Braised Chicken with Bittergourd

This is a way overdue dish that I found still stuck in my draft.  If you have been keeping up with my blog, you will know that I am a lazy wife and cook who churn up only simple, fast and easy dishes. No need for much of cooking skills, and there you are, one pot dishes to get you over 1 meal.

Hubby and I love this braised chicken with bittergourd and we could just eat it with rice alone! Feel free to use prime pork ribs in place of the chicken meat and it will taste equally yummy too.

I over-braised it quite abit and got soft bittergourd, where they were not that bitter anymore and suits Hubby's taste.  Gonna cook this again!

Now, it is coming to the end of my 4 days' long weekend break and tomorrow is back to work tomorrow!!! Monday blues will soon set in *sob* Good luck to all who are like me hehehe!

Braised Chicken with Bittergourd
Recipe by Patsie Cheong from One Day One Dish 365 Selected Home-Cooked Recipes

Ingredients A
600g chicken meat ( I used thigh meat)
1 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp corn flour

Ingredients B
2 tsp bean paste
2 tsp sugar
1 tbsp minced garlic

Ingredients C
400g bittergourd
60g carrot ( I used 1 whole carrot)
2 stalks spring onion  (chopped)
some windmill flour solution (I left this out)

Seasonings
2 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp Huadiao wine (chinese cooking wine)
1 tsp dark soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
1 1/2 cup water

1. Cut chicken meat into small pieces and marinate with light soy sauce and corn flour.
2. Remove seeds from bittergourd and cut it into sections. Peel and slice carrrot and set aside.
3. Heat up 2 tbsp of oil and stirfry Ingredients B till fragrant.

4. Add in marinated chicken and Ingredients C, and stirfry till well combined. Pour in Seasonings and simmer till the meat becomes tender and cooked.

5. Stir in flour solution and serve. (I left this out)

Tips: Chicken can be substituted with roast pork as well..

Carrot & Tomato Porridge 红萝卜,番茄,干贝干耗粥

I have been cooking quite abit of congee recently. We just wanted something easy to cook and easy on the tummies. No fuss. And congee was the easiest of all.

I made some carrot & tomato porridge this time. I still remember how I always fight for some of the carrot tomato porridge my mum used to cook for my little brother then. It was really yummy. And healthy!

Like always I used the simplest ingredients I could get out of my fridge. I never like stuffing my fridge with lots of ingredients because I do not cook daily and by keeping too much meat and vegetables in the fridge, I am not getting the freshest deal when I finally get to cook them. I tend to plan my dishes to cook for weekend and then go marketing on the weekend morning after our breakfast.

So here I present you my babyish like porridge.

Carrot & Tomato Porridge
Serves 2 to 3

2 tomatoes, washed and remove the top stalk portion

1 medium sized carrot, deskinned and shredded

2 dried oysters, washed and rinsed

Dried scallops (I used 4 pcs of big dried Hokkaido scallops and a handful of small dried scallops since I had them) - I love lots of scallops in my porridge

Half a bowl of peanuts (Soaked and remove skins, rinsed, drained)

4 tbsp of minced pork meat, seasoned with 1 tbsp light soy sauce, a dash of pepper, half tsp of cornflour and 1/2 tsp sesame oil

1 rice cup of rice

Water (I did not measure exactly the amount of water but I just filled my 5-litre thermal pot to almost half filled and I used about 2 rice cup of water since I am adding 2 tomatoes and they produce water when cooked and softened)

To taste, optional

A dash of pepper

Light soy sauce, if preferred

1. I soaked the rice and washed dried scallops in water overnight on my stove top, covered. Kept the rest of the ingredients in the fridge. 

2. When ready to cook the porridge that morning, bring out deshelled peanuts, rinsed dried oysters, shredded carrot and tomatoes and add into thermal pot. Add about 1 tsp of cooking oil and 1 tsp of salt into thermal cooker. Stir to mix well the oil and salt with the rice and ingredients. Turn on fire to high and let it come to boil.

3. When the rice mixture comes to a boil, I placed a wooden chopstick at side of pot so that my thermal pot lid can rest on the wooden chopstick, allowing an opening enough for porridge to boil and yet not foam and overflow. Turn down heat to medium high for further 20 to 30min, if you have more time on hand.

