Shaking beef

One of my new year resolutions is to try something new especially in cooking . What's the use of being a "food explorer"? LOL!

I tried SHAKING BEEF. The recipe is from the Periplus Mini Cookbook. This is good for 4 servings.

Ingredients:

750 g piece lean beef fillet
1 1/2 tbsp fish sauce
1 1/2 tbsp light soy sauce (if you noticed in the market, there are different kinds of soy sauce. It takes me time to look for it coz what's available in my kitchen is the thick soy sauce)
1 1/2 tsp caster (superfine sugar)
6 garlic cloves, crushed
3 spring onions (scallions), white part only finely chopped
60 ml (1/4 cup) vegetable oil
2 tsp rice vinegar
2 tsp lime juice
1 tsp light soy sauce, extra
100 g mignonette or green or lettuce leaves ( I forgot that we just consumed our lettuce, so I just steamed bok choy or Chinese white cabbage instead:))

Procedure:

1. Cut the beef fillet into 2 cm (3/4 inch) cubes and place in a non-metallic bowl. Combine the fish sauce, soysauce, sugar, garlic, spring onion and 1 tsp of the oil in a small bowl or jug with 3/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper and 1/2 tsp salt. Pour over the meat, toss together so that the meat is well coated, then cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or overnight. (In my case, it's 24 hours)

2. To make the dressing, combine the rice vinegar, lime juice, extra soysauce, 2 tsp of the oil and 2 tsp water in a non-metallic bowl or jug. Wash, trim and dry the lettuce leaves, then toss with the dressing. Arrange the leaves on a serving plate. (as i told you, lettuce is not available in my kitchen, so I just steamed the bok choy and dressed it:))

3. Heat a wok over high heat, add 1 tbsp of the oil ans swirl to coat the side of the wok. When the oil is hot, add half the beef in one layer, allowing it to sit without stirring for 1 minute, so that a brown crust forms on the bottom. Stir-fry the beef quickly, or use the handle to shake the wok vigorously, tossing the beef around in the heat. Cook for 3-4 minutes for medium-rare, or until cooked to your liking ( I like well-done). Remove from the wok and repeat with the remaining oil and beef. Arrange the beef over the lettuce leaves and serve immediately with steamed rice.

It taste like steak, said my hubby. I'm just glad he like it. That's the important thing coz he's the only customer I have...LOL!

entry for

Yummy Sunday- Fried Rice with Seafood

I order "Kaw Pad Talae" Fried rice with seafood in one of the local restaurant in Bangkok and I didn't expect that shrimp would be served in this form...LOL! It's usually served shelled.

I think everybody know how to cook fried rice but Thai fried rice gets much of its unique flavor from the mix of fish sauce, soy sauce, chili peppers and lime. The cilantro and a dusting of pre-ground white pepper gives the flavors a clean, rounded finish.

I wanna share the recipe I learned from Group Recipes:

Ingredients:

* 2 bowls of cooked rice (cold)
* 50 grams of seafood (shrimp & squid)
* 50 grams of pork (finely sliced)
* 100 grams of kay lan or cabbage
* 2 eggs
* 50 grams of onions, finely sliced
* 2 garlic, finely chopped
* 1 chilli ( if you like the heat)
* 1 fresh tomato, cut into small slices
* 1 tbs soy sauce
* 1 tbs oyster sauce
* 1 teaspoon fish sauce
* pinch of sugar
* 2 tbs of oil
* pinch of salt and pepper


Directions:

1. with oil, saute garlic and onion (chilli) until fragrant
2. add pork, keep stirring until pork is cooked and brown
3. add seafood, stir well add tomatoes, kay lan toss well
4. add eggs, scramble,
5. add rice, soy sauce, oyster sauce, fish sauce and sugar, salt and pepper
6. taste, if it's not salty enough you can add more fish sauce
7. and if you like a richer flavor add more oyster sauce
8. serve hot
9. if you like, you can serve it with a sunny side up

Making great fried rice requires a number of tricks:
- A wok - it is the best tool for fried rice. If you don't, it can be tricky but still manageable.
- High heat - you want your pan as hot as possible. That's why it frequently tastes so much better at a restaurant.
- Dry rice - Making your rice a little drier than normal or using day-old rice keeps the rice from clumping together and turning into wok-concrete.
- Ground black or white pepper and lime - You'll be surprised how much flavor the ground pepper and lime can bring to fried rice.

Happy Sunday and enjoy drooling for foods at Perfectly Blended.

on exploring my own kitchen

I've been changing this blog's templates from one template to another for the past few days and since it's a free blogger template, I've seen lot of us using the same template I opted lately. So, I revert to this original template designed alone for Tasty Exploration by a good friend of mine, the owner of Femikey's Design. I really wonder why I decided to change the look of this blog which in fact when I finally decided to upload back the old template, I love it all over again! LOL! It's just man's nature not to be contented of what's in front of him but when it's gone you'll have to look for it. Oh, man! It's so confusing...LOL!

So much of my "blahs", this new year I wanted to try exploring food in my own kitchen especially the Thai dishes. I've been in Thailand for almost 4 years now but I'm not yet expert on their food in terms of cooking them in my own kitchen rather than ordering them. It's just that I'm not familiar with their other ingredients and I don't know where to find them. I'm looking for some Thai dishes' recipes and luckily this month I found some at SEED bookstore. If I could have budget, I would love to purchase some recipe booklet and try them in my own kitchen and share some with you .

If you're here in Thailand, I don't know if you would be like me who'd like to prefer eating outside coz it's affordable, it's very delicious in spite of it's "chili" and nutritious. You could even have 3 varieties of viand for only 30 baht. Now that I have my own family, I prefer cooking for them amidst my pretty hectic schedules.

I just hope that through this blog, I'll be inspired and motivated to explore more in my kitchen so that I do have something to offer to you even once a week, right?

That's all for now and Happy Children's Day in Thailand:)

Yummy Sunday- Daiichi's Menu

Happy New Year to all Yummy Sunday participants! I wanna share to you the menu we had during the new year's party of our school. I don't get the exact name of each menu but I'll try to describe some of the ingredients. I tried to name them Daichii's Menu coz the venue of the party is in Daichii Hotel.

sliced fried chicken with mayonnaise and sliced lemon on top and garnished with dried seaweeds

seafood salad with fish balls and meat balls

stir-fried seafood with hot dog and quails' eggs on edible bread basket

More Yummy food at Perfectly Blended.

Happy New year 2010!