Cold Soba Using Lee Kum Kee Sweet and Vinegar Spare Ribs Sauce

I have decided to make Cold Soba using Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Sweet and Vinegar Spare Ribs. This is a meatless dish. You may add shredded chicken breast or lean pork if you want. Increasing the portion of the vegetables will change it to a more salad.

Fairly simple, you only need to pan fried an egg, a dou gua and cook the soba. Dou gua turns bad easily once it is open. What my mum does is that she will pan fry the entire Dou gua and store it in the fridge to prolong its shelf life. Thereafter, it can be used as toppings for our noodles or as an ingredient for other dishes.

First, I sliced the cucumber, carrot and red capsicum. You may choose the type of vegetables you want. I would normally use cucumber and carrot for the extra crunch. I have ever used kidney beans, straw mushrooms for the colours and texture.

After which, I put the soba to boil. When boiling, I pan fried the egg. I rolled the egg to get a springy texture. Since the sauce is on the sweeter side, I added a pinch of salt into the egg. If the sauce for the soba is a savoury one, such as seaweed sauce which i have used before, I would make tamago instead. I'm not sure about the standard recipe, but I make mine by adding a tablespoon of milk and a pinch of sugar.

To speed things up, I pan fried the dou gua using another sauce pan, which had been soaked in salt water before hand. My mum taught me that this will prevent the dou gua from crumbling, and at the same time, to give it a bit of flavour.

After my soba was done, I scooped it directly into a bowl with a table spoon of Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Sweet and Vinegar Spare Ribs. I stirred to mix the soba evenly with the sauce and then put it in the fridge to cool it.

Dish: Cold Soba

Ingredients
- Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Sweet and Vinegar Spare Ribs
- Buckwheat noodles
- Cucumber
- Carrot
- Capsicum
- Egg
- Dou gua
- Salt
- Cooking oil

 Directions
1) Soak the Dou Gua in salt water first
2) Throw in the noodles when the water comes to a boil
3) Boil for 5 minutes. As different brands of noodles may have different cooking time, you may want to check the texture after 4 minutes.
4) Put 1 tablespoon of Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Sweet and Vinegar Spare Ribs into a bowl. Once the noodles is done, scoop it into the bowl and stir it well.
5) Chill the noodles ih the fridge for 10 minutes.
6) Beat the egg. Grease your cooking pan. Once hot, pour in the beaten egg. Form a thin layer on the base. Once the sides have firmed up, it is ready to be roll.
7) Pat dry the dou gua. Grease your cooking pan. Once hot, place the dou guan flat on the base. Turn it once the side underneath and edge start to brown.
8) After panfried till crispy, dice it.
9) Slice up all carrot, cucumber and capsicum. I feel cucumber is a must, for the refreshing taste. You may also use other ingredients such as kidney beans, beansprouts, cabbage etc.
10) Once all ingredients are ready, simply mix them together.

Creating salad style dishes at times allows me to use up the remnants in my fridge. It’s really all up to you how you want to make use of the ingredients which you have on hand, without having to purchase excess. This shall sum up my cooking session last weekend. Hope my dishes ain't too plain for you guys..!

Lee Kum Kee
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LeeKumKeeGlobal
Website: http://singapore.lkk.com/en/Kitchen

Written and Photography By Si An. A girl who is allured by travelling, loves the feel of freedom, smell of the rain and the aroma of fine coffee and food. 

Asparagus Wrapped with Bacon using Lee Kum Kee Honey Garlic Sauce

Following my first recipe post on Minestrone Soup, I shall now share with you the second dish which I had made concurrently - Asparagus Wrapped with Bacon is done using Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Honey Garlic Spare Ribs. Inspired by my previous tasting at Moosehead Kitchen, honey dates wrapped in bacon, I decided to do my rendition of this dish. The three main ingredients are asparagus, bacon and leeks. I feel bacon is quite a versatile ingredient. It is like a condiment that gives the dish a salty, smoky characteristic. I use leeks a lot in my everyday dishes as they have a long shelf life and pair well with meat or fish.

