Asian Noodle Salad

Yes, I am still here.

I cannot tell you how much I miss my blog, and all the blogs of my fellow food bloggers, when I am not able to sit down at the computer for extended periods of time! Things are going to be a little different around here for a while. Work has gotten busier, the house hunt is still on, which I'm sure will be followed by the craziness of moving. I have decided that while I still will blog, it will be less frequent. I am also going to try to visit as many blogs as possible in the midst of all this.

Thanks to all those who left me encouraging comments on my previous post. I really appreciate the comments, and all the positive wishes you all sent me! As I mentioned in that post, I do know that God has a better place in store for us, and I am not too worried about it! Now that I'm over the initial shock and the panic attack, I'm actually starting to look forward to a new environment, and I am excited about kinda setting up home all over again. My little girl will have new places to explore, and I am praying I will have a beautiful, and bigger kitchen. That's not a too much to hope for - if you knew how small my present kitchen is, you would understand. :)

Here is something I made a while ago. I had been wanting to try the popular peanut butter dressings for noodles for a long time. I combined a few recipes and added my own spin on the whole thing. On top of everything, I was feeling very pleased with myself for making the noodles from scratch using a borrowed pasta maker. I made a basic whole wheat egg pasta dough, and it was super silky, and really tasty.

Before I get into the recipe, please note that this is more a guide than a recipe. You might have to make adjustments based on your personal taste.

Asian Noodle Salad
Ingredients
250g whole wheat linguini/spaghetti/noodles, cooked al dente
1/4 cup smooth peanut butter
2 tbsp dark soy sauce
2 tbsp honey
1 tsp (more or less, depending on taste) hot sauce
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp melted butter
1 tsp sesame oil
1/2 cup shredded vegetables (I used mostly carrots & some cabbage)
1/2 cup bean sprouts
1/2 cup cook broccoli florets
1 red onion, sliced thin
3 tbsp toasted sesame seeds, plus extra for garnish.

Method
1. In large bowl, combine all the ingredients except the noodles, the shredded vegetables, the sprouts, the broccoli, the onion and the sesame seeds.
2. Mix well, and taste. Adjust seasoning, adding more soy, vinegar, hot sauce or honey as desired.
3. Reserve about 1/3 of this dressing in a small bowl.
4. Into the remaining dressing in the large bowl, stir in the noodles, sliced onion, sprouts, broccoli and shredded vegetables. Stir lightly to coat everything.
5. If desired add the reserved dressing, or just keep it aside to drizzle over the salad on each person's plate.
6. Stir in the sesame seeds, and serve garnished with more toasted sesame seeds, and the reserved dressing.

Personally, I was quite pleased with this dish, and my little girl ate it without a fuss too. My husband complained it tasted too 'vegetable-ly'! I found that a strange thing because he usually loves his vegetables. It turned out he wasn't too fond of the sprouts in there. Of course, because I can see the future, I anticipated this would happen, and made one of his favorite chicken dishes to go on the side.

For the side salad for this salad, I just sliced up some fresh tomato, and drizzled over some olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and seasoned it with salt and pepper. It was a delicious and light accompaniment to the noodles. At least I thought so. My husband detests tomatoes, and so he wouldn't even try the salad. He was really grateful for the chicken on his plate. I will share the chicken recipe another time. It is a simple but really popular dish among my family and friends.

Thanks to all those of you who keep visiting even though I've been so bad at visiting your sites these last few weeks. I hope to be back in a couple of months when we've settled into our new place. Until then, I will try to post a new recipe at least once in two weeks! Thanks for being such awesome peeps! :)

Chicken Porridge

So much has happened this week. Thankfully, we are all back in good health. But things have gotten really crazy. And in the midst of all the craziness, I have not been able to sit down at the computer long enough to post, or even to visit blogs. I have started going through my subscriptions, and I have started visiting blogs, and if I haven't gotten around to yours yet, you can be sure I will soon!

