Daily Archives: January 8, 2018

5pax Dinner for KH & LL, our long-time Friends on 20Dec2017

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5pax dinner dishes

we have a friend couple KH & LL who helped us a lot when we were younger, long time friend since 1990.

recently we connected up again, and they came by for a quiet dinner, just 4 of us & my son joined in dinner so 5pax.

i made the simple & nice dishes – claypot rice, tofu prawns, steamed minced pork, wine chicken & HK steamed red garoupa & a fried vegetable.

claypot chicken rice

claypot chicken rice was the usual very flavourful, well smoked, very tender chicken, flavourful pork & liver sausages from hong kong…a very delicious claypot rice dish.

claypot chicken rice

my friends really enjoyed this claypot rice.

i made my usual steamed minced pork with light soy sauce.

this evening though, my light soy sauce was not the best grade. it was darker, and flavour made a difference.

anyway still a smooth, very tasty dish. just that a top grade light soy sauce would have made quite a big difference in flavour.

my tofu prawns had very tasty stock, nicely infused tofu & succulent prawns.

i stirred in the egg a bit early. so the look was less attractive w/o the drawn out egg after reheating when friends arrived for dinner. have to do this when just about to serve the dish…

tofu prawns

otherwise, it was still a very tasty dish.

i made the usual wine chicken – recipe here – which everyone liked.

chicken very tender & tasty & stock was marvellous.

i also had a hk steamed red garoupa. didn’t take phot as it was served later during the dinner.

had really great evening with our friends, sharing & memories. will do this again soon. ^^

c.h.e.f andy

3pax Family Dinner = Experimental Dishes Tapas & Fiduea on 10Dec2017

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tapas + fiduea

i experimented some tapas dishes & a fiduea this evening on 10.12.2017. ^^

what i prepared for 3pax family dinner –

  • chorizo prawns
  • ika sugatayaki (jap fusion)
  • seafood fiduea

i made my own fiduea😜cannot find in cold storage..so just cut up angelhair 😂

chorizo prawns very flavourful dish…

i had something similar recently at –

  1. gambas al pil pil at sabio on 5.11.2017 – a prawn in alio olio dish
  2. chorizo prawn liguine at porta on 8.11.2017

enuf of inspirations to do my own..lol! 🙂

i bought an expensive spicy chorizo from cold storage, like S$18 for 300g, anyway can cook many times so ok la…

& i experimented chorizo prawns first time on 9.11.2017 – recipe here! 

so this evening i just repeated that..very tasty, plump, succulent prawns, with excellent chorizo & alio olio flavours..

ika sugatayaki 

& this evening i did my most successful ika sugatayaki..

previously i used the oven. but there is the great difficulty of getting a dry enough squid w/o overcooking it. very difficult. 

ika sugatayaki 

so i decided to switch to flaming with a torch.

a flaming not enuf to cook the sotong, i steamed the sotong first about 70% cooked, then put in the fridge & dried with kitchen towels.

when about to cook, i added sea salt, 1 tbsp olive oil, then drizzle honey (or agave nectar) on the squid, on a metal tray. then i flamed it.

ika sugatayaki 

it was a delightful, delicious dish. superb chow tar (BBQ) flavours, just the right texture, tender & tasty…

seafood fiduea

& my very first experiment with my own “fiduea” concoction a big success haha! by my own standard only la!

so the key of any pasta is the stock. i had very intense tasty chicken stock. can also add prawn stock if have.

as angelhair cooks in 2 mins & the small squid pieces cooked quickly & so would the prawns, it is tricky getting the quite amount of stock so that it would infuse the angelhair while reducing, and all the angelgair, squid & prawns would be cooked right.

seafood fiduea 

i first have the stock ready – browned one whole bulb of garlic cloves, added chilli padi, sweet basil, then off fire, and added 1 cup chicken stock, & 1/4 cup white wine, and reduced by 1/2 i think, all agaklogy..then i added the prawns (seasoned with fish sauce & white pepper) & cooked like 70%, and removed.

when cooking the dish, i added the cut angelhair first & covered for a minute, then added the squid & stirred thoroughly & covered for another minute.

anyway all by looking & tasting. when pasta about ready, added some butter & the prawns, stirred & covered for 1/2min.

seafood fiduea 

the dish turned out superbly this evening.

& i have repeated it for couple dinners with friends with different amount of pasta & they worked out quite well.

seafood fiduea 

angelhair was al dente, so while looked like bee hoon texture was different from the softer, clumpier, stick-together beehoon.

the squid & prawns were dne just right so bouncy & plump and tasty.

a very good dish considering that it was make-shift using angelhair & not the real fiduea.

c.h.e.f andy