First, I wrapped 3/4 of the asparagus with the bacon

After my non stick pan was heated, i placed them neatly side by side to brown the bacon. I turned them regularly to prevent them from being too burnt on one side.

Once evenly brown, I placed them on an aluminium foil ( when I'm too lazy to wash the oven pan). I then glazed the bacon streaks with Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Honey Garlic Spare Ribs. I only use about 2 tablespoons of it and kept the remaining in a container. They are to be roasted for 15 minutes, 250 degree Celsius. Oven is my best friend in the kitchen. It allows me to prepare other dishes or back to my chores while it works its magic.

While waiting for the asparagus to be done, I stir fried some shredded leeks with the oil rendered from the bacons.

When my asparagus was done, I topped it with the shredded leeks. I then dressed it up with my very own lemon mayonnaise to cut the fats. You may want to use lemon juice only. I adore savoury-sweet taste! I find that the garlic-ky sweetness of this sauce coupled really well with the salty, smoky bacons. The lemony mayonnaise also lends some creaminess and tanginess to the overall taste.

 If you ain't into intuitive cooking, below is the recipe:

Dish: Asparagus wrapped with bacon, glazed with Honey Garlic Sauce, spiked with shredded leek. Drizzled with lemon mayonnaise.

Ingredients
- Lee Kum Kee's Sauce for Honey Garlic Spare Ribs
- Asparagus
- Bacon streaks (1 streak per asparagus)
- 1/2 stalk Leeks
- Cooking oil
- 1 tablespoon of mayonnaise
- Dash of lemon juice

Dressing 
Simply squeeze some lemon juice in the mayonnaise and mix it up. · 

Cooking method
1)Wrap 3/4 the asparagus with the bacon. As bacon can be quite salty and flavourful, wrap half the green is enough.
2) Grease the non-stick pan thinly and place it over medium heat.
3) Once heated, lay the wrapped asparagus neatly side by side one another.
4) Grill to slight brown.
5) Slice the leeks and stir fry it in the non stick pan using the oil rendered from the bacon.
6) Once brown, roast them in the oven for 15 minutes , 200 degrees celsius.
To be safe, check it after 10 minutes, to make sure that the temperature of your oven is right for the bacon. Too high a heat may cause the bacon to char before the asparagus gets cooked.
7) Lastly, dress it up with lemon mayonnaise and its done!

Lee Kum Kee
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LeeKumKeeGlobal
Website: http://singapore.lkk.com/en/Kitchen

Written and Photography By Si An. A girl who is allured by travelling, loves the feel of freedom, smell of the rain and the aroma of fine coffee and food. 

Minestrone Soup Using Lee Kum Kee Tomato Garlic Prawns Sauce

I love cooking... For its therapeutic nature, and partly because my taste buds do fuss a lot. By far, I do not adhere to any recipe, dread the use of any measuring equipment and the aftermath of cooking (washing, scrubbing, wiping etc.) More subtlety put, free-style and intuitive or you may call it lazy.

For the next few posts, I'm going to share with you my experiences in cooking. I usually cook individual portion for just myself, and when I have gatherings, it would then be more towards tapas-style. I won't say that my recipes are original. They are more of inspirations or motivations derived from other meals. I feel once you start to get your creativity working, cooking can be rather simple.

Many may find it not worth the hassle just to cook for an individual portion. It can be tricky when comes to buying the ingredients - too much for too little used. To counter that, I try to use more versatile ingredients that allows me to create a variety of dishes throughout the week and those with a longer shelf life means you don't have to worry buying too much of it. Using pre-mix sauces can be one of the ways to help lighten your load. They enable you to create the flavour without you having to purchase the numerous ingredients.

I was really disappointed with a minestrone soup which I tried recently in a restaurant. Hence, the very first dish that I am going to share with you is my own version of Minestrone Soup made using Lee Kum Kee Sauce for Tomato Garlic Prawns. Soup is usually the first dish I would make for the meal as time is needed to get the goodness out of all the ingredients. By the time I am done with the rest of the dishes, the soup will be just ready in time together with the rest.