In other news, we got a bit of bad news this week. We need to find a new place to live. Our landlord wants to move in to his own apartment, and so we have just over 2 months to find a new place and move in there. We've been here more than 7 years. We moved in here right after we got married, and this place is full of memories. This is the only home our little girl has ever known, and I am sure she won't have too many memories of this place when she grows up. I don't know where to start with the packing. So I am going to just concentrate on finding a new home first. God is good. And I am sure He is going to give us a better home than what we have right now.

During times like this, I need comfort food.

I made this a couple of weeks ago, and this is perfect comfort food. I wish I had had some of this leftover for this stressful week. My husband and I were addicted to this dish when we lived in Singapore, and we often ate it for breakfast. It is great for dinner too, in my opinion. I have made this a few times after we moved back. I don't know how authentic my version is, and I apologize to anyone I might offend with my recipe! I can assure you it tastes really good. In Singapore, we used to eat it with this yummy fried bread, but I haven't tried making that yet. Anyone have a good recipe for you tiao?

Chicken Porridge
Ingredients
For the stock
1/2 kg (a little more than a pound) bone-in chicken, washed and cut into small pieces
1 large onion, roughly chopped
2 medium carrots, roughly chopped
1/4 cup chopped celery
1/4 cup chopped leeks
4 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
1 1" piece of ginger, peeled and crushed
2 bay leaves
1 2" piece of cinnamon
2 cloves
1 star anise
1 tablespoon pepper corns
2 1/2 litres water
Salt to taste

For the porridge
3/4 cup rice, washed and soaked for 1/2 hour
8-12 cups of chicken stock
Shredded, cooked chicken (from the stock)
2 tsp sesame oil
Salt, and pepper to taste

Garnishes
Caramelized onion
Chopped Spring onion
Chopped cilantro/coriander
Soy Sauce
Chili Vinegar Sauce

Method
1. Combine all the ingredients for the stock and cook for about 45 minutes. Strain and reserve all the stock. Shred the chicken from the bones, and discard the bones. You could leave the chicken shredded or chop it up. Discard all the vegetables and spices.
2. Bring 8 cups of stock to a boil, and add the washed, soaked rice.
3. Cook for 45 minutes to an hour on a medium flame until the rice is cooked and mushy. Add more stock if needed.
4. When the rice is cooked, and the porridge has the right consistency, add the chopped/shredded chicken and the sesame oil.
5. Check the seasoning and add more salt/pepper if needed.
6. For the caramelized onion garnish , deep fry 2-3 finely sliced red onions until golden brown. Stir some of the caramelized onion into the porridge, and reserve the remaining for garnish.
7. For the chili vinegar sauce, combine 1/4 cup of rice wine vinegar with 1/4 cup of sugar, and 2-3 chopped, fresh chillies (depending on how 'hot' you want it), and cook together until it is slightly syrupy. Allow to cool before serving.
8. Serve the porridge warm, garnished with chopped cilantro, spring onions, and caramelized onions. On the side, serve small bowls of soy sauce, and chili vinegar sauce.

This can be made with store-bought stock as well. That would make this even quicker, and more convenient. You would just need some rice, and some cooked chicken to throw into the porridge. And the garnishes, of course. This dish just isn't the same without the garnishes. The flavors of the porridge are really subtle and the garnishes add that extra bit of magic to this dish.

It is perfect for when you need a warm bowl of comfort. It is also perfect on rainy days, perfect to eat in bed and perfect for when you're sick and nursing a cold. I love this dish. My husband loves it. I just discovered my little girl loves it too. And so does my dog. We are a happy, chicken porridge-loving family.

Apple, Rosemary & Olive Oil Cake

Before I get into this post, I want to thank all those who left comments/emailed asking about my daughter. She has completely recovered, by God's grace, and is back to driving mommy nuts. :) I'm a happy, nutty mommy. I was also sick for a while after that. That's why there hasn't been a recipe in over a week. And I feel bad about not being able to visit all your lovely blogs, but I intend to do some serious catching up in the coming week.