4. Remove wooden chopstick and cover pot lid well, turn off heat and put thermal pot into thermal pot holder. It will keep cooking while inside the holder and be kept warm.

5. When back home after work at about 6.30pm, bring thermal pot of porridge to boil on high heat, mash softened tomatoes with the back of the ladles and stir to mix it into the congee. If too sticky, add some boiling water.

6. Form small minced pork meat balls with a teaspoon and drop them gently into the boiling porridge. Let it cook till done.

7. Do a taste test for the porridge, add salt to taste. Serve immediately.

Century Egg, Minced Pork, Peanut & Dried Scallop Congee 皮蛋猪肉花生干贝粥

I have got a wonderful thermal cooker that does wonders. I made yummy soups with them. I recently learnt that I could make delish congee with these thermal cookers too. Tried congee with it for a first time and I kinda got it.

I grabbed whatever ingredients I had in my fridge and did as best as I could.

They were simple ingredients like dried scallops, peanuts, minced pork meat and century eggs. That's it. Mum told me before that adding a few drops of cooking oil and a tsp of salt into the rice and water pot prevents the porridge from sticking to bottom of pot and this would yield a pot of silky creamy congee. Armed with this simple knowledge I tried my hand at cooking congee. 

Century Egg, Minced Pork, Peanut & Dried Scallop Congee
Serves 2 to 3

Dried scallops (I used 4 pcs of big dried Hokkaido scallops and a handful of small dried scallops since I had them) - I love lots of scallops in my congee

Half a bowl of peanuts (Soaked and remove skins, rinsed, drained)

4 tbsp of minced pork meat, seasoned with 1 tbsp light soy sauce, a dash of pepper, half tsp of cornflour and 1/2 tsp sesame oil

2 century eggs, deshelled and cut into small cubes

1 rice cup of rice

Water (I did not measure exactly the amount of water but I just filled my 5-litre thermal pot to almost half filled)

Garnishings, optional

Fried onions

Spring onions

A dash of pepper

Ginger slices

Light soy sauce, if preferred

1. I soaked the rice and washed dried scallops in water overnight on my stove top, covered. Kept the rest of the ingredients in the fridge. Century egg to deshell and cut into bits at that moment before adding into congee.

2. When ready to cook the congee that morning, bring out deshelled peanuts and add into thermal pot. Add about 1 tsp of cooking oil and 1 tsp of salt into thermal cooker. Stir to mix well the oil and salt with the peanuts, soaked rice and dried scallops. Turn on fire to high and let it come to boil.

3. When the rice mixture comes to a boil, I placed a wooden chopstick at side of pot so that my thermal pot lid can rest on the wooden chopstick, allowing an opening enough for congee to boil and yet not foam and overflow. Turn down heat to medium high for further 20 to 30min, if you have more time on hand.

4. Remove wooden chopstick and cover pot lid well, turn off heat and put thermal pot into thermal pot holder. It will keep cooking while inside the holder and be kept warm.

5. When back home after work at about 6.30pm, bring thermal pot of congee to boil on high heat, stir abit using a ladle for a thick mixture of congee should have been formed right now after almost a day of cooking. Add some boiling water if too dry and sticky.

6. Form small minced pork meat balls with a teaspoon and drop them gently into the boiling congee. Let it cook till done.

7. Meanwhile prepare century egg bits and leave it in the bowls you will be serving the congee in.

8. Do a taste test for the congee, add salt to taste. Scoop congee over century egg bits and garnish. Serve immediately. (If you like to add an egg, crack and leave it in the serving bowl and spoon hot congee over the egg, and it will be cooked soon after, with a runny yolk centre.

Yong Tau Fu in Black Bean Sauce 娘豆腐炒黑豆酱

My annual vacation is coming right up and am still not quite done with the F&E plannings! Gonna be a good break I am taking to be away from housecleaning, cooking, baking and above all, office work! Can't wait for my vacation really!

A throwback for this post. Cooked this dish before the Lunar New Year which is now over in a twinkle of eye.  Oh in fact, I have quite some overdue posts waiting to be posted. Pls bear with me!

