Friday 28 November 2008

Chicken Noodle Soup

Asian Chicken Noodle Soup Hi folks!

This next culinary creation is a from a favourite recipe of mine, titled "Asian Chicken Noodle Soup." Which particular "Asian" country this is supposed to be based on, I couldn't tell you! Anyway, you can find the recipe here.

I pretty much stuck to this recipe entirely (for a change!), except I used dried chillis instead of fresh ones, and I halved the recipe so that it only served the two of us.
Japanese seven spice powder
Oh, also, I sprinkled over a little Japanese seven spice powder (Shichimi in Japanese). It's a very popular condiment here, and is basically a red, spicy powder which adds a little heat and flavour, without being too over the top.

I love this dish! It is low fat, cheap, easy and totally delicious. The weather is becoming quite frosty over here in Japan these days, so I'm enjoying experimenting with a few soup recipes.

It's quite nice to serve a few steamed dumplings on the side, too.

Monday 17 November 2008

Faster than fast food

Here's a healthy, delicous meal that you can whip up faster than you can say "pass me the eggs." Yes, it's the good old fashioned omelette.


Omelette
First, lightly whisk two eggs, salt and pepper in a bowl with a fork.

Then, throw the eggs into a hot, small frying pan.

Now, sprinkle over some chopped ham, quartered baby tomatoes, sliced spring onions, grated cheese and fresh herbs (or anything else you like).

Once the cheese is melty and the egg is mostly set, just fold it in half and serve with some fresh, crusty bread or some toast.

Better than any fast food in the world!

Saturday 15 November 2008

My take on the burrito

Here's another meal I like to whip up using this little beauty:


Chicken Burrito

I call this a "burrito", even though I'm sure it doesn't even resemble an authentic burrito! Here's what I do.

I take two chicken breasts (skin off) and slice them about 2cm thick across the grain. Then, I brown the slices in a tiny bit of oil in a large, non-stick frying pan. Once the chicken is sealed, I give it a liberal coating of the taco seasoning on both sides of the chicken, and continue cooking it for a minute. Then, I add a little water, about half a cup. At this time, I sometimes add some sliced capsicum and perhaps some cannelini beans, red kidney beans, or anything I feel like. I continue to cook until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce has reduced to a thick consistency.

Meanwhile, I take out my stash of tortillas from the freezer, and freshen them by chucking them in the toaster oven, one at a time.

Now, you can just build your burrito as you like! I firstly put some grated cheese, then top with the chicken mixture, salsa, lettuce, tomato, grated carrot, and anything else yummy that's lurking in the fridge. There's enough chicken for about 3 or 4 burritos.

This is budget, healthy, quick and tasty - it ticks all the boxes!

Old El Paso Taco Seasoning

Wednesday 12 November 2008

Tandoori chicken with coconut rice and salad

Tandoori chicken with coconut rice and tomato saladContinuing on my Indian theme, here is another meal which I like to cook using Indian flavours: tandoori chicken served with coconut rice and salad.

To make the chicken, I marinate some mini drumsticks in some tandoori paste which has been mixed with equal parts yoghurt. I put it in a little plastic bag and leave it in the fridge all day. I fry it in a frying pan until cooked, and it turns out so tender and delicious. If you have an oven, you could just pop the drumsticks in the oven for about half an hour.

To make the rice, I cook basmati rice in water with about half a can of coconut milk mixed in. Then, after it's cooked, I mix in a little shredded coconut.

I like to have some vegies with every meal, so I served a simple baby tomato salad which was flavoured with parsely, salt and cracked black pepper, and drizzled with a little extra virgin olive oil.

Puppodums, naan bread and raita
On the side, I served some puppodums and naan bread with raita. I made the raita by mixing yoghurt with a grated cucumber, a clove of crushed garlic and a squeeze of lemon. The leftovers make a lovely dip with some chips or crackers!

Tuesday 11 November 2008

Curry in a hurry

Here's one of my original creations. I like to call it "the mother of all curries."

Curry with rice and naan bread


Ingredients:

2 chicken breasts, diced into large chunks

1T garam masala curry paste

half an onion, diced

1 carrot, chopped

a few potatoes, chopped in big chunks

half an apple, grated

half a cup of frozen peas

dried corriander

a couple of bay leaves

half a can of coconut milk

about half a cup to one cup of chicken stock

2 tsp cornflour (optional)

Method:

In a little oil, fry the curry paste for one minute. Then, add the onions and cook for a few minutes.


Add the chicken. Keep cooking until the chicken is sealed.


Add the carrot, potato, coconut milk, apple, bay leaves and corriander. Also, add the chicken stock, but only enough so that all the ingredients are just covered.


Cover and simmer on low heat for about 20 minutes. Then, remove the lid. Throw in the peas. Simmer for another five minutes with the lid off.


Check that the potatoes and carrots are tender. Once they are good to go, your curry is ready! Sometimes it's a bit runny, so if that's the case, I would add some cornflour made into a paste with a little cold water.


