Beef noodle soup

It tastes fresh and light, would be great as a summer dish.

Ingredients:
1 sirloin steak
50ml rice wine
dash Soy sauce
juice of 1 lime
1.5L chicken stock
1 packet rice vermicelli noodles
4 bird's eye chillies
bunch of coriander, chopped
Fish Sauce, to taste

Method:
Marinate the steak for 2 hours in the rice wine, soy and half the lime juice. Set aside.
Place the stock in a saucepan and reduce by a third.
Cook the noodles according to the package instructions, then cool under cold water and set aside.
Chop the chillies and put into a small bowl of fish sauce.
In a very hot pan, sear the steak for a minute on each side. Remove from the pan and let it rest, then cut it into thin slices (it should be very rare, as it will cook a little more when put in the hot soup).
Reheat the stock if necessary, then ladle into a bowl, add the noodles, the remaining lime juice, a big dash of fish sauce and add the chilli/fish sauce mixture to taste. Top with fresh coriander and the rare slices of beef.

Easy tempura

This tempura is quick and easy. It's great when you have so many other dishes to be prepared.

Ingredients:
Flour
Egg
Very cold sparkling water
(ice cubes = optional)
Salt and Pepper

Prawn/vegetables

Method:
Put the flour into a bowl, beat in the egg. Pour the water (and ice cube) and mix. The batter should have the consistency of single cream.
Do not over mix the batter.

Dip the prawns/vegetables in the batter and fry them in hot oil.

Serve with Japanese soy sauce and wasabi.

Inari Sushi

Another kind of sushi. It's delicious, healthy and suitable for vegetarian. Very good for pack lunch too.

Ingredients:

8 fried bean curd pouches (abura-age)
1 tsp toasted black sesame seeds (I used white ones)
130g Lebanese cucumber, halved seeded, diced finely (I used 1 grated carrot)
1 ½ cups prepared sushi rice
8 strips seasoned gourd/kampyo (I didn’t use it)

Method:
Carefully cut open pouches on one side.

Reserve a few of the sesame seeds for garnish, fold remaining seeds and cucumber/carrot through rice.

Fill the pouch with the rice mixture. Be careful not to overfill or tear pouch.

If you use gourd:

Fold one side of pouch down over rice, fold the other side over the first and turn the pouch over so the join is underneath.

Tie a strip of gourd around pouch with loose knot on top. Garnish with a little red pickled ginger and reserved sesame seeds.

Repeat with remaining ingredients.

Risoles

Extracted from Wikipedia:

A rissole (from Latin russeolus, meaning reddish, via French in which "rissoler" means "to [make] redden") is a small croquette, enclosed in pastry or rolled in breadcrumbs, usually baked or deep fried. It is filled with sweet or savory ingredients, most often minced meat or fish, and is served as an Entrée, dessert or side dish.

In Indonesia we call them RISOLES and use pancakes/crepes for the 'skin' and fill with ragout. That is the common one that you can buy in shops.
Usually served with mustard sauce and bird chillis (small chilli).

Ingredients:
For pancakes/crepes:
200g Flour
600ml Milk
3 Eggs
Salt
75g Melted butter

Extra egg(s) and bread crumbs

For filling:
200g Minced meat
150g Vegetables (I used grated carrots and frozen peas)
1 Onion, chopped finely
2 cloves of Garlic, crushed and chopped finely
2 tbsp Butter
3 tbsp Flour mixed with 1 cup of milk
1 Stock cube

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour and the eggs. Gradually add in the milk, stirring to combine. Add the salt and butter; beat until smooth.
Heat a lightly oiled frying pan (23cm diameter) over medium high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto the frying pan, using approximately 1/4 cup for each crepe. Tilt the pan with a circular motion so that the batter coats the surface evenly.
Cook the crepe for about 2 minutes, until the edges turn brown. Loosen with a spatula, turn and cook the other side. Set aside.

For the ragout:
Heat a little oil in a pan then fry the onion until soft then add the garlic and fry for a little while more.
Put in the minced meat, fry until it changes colour.
Add the vegetables, stir for awhile.
Pour in the flour and milk mixture, stir until it thickens.

