Sweet Braised Pork belly

This is the dish every kid loves because it is sweet, soft and gluey ^^ It can be eaten with steamed rice or with fried rice and chilli sauce. It is really simple to cook and doesn't have too many ingredients.

Ingredients :

• 600 g Pork belly cut into 1cm wide strips
• 2 Tbsp Shallots sliced
• 4 Tbsp Palm sugar or brown sugar
• 2 Tbsp fish sauce
• 2 Tbsp dark soy sauce
• 2 Tbsp cooking oil

Method :

Heat the oil in the wok on high heat.

Add shallots and stir until it fragrant then add the pork belly. Stir well.

Add the remaining ingredients, stir well (if it looks dry, you can add a little water into the wok)

Turn the heat down and leave it cooking until the sauce thickens. Turn the heat off and serve. 

Thai Green Papaya spicy salad or Som Tum

Thai Green Papaya spicy salad or Som Tum

This is the most famous salad in Thailand. The original dish came from North-eastern Thai/Laos. Ever since I was a kid, this dish was always around and everyone loves it. When I grew up, lived and worked in Bangkok, I had this dish everyday for lunch, especially when I wanted to loose weight!! 

There are several versions of it. Sometimes people use shredded carrot instead of green papaya. All kinds of hard fruit like guava or apple can be use as well. 

In this recipe I added cooked seafood into the dish to make it more luxurious ;P 

Ingredients :

• 2 hand full Shredded Green Papaya (Paw Paw)
• 1/2 Cup chopped cherry tomatoes
• 1/2 Cup green bean cut 2cm long (In the photo I used some cabbage as it was all had in the fridge at that time :P) 
• 1 Cup seafood mixed (cooked)
• 1Tbsp fish sauce
• 1Tbsp lime juice
• 1Tbsp palm sugar or brown sugar
• 2 Cloves garlic
• Red eye chilli (choose your own level of spiciness)

Methods :

Add garlic and chilli in mortar and pestle and crush together.

Add tomatoes, fish sauce, sugar and lime juice and mix it together using pestle, lightly crushing  the tomatoes. Taste. The taste should be combination of spicy, salty and sour.
Pour the mixture into a salad bowl and add green beans and papaya.
Mix well
Add cooked seafood into salad and mix well.
Serve with grilled chicken or BBQ pork and sticky rice :)

Halloween lunch - Nightmare before Christmas

Menu today > Fried chicken :)

I marinated the chicken thighs with soy sauce, sugar, pepper and salt and kept in the fridge over night. I took them out in the morning,dusted with plain flour and fried it.

I prepared the rice by using cling wrap to help shaped it up the way I wanted it to look like.

Laid lettuce leaves on the bottom and put rice ball on the top of that.

Add some extra decoration like carrot and seaweed. Don't forget to arrange everything as tight as you can so that it won't move during transportation. :)

Seasoned Pork mince and Flying fish roe rolls

Ingredients :

• 600g Pork mince
• Fish roe (Available at Asian supermarket in frozen food section)
• 2 stalks coriander roots
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 Tsp Black Pepper corn
• 1 Tbsp Soy Sauce
• 1 Tbsp Sugar
• Pinch of salt 
• 1/2 Tsp Chicken powder
• 1 Tbsp Corn flour
• 3 Tbsp water
• Roasted Seaweed sheet

Method :
Mash together coriander roots, garlic and black pepper corn using mortar and pestle.
Add pork mince and all remaining ingredients including coriander and garlic paste into blender and blend it until it becomes a paste. Set aside.
Put seaweed on sushi mat then spread the pork paste evenly on the sheet. Place fish roe on the top of the mince paste.
Roll them up the same way you are making sushi.
Wrap roll in cling wrap and steam for around 15 minutes until firm.

Totoro cake

My daughter loves Totoro! Actually everyone in my family does and that includes me. :P I made this cake for her 5th birthday. Even though sweets are not my cup of tea I managed to pull it off..  >_< 

This was my first time working with fondant. I know what Totoro looks like and know the story very well but I had to do my research a little bit on how to cover a cake with fondant and how to adding the colour etc.

I bought a couple of cake decoration tools like leaf moulds and flowers moulds.

I tried to make soot sprites but it didn't come out as I wished... they look exactly like them anyway - lol

I fried angle hair spaghetti to create a wooden stick in the the wood.

Luckily I didn't have to make the cake. I called my cake specialist friend and asked her to make butter cake for me. It works really well with fondant. All of the guests at the party enjoyed the cake very much!

