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A Weekendful

It's one of those weekends where it just revolves around food, food and more food. So, I signed up for another one of Chef Eric Low's class cos the menu had something I wanted to learn. PESTO! It's never been something I would order if it were on the menu, but so many people have raved about it, I settled that it was time to get into the greens. It isn't something particularly pretty at first sight (green goo doesn't appeal to me), but I was pleasantly surprised at how tasty fresh made ones are. I'll talk as we go along!

Menu:

Prawn Cocktail with Avocado and Thousand Island Dressing

Fish Fillet with Pesto Sauce

Rosemary Banana Tart Tartin

If you're thinking of serving an appetizer that's simple and tasty, this would be it. The only difference is that the 1000 island dressing is not store-bought but home made! Trust me, homemade ones are far better and a lot more healthier. If you're a salad person, make a bottle of two of these during the weekend and you can store this easily for the rest of the week! It takes 5 mins.

Here's the star of the day. Fish fillet with pesto sauce, served with baked potato wedges and stew vegetables. That green goo on the fish is a burst of flavours. It's a perfect combination of sweet Italian basil leaves, pine nuts, garlic, parmesan cheese and extra virgin olive oil. I absolutely adore it with the pan fried fillet. It's heavenly with the wedges as well. Pesto generally goes well with any seafood or white meats, or even a spread for toast.

Then we ended the lesson with bananas! Molecular gastronomy discovered the beautiful pairing of bananas and rosemary, hence the invention of this dessert. Tart tartin is a french term for caramelised apple tart that's served upside down. I love this banana version. I'm not a fan of desserts, but this was good. The warm caramelised bananas went extremely well with the cold vanilla ice cream - the perfect comfort dessert.

The only thing that didn't go well with me was the puff pastry. It's a ready rolled frozen pastry from carrefour. It was a little hard and didn't provide any crunch to the tart at all. Wait till I go on to my dessert lesson at Palate, I'll be making my own pastry!

Then barely 2 hours later, I went for my 5th module at Palate Sensations! I know this sounds crazy, but I'm enjoying every minute of this. Would be even more fun if I had friends with me :) I casually left my camera in the car so I don't have any pictures of the class, but we made our own pasta!

Menu:

Goat Cheese and Parmesan Ravioli with Pesto Sauce

Fresh Linguini Pasta with Prawn and Tomato Sauce

Penne Al Aglio Olio

Mushroom and Parmesan Risotto

By the end of the class, I was sure I wouldn't eat pasta for a week. Not that the food wasn't good, but that's FOUR pasta dishes in 3 hours! I loved the ravioli and risotto. We filled our raviolis with roasted red bell peppers and feta cheese and pounded our pesto sauce the traditional way. Yup, pesto again, but this time, it was a pesto cream with pasta, as some would say, pesto was truly made for pasta.

Then on Sunday, my 2nd aunt invited us over for dinner, well just a casual dinner and a game of mahjong for the regulars, or so she said. When we reached, she greeted us with this...

Lime Juice with Gula Melaka.

If you have friends coming over, prepare this and everyone would love you, especially on a hot humid day. I had 3 cups.

And then she went on to do this...

Can you think of what she's preparing for dinner? By the way, the un-peeled crab pincer left sitting on the plate never made it to her hands.

Lavish.
Yup, it was one of the ingredients she prepared for POPIAH!!!

Look at that spread. If the popiah auntie had all these ingredients in her hawker stall, I'll be her regular patron.

My 1st aunt, the first to lay her hands on the spread. By the way, she's an amazing cook as well. Now you know why I'll never be thin.

This was quite a funny shot cos she paused for quite a while to think what to add to her popiah. Talking about being overwhelmed.

My beautiful popiah. haha

This is the generously generous host of the night.

Her mission in life is to ensure no one goes hungry. Not only will she feed you, she'll give you enough to take home for next day's lunch.

Check out her popiah. I feel the stress of Mr. Popiah Skin.

Then on monday, public holiday! My mum use to always complain how much time she spends in the kitchen preparing lunch and then dinner and end up not having time for anything else. And since lunch was settled (remember we had 3rd aunt's popiah take home), I decided to whip up what I've just learnt! A quick blend of pesto, cooked spaghetti, pan fried some fish fillet and tiger prawns, and dinner was ready in 30 mins!