This serves 4-6 generously. Since there is only two of us, I always freeze half. It freezes and re-heats really well!


I recommend serving the curry with basmati rice and naan bread. It goes very well with a full bodied white wine, such as chardonnay, or a fruity medium bodied red wine.

Thursday 6 November 2008

Turning Japanese

Shizuoka Green Tea

There are some really great things about living in Shizuoka, Japan. One of them is the availability of fantastic green tea grown right here in Shiz. This green tea is such a refreshing treat of an afternoon. There are many health benefits, too!




Green Tea set with Matcha Sembei
It's nice to enjoy something sweet to offset the bitterness of green tea. Here, I am enjoying a sweet sembei cracker, flavoured with matcha, which is powdered green tea. This cracker was a gift from my friend Kaz, who kindly bought it as a souvenir in Nara. The pairing of flavours was wonderful!

Monday 3 November 2008

Pasta alla Carbonara

This is a dish that has become a favourite in our household, thanks to the recipe from Nigella's excellent book "How to Eat".

Unfortunately, I can't seem to find a link to this recipe, so I'll explain it here.

Ingredients
250g pasta - I prefer spaghetti
100g pancetta or bacon - I use about 5 rashers of bacon
1 whole egg plus 1 egg yolk
quarter cup of parmesan cheese
4T white wine
1T butter
a pinch of nutmeg
black pepper

Method
Boil the pasta in salted water according to packet directions.

In the meantime, slice the bacon and fry in a little olive oil for about 5 minutes, or until the bacon is nice and crispy. Then, add the wine and let it bubble for a minute or so or until there's just a little liquid left. Finallly, add the butter and let it melt. Remove the pan from the heat.

For the sauce, whisk together in a separate bowl the whole egg, egg yolk, parmesan cheese, nutmeg and black pepper. Once the pasta is cooked, drain it well and add it to the bacon mixture.

I stress again that you must take the pan off the heat for this next step, otherwise you get scrambled eggs, which is bad.

Now, just add the sauce mixture to the bacony pasta. Stir quickly and vigorously, until all the stands of pasta are coated in the delicious sauce.

That's it! This recipe serves two generously. Definitely not diet food, but hey, it's damn tasty!

Spaghetti Carbonara

** Notes:

I use parmesan cheese from a can and nutmeg pre-grated. Yes, I know Nigella would be horrified, but it's just the best I can do here in Japan! I really think it turns out a treat, anyway.

Some people use cream in a carbonara sauce - I think it's unnecessary. Besides, that's not how the Italians do it.

Pancetta would probably be better in this recipe, but I can't buy it. Instead, I use some smoked bacon which is thickly cut. Luckily, this is sold at a supermarket near my workplace.

Nacho nacho man... I've got to be a nacho man

Nachos

This is the best "sitting in front of the telly watching sports" meal. And it's so simple to make.

First, I fry up some mince, chilli beans and capsicum in a pan with water and this little beauty:
Old El Paso Taco Seasoning
Then, once the liquid has evaporated, I dump the whole lot on a pile of corn chips, add some salsa and cheese, and whack it all in the toaster oven.

Cheesarific!

Nachos with Coronas
Of course, this Mexican fiesta should be washed down with a couple of Mexico's best - Coronas.

Sunday 2 November 2008

A taste of Korea

While this is a cooking blog, and I mainly want to feature my kitchen experiments, I couldn't resist sharing some of the spicylicious food that I sampled during my recent trip to Korea. Who knows, maybe I can replicate them in the kitchen sometime, although I have no idea how to knock up a Korean concoction.

Spicy fishMoving right along, here is a meal that I enjoyed in a small sidewalk restaurant, run by a gruff but very kind old lady about half my height. You can see the main dish is some spicy fish. I'm not sure what kind of fish this is, or what it was flavoured with exactly, but it was very spicy and delicious! All Korean meals are served with plain steamed rice, which I found to be quite similar to that of Japan. Also, there is always a variety of condiments to go with the meal, a few of which you can see in this picture. The most common condiment is the ubiquitous Kimchi, which I can't say I'm a big fan of, but I was glad to try it.

This meal, and several meals thereafter, was served with "Hite" beer - a crisp and clean Korean beer which was refreshingly well paired with the food. Hite beerIn fact, I consumed far too many Hites on the first night, along with some Korean Soju, so I felt slightly unwell the next morning. This was my hangover solution:

Korean noodles with rice and side dishesI walked into the first traditional style restaurant that welcomely ushered me inside.

It was still breakfast time, but I sat down to a full meal. I was starving! The main dish was some kind of transparent noodle with shredded meat (beef, I think). It had just the right amount of kick to really kick my hangover in the butt. Served with rice and a variety of side dishes, it was a very satisfying and hearty meal.

Overall, I found Korean food to be very tasty, fresh, healthy and varied, and I'd love to go back there to try out more dishes and get to know the country a lot better.