Moving on... I haven't mentioned this before, but I LOVE Masterchef Australia. I love how much I learn from it. I love George, Gary and Matt. I love the contestants. I love the celebrity chefs. I LOVE the ideas and inspiration that the food on the show gives me. Earlier this week, I was watching an episode with a challenge by celebrity chef Maggie Beer. She is an amazing person and chef. And the contestants had to plate up three desserts using her recipes - a nectarine frangipane flan, a bruleed lemon tart, and an apple, rosemary & olive oil cake. It was a great episode to watch, but even after the show was over, and I was in bed, that cake kept coming back to me. Apple, rosemary and olive oil! Sounds divine.

So, the very next day, I made this.

I found the recipe on the Masterchef website, and made only some minor substitutions. The main ingredient I had to substitute was verjuice. After doing quite a bit of research on it, I substituted it with a mixture of apple juice and apple cider vinegar. I have no idea how the cake tastes with real verjuice, but this tasted really good. Another was that I used Granny Smith apples. You can find the original recipe here.

There are four separate components, but it is doesn't take too long to put together. And the results are worth it.

Apple, Rosemary & Olive Oil Cake

Ingredients
Poached Apples
4 large granny smith apples, peeled, cored, and cut into eighths
250ml apple juice
50ml apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon finely chopped rosemary
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

Olive oil Cake
3 eggs, separated
125g castor sugar
75g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
60ml extra-virgin olive oil
60ml poaching liquid

Sabayon
2 egg yolks
1 tsp castor sugar
30 ml poaching liquid 

Glaze
1/4 cup castor sugar
Remaining poaching liquid

Method
1. Grease, and line the bottom of a 9 inch spring-form cake tin with greaseproof paper. 
2. In a deep frying pan, combine the apples, apple juice, vinegar and chopped rosemary. Bring to a boil, and simmer for about 10 minutes, until apple is tender.
3. Strain, and reserve the poaching liquid.
4. Into the same frying pan, add the olive oil, and heat. Saute the apples until they are golden brown.
5. Arrange the apples in an even layer on the grease-proof paper in the cake tin, and set aside.
6. Preheat the oven to 180.
7. In a medium bowl, beat the egg whites until they are stiff. Add half the sugar and continue until the sugar has dissolved.
8. In a large bowl, beat the egg yolks with the remaining sugar.
9. Sift in the flour and baking powder. Pour in the olive oil and 60ml of the reserved poaching liquid. Stir to combine.
10. Fold in the egg whites, 1/3rd at a time.
11. Spoon the batter over the apples in the cake tin, and bake for about 35-40 minutes, until the cake is springy to the touch and evenly baked.
12. Remove from the oven, and allow to cool in the tin for 10 minutes.
13. Remove the collar of the springform tin,  and invert the cake onto a cooling rack.
14. To make the sabayon, combine the egg yolks, 30 ml of the poaching liquid, and the castor sugar in a heat proof bowl. Place over a saucepan of water. Cook the sabayon over this water bath, whisking continuously as it thickens. If you feel the mixture is getting too hot, remove from the heat, and continue whisking vigorously. Return to the heat, and cook until the sabayon is thick, creamy and frothy. Set aside to cool.
15. To make the glaze, combine the remaining poaching liquid and the sugar in a small saucepan, bring to a boil and simmer until the glaze has reduced by half. If you feel you don't have enough liquid or that the glaze is too thick, just add more apple juice. Spoon over the apples on the cake.
16. Slice the cake, and serve warm with the sabayon.

What I love about this cake:
1. The generous, thick, juicy, perfectly tender chunks of apple.
2. The subtle but incredible flavor of rosemary.
3. The wonderful aroma of extra-virgin olive oil.
4. The beautifully light cake, with a tender crumb.
5. The fact that the only fat in this recipe is 60 ml + 1 tbsp olive oil. No butter. No butter.

This is a recipe I have no doubt I will make again, and again and again. All of us loved this cake. My husband said it was great, but that he would have liked less cake and more apple. I thought it was just perfect. Maggie Beer did not disappoint with this one.