I love making soups, because I just need to put everything into a pot and leave it alone. For this minestrone soup, it's the same. Simple ingredients - onions, tomato, carrot, celery. As I'm not of a meat person, I used cod fish bones in place of pork ribs or chicken bones to give the soup some sweetness and viscosity.

After the water came to a boil, I threw in all the ingredients and let it boiled for 20 minutes in medium heat. As all are hardy vegetables, I do not need to worry about overcooking them. If you prefer, you may add some white pepper corn to spice it up a bit, especially on wet days.

After 20 minutes, the vegetable cubes were pretty soft. I mixed in 2 tablespoons of Lee Kum Kee Sauce for Tomato Garlic Prawns into the soup and let it simmered in low heat for another 10 minutes for the ingredients to soak in the flavour.

I think sweet corns, leeks or even potatoes very suitable for such vegetables soups as well. To make it even more sumptuous, seafood such as prawns, squid and white fish will make the taste more robust. On lazy days, a hearty soup makes the best meal.

Dish: Minestrone Soup

Ingredients
- Onions
- Tomato
- Carrot
- Celery
- Cod Fish Bone
- Lee Kum Kee Garlic Prawn Sauce
- Optional: Other vegetables e.g sweet corns, leeks, potatoes, or seafood such as prawns for a more hearty soup.

 Directions
1) Dice all the ingredients.
2) Bring the water to a boil.
3) Put in all the vegetables and let it boil for 20 minutes.
4) Put in 2 tablespoons of Lee Kum Kee Sauce for Tomato Garlic Prawns. (You may put more if you want to make it more flavourful)
5) Simmer for another 10 minutes or more for a thicker broth.

Lee Kum Kee
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LeeKumKeeGlobal
Website: http://singapore.lkk.com/en/Kitchen

Written and Photography By Si An. A girl who is allured by travelling, loves the feel of freedom, smell of the rain and the aroma of fine coffee and food. 

Knorr Blogger Cookout Session

Do you remember a friend asking you to check out a newly opened restaurant, your friends or family members asking you to come over for a lunch/dinner gathering? Delicious food bring friends and family closer together, especially home cooked meal. Understanding this, Knorr organised a blogger cookout session at ToTT on Sunday where we attended a cooking demo by local award winning celebrity chef, Chef Daniel Koh. We also got to whip up our own recipe under the guidance of Chef Daniel during the blogger cookout session.

For the cooking demonstration, Chef Daniel shared with us one of his family recipes, Stir Fry Tom Yam Chicken.

Stir Fry Tom Yam Chicken

Ingredients
- 1 chicken breast
- 1 cube Knorr Tom Yam Stock
- 250ml water
- 1 tbsp Knorr Hao Chi
- 1/2 lime slice
- 1/3 tsp lime zest
- 1 stick lemon grass, cut into small pieces
- 1 lime leave julienne
- 1 tbsp chopped onion
- 2 garlic slice
- 1 chilli padi diced
- 1 stalk basil
- 1 tbsp coconut milk

Method
1. Slice chicken breast and season with Knorr Hao Chi
2. Heat pan with oil and fry chicken for 1-2 minutes. Remove set aside.
3. Fried onion, garlic, lemongrass, lime leave till fragrant and add Knorr Tom Yam Stock.
4. Bring to boil and add the rest of ingredients and chicken breast.
5. Simmer till sauce almost dry and lace with coconut milk.
6. Plate and serve.

Stir Fry Tom Yam Chicken

Including preparation and cooking it took about 30 minutes for Chef Daniel to whip up the delicious Stir Fry Tom Yam Chicken. This is possible all thanks to the Knorr Tom Yam Stock. If not for it, more time would be needed to prepare the Tom Yam paste and stock. The dish smelled so good that we asked the organiser whether we can have a bowl of rice to go with it.

After Chef Daniel's demonstration, it was our time to cook our own family recipe dish. Vicki and me has been brainstorming for a simple dish that we can handle within our culinary ability. After consulting with Vicki's mum, we decided to cook Golden Sands French Beans. We even practiced the dish the night before so that we don't make a fool of ourselves in the blogger cookout session.  Everything turned out pretty well and we even learnt some tips from Chef Daniel. Thanks for his guidance.

