Foodelicious!

The other day I walked by a restaurant and saw everyone was having sui kows, (dumplings) and instantly wanted to have some. However, as I dont consume pork, sui kows sold outside are not for me.. hehehee.. so, arm with mince chicken, prawns and fish paste, some water chestnuts, chinese mushrooms, spring onions and shredded carrots, I set out to make my own sui kows.. It's a easy peasy process that can be quite therapeutic....hehehehe.. A little bit of everything could give me quite a few sui kows which I kept the balance in the fridge in an air tight container for consumption as and when I like.. hehehe..

I had my first round of sui kows with lots of choy sum from my garden in a simple ikan bilis soup. Other times, I had my sui kow with some mee suah soup with lots of vege, or simply steam and eat it just like that or deep fried them is yummy too!! Nothing beats a home made sui kow.. I love it! Hehehehe..

I was approached by a lady over the phone one day and she enquired if I was keen to cook for her on Sunday and she drops by to pick the food up. I was taken by surprised!! Hahahahaha.. and so, from that day, I was thrown into the roller coaster of dinner catering ..there is the planning of the menu, the sourcing of ingredients and finally, the works. Tiring but a good experience and an opportunity to explore my cooking creativity. Heh! heh! heh!

As these food are kept in the fridge as most of my customers are working people, I am mindful that the food I propose have to taste just as good if not better after being kept in the fridge. Hence, a lot of times, I make sure I have a variety of meat and vegetables that can be kept for a few days in the fridge and taste as good as it was just freshly cooked.

 

I personally am not a big fan of salmon... but I am a big fan of salsa! Hahahahhaa.. On hot days, I like my salsa to be tangy. On rainy days, I like it spicy. Today, as I am not well, I have decided to pan fry a piece of salmon and ladden it with very tangy mango salsa. This shall be my monster's lunch today.

On a hot pan, as the salmon sits sizzling, I chopped up tomatoes, onions, pineapples and mangoes into small cubes, spice them up with bunch of thyme with lime, salt, honey and a dash of balsamic vinegar. Once the salmon was dished up, it was generously ladden with tangy Mango Salsa.. The aroma is simply very very enticing and with a plate of hot rice, my monster polished off all in a jiffy.

With the extra salsa, my monster and I had a whale of time watching TV and eating corn chips dipped in these salsa. A very addictive passtime..

You will not be able to find this dish being sold anywhere nowadays and quite frankly, most people dont even know there is such a dish! Hehehe... This is a bygone era dish. This dish is very popular with the Penang Peranakan clans. During those times, people are very frugal and I must say very creative to come up with dishes that does not require expensive ingredients but yet is extremely appetizing, flavourful and most importantly, filling to the stomach. You dont need a lot of this to eat plenty bowls of rice..With this dish, one will polish off at least 2 bowls of rice.. 2 big bowls!! This is plainly because the sauce or kuah from this dish is so seducing.. once it is mixed with hot rice, one cannot stop eating it.. spoon after spoon after spoons of rice.. and I always tell myself.. "ok! this is the last spoon.." but some how, it is never to be... Hehehehe...

To prepare this dish, one must have the patience of a nyonya.. hehehe.. I can just imagine girls born into and brought up by in a Peranakan family. These girls are required to have good cooking skills.. Everything has to be nicely done... there was no blender then and you just have to slave away using the mortar and pastel!! Peranakan girls are also required to cut everything finely, something which I will fail face down! Hahahahaha.. any fine cutting or chopping or slicing are always done by my aunt.. I dont have such patience... not even for food.. Heh! heh! heh!.. So, you can guess who did most of the work for this dish.

To start making this dish, one has to get lime, wash them, grate off the green part nicely and make slit around the fruit. Boil a pot of water and drop these "processed" lime and scoop up. Leave them aside to dry. Slice garlic, onions, chilies finely. When I say finely, I mean finely.. like hair! Sun dry them together with red and green chili padis for a few days.. while those are taking a nice sun tan, one can start with getting the sauce ready.. tumeric, vinegar, sugar and lots of oil.. fry them and when everything is nicely blended, leave it to cool. Once this sauce is ready, just dump in all the nicely tanned and finely sliced ingredients.. mix and throw in the limes. Let them soak for days.. (if the whole thing bubbles up, you can kiss all your hard work goodbye and start again!) After a week or so, it should be ready.. and that's when you fry some fishes and drop them into the acar. The fried fish will soak up the flavour of the acar and together, the taste is extremely appetizing and exciting! It's savory, it's tangy, it's sweetish, it's spicy, it's aromatic, all your five tastebuds will be alive! Woo hooo...

And yes, on a draggy Thursday, I really need something like this to make my day. Hehehe.. yes, I am waiting, not very patiently though, for Friday to come....