Love how this one dish is just enough to get us done with a meal. Under my dearest Mummy's influence, I love eating yong tau fu from young. Good in soups, with dry or soupy noodles and even stir fries, yong tau fu are easily my go-to help if I want to be a lazy bum that day :P

Yong Tau Fu in Black Bean Sauce
Recipe by Noob Cook

350g yong tau foo (about 15 pieces or so)
1 tbsp cooking oil
2 tsp fermented black beans rinsed, patted dry, mashed slightly with fork
3 cloves garlic minced
2 chilli padi sliced
1 tsp hot bean sauce/la dou ban jiang (辣豆瓣酱)
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1/4 cup water
cornstarch solution (1 tsp cornstarch mix with 2 tsp water)

1. Cook yong tau foo pieces in boiling water for about 2 minutes. Drain and set aside.

2. Heat oil in claypot or wok and stir fry fermented black beans, garlic and chilli until fragrant.

3. Add spicy bean sauce, oyster sauce and water to the casserole, stir evenly to form a paste.
4. Add the blanched yong tau foo pieces and stir to coat them well in the sauce. Thicken the sauce with cornstarch solution.

Tteokbokki (Korean Spicy Stir-fried Rice Cake)

Have you tried tteobokki, Korean Spicy stir-fried rice cake before? I love this Korean dish which is commonly found along the streets of Korea. I love it for its spicy chewy tasting rice cake. I love the bite of the rice cake.  I like that it can fill me up easily, and that leftovers can be kept overnight, only to be reheated the next day and paired with instant ramen.

Authentic tteokbokki does not have the addition of chicken franks and chinese fishcakes but i added them anyway because this was gonna be our one-pot dish for a Saturday evening. I could not get Korean fishcakes, hence I used the chinese one. Oh... I miss tteokbokki now as I blog away! I love Korean food. Okay, Korean anything, anything Korean I all like :P

Tteokbokki (Korean Spicy Stir-fried Rice Cake)
(Serves 3 to 4)

1 packet of rice cake (I bought Singlong brand, 500g rice cake)
300g bokchoy or cabbage (wash and cut into 1 inch size)
1 sheet of Korean fishcake (I used 1 whole pc of the chinese kind)
5 pcs spring onion (3 to cut into 1-inch long, 2 to cut into small bits for garnishing)
1 chicken frank (sliced thinly) - optional
2 to 3 tbsp Gochujang, Korean red chilli pepper paste
About 1.2l anchovy stock (1 handful of dried anchovies + 1.3l water)
6 pc garlic, minced
1 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tbsp sugar
2 to 3 tsp sesame seeds
1 tsp sesame oil

1. Remove head and guts of dried anchovies and rinse with water twice. Drain and put anchovies into stock bag or straight into small pot. Fill pot with 1.5l water and bring to a gentle boil, without lid on hight heat. Bring down heat to medium high and let boil for further 15 to 20min. Use a strainer to remove anchovies. Set aside.

2. This could be an extra step but I normally do this to remove excess oil and perhaps quicken the cooking of the rice cake at the later stage. In a separate pot of boiling water, blanch rice cakes for  about 1min, remove with sieve or strainer and leave in a pot of room temperature water.

3. Pour anchovy stock into a bigger cooking pan and turn on high heat and bring to a boil. Add in minced garlic and Korean red chilli pepper paste (gochujang) and stir well till  chilli paste dissolves. Add in sugar and light soy sauce and stir till sugar dissolves. You may taste the sauce to see if you would like to add in more chilli paste or add in more sugar to bring down the spiciness.

4. Add in blanched rice cakes, sliced chicken franks, fishcakes and spring onions, stir and mix well. Cover with lid and let boil for about 8min.

5. Stir in bokchoy or cabbage and stir well. Cover and let boil for further 5min or so till rice cakes have softened. Stir in sesame oil and sesame seeds. Serve!

An easy and simple to cook yummy Korean street food!

To reheat, add in a little water and bring to boil on low heat. Sprinkle with some sesame seeds and serve.

Claypot Chicken Rice

It was a lazy weekend and I just needed all the rest I could have. Sometimes I just do not have the mood to do anything but just laze around. Because I am a wife to a man, I need to do my part and feed the hubby as well. I still need to cook to fill our stomach, right? Well, not that we cannot eat out, but we just prefer home cooked food so here you are, another lazy one-pot dish from me, the lazy wife.