Golden Sands French Beans

Ingredients
- 300g French Beans
- 1 tbsp sweet chye poh
- 1 red chilli shredded
- 1 tbsp dried shrimp
- 200g minced pork
- 2 salted egg yolk
- 1 tsp minced garlic

Seasoning
- 2 tsp sweet soya sauce
- 1 tsp sesame oil
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- 1/2 tsp Knorr chicken powder
- 50ml water

Method
1. Wash dried shrimps and soak in water for 10 minutes, dried and minced. Set aside.
2. Steam salted egg yolk for 7 minutes. After that mashed it with a fork. Set aside
3. Wash french beans, trimmed end and cut diagonally into 1-2 cm length.
4. Blanch french beans in boiling salted water for a few minutes.
5. Drain and immerse the french beans in cold water to refresh them. (helps to retain its bright green color).
6. Heat the oil in a wok or frying pan. Stir fried for 1-2 minutes. Remove and plate.
7. Heat up 2 tbsp of oil, saute minced dried shrimp, chye poh and garlic till fragrance.
8. Add in shredded chilli minced pork and seasoning. Once cooked. Remove and plate.
9. Heat up 1tbsp of oil, saute mashed salted egg yolk until bubbly. Remove and plate.

40 Cloves of Garlic Roasted Chicken

I am glad to see fellow bloggers and friends at the Knorr Blogger Cookout session. You can go to their blogs for their recipes. Jacob and Chloe  cooked the 40 Cloves of Garlic Roasted Chicken which was super delicious. Too bad I don't have an oven at home to try out the recipe.

Hainanese Pork Chop

Maureen being a Hainanese cooked the staple Hainanese Pork Chop together with Chuan Kai. Never know Maureen not only "Tam Chiak" but can cook pretty well.

Babi Pongteh

Philip and Serene cooked Babi Pongteh which is a Peranakan dish. Tracing back to Serene's family roots, this was probably the dish that everyone wants to dig their fork into. Look at those pork belly!

photo from MissTamChiak

Here is a group photo of all the wonderful bloggers cum cooks for the day with Chef Daniel before we all dug into for our lunch tasting one another's dish.

To encourage home cooking for quality family meals, Knorr is also organising a public Cookout Competition themed "Your Ingredient to Happy Family Moments". Chef Daniel Koh will be leading the panel of judges and sharing 10 original recipes that are created and inspired by his own family recipes.

Participants of the Cookout Competition stand a chance to win up to $8000 worth of prizes and share the stories behind their family recipes. Finals of the Cookout Competition will be held on 29 May 2013, Wednesday, 10am at ToTT Cooking Studio.

To participate, just form a team of two with one of your family members and send in the following details to knorr@vmsd.com.sg from now to 12th May 2013:

- Participants details, including name, date of birth, NRIC No., contact email and numbers and relationships of team members.
- Name and photo of family recipe dish.
- Story behind the family recipe dish (limited to 100 words)
- The recipe and Knorr product(s) used.
- Cost breakdown of dish (limited to $30)

*Terms and Conditions apply. For more information, please visit Knorr Singapore Facebook Page or email knorr@vmsd.com.sg

Cook For Family

It has been a while since I last cooked as I am caught up with work and blogging. If I am not wrong, the last time I cooked was for the Cook For Family event initiated by Daniel Ang. The dishes below were cooked a couple of weeks back on a particular Sunday evening dinner.

Cold Tofu with Minced Pork

This is one of my girlfriend's favourite dishes. She has cooked this for me once and I thought I would try to make it and cook for her next time. The minced pork was stir fried in dark soy sauce and oyster sauce for taste. I also added some chopped chill to give it some kicks.

Steamed Fish with Green Kiwi

Inspired by Ellena aka Cuisine Paradise, I fell in love in using kiwi to steam fish. Use only green kiwi and not yellow kiwi, also choose one that is not too ripe so that the kiwi will not be too mushy after steaming.

Steamed Fish with Green Kiwi

Simply enjoyed the taste and flavour of the steamed fish using green kiwi. The green kiwi after steaming will have a sour flavour similar to sour (salted) plum commonly used for steaming fish. If you like it to be more sour, you can add a few slices of tomatoes.

