Cong You Bing / Chinese-style Spring Onion Pancake with Ginger Dipping Sauce

Cong You Bing is a Chinese-style unleavened flat-bread, commonly referred to as Spring Onion Pancakes. It uses very few ingredients and is quite easy to prepare and yet has a very remarkable flavour. The dough is a combination of water, salt and flour. This combined with sesame oil, spring onions, salt and pepper and then being toasted in very little oil creates a delicious snack. The recipe here is from a Chinese colleague from years back.

Char Siu Bao/ Chinese BBQ Pork Bun

Char Siu Bao is a Cantonese bbq pork filled steamed bun and is the most popular street food in China. Char Siu is bbq pork and Bao is covered or wrapped. Pork meat is marinated in a maltose-hoisin-rose wine sauce and then grilled over the bbq to a charred, savoury, sweet perfection. Then are then chopped and filled inside a yeast-dough, shaped into buns and steamed. They are served hot, straight from the steamer.

Black Sticky Rice Pudding

This Black Sticky Rice pudding comes from Thailand, the land of smiles. Black rice is a glutinous sticky rice is naturally sweet and nutty and has a dark purple colour to it. It has fibre and lots of antioxidants which makes this a healthy dessert. The rice has a bite to it, even after hours of cooking and when paired with coconut milk, toasted coconut, fresh fruit and ice-cream makes a complete nutty dessert with lots of freshness to it. For the people in Kerala, it will surely remind you of the Aravana Payasam.  

Chinese Style Minced Beef Chowmein

My boys have lately fallen in love with Oriental flavours, where Korean, Vietnamese and Chinese top their list because they have more spicier options of the lot. So, as soon as they see any Oriental recipe, they want it to be prepared at home, simply for the convenience of eating it at any time they want. We saw this recipe for Minced Beef Chow Mein in an episode of Better Homes and Gardens almost a year back and have fallen in love with the flavours with our first bite.

Quick and Easy Fried Rice

Fried rice is a remarkably versatile dish that is good for a simple dinner or for a lavish party presentation. It is the simplest, quickest and most nutritious meal that every lady in today's fast paced world resorts to prepare at least once every week in her kitchen. Though its origins can be traced back to China, this rice dish loaded with veggies and sometime egg and meat, is a staple food in almost every household in every fast-paced country now.

San Choy Bao - Chinese style Lettuce Cups

San Choy Bao is a classic Chinese dish; a nice, refreshing, light meal that can be served both as an appetiser and a main course - a dish that is equally loved by young ones and old alike. Crispy, ice cold lettuce cups filled with a warm flavourful filling of minced turkey and vegetables makes it a balanced nutritious meal. It is quick and easy to prepare and at the same time a fun dish because it involves a little bit of playing and messing around - you have to assemble the ingredients to make your own cups to chomp down!

Kaeng Khiao Wan Pla Thot/ Sweet Green Fried Fish Curry

It is Thai today!

A marriage of Eastern and Western influences, harmoniously combined with the traditional Thai style of cooking has led to what is now known internationally as the Thai Cuisine. It is a balance of spicy, sweet, salty and sour. The food is loaded with fresh herbs like coriander leaves, lemon grass, kaffir lime leaves, basil and mint and what awaits your palate is simply dazzling and delightful.

My first experience of Thai cuisine was Kaeng Khiao Wan Pla Thot served at Okra Restaurant, Hawthorn in 2006. I was carrying my second child at the time and my friend from work (who had seen and experienced my love for seafood), ordered this for me.
Man! Did I fall in love? With the dish I mean; not the Chef!
Unfortunately, this was not the case with my husband, when I took him to the restaurant later. While he did like the dish, he kept complaining about the aroma of lemon grass which was a reminiscence of a bitter medicine he had as a child. But he grew out of it and now loves anything that is Thai.

Kaeng Khiao Wan is sweet green curry and Pla Thot is deep-fried fish. So this is deep-fried fish in a sweet green curry, with pak choy, okra, eggplant, water chestnuts and bean sprouts to make it a complete meal served with Jasmine Rice. I guess they call it sweet only because it is not as hot and spicy as the other Thai curries like Massaman.

Thai Green Curry Paste

There are different interpretations of what makes an authentic Thai green curry paste. Experts in Thai cooking advocates using a mortar and pestle with fresh Thai ingredients to make an authentic curry paste. However, I used my mixer grinder to make this paste and made some substitutions and was quite happy with the result.