Claypot Rice 
(Serves 2)

1 cup rice
1 cup water
1 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp oyster / abalone sauce
1 tbsp dark soy sauce
2 tbsp oil
a dash of pepper

Chicken marinate
1 tbsp oyster / abalone sauce
1/2 tsp ginger juice
1 tsp dark soy sauce
a dash of pepper

2 chicken thighs (deskinned, excess fats removed & chop into small pieces)
1 tsp salted fish (finely chopped) - you may add more if you prefer stronger salted fish taste
1/2 pc of a whole Chinese sausage (lup cheong), sliced thinly
4 pcs dried Chinese mushrooms (soaked till soft & halved) - reserve mushroom water for cooking with the rice
2 stalks of cai xin or xiao bai cai

Spring onions or Chinese parsley, for garnishing (optional)


1. Mix chicken with the marinate, cover with clingwrap and leave in fridge to marinate for 2 hours or overnight.
2. Soak rice in the one cup of water in a bowl for 30min to an hour.
3. Mix together light soy sauce, oyster/abalone sauce, dark soy and pepper in a bowl.  Set aside.
4. Heat a tbsp of oil in claypot and stir in salted fish bits and fry till fragrant and golden brown.  Remove just the salted fish and dish onto a small plate.
5. With the leftover oil from the salted fish in the claypot, pour in the soaked rice plus water and add in 2 tbsp of the mushroom water.  Put on claypot lid and let the rice come to a boil.
6. When rice has boiled,  place marinated chicken thighs on top sides of rice, chinese mushrooms, sausages, sprinkle salted fish all over , top with vege and cover.  Lower heat to small and let simmer for 8 to 10min.
7. Pour in prepared sauce all over top of rice and ingredients.  Cover and let it heat for 5min.  Serve immediately.  You may add more dark soy sauce if preferred.

Beef Stew

My younger brother stayed over at our place last weekend and I made a pizza and cooked a beef stew. I used the same pizza recipe as the last round as I really like how time saving this recipe was, and I could have nice tasty pizza in no time! I guess it will take me quite awhile before I get willing to move on in search for another thin crust pizza recipe...! Hehe!

Now for the beef stew, I tested and came up with a simple and yummy beef stew that hubby and brother commented "delicious!"

I love how easy and forgiving stews are. You can just dump all the ingredients into the one pot and let it simmer on low heat till meat turns tender, vegetables turn soft and the gravy gets thick and tasty. It goes so, so well with rice, and not forgetting bread too, for some stews!

Beef Stew 

(Serves 2 to 3) 

300g beef cubes 

1 brown onion (diced) 

2 carrot (cubed) 

4 brastagi potatoes (quartered) 

250ml beef broth (I used Campbell's Real Beef Stock) 

3 tbsp vinegar 

100ml water 

125ml red wine 

5 pcs garlic (flattened with a knife/ chopper) 

1 tsp of dried thyme leaves 

1 tsp dried parsley 

Olive oil 

Fresh ground black pepper 

Salt 

Cornflour + water mixture (if required) [1 tsp cornflour + 2 tsp water] 

1. Heat a casserole dish with 2 tbsp of olive oil and add in add in beef cubes to brown them.  Do it over 2 batches if your casserole dish or crockpot is not big enough to brown all beef cubes.

Season beef with some fresh ground black pepper and salt. 

2. Once beef has browned on the bottom side, use a tong and turn all beef cubes top side down.  Again, sprinkle black pepper and salt all over beef. 

3. Remove beef cubes.

4. Pour in vinegar into pot and mix with wooden spoon to "release" browned bottom of pan with vinegar. 

5. Place in brown onions and garlic and saute till fragrant and onions has turned translucent.

6. Place in browned beef cubes and stir well. 

7. Pour in beef broth and stir well, then add in red wine and water.  Stir and let it come to a gentle boil on medium high heat. 

8. Add in potato and carrot, dried parsley and thyme leaves. Stir well, cover and let it come to a boil.

9. Turn down heat and let simmer for the next 1.5 hour to 2 hours or till beef cubes turn tender and come apart when pressed in with a fork.  When ready to serve, add in cornflour mixture to thicken stew gravy if required. 

10.  Serve with rice or sliced baguette.

Tomato Rice with Sunny Side Up Egg (Rice Cooker Version)

There has been this tomato rice craze going on in the Facebook & blogsphere for the longest time. I see so many people cooking this and raving about how yummy it is. I hesitated for so long before I finally got my butt up to want to try the tomato rice out.