Heat some oil in a pan for deep frying.

Put some of the filling in the centre of one of the crepes.
Fold in both sides, and then fold in the top and bottom to make a rectangular parcel.
Next roll it in beaten egg until all covered, then roll it on the breadcrumbs until it's well coated.
Repeat until you have used up all of the crepes and filling.
Deep fry the risoles until they are brown all over.
Ready to serve.

Note: You can bake the risoles in the oven instead of deep frying, if you want to.

Ronde - Peanut filled sticky rice dumplings with ginger sauce

It's a Javanese dessert made out of sticky rice flour and filled with coarse ground peanuts.
Usually it's served warm with lots of other things thrown in beside the dumplings, like peanuts, some kind of jelly, kolang-kaling or other thing.




Kolang-kaling (Arenga palm fruits) that have been coloured.


It's different from one place to another, but one thing would be the same, they are always colourful. Most common colours would be green and pink.
Because of the ginger and how it is served, it will make you feel warm. This dessert is very popular in colder areas of Java but you can also find it in stalls or some restaurants too. So it will be great as a winter dessert.
















The original name is WEDANG RONDE

Ingredients:
For dumplings:
150 g sticky rice flour
1 tsp salt
130 ml water
food colouring of your choice

Filling:
100 g peanuts
75 g sugar
25 g sesame seeds
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbsp warm water

Ginger sauce:
1 l water
100g ginger (or more if you like it spicier/hotter), sliced
2 lemon grass, smashed
2 pandanus leaves (I use 1 tsp pandan extract)
150g - 200g sugar

Put all the filling ingredients in a food processor and process until it's smooth enough (but coarser than peanut butter). Make small balls and set aside:














Mix all the dumpling ingredients in a bowl and knead until it's mixed well and smooth.
Take one of the peanut filling, cover it with the dumpling dough. Keep making them until both the dough and the filling have gone:


















Boil some water in a pot and cook the dumplings in stages until all float and cooked. Put the aside:















Cook all the sauce ingredients in a different pot until it's boiled, simmer for 10 minutes until the sauce is very fragrant.


Assemble:
Put some of the dumplings and some dry roast peanuts into a bowl, pour the ginger sauce over while it's still hot.
Serve immediately.


Peeling the skin off dry roast peanuts.

Poffertjes - Dutch pancake balls

They're fluffier than American pancakes because of the yeast. Originally they were cooked in a special pan which makes them turn out like balls. They're served with lots of icing/powdered sugar.












POFFERTJES

Ingredients:
200 g plain flour
7g (1 pack) yeast
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
2 eggs, beaten lightly
500ml (warm) milk
25 g melted butter

Put the flour in a bowl with the yeast.
Slowly pour the milk in, whisking as you pour.
Add the lightly beaten eggs, mix well.
Cover with kitchen towel or cling film for 30 minutes to 45minutes in a warm place.
Mix in the melted butter while you're heating up the pan.
Cook the batter until it's brown then flip it over to cook the other side.
Serve with lots of icing sugar

Fish Satay

We went to Prague in Czech Republic last weekend. It seems Czechs eat lots of meat because their dishes mostly are meat dishes. I love meat but I really missed fish. So yesterday I cooked this Fish Satay for our dinner, served with boiled rice and spinach clear soup as the accompaniment (my previous post).

















FISH SATAY (Sate Lilit)

Ingredients:
300g white fish, chopped
300g prawn
500g grated coconut
5 lime leaves, shredded
1 tbsp grated palm sugar
black pepper & salt

For the paste:
1 big red chilli (or more if you want)
1 tbsp grated palm sugar
2 cloves of garlic
12cm turmeric
2.5cm lesser galangal
2 lemon grass (the white part)
9cm galangal
10 candle nuts

Mix all the ingredients and spice paste into a food processor. Process it until all mix really well and form a big clump.
Take a handful of the fish mixture and stick it on a skewer. Flat it a little bit.
Finish all the fish mixture.
Grill them on a griddle / bbq / in the oven until all brown and cooked.

Serve with lemon wedges.


This satay is really good, especially if you want to give lots of flavour to rather bland fish like cod.