So Chicken Congee seems to be the new thing in the foodie world at the moment. After seeing mellie's post about making chicken congee and then reading the original recipe here, I figured if I could shell out $6 for a bowl, I may as well try and make my own.
Growing up, I was not the biggest fan of congee at all. Whenever I was sick in bed, the smell of steaming plain congee would come wafting up the stairs and I would inevitably be brought a large bowl. Eaten plain, it is nothing more than literally boiled rice porridge and doesn't have much flavour at all. My grandma's favourite garnish was flossed pork, which added to it a nice sweet meaty flavour. My mum, on the other hand, loved congee with a passion and whenever we went out for a traditional breakfast at our local wet market hawker stalls, she would inevitably work on a bowl of congee with sliced pork and century egg whilst my dad and I chowed down on plates of steamed rice rolls with soy sauce and sesame seeds. Thus when my mum heard of my newest cooking endevour, she started laughing down the phone, then proceeded to call my grandma, who commented that I was "finally becoming a real Chinese person" and perhaps given that I had started to cook Chinese food, maybe I could find a nice Chinese boy instead of the gwai lo that I am currently dating. Ha. (My grandma is, however, slightly mollified by the fact that A is studying medicine, which is apparently something that works very well in his favour. The Chinese are crazy (actually - just my grandma is).
My newfound love for congee was triggered by the cold winter that has thankfully been chased away by the warm shining sun, and was also spurred on by the wonderful sliced duck and lettuce congee I had a few weeks ago at Supper Inn. Yongtze's recipe was easy enough to follow, but I substituted with whatever I had, meaning I used chicken thigh fillets and minced ginger instead of chicken breast and the traditional sliced garlic. Also, I had unfortunately run out of soy sauce. However, I can tell you all that it still tasted delicious. Congee is one of those recipes, like pasta, where you can pretty much chuck anything into it and it will generally turn out OK. It's easy and warming and comforting and easy to store in the fridge to be heated up in the microwave when you get home after a long day. Plus, it can traditionally be eaten at any time of the day. I think I'll have some for brekky tomorrow morning!
Chicken Congee
(modified from Yongtze's recipe)
1 cup Jasmine rice
Salt
1 tbsp vegetable oil
10 cups water and/or chicken stock (I used a mixture of both)
1 tbsp minced garlic
1 chicken thigh fillet
Sesame oil
1. Wash and drain the rice in a pot. Add 1 tsp salt and 1 tbsp vegetable oil, mix well and allow to sit for 10 minutes.
2. Add water/stock to the rice. Bring it to a boil. Turn down the heat to medium low, stirring occasionally. Simmer for 20 minutes.
3. Marinate the chicken with sesame oil and minced garlic.
4. Add the chicken to the congee. Cook for 5 - 10 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked. Take the chicken out and set aside to cool.
5. Season the congee with salt and cook for another 30 minutes or so.
6. Shred the cooked chicken and throw into the pot. Cook for another 5 - 10 minutes until the congee reaches your preferred consistency.
Showing posts with label chinese. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chinese. Show all posts
Monday, August 27, 2007
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
New Experiences
After finding ourselves in the city after a lesson at CAE at 9.30 on Monday night, we were starving and frankly, the thought of food was the only thing keeping us from not going home due to exhaustion of busy-ness. C thought of Supper Inn, which excited me beyond belief. Supper Inn holds a bit of nostalgia for me, as it was the place where my parents took me the night before I was due to start orientation at uni a while ago. Also, in my two-and-half years in Melbourne, I had heard lots about the famed congee (or rice porridge) and I was itching to try it. At that point though, probably anything hot put in front of me would have been OK by me. Nonetheless, we trekked to Chinatown and up the rickety stairs, and after a 2 minute wait, we sat and ordered. C ordered a thousand-century egg and pork congee, whereas I went with the less conventional, but more appetizing (to me, at least) roast duck congee, as well as some fried dough sticks to go with it. Mmmm. The congee was flavourful even on its own, without any smidgen of MSG (or perhaps they just cooked it so well that I didn't taste it). The duck was delicious, tender and slim with barely any fat. The chinese donut, sliced into little bits, dunked into the congee was just the icing on top of the cake. Speaking of cake, we didn't have any cake, but we did have banana fritters with vanilla ice cream covered with some type of heavy syrup. I loved every bit about that meal, including the fact that it was mostly conducted in Cantonese, there were a large number of Caucasians there appreciating the authenticity of the food, and also I'd been waiting to eat this meal for a few years now. Though the congee was a little pricy ($6 each), the meal worked out to $10 for each of us, so we were pretty happy with it. Perusing the menu, C commented that a proper meal with dishes a la carte would probably have worked out to way more expensive. However, it was still delicious and I pronounce it one of the Best Meal Ever, the first of its kind here at The Secret Foodie. In fact, just thinking about it is making me hungry....