Khao Man Gai or Hainan chicken on rice

Khao Man Gai or Hainan chicken on rice originally a Hainanese dish that was brought to Thailand by the Hainan people. There are many versions of it like Singaporean, Malaysian and Thai. The suace in the Thai version makes this differnt to the other recipes. Every where you go in Thailand, you will see at least one or two street stalls selling this dish, even in shopping centres.

This is my very own version and is a mix of the other varieties. It is my signature dish!

Ingredients (may be varied to taste):

• Light soy sauce
• Fermented soy bean sauce (you can find this sauce in every asian store)
• Dark soy sauce
• Chicken stock powder
• Sugar 
• Coriander seeds
• Ginger
• Garlic
• Coriander roots
• Chilli
• Salt and pepper
• Chicken fat cut it off from chicken.
• 1 Whole chicken

For the sauce

• 2 Tbsp chopped ginger
• 2 - 3 Cloves of Garlic
• 1-2 Tbsp chopped chilli
• 2 Tbsp Fermented soy bean
• 1 Tbsp Dark soy sauce
• 2 Tbsp sugar
• 2 Tbsp vinegar
• 1/2 cup boiled water

Blend all sauce ingredients in a food processor, be careful not to blend it too much untill it becomes a paste... I like to leave a bit of chunk in there.

Boil water and then add 1 or 2 coriander roots (crushed first for more flavour), 1 Tbsp Chicken stock powder and pepper.  Boil the chicken till its cooked then take the chicken out and rest. Remember to add a lot of water because we will use the broth for cooking rice as well. 

 For the rice we need a few slices of few ginger, 2 Coriander roots, 2 crushed cloves of garlic and roast ground coriander seeds. 

 Add everything to 4 rice cups of rice (I use small coffee cup measure the rice).

Add 2 Tbsp cooking oil to the wok andt add chicken fat when it has heated.  Fry the fat till it is brown.

 Add chicken fat including oil into the rice mix.

 Add 3 cups chicken broth into the rice mix then cook the rice in the rice cooker.

This is how the rice looks when it is cooked.

Chop up the chicken arrange on the side of the rice and garnish with coriander and sliced cucumbers and the sauce.

Homer Simpson

Homer Simpson lunch!

This box contains:

• Pork Dumpling
• Little weiner (hot dog)
• Boiled quail egg
• Rice mixed with boiled egg yolk and ground black sesame.

I put the dumpling underneath  the rice.

Left over Bolognese pasta make over!

Every Friday I feel so lazy to cook. Sometime we have take away for dinner but there aren't many choices around only Indian or Pizza and Chinese (This is the time I miss my Bangkok a lot >_<) 

Tonight my husband has a party after work (you know.. after work Friday party thing..kind of) which means he's not home for dinner. I've looked in my freezer and there is only one container of pasta bolognese  sauce and it's not going to be enough for us (me and 3 kids). I cooked some more pasta and beat eggs with grated zucchini and Parmesan. I mixed them together with bolognese sauce, season with some more salt and pepper. I cooked it on frying pan on a low heat. Once it's firm enough, I flipped it over to the other side and cook through until both sides are well cook.

My girl's lunch box 

                                                                                                                  

My boy's lunch box

The boxes contains: 

• Pork balls : I mixed pork mince with garlic,salt, pepper, soy sauce and pince of sugar. 
• Egg sheet and crab stick rolls
• Mini hot dog 

Prawn Fried rice lunch box.

Prawn fried rice : for 2 boxes (2 ppl)

• 2 eggs lightly beaten 
• 2 1/2 cups steamed rice
• Coriander and Spring Onion chopped
• 1 Cup prawns
• 1/2 Cherry tomatoes cut in half
• 2Tbsp light soy sauce
• 1Tsp sugar
• 'Ground pepper
• 2 Cloves garlic chopped

Methods :

Heat the oil in the wok. Add garlic then stir until fragrant.

Add prawns into garlic, give it stir. Once the prawns are cooked, add cherry tomatoes then rice.

Stir the rice through garlic and prawns and season well with soy sauce, sugar and ground pepper.

Add the eggs mix and stir until the egg cooks through.

Add spring oinion and coriander and stir through

Turn the heat off  and serve it with slices of lime and cucumber slices.