Spaghetti with Pesto Cream topped with Pan Fried Fish Fillet and Prawns on Pesto

You can always have it gorgeous.

Pesto Sauce

250ml Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO)

4 cloves Garlic

100g Fresh Grounded Parmesan Cheese

100g Pine Nuts, toasted for 5 mins at 150 degree celcius

30g Italian Basil Leaves

1tsp Salt

In a food processor, combine garlic, cheese, nuts and basil leaves together. Blend, adding the EVOO in at a trickle until fully incorporated. Season with salt and allow to rest for an hour before using.

You can always vary the amounts of pine nuts and cheese according to your liking.

Cover your pesto with EVOO to keep its green-ness.

The important thing is to make sure you have a sharp blade that will blitz the basil quickly without it becoming warm, it it will begin to ferment and taste bitter. The same goes for the nuts, if you overwork them, they become sweaty.

Blend the basil leaves at low speed to prevent it from turning into a dark olive green.

Eggilicious

It was a week of eggs! haha...2 weeks ago actually. Eggs are my absolute favourites and I can have them anytime of the day. Nature designed eggs as the food source for developing chicks. But it also became an excellent food for us humans because of their high protein content, low cost and ready availability. I love its versatility. You can either serve it alone or as an ingredient in almost every cuisine under the sun. A quick eat I always have is a quick 2 min microwaved whisked egg. The aroma is simply heavenly.

How do you know if an egg is fresh? The most common way we know is to see if we could pick up with yolk with our fingers, thanks to Seng Choong for the tip. Another way is to see how runny the whites are. The fresher the egg, the firmer the whites. Also, notice the bubble in the membrane whenever we crack open the shell? The bigger the bubble in the membrane, the less fresh the egg. Proper storage of your eggs help to maintain its quality. Eggs should be stored at temperatures below 4 degree celcius and at a relative humidity of 70 to 80 percent. Eggs will age more during one day at room temperature than they will during one week under proper refrigeration. So now you know! Eggs stay happy in the fridge :)

So, lesson 4 was on eggs. And more eggs. It was the most eggy day I've ever had. First up! We did poached eggs. The trick to making perfect poached eggs is to grasp the proportion between water and vinegar. Yup! it's VINEGAR. Bring water to boil, add salt and vinegar, then crack an egg into a cup and carefully add it to the water. It's approximately 4tbsp of vinegar to 500ml of water. It's quite amusing to watch as the egg white envelops round the yolk (with a little help from Mr. Spoon) and forms a pretty little treasure bag. If your egg white become scattered when it hits the water, you need more vinegar. But if you add too much of it, your egg will taste sour. So balance is the key...

This is Hung. He's become our frontline warrior. Basically he gets to do everything first, commits all the mistakes and we learn from him. Hung, it's been really helpful. Thanks for reminding us it's important to remember the salt and pepper. Oh, but I must add, he made the most beautiful poached egg among the 3 of us (the first egg to ever go into the pot...) *Clap Clap*

Presenting to you....Tania, our dearest Egg "Opener", which to date, Francois is still teasing her about. While most of us cracks our eggs, she opens them :)

Our fluffy clouds of poached eggs. The runny yolks are what makes me salivate. We lower the eggs into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking and also to store it for future use. It comes in handy if you're cooking eggs for a whole bunch of people. This can be done an hour or two before, and then reheated in boiling water for about a min before serving.

Omelette! You can have almost ANY filling you want, anything you think can go with eggs. The key to a beautiful omelette is your ability to work the pan with your spatula and roll the omelette to envelop all its toppings without it breaking.

It comes with practise. It turned out that Hung's omelette was the most pretty looking one. Mine isn't even worth taking a picture of. Tania's was LOADED with good stuff. Oh I forgot to mention, our frontline warrior had the prettiest looking omelette... BUT he forgot salt and pepper. Well, we learn that sometimes looks are not everything...

It's serious business here.

We moved on to making egg benedictes. I remember watching The Prince and I and how the butler was cooking egg benedicte on a portable stove in a hostel room. Anyway, egg benedicte is typically poached egg serve on a toasted bagel with meat and greens, topped with hollandaise sauce. So here we are, making our own hollandaise sauce and as with most of the sauces we made, involved whisking...

and more whisking...

and more whisking....

