok, tip into a large warmed serving bowl, garnish with some chopped coriander if you wish and serve straightaway.

From the time you’ve heated the wok to the time you tip out the food it should take you less than five minutes. The Chinese are the true masters of fast food.

Chicken Soong

I threatened to post this up a while ago, so here it is. This is a totally stunning starter and is great fun if you serve up the salad in communal style. The variations in taste and texture are as explosive as the variety of herbs and leaves you use. Go mad!

The recipe might look complicated because of the different stages, but it'll take you ten minutes to assemble these and another ten to cook it up. Serve the soong warm, but not piping hot.

At the table, the trick is to spoon a heap of the soong mixture into a lettuce leaf (or any other leaf of appropriate size from the selection in front of you) and then add a few other herbs and bits and bobs as your fancy takes you, then wrap it up around the chicken and pop it in!

Ingredients

• 400g Chicken, minced
• 1 onion, chopped
• 300g mushroom, chopped
• ½” fresh ginger, finely chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 2 tbsp oil

Marinade

• 50ml soy sauce
• 50ml white wine
• 1 tbsp sugar

Sauce

• 50ml white wine
• 50 ml soy sauce
• 50 ml vinegar
• 1 tbsp honey
• 1 tbsp ketchup
• 1 tsp cornflour

Leaves

• Mixed Lettuce (iceberg, oakleaf, garden)
• Bunches of fresh basil, coriander, mint, dill

Marinate the minced chicken along with the garlic and ginger in the marinade ingredients for about an hour. Mix up the sauce ingredients. Fry up the onion in the oil, adding the mushroom once the onion has softened a little. Add the chicken and stir fry for a few minutes until it’s cooked through, then add the sauce ingredients (the sauce may need a ‘refresher’ stir before you add it to the chicken as the cornflour tends to settle reasonably quickly) and stir fry for a minute more, then serve with a selection of mixed lettuce and herbs.

Baked Salmon with Nori and Wasabi mashed potatoes

This recipe is a ‘work in progress’ and I continue to tinker around with. I served it on Thursday night to some friends and it was very well received so I thought I would post it up.

Ingredients (serves 4):

4 salmon fillets, skin on.
2 full sized sheets of nori (japanese dried seaweed)
200ml teriyaki sauce
1 tsp sesame seeds

2 large leeks, washed and cut into thin rings
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

Mashed potatoes (as per this recipe)
1 tsp wasabi paste (or more)

Put the salmon in a freezer bag, pour in the teriyaki sauce, seal and leave for at least two hours.

In a large frying pan heat 1 tbsp olive oil over a medium heat, throw in the leeks and garlic and saute until they are a little soft, about 5 minutes.

Once cooked tip them into a baking dish and spread them evenly over the bottom.

Cut each of the nori sheets in half and using a bowl of cold water dip them in for 1 or 2 seconds to soften them slightly. Lay flat on a board, remove salmon from marinade (reserve the liquid) and place one salmon filet on each. Gently roll the nori around the fish. Place all four fillets in a line on top of the leeks and sprinkle the sesame seeds all over the top of the fillets.

Heat oven to 200C/400F and cook salmon for 20-25 minutes.

In the meantime pour the reserved teriyaki marinade into a small saucepan and bring to boil. Reduce to about one-quarter of volume until it is quite thick and syrupy. If you also want to add 50ml of mirin or some dry sherry to give it a bit of a lift please go right ahead!

Once the fish is in the oven make the mashed potatoes and add the wasabi along with the butter, philly, cream etc. Taste, add more wasabi if necessary.

I have used wasabi paste from a tube as that was all I could find at the time but it is not as ‘hot’ as the stuff made from a powder. I used almost the whole tube for ten people though one night and it was still very mild. If you are using the powder make up a paste with an equal amount of cold water. One heaped tsp of paste made from powdered wasabi is enough for four people, you want just a hint in the mash, not a sinus clearing explosion!

Spoon mash into the middle of four warmed plates, spoon leeks on top of the mash and then place one salmon fillet on top of each. Drizzle the thickened teriyaki sauce around and serve immediately.