Maggie Simpson

My kids love The Simpsons, especially my daughter. She loves Maggie the most. She mentioned to me one day that it would be nice if mummy can put Maggie Simpson into the box for Daddy's lunch! And I did! How can you say no to your little angel ;P

Maggie lunch box contains : 

• Teriyaki Salmon
• Seaweed and Glass noodles rolls : Soaked up glass noodles and sliced some veggie like carrot for example. Mixed them well together and season with salt, pepper,soy sauce, pinch of sugar and little drop of sesame oil.  
• Roll the noodles mix with seaweed sheet same way you do with Shushi roll. Dust the rolls with plain four and deep fry.  I usually make them before hand and freeze them in the freezer for later use during the week. They are great for after school snacks as well. 
• The yellow rice I used egg yolk (boiled) and a little bit of yellow food colour then used the cling wrap to shaped up Maggie's head
• The blue rice is the same with the yellow one.

Quick n Easy chicken lunch

This lunch box was really quick. I didn't plan it before hand. All we had were couple of chicken breasts and half of a cabbage in the fridge >_< . I sliced the chicken breast in half then seasoned it with salt and pepper, dusted with plain four and fried them in shallow frying pan. 

I stir fried  the cabbage with diced garlic and chilli. Season the stir fried with oyster sauce, fish sauce and sugar. Add half of solft boiled egg and cut out the red cheerios and carrot, cheese for extra decoration and that's it! ^^

Southern Thailand Spicy and Sour Pickled Bamboo and Prawns Soup (แกงเหลืองหน่อไม้ดอง)

I love southern Thai food even though I grew up in northern Thailand and Bangkok. Their seafood dishes are full of richness and the strong taste of spices. Southern Thai food has Malaysian and Muslim influences and they often use Turmeric in the soup to enhance colour. 

One of the best places to experience southern food in Bangkok (that my dad and I always go to for lunch when ever we have a free time together) is the suburb call Flat Klong Jan, Bang Ka Pi. I think this is the biggest southern community in Bangkok :)  Since I came to live here in Brisbane, I've missed all of the food in Bangkok.  I have to learn how to cook the food that I love and to remind me of my time with my dad. This dish is one I often cook! 

Southern Thailand Spicy and Sour Pickled Bamboo and Prawns Soup

Ingredients (Share meal) :

- 200g Pickled bamboo (Available at Asian supermarket) 

- 1 cup Prawns (Frozen or fresh)

- 5 cups water

- 21/2 tbsp fish sauce

- 1 tbsp Tamarind paste (Available at Asian supermarket) * Be careful using Tamarind. I recommend that you should try 1/2 tbsp first.

For the chilli paste

- 1 tbsp Galangal sliced

- 1 tbsp Shrimp paste

- 4 Cloves garlic crushed

- 4 Shallots sliced

- 1 tsp Tumeric powder or fresh tumeric crushed

- 2 tbsp Fish powder,Alternatively can of Tuna

- 3-4 Dried chilli maybe more if you want spicy

Method:

Place the water into the sauce pan and turn on the high heat. Leave it boil then turn the heat down.

Wash the pickled bamboo with water, drain and set aside.

In food processor, add all ingredients for the paste and blend it until it become paste.

Add the chilli paste into the boiling water.

Once it's boiling, add prawns then bamboo. Turn the heat down and let it simmer for about 2-3 minutes

Turn the heat off and serve with steamed rice

This soup will goes well together with Thai fried egg, sweet sun-dried sardine or vegetable stir-fry. ^^

Astro boy! A childhood super hero.

Astro boy!

Childhood anime hero XD 

The box contains :

• Fried chicken marinated in soy sauce.
• Sun dried sweet sardine

I mixed the rice with a little drop of soy sauce to created the skin colour and using boiled egg for the eyes.

Cut out the carrot for extra decoration. :)

Soba & Chashu Pork

This is a really quick lunch I've packed for my husband.  I made the Chashu Pork a week before and froze it in the freezer in a small container. It can keep in the freezer for up to 1 month.

Recipe for Chashu Pork.

Ingredients :

• 1/2 kg Pork spare ribs
• 1Tbsp Japanese Bonito soup powder
• A few Spring onion stalks
• 2-3 Garlic cloves crushed
• 2Tbsp Mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine)
• 3Tbsp Soy sauce
• 1 Tsp Black soy sauce
• 3-4 ginger sliced

Method:

Heat 2 Tbsp cooking oil in the pan then add pork spare ribs and cook it until brown both side. set aside

Add pork spare ribs into the soup pot then add the remaining ingredients.

Add the water enough to cover the pork.

Leave it simmer until the pork becomes soft. 

Divide the pork into a small container (Maybe one piece per one container, depend on how much do you want to use at times)

The Chashu pork can be eaten with steamed rice and noodles. It's also good for a quick lunch box filling too.

