Foodarrific

Our school day lunches have been rather run-of-the-mill of late due to our hectic schedule. So I try to spice things up during the weekends and school breaks. This time I decided to surprise my daughters with Thai green curry for lunch.

This is a dish I can only prepare when I have ample time because it requires quite a lot of ingredients and preparation. Glad I got to use fresh basil from my own garden and lemongrass from my neighbor’s garden .

For the curry paste, I blended these ingredients into a paste:

• 5 large green chillies, or jalapeno, seeded and chopped
• 1 knob ginger
• 6 cloves garlic
• 4-5 medium sticks of lemongrass, chopped
• zest from 1 lime, grated
• 2 medium onions, diced
• 1 bunch cilantro, chopped
• ½ cup fish sauce
• 1 Tsp sugar

The other ingredients are:

• 2 boneless chicken thighs, cut in 1” pieces
• 2 cups thickened coconut milk
• 1 zucchini, diced
• 1 egg plant, diced
• 6-8 long beans, diced
• 1 bunch basil
• 1 cup chicken stock, or water
• a few drizzles of soy sauce
• 1 Tsp lime juice
• 3 Tsp cooking oil

First I heat up the pot with cooking oil to fry half the green curry paste on medium heat for about 5 minutes till fragrant. Then I add the coconut milk and chicken stock followed by the long beans since they take the longest to soften.

I let it simmer for about 5 minutes before adding the remaining green curry paste and coconut milk, followed by zucchini, eggplant, chicken, soy sauce, lime juice and basil, then for another 5-7 minutes on medium to low heat till the veggies are softened.

As usual, I add just enough salt to taste. Remember the fish sauce and chicken stock are salty in themselves, and you don’t want to end up with a sodium overdose.

Thai green curry is the best thing ever eaten over rice. I’m am not a big rice fan though so I prefer mine over noodles. You can see from the first photo that my curry is not too thick so there’s more than enough sauce to make a noodle soup.

If you’re craving a wonderfully exotic curry, there’s no need to wait till the next time you visit a Thai restaurant or go on vacation at a hotel, try cooking this at home instead. It’s not hard but it needs quite a bit of prep time .

Filed under: AsianCurryOne-dish MealsPoultryRecipesRice & NoodlesSpicyVegetables by chili queen - No Comments →

The weather’s been rainy with cool mornings and heavy downpours in the evenings which would’ve been perfect for checking out the warehouse sale my girl friend’s been dying to get to.

Except she’s down with the flu so there goes our brilliant plan to go shopping for wholesale handbags. So I stayed home and decided to cook tomyam rice noodle soup instead, which incidentally makes a warming meal for cool weather days.

I use tom yam flavored cubes for the soup base. I don’t stick to any particular brand of cubes, sometimes I use Maggi, sometimes Knorr, and you can pretty much use whatever brand you can find. There’s also the tomyam paste that comes in a jar but I didn’t quite like the taste of the ones I tried.

So I tend to stick with the flavored cubes which come in packs of 6. I typically use 3-4 cubes into a saucepan of boiling water to form the soup base depending on how strong a flavor I want.

To sweeten the soup, I add some chicken carcasses (to be removed later), sliced celery and carrots, fresh black mushrooms, fresh enoki mushrooms, fishballs and pork balls. Tomyam goes well with other ingredients like chicken or fish slices, squid or shrimp and whatever vegetables you fancy so go ahead and be creative.

Bring everything to a boil on medium to high heat. It’s important to taste the soup before serving. Depending on which brand and how many cubes I use, the soup may end up too sharp. If that’s the case, I just add a bit of sugar to take the edge off the tomyam. If you’re a chilli freak like me, you can also add fresh chopped chillies to really spice things up !

In another saucepan, I boil up enough water to soak the rice noodles in. When the noodles are softened, drain and scoop into individual bowls. Ladle tomyam soup over the noodles and serve hot. Sometimes I make a big pot of tomyam soup, enough for lunch and dinner and we eat this for a whole day.

Filed under: AsianOne-dish MealsRecipesRice & NoodlesSeafoodSoupsSpicyVegetables by chili queen - 2 Comments →

I’m not really in the habit of buying instant noodles. They’re more of a contingency item that I have around for desperate times. My kids don’t like them (thank goodness!).

While accompanying my girl friend to look for wii accessories, we ended up having breakfast and doing groceries. That’s when I spotted these so-called premium instant noodles. I usually buy el-cheapo instant noodles because, well, aren’t instant noodles supposed to be cheap and quick?

This Four Seas Seaweed Hot and Spicy Instant Noodles are premium so they cost double what I normally pay. Taking expensive to mean a bigger pack of noodles with better taste, I went for it.

I added some cabbage leaves to the noodles. Looks good, doesn’t it? I normally don’t add other ingredients except for veggies maybe. To me, instant noodles are supposed to be quick and easy and fuss-free. I know many folks love to add eggs, meat or seafood though.

Well, obviously premium isn’t for me, I couldn’t even get through this bowl of noodles. The seaweeds are healthy, no doubt but the amount of sodium and MSG in it far outweighs any goodness it might’ve contained. I’ll stick with el-cheapo next time .

Filed under: AsianOne-dish MealsQuick & Easy CookingRice & NoodlesSpicyWestern by chili queen - No Comments →

During the holidays, we chanced upon a spanking new restaurant on the first floor of The Curve courtyard where all the restaurants are located.

Its name, Fireman, promises fiery food and what luck, they were having a promo at the time. The place was empty except for us but since there was a large screen TV playing a Westlife concert, we were quite happy to park ourselves there for lunch.

They serve predominantly Thai food at reasonable prices. This is the Phad Thai, or the Thai style of fried flat rice noodles with bean sprouts and peanuts with a squeeze of lime.

I have no complaints about the taste except that it’s over-salty. Luckily for rm9.90, we get the noodles plus free unlimited refills of green tea so that’s a redeeming factor.

For the same price, we also get green tea with this Thai style Fried Fice with Fried Chicken Drummets and salted egg. The fried chicken is good but the rice tastes wierd to me.

We enjoyed the Westlife video but it was unnerving being surrounded by their numerous staff. Since we were the only table there, I guess they had nothing else to do but watch us eat. As for the food, there was nothing very fiery about it.

Filed under: $ave moneyAsianReviewsRice & NoodlesSpicy by chili queen - No Comments →

Okay, if you’ve been drooling in your sleep about the McDonald’s Prosperity Burger you had last Chinese New Year, well, it’s ba-ack!

With a vengence, I might add!

The girls and I innocently stepped into McD’s this afternoon and woot, there’s the Beef Prosperity Burger, and then there’s the Double Beef Prosperity Burger for doubly good luck in riding out this economic crisis.

To be on the safe side, go for that Double Beef Prosperity Burger for double the pimples wealth, double the zits money, double the acne good fortune .

Yes, we’re officially one month (give or take) away from Chinese New Year so if you start eating ‘em prosperity burgers now, you’ll be looking nice and fat prosperous by Chinese New Year!

Okay and you can stop wondering now. McDonald’s isn’t paying me in Prosperity Burgers to write this post, okay?

Filed under: Fast FoodFusionReviewsSpicy by chili queen - 3 Comments →