Bak Chang

Duan Wu Jie or Dragon Boat Festival is just round the corner on 30 May this year. What a better way to celebrate than to make bak chang!! By the way, bak chang is Hokkien for glutinuous rice dumplings. 

A brief surf of the net reveals that there are many ways to make and types of fillings for these rice dumplings - some glutinuous rice are unseasoned and unfried while others are fried beforehand, some fillings are different etc. There are also sweet dumplings and savoury ones. There are nyonya changs, there are Hokkien changs, and Cantonese changs. I am not really sure what mine really is, I think it is just a combo of what I like best - my own chang of pork belly, shitake mushroom, chestnut and glutinuous rice.

 

Making changs is not difficult, but it is a very time consuming process. The glutinuous rice and shitake mushrooms must be soaked overnight so that is is easier to cook, the pork belly marinated overnight with five spice powder, light and dark soy sauce, shaoxing wine and pepper for better flavours. The chestnut must be de-shelled beforehand. The bamboo leaves are soaked overnight to clean and make it pliable. So overall, wrapping changs is at least a two day activity.

On the day of wrapping, the pork belly, mushrooms and chestnuts are braised. With the braising liquid from the pork, I fried the glutinuous rice until it is about 30% cooked. For better results, a dash more five spice powder and salt is added to the rice.

The wrapping was indeed the most fiddly of it all. The bamboo leaves has to be perfect without any splits, tears or dirt to ensure that it would hold the rice in nicely. But once one masters the wrapping and tying of the chang, I imagine it's not difficult at all to wrap one within half a minute.

Once wrapped, the changs are boiled for 1 hour. If the wrapping is not done correctly, the glutinuous rice will escape from its wrapping. But no matter how well the wrapping is done, some water from the boiling process will seep into the bak chang diluting the flavours so each ingredient should be heavily seasoned in the first place.

I have learnt so much from this experiment - that making bak chang need not be the scary process that I thought it would be, that I could be making my own bak chang rather than spending $8 buying one at a grocery store (it used to be much cheaper, like $3), to season the rice well before wrapping. I am still learning the most efficient way to wrap, and best way to wrap the twine around the bak chang.

This recipe is still a work in progress, looking forward to the second bak chang wrapping day!

Medah Mediterranean Kitchen, Knox SC

We had a really lovely dinner the other night at Medah Mediterranean Kitchen at Westfield Knox. The Knox O-zone area was abuzz with activity, and full of lovely food smells wafting from the line of restaurant establishments.

Walking down the strip, one was indeed spoilt for choice. There is Mexican cuisine at Fonda's, Korean Fried Chicken at Gami's, dumplings from Angie's Dumpling Kitchen, Thai food from Kinn Thai and dozens of other restaurants. It's just a shame that Dragon Boat had closed their doors and there is a void for Cantonese food in the zone.

We visited Medah with a Groupon voucher for a meat platter and here is what we got:

A meat platter (indeed!) full of goodies - braised pork belly, pork sausages, beef ribs, roasted chicken and grilled lamb. There was tzatziki dip with pita bread and olives, and salad with feta cheese. The chips were delicious - so crispy, topped with feta cheese.

 

The grilled lamb was smoky and deliciously tender. We really enjoyed the warm pita bread with the tzatziki dip as well. The portion was just nice for a gluttonous pair! We finished everything on the platter, right down to the last olive.

We wanted tiramisu to finish, but they had ran out so we chose the chocolate volcano dessert instead. It was warm and oozing with rich chocolate - so irresistible! Topped with an Oreo cookie, and ice cream on the side (which was also topped with crunchy cookie crumb, yum!), it was the perfect sort of dessert to end the meal with!

Beansprout Soup, Kongnamulguk

This soup is almost fat free and is great in bringing out the crunchiness of the bean sprouts. And it's easy peasy too!

This is my version of beansprout soup, or kongnamulguk in Korean.

250g beansprouts, soaked beforehand and any brown ones discarded
3 cups of water
7 dried anchovies
1 teaspoon of minced garlic
Half an onion, sliced
1 teaspoon of light soy sauce
2 teaspoons of Korean red pepper flakes
Half a cup of clam meat

Bring everything but the clam meat to a boil, then lower to medium heat and boil for 30 minutes.

Add clam meat and season with salt, boil for another 10 minutes. Ready to serve!

Himalayan Salt Block

These Himalayan salt blocks are so pretty! Himalayan salt is naturally pink because it contains trace minerals such as potassium and calcium while table salt contains only sodium chloride.

The salt is mined at the foot of the Himalaya mountains in Pakistan and is made into bowls, chopping boards, lamps and so on.

They look like rose quartz to me and I would just love to have a block at home for serving sushi!

Chicken Abalone Congee

Look at these beauties!! Three abalones, weighing around 80g each and half a palm in size. It has been a while since I bought canned abalones and even then I have never seen the contents of the can let alone tasted it. They were always bought as gifts for relatives from abroad.

There are several types of canned abalones with difference in the size and number of abalones per can and of course, the price. The shopkeeper taught me how to check the print on the top of the can that will show the number of abalone in the can, and the license or factory from where the abalones are packed.

I put the can to good use for chicken abalone congee.

1kg chicken wings
3 cups of uncooked rice, soaked overnight
1.5 litres of water
Can of abalone, reserve stock for the congee

I placed the chicken wings and water in a pot to boil for forty five minutes or so, then removed all the wings to debone and de-skin.

Skim the broth to remove all oil and fat. If I had used chicken breast, I could have skipped this step but I find that using chicken wings results in a tastier broth because the flavour is where the bones are.

Use the chicken broth to cook the rice, until soft and disintegrated. Stir in the pieces of deboned and deskinned chicken. Lastly, stir in the abalone stock from the can.

Thinly slice the abalone and serve with congee. You can also stir the abalone in with the congee but we found that it becomes tougher when heated through, so we prefer it on the side or just on top of the congee. Yummy!!