It looks fabulous, the nori keeps the salmon lovely and moist so it tastes great and as you can see it is so very, very easy.

Peking Duck with Pancakes

Is there a dish more universally loved than Peking Duck? If there is I don’t know what it is. This is a dish that the Chinese claim is 700 years old, but one that the West has taken to its collective heart, played around with it a little and claimed it as their own. This dish basically comes in two versions, the aromatic crispy fried and the roasted. The crispy fried is purely a western invention and you won’t find anything similar in China.

If you have the good fortune of eating this dish in China the duck will appear as three different incarnations. First of all the expected slices of duck served with little thin pancakes, hoisin sauce and julienne strips of spring onion and cucumber, then as a soup will arrive made from the carcass and then finally a stir-fried dish with duck meat and usually little pieces of celery and cashew nuts. The duck slices that are served with the pancakes are normally just the crispy skin and little slivers of fat whilst the flesh part is saved for the stir fry later. Not quite what we have come to expect in the West!

Now that Beijing has changed its name why isn’t Peking Duck called Beijing Duck I wonder? Even in Beijing you still order Peking Duck! One of life’s little oddities.

A lot of myths seem to have arisen around this dish and as a result people think that it must be very hard to make. Nonsense I say! It is very easy, a little time consuming I grant, but for a wet afternoon pottering in the kitchen nothing could be better. You do not need bicycle pumps, special secret marinades, you don’t need to leave the duck hanging in front of a fan for hours, all these and more are a load of old cockerel.

You will need:

1 large duck (if frozen, defrost thoroughly and bring to room temperature)
1 lemon (chopped into quarters)
2 litres water
150ml honey
4tbs soy sauce

Spring onions and cucumber, cut into julienne strips

Pancakes:

180g plain flour (sieved)
150ml HOT water
Sesame oil.

Okay here goes:

In a large saucepan put water, lemon, honey and soy sauce and bring to boil. Simmer quite hard for about ten/fifteen minutes.

With a sharp fork stab duck all over (be very firm) really give it a good working over. Place duck on wire rack over a deep baking tray. Ladle very hot honey / lemon liquid over duck, pour liquid back into saucepan, bring back to a hard boil and then repeat process four or five times. What you are doing here is separating the skin from the fat and also slightly rendering the fat so that it will drain away from the bird during the roasting. Also of course you are coating the duck in a slightly sweet sticky mixture that turns a lovely golden colour during cooking.

Leave duck standing for a while so that the skin dries. An hour is enough but longer is better.

Heat oven to 200C/400F, place duck in oven still on wire rack over deep tray (to collect all the yummy duck fat that drains). Roast for about one hour. Cover in foil, leave to stand for about ten minutes and then carve into slices.

Whilst the duck is roasting make the pancakes.

Put the flour into a large bowl and stir the hot water gradually into the flour, mixing all the while with chopsticks or a fork until the water is fully incorporated. Add more water if the mixture seems dry.

Remove the dough from the bowl and knead it with your hands for about 8 minutes until smooth. Put the dough back into the bowl, cover it with a clean, damp towel and let it rest for about ten minutes. After the resting period, take the dough out of the bowl and knead it again for about 5 minutes, dusting with a little flour if it is sticky.

Once the dough is smooth, form it into a long sausage like roll about 45cm/18 inches long and 1 2.5cm/1 inch in diameter. Take a knife and cut the roll into equal segments, each one should be about the size of a chestnut and out of the roll you should get 18-20 pieces.

Roll each segment into a ball. Take two of the dough balls, dip one side of one ball into the sesame oil and place the oiled side on top of the other ball and sort of squish them together a little. Take a rolling pin, and roll the two balls together into a circle about 6 inches in diameter. It is important to roll double pancakes in this way because the resulting dough will remain moist inside and you will be able to roll them thinner but avoid the risk of overcooking them later.