I did so yesterday for Hubby and my brother who stayed over at our place for the weekend. I had 2 guinea pigs this time :P

Tomato Rice with Sunny Side Up Egg

1 big tomatoes or 2 small tomatoes (washed & stem removed)
2 chicken thighs (de-skinned, remove fats & cut into small pieces)
4 tbsp mixed peas (rinsed & drained)
5 button mushrooms (sliced thinly)
1.5 cup rice (washed to normal rice cooking level)



Seasoning
1.2 tbsp olive oil
a pinch of salt
1 tbsp soy sauce
a dash of pepper

1. Remove about  5 tbsp if using 1 big tomato & 10 tbsp of rice water if using 2 tomatoes. (just make sure that rice water level is about same level as those of the ingredients added) The cooked whole tomato will produce lots of water when mashed, so too much water will cause the rice to be sticky when mixed with the mashed tomato.
2. Place all seasonings into pot and mix well with the rice and water.

3. Spoon in ingredients separately, leaving some space in the centre for tomato.
4. Place the tomato (top facing down) in the centre and put cooker to cook.

5. When rice is cooked & ready to be eaten, mash tomato to release the juice and mix it well with the rice and ingredients.  (You may remove the tomato skin if you want to)  Serve immediately.

Beer Chicken - Claypot Style

I was treated to a good one-pot dish meal in office last week by one of our nice lady. I love how simple and heart-warming this dish is, especially when beer is added!

The trips to Europe has kinda turned me into an alcoholic! I need beer even in my food???  Let's not sidetrack. Okay, I must say this is really one pot of comfort food. You get meat (chicken), potatoes and carrots all in that 1 pot. Good lot of gravy for pairing with rice too! Beer made up the gravy.  Sounds good? Cook it :)

I added a handful of black fungus to have more varieties. This is quite a versatile dish. You can add other ingredients too. Chinese dried mushrooms, canned button mushrooms, radish etc. It is really up to you. This is somewhat like the chinese version of meat stew.  Hubby savoured and enjoyed every spoonful of this dish.   Yeah!

Beer Chicken - Claypot Style 
(Serves 2)

2 chicken thighs (skin and big fatty lumps removed), cut to chunky pieces
3 Brastagi Potatoes, deskinned & quartered
1 big carrot or 2 small sized carrots, deskinned & cut into bite sizes
a handful of black fungus, soaked in water till softened, snip off hard areas, rinsed, drained and tear into bite sizes
1 onion, deskinned and quartered

1 can of beer (room temperature)
1.5 tbsp oil
Half tablespoon of old ginger juice
1.5 tablespoon oyster sauce / abalone sauce
1 tablespoon light soy sauce
1/2 tbsp Chinese cooking Wine / Hua Diao Jiu
1 tsp sesame oil (optional)
a dash of pepper

1 small piece ginger, sliced thinly
1 tbsp black soy sauce
1 tbsp cornflour (mixed with 1 tbsp water) - for thickening (optional if you prefer a more watery consistency)

Spring onions, 1 sprig cut into 1 inch length and another sprig cut into small pieces - for garnishing (optional)

1. Marinate chicken meat with ginger juice, oyster sauce, light soy sauce, chinese cooking wine, sesame oil and pepper.  Cover with clingwrap and eave in fridge to marinate for 2 hours.

2. Heat oil in claypot till hot and add in ginger slices and onion slices and saute till fragrant.

3. Place in marinated chicken pieces and sauce into claypot.  Mix well.

4. When chicken meat has turned white, add in potatoes, carrots and black fungus and mix well.  Cover and let the dish cook for about minutes on medium heat.

5. Pour in beer and stir well.  Cover and let it come to a boil.

6. Add black soy sauce and mix well to coat all ingredients. Put in the big pieces of spring onions then give a quick stir, cover again and let it simmer on medium low heat till potato and carrot and softened. (You may do a taste test at this stage, if it is bland - add in some light soy sauce or oyster sauce, whichever preferred)

7. Add in cornflour mixture to thicken the sauce.  Be sure to be stirring the dish while adding the mixture to prevent lumpy gravy forming.
8. Turn off heat, Sprinkle spring onions on top and serve with rice.