Chicken & Cherry Tomato Frittata

I got the recipe from The Recipes Magazine. It's very easy and perfect for my dinner budget for the week ^^

Tantan-men

I love Ramen and all of my children love them too. I think it might not be a bad idea if I know how to make it. I've made Tonkotsu Ramen before but never tried to make this Tantan-men. I've looked at so many recipes on the internet and I got confused. In the end I thought that I should try to recreate the taste I remembered and make my own recipe >> The outcome is pretty good and I thought that I should share it with you guys too! 

Note that this noodle soup can be a bit spicy for those who are aware of the spiciness (I am Thai so I love it ^^)

Ingredients for 4 People :

- 500 g Pork mince
- 4 packs Ramen noodles or Chinese egg noodles
- 5-6 cups chicken stock
- 3 cloves of garlice chopped
- 2 Tsp ginger crushed
- 2 Tbsp of Gochujang (Korean Hot Pepper Paste) for the soup and 2 Tb for the pork mince paste.
- 2 Tbsp of Miso paste (There are several type of Miso paste in the market. I used white Miso)
- 1 Tbsp Sesame oil
- 2 Tbsp cooking oil
- 2 Tbsp Japanese soy sauce
- 2 Tbsp Mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine for cooking)
- Pinch of Salt and Pepper
- 1 Tbsp Sugar

For Topping :
- Chopped spring-oinion
- Black fungus mushroom sliced (Optional)
- Corn kernel cooked
- Soft boiled egg cut in half
- Roasted white sesame seed (Optional)
- Seaweed (Optional)

Method :

In the pot, heat the chicken stock then add 2 Tbsp Gochujang paste stir well and leave it simmer on a low heat.
Heat the oil in the wok.
Once the oil is hot, add garlic and ginger and give it stir until fragrant.
Add pork mince. Stir the mince until the mince is cooked.
Add Miso paste; 2 Tbsp Gochujang paste; soy sauce; Mirin; Sesame oil; salt and pepper and Sugar.
If it is getting too dry you can add a bit of the chicken soup. Leave it simmer until the sauce thickens.
Turn the stove off and let it cool.

When serving, cook the noodles in boiling water, drain the water and put the cooked noodles into the bowl.  Top with pork mince paste then the soup the rest of the toppings.

Enjoy! ^^

MJ! ^^

My Husband lunch box > MJ Micheal Jackson!

The box contains:

• Thai fish cake
• Seaweed rolls
• Beef stir-fried with cabbage
• Steamed rice mixed with tomato sauce to created skin colour
• Egg white (boiled egg) for the eyes and seaweed for eyes-brown
• Pickled plum for the mouth
• Thin sushi rolls for the hair.

 I used cling wrap to shape the rice to be the face first.

Chicken and Banana blossom spicy salad northern Thailand style

When I was a kid I lived with my grandma most of the time and I loved it. There were a lot of banana trees in her backyard. She used to yelled out at us to help her to cut down banana leaves for her cooking and sometimes she used banana blossoms for cooking as well. 

Here is my grandma's salad that she used to make for us. I've changed the recipe a little bit to suit those not used to strong tasting Thai food. Hope you all enjoy this dish and if any of you have questions please ask me. I'll get back to you as soon as possible.

This is a healthy dish, full of fresh herbs and northern Thailand flavours. 

Ingredients (Share meal) 

- Half chicken, cooked (boiled)

- Half cooked Banana blossom (Steam or boiled) 

- 4-5 dried chilli (maybe less if you don't want it too spicy)

- 4 Shallots (Peeled)

- 4 cloves garlic

- 1Tbsp Shrimp paste (Available at The asian supermarket)

- 1Tbsp Galangal sliced

- 1 Tsp Roasted ground Sichuan pepper or Szechuan pepper (Also available at asian supermarket)

- Fish sauce and sugar to taste

- Chopped Spring-onion and coriander for garnish 

*Tips - When boiling banana blossom, it's best to boil the whole of it so that it doesn't goes     black from the sap.
          - Keep the chicken soup for salad 

Method

Take all the meat off the chicken then use the fork to separate chicken meat into pieces and set aside.

Use fork and do the same thing as the chicken to the banana blossom.

Blend together all the remaining ingredients in the blender or mortar and pestle until it becomes a paste.

Heat  2Tbsp cooking oil in the wok then fry the chilli paste until fragrant. Turn the stove off and let it cool.

In a salad bowl, add together all of the ingredients including the chilli paste and 1 soup spoon of chicken stock soup from the boiling chicken.
Mix well, then season with fish sauce and sugar.

Top with chopped  spring onion and coriander. 

Serve with steamed rice as a part of a shared meal.