Foodarrific» Asian

Sweet sour yumminess

Chili Queen — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 13:14:45 +0000

We really have a thing for Vietnamese food. We inadvertently find ourselves drawn to its yumminess. This set meal of sweet sour pork is our current lunch favorite, if we do get to eat out on a weekday which isn’t very often.

Apparently we’re not the only ones who love this set meal. The servers practically have to wheel them out by the medical cartload. What’s not to love, the fried wontons are yums too.

Lunch @ Mizu

Chili Queen — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 15:54:14 +0000

We heard that Mizu has a weekend Japanese lunch buffet and decided to give it a try. The place is cozy (read: small) with barely 3 spreads of food. I guess we’re used to seeing extensive buffet spreads at other restaurants. We started out with these fresh oysters, sushi and salmon sashimi (my favorite).

As we soon learnt, what’s not on the spread, you have to order from a buffet list and it will then be served to you. I’m not sure that’s how a buffet would work in the real sense of the word. Anyhow we were checking off the little boxes for tempura and teppanyaki fare.

The shrimp wasn’t fresh so we had to leave it.

The cawan mushi was on the order list and apparently tasted quite good.

The ice cream was good but as you can see, the single scoop is just one mouthful for the guys. We’re pretty sure we ordered more than this but I don’t think they all arrived.

For such a limited selection, it did not come cheap. With the buffet list, it’s all too easy to lose track of what you’ve ordered especially if you go in a large group, and it’s even easier to lose track of the orders that never arrived. We all agreed we got less than we ordered. So I guess it’s a case of “you lose”.

Considering that the restaurant was less than half full, service should’ve been much better. Instead we were constantly having to raise our hands for green tea refills, extra napkins and to ask what happened to our orders. We definitely prefer the buffets where everything is laid out and we get to help ourselves.

Tea lover

Chili Queen — Wed, 18 May 2011 09:39:49 +0000

I enjoy me a good cup of green tea every now and then. When I’m eating out at a Japanese restaurant, green tea is, of course, the default drink. At home, I sometimes brew a pot so my kids can have a few sips though they aren’t really fond of it.

Green tea is supposedly very good for you. It works as a detox and antioxidant. It lowers your cholesterol level, burns fat and fighting off major diseases. It promises countless other health benefits as well, too many to name. Who knows, it may even work as a Hormone replacement therapy but don’t quote me on that.

I love all types of tea and drink them for their taste. If they come with health benefits, then that’s definitely a bonus, isn’t it?

Vegetarian tempura and miso soup

Chili Queen — Wed, 04 May 2011 12:43:41 +0000

Tempura is a hot favorite in our household and even more so now that I’ve started making it myself for our vegetarian days. With some miso soup to go with my yasai tempura (vegetable tempura), we’ve got an entire Japanese meal at home.

I’ve got my wasabi (green mustard), soy sauce and instant miso soup sachets in 3 flavors – tofu, seaweed and green onion.

The instant miso soup is so easy that I just need to add hot water and all those dried ingredients in the sachet instantly popped to life! The thing I love most is that it’s sodium-reduced too!

The tempura batter is easily whipped up in a large bowl with 1 cup flour, half cup cornflour, pinch of salt and pepper and icy cold water. I’m not one to measure ingredients to a T but these are just to give you an idea.

Mix everything together to a consistency thick enough to coat the veggies. I used sweet potatoes and broccoli here but you can use shrimp and any number of your favorite veggies. Deep fry till golden brown.

The dip is just some wasabi in a small dish with a drizzle of soy sauce stirred together. But be warned, will instantly send a powerful sting right up your nose. If you can get someone to capture that fiery moment on a digital camera casio, it will be priceless (just kidding ).

And there you have it, yasai tempura and miso soup for the whole family without forking out the big bucks.

Dinner at Sushi Zen

Chili Queen — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 15:55:36 +0000

It’s Friday and it’s time to close my kitchen. As usual, we were trying to decide where to eat. Decisions, decisions. Lately Japanese has been the unanimous answer.

Whenever we do Japanese, we always order tempura. It was our first time at Sushi Zen in Midvalley. This is the ebi tempura (shrimp tempura) and yasai tempura (vegetable tempura) we had at Sushi Zen in Midvalley. I love the big shiitake mushroom tempura but the one made with enoki was pretty difficult to eat because of the long strands of enoki.

The unagi (eel) over rice was pretty good. When my youngest daughter is into her unagi, don’t bother asking her what does creatine do?, she’d be too busy savoring her favorite unagi.

Stirfried broccoli and carrots

Chili Queen — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 03:55:33 +0000

This is one of the dishes that I prepared for my son and stored in the fridge to be eaten later. It’s so easy and so healthy you’ve just got to try it.