Trust me, the smile was not a true reflection of the condition of my hands.

The therapeutic part

I need to get my hands on one of these. You can torch anyone... anything I mean.

My beautifully torched Egg Benedicte

Finally, we did a scrambled egg with smoked salmon. I always thought scrambled eggs was made with whisked eggs, but apparently the yolks are only beaten together with the white when it hits the pan. You can see the shreds of whites among the yellow. To make your scrambles a little smoother, add a splash of cream :)

For the first time, I had too much eggs.

Power Week

Last week was probably one of the most eventful week I've had in a long long time. Asia Conference was just phenomenal. The message wasn't particularly one that we've never heard of before but it clicked this time. One person can make a difference. The power of one isn't just for the intelligent or talented, but simply for the willing. As long as you're willing to give, your love and giving goes a long way.

Well, I hope this blog's been giving you an appetite! I had a blast last Saturday with 2 back to back sessions of non-stop aroma! Mummy and 1st aunt have been attending a number of Chef Eric Low's cooking classes and everytime they never fail to give praises. Also known as Chef Yong, he gives demo classes at community centres on particular weekday nights and weekends, empowering the regular women and housewives to create restaurant-salivating dishes at the comfort of their own homes. What he says of his profession: He Cooks, Hosts, Educates and Feeds people about food, ie. CHEF.

And so, I finally signed up for one of his classes at Cairnhill, though a little apprehensive about what to expect, but I must say, I enjoyed myself! Though it wasn't hands on, but I thought it was sufficient for me to duplicate it at home. The good thing about going for classes as opposed to just reading a recipe off a cookbook, is that you get to see the cooking process. It's crucial as most cookbooks omit little but key steps that transform your dish from being just ordinary to spectacular.

Menu:

Baba Ghanoush on Toast with Fresh Prawns

Osso Bucco

Molten Lava Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream

Chef Yong at work.

The key ingredient to Baba Ghanoush. These shrivelled up, mushy looking giants will probably not attract you, but I simply love the taste of it.

Baba Ghanoush on Toast with Fresh Prawns

Most of us are familiar with Hummus when it comes to Middle Eastern dips, but its cousin, Baba Ghanoush is an equally popular appetizer and dip in the Middle East too! You could serve alongside pita bread, raw vegetable sticks and even use it as a sandwich spread. I thought the garlic was a little overpowering though, would have enjoyed it more if it tasted more of eggplant. To give it a more vibrant colour, you could replace the prawns with tiger prawns, which has a beautiful deep orange colour and a firmer texture, which also helps to balance out the goo-iness of the Baba Ghanoush.

Osso Bucco

This is an Italian dish that traditionally uses veal shanks because of the long simmering time. The one we had was replaced with pork ribs because of the time factor. I think I would love an oxtail version. Served on a bed of spinach and chickpeas, finished off with a sprinkle of parsley and lemon zest.

Molten Lava Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream

This is a fail proof dessert. IF you manage to do it successfully, you serve it as molten lava chocolate cake, but if you miss it by a minute or two, you can serve it as chocolate pudding, but if you happen to need the toilet halfway through baking and overbakes it, you've just made for your guests some chocolate brownies.

Just when you think that's mouth-watering enough for the day.... I had part 2 of the day! As you can imagine, after a long week of chiong-ing in Asia Conference, I was sleep deprived and a little groggy when I went for lesson. But it was the most enjoyable class I've had so far! Probably cos everyone's getting to know each other, and my cooking buddies are the funnest people around!

Menu:

Braised Chicken in Red Wine with Mushrooms

Mashed Potatoes

Quiche Lorraine

Our pot of braised chicken in red wine bubbling away. I'm not really a fan of chicken (it's actually at the bottom of my list of favourite meats), so I wasn't particularly excited about this. But the red wine sauce was flavourful and really tasty. I would consider substituing the chicken with veal or beef shanks.

As you can see, I was the only one not paying attention...

Our tarts undergoing the test of heat. Can you what's sitting inside our tarts? It's bags of baking beans that helps to prevent our tart base from rising and keeps it flat. Brilliant. In case you think what a waste, the beans are reused.