Heat a skillet or wok over a low-medium heat. Put the double pancake into the wok or pan and cook it until it has dried on one side. Flip it over and cook the other side. They cook pretty quickly so keep an eye on them. The pancakes will bubble a little which is a good thing. Remove from the pan, peel the pancakes apart and set them aside. Repeat this process until all the dough balls have been cooked.

Steam the pancakes (preferably in a bamboo steamer) when you want to reheat them.

As any fule nose to eat this dish you dip duck meat into hoisin sauce and then place on pancake (or use a small spoon to smear some hoisin sauce on the pancake and place duck on top), add a couple of strips of spring onions and cucumber, roll up pancake and wolf down!

Grilled Prawns with Clam Sauce, Macau Style

We used to visit Macau a lot from Hong Kong and almost always to go and eat at a fantastic little restaurant called “Fernando’s” which was situated on a black sand beach on the last of the three islands that make up Macau. This restaurant was very unprepossessing, the front of it was the usual Macanese style of open to the elements, plastic tables and chairs, TV blaring in the corner and overhead fans whirling lazily. However, those in the know, would march straight through to the back where it opened up into a lovely little garden, a wood and brick circular bar and a large, light and airy restaurant with checked table cloths and a big log fire burning in the cooler months. On your way through to the back you would pass the open kitchen which had charcoal pits ablaze over which would be roasting suckling pig and ‘road kill’ chicken (as we used to call it!). Pots of soup and sauces would be on the boil, particularly the famous Portuguese soup, caldo verde, but most importantly of all would be the buckets of huge king prawns and the utterly delicious, garlicky, spicy ‘clam sauce’. Luckily the table would be generously served with home made, rustic bread so that not a drop of the clam sauce would escape.

I asked the owner, Fernando himself, for this recipe on many occasions and he would just smile, tap his nose and basically tell me to bugger off. Now I have tried, over many years, to perfect this recipe and I reckon I have got it pretty close. And because I am such a nice guy I am going to share it with you all. Here goes:

You will need

1 kg large prawns, head and legs off, tail and shell on. Give them a good wash.
1 kg Clams in shells
200ml White Wine
1 Onion chopped
1 bulb Garlic, each clove crushed and roughly chopped
1 Thai chilli, chopped (or more)
1 can chopped tomatoes
1 heaped tbsp tomato puree
1 big handful chopped coriander
2 tsp sugar

And then you have got to:

Give the clams a wash and drain them in a colander.

Heat a splash of EV olive oil in deep saucepan, add about five cloves crushed garlic, stir for a minute or two and then add wine. When wine is boiling add claims, put lid on saucepan and cook over medium heat for about 5 mins.

Drain clams but RESERVE COOKING LIQUID and then pick clam meat out of shells.

In another saucepan heat 1 tbs EV olive oil, add onions, chilli and rest of the garlic. Stir over medium heat for about two minutes and then add the tin of chopped tomatoes, tomato puree, clam meat, clam/wine liquid, sugar and three-quarters of the coriander.

Cook over low-medium heat for about ten minutes or so until it thickens slightly. It needs to be sort of thick soup consistency. Put the sauce into a food processor and whiz until quite smooth, don’t try and finely puree it, it should have a few little bits of garlic and clams through it.

Grill prawns over BBQ until cooked and place on a large shallow serving dish

Stir remainder of chopped coriander into sauce and pour over prawns.

This is a messy dish to eat, prawns to be picked up with fingers and pulled apart. Lots of finger licking, bread mopping and a huge pile of discarded shells in the middle of the table! Serve with a crisp green salad with a classic vinaigrette and lots of farmhouse-type bread to mop up the yummy sauce.

Prawn Chow Mein

Chow Mein means fried noodles and there are probably as many recipes or versions of this as there are cooks in China. You probably wouldn’t find anything like my version in the great People’s Republic of China but it is still quite tasty.