As for tonight, on the pretense of 'research', I trekked to the Moroccan Soup Bar accompanied with T, C and a bunch of other girls. We arrived at 6.20 to be told that they were all booked out (we forgot to book ahead of time), but if we could eat fast, we could have the tables that were reserved for 7.30 onwards. So we plonked down, and little glasses of sweet mint tea were handed to us as we waited for the rest of our group to turn up. I, of course, had heard all about this place for a long, long time and had, again, been meaning to try it out. We all decided to go for the $17.50 banquet, and platters of pita bread and dips were brought out to us. The hommus was a particular winner in my books, and other parts of the entree platter included marinated carrots, potatoes and olives, broccoli dip, tzatziki. As soon as we had wiped the last bit of hommus off the plate, more plates laden with beautiful looking food came out and were put in front of us. We had spicy vegetable stews with couscous, roasted eggplant, lentil stew with rice, a potato dish with rice, the famed chickpea bake and homemade dolmades. The meal became a bit of a blur, as everyone tried to juggle spooning food into their bowls, passing all the dishes around and trying to eat at the same time. Everyone loved the chickpea bake, whereas I, though enjoyable, had concluded that perhaps I just am not necessarily that partial to chickpeas. I don't know. It was still really very good though, and I loved the not-so-crispy-yet-not-soggy bits of baked pita bread in the dish. I particularly liked the spicy veggie stews with couscous. My utmost favourite part, though, was the cardamom sweetened coffee and the sweets that came at the end. We had a slice with pistachios, which was very nice. There was also a cream puff that looked rather like a spring roll which I didn't try, as I was more partial to the biscuit which was crumbly on the outside and had a nice dollop of sweet paste (perhaps date?) in the middle. Delicious. At that point, the 7.30 party arrived and we thought it might be prudent to scooch off so they could have their pre-booked table. Also we were just itching to go home to drink our bottle of wines in our bags.
--
Supper Inn Chinese Restaurant
15 Celestial Ave
Melbourne
Moroccan Soup Bar
183 St Georges Rd
Fitzroy North
As for tonight, on the pretense of 'research', I trekked to the Moroccan Soup Bar accompanied with T, C and a bunch of other girls. We arrived at 6.20 to be told that they were all booked out (we forgot to book ahead of time), but if we could eat fast, we could have the tables that were reserved for 7.30 onwards. So we plonked down, and little glasses of sweet mint tea were handed to us as we waited for the rest of our group to turn up. I, of course, had heard all about this place for a long, long time and had, again, been meaning to try it out. We all decided to go for the $17.50 banquet, and platters of pita bread and dips were brought out to us. The hommus was a particular winner in my books, and other parts of the entree platter included marinated carrots, potatoes and olives, broccoli dip, tzatziki. As soon as we had wiped the last bit of hommus off the plate, more plates laden with beautiful looking food came out and were put in front of us. We had spicy vegetable stews with couscous, roasted eggplant, lentil stew with rice, a potato dish with rice, the famed chickpea bake and homemade dolmades. The meal became a bit of a blur, as everyone tried to juggle spooning food into their bowls, passing all the dishes around and trying to eat at the same time. Everyone loved the chickpea bake, whereas I, though enjoyable, had concluded that perhaps I just am not necessarily that partial to chickpeas. I don't know. It was still really very good though, and I loved the not-so-crispy-yet-not-soggy bits of baked pita bread in the dish. I particularly liked the spicy veggie stews with couscous. My utmost favourite part, though, was the cardamom sweetened coffee and the sweets that came at the end. We had a slice with pistachios, which was very nice. There was also a cream puff that looked rather like a spring roll which I didn't try, as I was more partial to the biscuit which was crumbly on the outside and had a nice dollop of sweet paste (perhaps date?) in the middle. Delicious. At that point, the 7.30 party arrived and we thought it might be prudent to scooch off so they could have their pre-booked table. Also we were just itching to go home to drink our bottle of wines in our bags.
--
Supper Inn Chinese Restaurant
15 Celestial Ave
Melbourne
Moroccan Soup Bar
183 St Georges Rd
Fitzroy North
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Catching up (yet again)
Yes, I know, I've been gone a while. I'm sure my readers (all 3 of you, maybe) will have missed me, but right after exams, I went gallivanting places with no internet connection, hence my disappearing act. As I write, I am sitting in a nice little room in Oxford, England, with the sun shining in from the window onto my desk. Looking out, I see beautifully lush green grass and a babbling little brook that bubbles merrily while snow white swans float down, surrounded by mallard ducks bobbing up and down. Why am I here? C, R (another friend from uni) and I are all here at Oxford University for a month long summer school program on Int'l Human Rights Law (since we're all in law school and stuff). On our way here, C and I decided to do a bit of travelling. Ergo, involuntary internet hiatus.