Miso Soup

I still have some miso that I bought from Meidi-ya supermarket at Liang Court in my fridge so I decided to make miso soup. I also added in tofu and enokitake (golden mushroom).

Stir Fried Vegetable

Of course we need to have our greens to complete the dinner menu. A really simple stir fried vegetables to complete the 4 course dinner.

I Want to Cook For My Family

The I Want to Cook For My Family Campaign is initiated by Daniel Ang of DanielFoodDiary.com to gather 100 bloggers to cook for their family. Most of us bloggers spent most of our time outside attending events and food tasting session. At times, we are so caught up with our own personal life that we forget about the love ones in our family. The campaign helps to remind us to take a step back to do something and spend time with our family members.

Ingredients
- Kang Kong
- Yifon Botted Tea Tree Mushrooms
- 2 Cloves of Garlic
- Dried Shrimps
- Sambal Paste
- 1 Teaspoon of Knorr HaoChi All-in-1 Seasoning

Direction
1. Pre-heat Happy Call Double Sided Pan for 1-2 minutes.
2. Heat cooking oil in Happy Call Double Side Pan.
3. Add in garlic, dried shrimp and sambal paste. Saute till fragance.
4. Add in Kang Kong and Teatree Mushrooms and stir fried for a minute.
5. Drizzle in the seasoning.
6. Stir Fried for another minute and we are ready to serve.

The first dish I prepared for my family is Stir Fried Sambal Kang Kong with Yifon Teatree Mushrooms. It can be easily prepared for your family. Just need to fried fragrant some garlic, sambal paste and dried shrimp. Next just need to stir fried the Kang Kong and Teatree Mushrooms.

Ingredients
- Mackerel Cutlet
- Salt
- Pepper
- Teriyaki Sauce
- Chopped Red Chilli

Direction
1. Pre-heat Happy Call Double Sided Pan for 1-2 minutes.
2. Heat cooking oil in Happy Call Double Side Pan.
3. Pat dry Mackerel Cutlet before putting into pan.
4. Grill mackerel cutlet until one side is brown and flip over to the other side.
5. Drizzle in Teriyaki sauce and cooked both sides for 1-2 minutes.
6.  Topped with some chopped red chilli to serve

The second dish I cooked for my family was Teriyaki Mackerel Cutlet. It is another very simple dish to prepare. Just need to marinate the mackerel cutlet with salt and pepper. Grilled the cutlet until both side is brown and then drizzled with teriyaki sauce.

Ingredients
- Pork Ribs (7-8 pieces)
- 1.5 Cup of uncooked rice, rinsed
- 2 Cup of water
- 1 tsp of sesame oil (for marinade)
- 2 tsp of light soy sauce (for marinade)
- 1 tsp of dark soy sauce (for marinade)

Direction
1. Wash and blanch pork ribs in boiling water for 1-2 minutes.
2. Marinate pork ribs for 20-30 minutes with 1 tsp of sesame oil, 2 tsp of light soy sauce and 1 tsp of dark soy sauce.
3. Pre-heat Happy Call Double Sided Pan for 1-2 minutes.
4. Add in uncooked rice, water and left over marinade sauce. Close cover and simmer over low heat for about 5 minutes till water almost absorb.
5. Put in marinated pork ribs into pan. Close cover and cook for another 5 minutes till pork ribs are cooked through and done.
6. Drizzle some sesame oil and dark soy sauce over the rice mixture. Close cover and stands the rice for another 5 minutes.
7. Open cover, stir and mix the rice mixture before servicing. Add in more dark soy sauce if you prefer it to be darker and sweeter.

Wrapping up the 3 course meal was the Pork Ribs Claypot Rice. If you own a Happy Call Pan, claypot rice can be easily prepared in the ease of home.

As you can see, cooking a meal for the family does not need to be fancy and can be readily prepared. Greatly appreciated Daniel Ang for initiating the I Want to Cook For My Family Campaign giving me the opportunity to cook and spend some quality time with my family.