Migrated to Wordpress

Hey all,


I've migrated http://kitchenexperiments.net to a Wordpress platform. 


Follow me there for the latest, yummiest updates!




Goodbye, Blogger - you have served me well and I will remember you fondly. It's just me, not you. I need more modification pow-wow now


*MUAH*

The Overnighter Braised Pork Belly

I had 1lb of pork belly in the freezer and I had no idea what to do with it. So I hit up my foodie bestie, Kwok Mun,  and one of his braising suggestions kind of hit a home run. Well, it didn't help that I had Diners, Drive-ins and Dives playing on the TV as well. It was decided that the pork belly will be braised. Overnight. Yep, you heard me alright. I braised my pork belly overnight in my oven for over 8 hours in a slow and nice heat - 240F to be exact (approx. 120 C) - in a fragrant pool of dark liquid made up of similar ingredients to my other braised pork dish. The end result was delicious. Meat falling off the bones scandalously with an oh-so-tender, melt-in-your-mouth goodness.

You will want this recipe.

Chinese New Year: 9 Chinese Recipes Roundup

Happy Chinese New Year to all my readers who celebrate it and happy holidays to those of you in Malaysia. May this year of the Rabbit be a prosperous one by leaps and bounds.

This is my second year celebrating Chinese New Year away from Malaysia. During this festive season, I tend to miss home quite a bit but there is always next year (and I've already had an early family reunion dinner with my parents and brother who came to visit in Dec/January).


I've compiled 9 Malaysian Chinese recipe roundups of dishes for this occasion. Just click on any of the 9 images below and be swept off to its respective recipes page.




Enjoy!


xoxo,
Elaine

Penang Prawn Noodle (Hae Mee/Penang Hokkien Mee)

The first post of 2011. I do apologize for the long absence, it has been such a crazy year-end last year I had no time to properly craft a post but there has been a lot of eating. My parents and brother were here for Christmas and New Years, if you can imagine all the restaurants I wanted them to try on top of all the sight-seeing.

Now that they've gone back home and we're about 10 days to Chinese New Year, I wanted to start the first post of the year with a lot of "Har". So, I made Penang Prawn Noodles or Penang Hokkien Mee. "Har" is prawn/shrimp in Cantonese and auspiciously it sounds like "Ha" of "Hahahaha". I am originally Hokkien and we call prawns/shrimps "Hae", you could say it sounds like "Heh" of "Hehehehehe" too.  And so my point being, eating a lot of "Har/Hae" would induce a lot of happiness, one of the auspicious traits you want in your house during Chinese New Year!

Penang Prawn Noodles is a bowl of happiness in my eyes. Its rich broth is made from simmering pork bones and prawn heads until every ounce of their flavour is extracted. And then a necessary blend of spice paste carefully pounded with dried shrimps, chilies, shallots and garlic, which is then sauteed in peanut oil until fragrant and aromatic is added into the broth. It is an absolute delight to slurped on because the marriage of flavours from the prawns, pork and the slick red oil floating on every bowl dances in your mouth like sex.

The most time consuming part of cooking Penang Prawn Mee is the broth, it's an element that will either make or break the dish so take the time to clean the pork bones and use the freshes prawns you can get. You need A LOT of prawns/shrimps for this dish. Usually, I would used 1500 grams worth of shrimp shells and 700 grams of pork bones for 1.5 liters of broth. If you cannot get as much shrimp shells, you should get a sachet of Tean's Gourmet Prawn Noodle Paste from your Asian grocery store for a bit of help in boosting the flavour of your broth. You may use other brands but I won't be able to guarantee how the flavours will turn out.

Braised Minced Pork with Chinese Five Spice

 A bowl of fragrant deliciousness

This is the ultimate comfort food after a long and hectic day at work. Like everyone else, there are more days than I would like to admit where I was too tired to be bothered to cook. And on these days, I fall back to recipes that are simple, comforting and reminds me of home. This braised minced pork with Chinese five spice powder is easy and so delicious served on rice or even on noodles.

How easy can this recipe be?

Le Boucan - A Review

We headed to Montreal's Griffintown for BBQ at Le Boucan on Friday night, all 11 of us including one vegetarian. Most of us arrived 15 minutes early for our 8pm reservations, but we had to wait 25 minutes for our table because the establishment only sits, at most, 35 people now that their terrace is closed. All 11 of us waited outside, patiently, mingling with each other while our tables got set up. The temperature that night was a stiff reminder of the cold wintry days to come. BRrrr!

At exactly 8.10pm we headed in and were seated with extremely loud music playing in the background. It was quite annoying but the hint of smokiness wafting in the air reaffirms that this was not a dive bar but a smokehouse. Loud music aside, Le Boucan's decor was nice and casual, it's feels like a place you want to chill and have a good mug of beer while enjoying some nicely smoked ribs. So, what's my verdict on the food? Let's just say that I didn't exactly go into Le Boucan and expect gourmet style meals but I did expect to have properly seasoned food at the very least.

A Dreamy Lemon Cream Cake

When life throw you lemons, you make lemon cream cake with them.




This is the most divine cake I have ever had. It is creamy, lemony and perfectly satisfying. It tastes like lemon cheesecake except it is without cheese and it is light and fluffy like clouds in the sky on a blue summer sky. A bite of this cake makes you feel like you're skipping barefooted through a field of flowers with lemon trees all around you...in a dreamy kind of way.

And the best part? I invented this recipe...

Breakfast: Omelette and Greens with Preserved Figs

This is what happens when I have a long weekend.



I have time for proper breakfast.

Usually I have a mug of coffee with a cereal bar or a fruit but this morning, it's eggs and a bit of salad. Wow. ;)

As smug as I might sound, this omelette is not harder or more time consuming than say making my coffee. It just makes more dishes to wash up but that's what the dishwasher is for! The time it takes for my water to heat up, my omelette can be cooking in the pan. This omelette is dressed up with chives, 1 small dollop of cream cheese, slices of tomatoes and pieces of black oily olives. Then it's topped with some mixed salad greens, a drizzle of fig molasses*, preserved figs* and olive oil.

Now, isn't that easy?