Ingredients, serves 4:

• Packet of dried Chinese egg noodles
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 150g peeled big prawns (shrimp). I use frozen ones, thaw under a cold tap and drain in sieve.
• 1 carrot chopped into thin ‘julienne strips’
• 1 onion chopped into biggish chunks
• 3 cloves pf garlic, chopped
• Fresh ginger (about 2cm square) chopped
• 1 tsp chilli bean paste
• 3 tbsp fresh chicken stock
• 3 tbsp sherry
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 spring onion cut into very fine strips.
• Assorted other vegetables as you wish. You could use baby asparagus, thin French beans, red pepper and little pieces of celery and of course Chinese cabbage.


And then you need to:

Bring pot of water to the boil, chuck in noodles and cook for 3 mins. Drain, throw into bowl of cold water and then drain again. Put into large bowl, pour over sesame oil, stir to coat and put to one side.

Heat wok to medium high heat, add 1 tbsp groundnut oil, and throw in onion, garlic, ginger and carrot.

Stir for about 1 mins and then add stock, sherry, soy sauce and chilli bean paste. Cook for about another 2 mins, add all other vegetables and the prawns, and continue to cook until the sauce has become quite thick (this should not take long). Add the cooked noodles and the spring onion, stir to coat and to mix through and then tip out into a large shallow dish.

Serve with a little dish of soy sauce into which you have chopped 3 or 4 thai chillis.

“Pad Thai” - Fried Noodles Thai Style

I think pad thai is probably as close to a national dish as you can get in a country such as Thailand, it is available everywhere from hawker stall to five star restaurant. Pad thai is often served in a sort of thin omelette case which you peel open to reveal the noodles inside but that is far to fiddly for me! These noodles are usually offered with a choice of chicken or prawns and quite often will be served with a small pile of crunchy bean sprouts, a small spoon of sugar, a lime wedge and some crushed peanuts on the side.

This is a very fast dish to cook, as is often the way with SE Asian food, it is the preparation that takes the time.

You will need (serves 2):

• 100g Rice noodles (look for those that are thin and flat, rather like linguine)
• 1 onion chopped biggish pieces
• 2 cloves garlic chopped fine
• 1 cm square knob of fresh ginger chopped fine
• 1 Thai chilli, chopped fine
• 100g Prawns or chicken (cooked) as you wish
• 25g, Cashew nuts, roasted
• 2 Spring onion, chopped into fine strips
• A few leaves of fresh mint and fresh coriander
• 1 egg
• 100g Firm beancurd, cut into ½cm squares
• Small handful of beansprouts

Sauce:

• 2 tbsp fresh lime juice
• 2 tbsp tamarind juice (see note below)
• 3 tbsp fish sauce (nam pla)
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tsp paprika powder
• 2 tsp caster sugar

For the prik nam pla

• 2 tbsp fresh lime juice
• 2 tbsp fish sauce (the nam pla of the title)
• 2 tbsp cold water
• 2 heaped tsp caster sugar
• 3 or 4 finely chopped thai chillis

And then you need to:

Put dried noodles into large bowl and cover with boiling water. Allow to stand for 15 mins, drain and put to one side.

Wash bean sprouts, blanch in boiling water for 1 minute, drain and refresh under cold water.

Mix together the ingredients for the sauce

Mix together the ingredients for the prik nam pla, making sure the sugar has dissolved.

In the wok or a small frying pan heat over medium heat about 1 tbsp groundnut oil. When hot add chopped beancurd. Fry for about 5 mins on each side until lovely and brown. Don’t throw these around too much, just leave them to cook away and then turn them over every so often with a palette knife. When cooked drain on kitchen paper and set to one side.

Heat wok over medium high heat, add 2 tbsp groundnut oil and when hot throw in onions, garlic, ginger, chilli. Stir for about 1 minute.

Add noodles and quickly stir. Add cashews, prawns/chicken, fried beancurd, bean sprouts and stir to mix.

Add sauce ingredients and continue to stir to make sure everything is coated. Then make a sort of well in the middle of the noodles and add the egg. Let to set for a little bit and then mix into the noodles. Keep stirring.

Add spring onions, mint and coriander, quick mix then tip out onto a big shallow dish. Sprinkle some more chopped coriander leaves on top, and serve immediately. For those who like it spicy add some of the prik nam pla for the authentic Thai afterburn.