Finally, our tarts are filled with bacon and cream then topped with parmesan cheese.

All ready for devouring.

Not bad for a first timer eh. Daddy said it was good, which is a rare compliment.

Homemade Noodles

This is as random as it gets. But I've got to shout about these noodles. Two sundays ago, I went back to jurong west for service and everytime I go back there, I have craving for one thing: Dry Homemade Noodles at Best Coffee Pte Ltd. Located at the intersection of Jurong West St 91 & St 92, this coffee shop brings back memories from days when Jurong West was the weekly hangout place before and after service and also SOT days. We use to da bao this as early as 8am in the morning, slurp it down with satisfaction before the SOT clap sounded.

This dry homemade ban mian never fails to put a smile on my face. I can't recall who introduced me to this but once I ate it, I was hooked. The owner of the stall would cook this the regular way, in a broth with the noodles, pork, vegetables and egg. Once it's done, he drains away the soup and serves it with a homemade secret recipe sauce, which is the highlight of the dish. The luscious rich dark soy based sauce accompanied with sambal chilli perfectly balances with the lightly seasoned handmade noodles. The noodles are cooked to my liking, firm but without the floury taste.

When it first comes. Littered with generous amounts of ba chor, shredded mushroon, fried ikan billis and a poached egg.

Look at that gorgeous colour.

The ba chor is well seasoned, tasty and peppery.

Try it.

Lesson 2!

Lesson 2!

Menu:

Creamy Pumpkin Soup

Potato Gratin

Grilled Sirloin Steak

Sauces: Black Pepper, Bearnaise, Shallot Red Wine and Tartare

Lesson 2 was much more hands on with a lot more stove-work while the first was more explanatory and I must say, I'm enjoying every minute of it! I'll let the pictures do the talking!

Everyone hard at work, chopping, slicing, dicing...

Potato Gratin. Thinly sliced potatoes bubbling away in a cream sauce with a dash of nutmeg, topped with a layer of mozerella cheese, giving it a beautiful golden crust.

It's a really easy dish to prepare and impress with. Simple ingredients, minimal cooking yet bursting with flavour.

Crushing our beads of black pepper for our black pepper sauce.

Tania would say," Can't we just buy it off the shelve?"

All set for our very own black pepper sauce! Talk about being organized. I think my dad would be very pleased if he saw this at home.

Getting ready (and jittery) for the big "act".

Walah! We kinda thought stunts like that would be better left to the professional. That's called Flambe`, where you light the alcohol in your pan with a torch, burning off the alcohol. What's it for?

To look sey...

Making our own tartare sauce, which involves whisking that made 3 pairs of hands really sore. The basics of tartare is really just egg yolks, mustard, white vinegar and corn oil. The combination together with consistent whisking gives you a smooth creamy sunny yellow sauce, which in my opinion, is far better than commercial made ones.

Tadah! The 4 sauces we made from scratch. In order: black pepper, tartare, shallot red wine and bearnaise. I love the black pepper while Tanya and husband loved the shallot red wine. Now I can have sauces to go along with my steak besides plain old mustard!

Chef. Knife. Meat. Charming.

That's Aaron. The one out of two guys in our class.

Just adjacent to the cooking studio is a small outdoor area where you can grill your meats and enjoy alfresco dining.

The picture speaks for itself.

Personally, the dish I loved the most was the creamy pumpkin soup. Not only does it have a gorgeous orange glow, it has a soothing sweetness that's qualifies it as top notch comfort food! Everybody should have a bowl of this.

Creamy Pumpkin Soup

1 peeled, seeded butternut pumpkin cut into big dice

1 chopped leek

1 chopped onion

3 cloves of garlic

2 tbsp butter

4 sticks of fresh thyme

1.5 litres chicken stock

250ml cream

Salt

Pepper

1. Melt the butter in a large pot

2. Add in onion, garlic, thyme and leek, stir till it looks soft and yummy

3. Add in pumkin, cook gently for 5 mins

4. Add the chicken stock and let it cook for about 30 mins till the pumkin is soft and googey

5. Blend the soup and strain if necessary

6. Bring it back to boil and add cream

7. Check seasoning and serve with croutons!