I used:

2 heads of broccoli, cut into large florets
0.5 bag of baby carrots
1 clove garlic, finely diced
1 small slice of salmon
mushroom/oyster sauce
cooking oil
salt and pepper to taste

First, I heated up some oil in a non-stick pan on medium to low heat.

Place the slice of salmon, lightly salted and peppered, in the pan and let it fry slowly first on one side, then flip over and allow to fry until cooked through and both sides are lightly brown. This should take roughly 10-12 minutes.

Remove the salmon to a plate. Using a fork, break up the salmon into flakes and remove the bones. Leave aside.

Add a bit more oil in the pan on medium heat and lightly fry the garlic for a 2-3 minutes till fragrant. Be careful not to burn the garlic or it will taste bitter.

Throw in the carrots and add a splash of water and leave it for about 5 minutes to soften up.

Add the broccoli, a dash of mushroom/oyster sauce and a sprinkle of pepper. Stir-fry for approximately 5-7 minutes till the broccoli is cooked. Watch closely to ensure broccoli is not overcooked or it will turn yellow.

Serve on a plate (or in my case, I placed in a Rubbermaid container for refrigerating) and top with the salmon flakes.

And that’s all there really is to it. It’s really tasty and goes well with pasta, noodles or rice.

My son had some fruits left over from the fresh fruit baskets we got for Christmas and he ate those for dessert.

Steamed yam cake

Chili Queen — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:27:53 +0000

Once in a while, my aunt would whip up our favorite steamed yam cake for us if we beg hard enough. I haven’t got a clue how it’s made. I really should learn the recipe from her one of these days since my kids love it so much and the ones sold outside are somewhat watered down and not as yammy.

This picture of this steamed yam cake was taken before she sprinkled the chopped spring onions on top. So it looks rather bland with only chopped peanuts and fried shallots. But trust me, once you drizzle on the accompanying chilly and brown sauces, it tastes like heaven!

Steamed yam cake is a great one-dish meal usually served at lunch. It’s usually eaten slightly warm or at room temperature. I’ve never tried to subject it to the coolness of refrigerator filters but I doubt it would taste good cold.

Fascinated by Chinese herbs

Chili Queen — Sun, 30 May 2010 23:46:28 +0000

As a kid following my grandmother to the Chinese medicine hall, I used to be fascinated by the endless rows of little square drawers on the wall behind the men who patiently listen to each customer’s problem and then proceed to put together a combination of Chinese herbs on a sheet of brown wrapping paper.

I used to wonder how the men can remember which herbs are in which drawer. I mean, there’s a whole wall of drawers and they’re not transparent and have no names written on them. Amazing.

Anyhow I’m no expert at Chinese medicine but I know there are some which have a cooling effect while doubling as natural eczema treatment. I’ve often heard mothers asking the man to put together something for them to boil at home. Interesting .

Lunch @ the Little Dimsum Place

Chili Queen — Sun, 30 May 2010 06:40:36 +0000

On a whim, we decided to give the Little Dimsum Place in SS2 a try. This is our first time there. The restaurant is nice and clean, not too busy when we were there and the dimsum (little delicacies from the heart, in Chinese) is pretty good though some items were a little too salty for me.

We ordered ha gao (steamed shrimp dumplings), siew mai (steamed pork dumplings with roe), char siew pao (barbecued pork buns), woo kok (fried yam dumplings), lor mai kai (chicken in glutinous rice), ha lok (shrimp rolls with mayo), pork and century egg porridge, fried carrot cake, and a pot of hot Chinese tea.

That’s quite a lot of food and I’m sure some of us are going to need ab workouts afterwards. Have you tried the food there? What do you think?

lunch @ Nyonya Colors

Chili Queen — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 07:46:59 +0000

Although there’s a whole spread of eateries at the Midvalley walkway to the Gardens, there’s only one or two restaurants that we’re tried that appeal to us. One of them is Nyonya Colors which serves fairly decent nasi lemak (or coconut rice with condiments) but we’ve never tried their nyonya kuih (or cakes). There are certain prices I won’t just pay for certain food, period, especially if I know how easy and cheap they can be made at home.

This Nasi Lemak Pandan with Chicken Rendang is quite a decent portion of rice (the greenish color comes from the screwpine leaves used), fried anchovies and peanuts, half a hard-boiled egg, sliced cucumber and chicken rendang (dried curry sauce).

Another one of our favorites is Nasi Kunyit with Chicken Curry. The nasi kunyit, or turmeric rice, shaped like giant gold coins, may not look like a lot but eaten with the thick, coconuty chicken curry, this glutinous rice is very filling.

And if I’m not very hungry, I’ll order this basic, no-frills nasi lemak in a small portion that I can finish in a few scoops.