Leaving Melbourne about 3 weeks ago, C and I took 3 days in Hong Kong to see my family. Noy many (if any) of you may know this, but I lived in HK for 8 years after moving from Adelaide at the age of 10, after which I headed to Melbourne for uni. HK is possible THE BEST place for authentic Chinese food of any kind, and there is just so much of it everywhere. The entire culture is built around eating, resulting in a bustling, cosmopolitan city where East meets West, especially with regards to the food. I know you guys are hanging out for the food talk, so I'll get right down into it. We literally ate and ate and ate for those 3 days. We had authemtic yum cha in the morning surrounded by lots of old retired men and women gossiping and reading the paper, as steaming bamboo containers of har gow (prawn dumplings), mini glutinous rice packets wrapped in lotus leaves, malay cake (a beautifully spongy Chinese.. well, sponge, cake) and char siu pao were put before our hungry mouths as the smells wafted into our noses. The most unusual dim sum they had was a black and white sesame seed paste bun. I LOVE sesame seed generally, and sesame seed paste filled dumplings are my favourite Chinese dessert, so this was an absolute winner in my book. Beautiful.
We also had Shanghainese food, another one of my all-time favourite cuisines (right up there with Indian). We had succulent xiao loong baos (steamed pork dumplings - the special part is that there's a bit of tasty soup enclosed inside the dumpling when they steam it, so be careful when you bite into it lest a hot stream of soup squirts out onto your clothing, or even worse, into your eye) and dan dan noodles (Shanghai 'pulled' noodles in a spicy peanut-y soup), both favourites of mine.
Our last meal was at a local restaurant in Shen Zheng, an area whose restaurants specialise in roast goose. In my opinion, roast goose is a hell of a lot better than duck. The meat is more moist, there's a great depth of flavour and when you roast it the chinese way, the honey-glazed crispy skin (fat and all) is an essential part of the taste when eaten with the dark meat. Taken simply with plum sauce, steamed rice and some green veggies to balance it out, it makes one hell of a satisfying meal.
After leaving HK, our original plan was to head to London for a week. Whilst in HK, however, we decided that this, being both our first times in Europe, would be a great opportunity to see other parts of Europe. Somehow, with the help of lastminute.com, we found ourselves a few days later in Ibiza, Spain. Now this place is known mainly for the crazy insane all-night discos, beautiful beaches, hoardes of English tourists and the origin of many a Ministry of Sound music album. Those of you who know, the original Cafe Del Mar is actually here. I'm not really into techno or house music at all, so me? I was just there for the sun. Our days consisted of waking at noon, having a huge meal with sangria, margaritas, pina coladas or daiquaris, falling asleep on the beach for several hours in the afternoon, wandering amongst the rambling windy cobblestoned streets to do some shopping, snacking on some fresh watermelon, more cocktails or homemade icecream, tanning some more, watching the sun set with yet more cocktails, then heading to a club till sunrise when we would flop into bed - then do it all over again 6 hours later. Trust me, the best and surest way of getting over jetlag. But the food, oh, the food. We feasted on paellas, fresh calamari, fish and other seafood caught earlier that morning. We had some rather touristy, b ut still excelent, Tex-Mex food - burritos with chorizo, nachos with beans, cheese, sour cream and guacamole, tacos with chilli con carne. To commemorate our last night there, C and I indulged in the best Spanish food we've ever had at El Rincon de Pepe, allegedly the first tapas bar in Spain. Whether this is true or not, it was the best tapas I'd certainly ever had, and judging by the number of locals there, it was probably true in the town of San Antonio (and possibly Ibiza). Accompanied with a lovely white wine, we started with some bread and olive oil, as well as a marinated eggplant, peppers and capsicum salad. Gazpacho then arrived, as did a Spanish spinich omelette (more like a frittata than anything else). The best deepfried baby squid then arrived, all crispy and hot and tart from the lemon juice. Mussels cooked with vinegar followed, as did lamb kebabs with home-cut fries. Full as we were, C insisted on trying at least Spanish dessert, which turned out to be a version of creme brulee. It was served cold, but with a crisp toffee top and tasted deliciously cool, feeling more like a firm custard. We rolled home after that, perfectly content.
Sunset with sangria
Paella, dispersed with beautiful prawns and mussels; and deep-fried calamari rings, eaten surrounded by a bunch of Spanish middle-aged men drinking coffees and no doubt gossiping about the 2 obviously foreign girls in their midst.
El Rincon de pepe - Best tapas EVER.
Unfortunately, all holidays must come to an end at some point, and ours unfortunately did. Heading into London was an interesting experience. I admit we were a bit biased against London, having just had the holiday of our lives in Ibiza. C was definitely not impressed with London, wanting to get out of there as soon as possible. As for myself, I enjoyed the architecture, the history, the museums and found everything fascinating. The British Museum and Library was awesome, as was Westminster Abbey and Cathedral. Hamley's, a children's toy store, was fun, even for grown-ups such as ourselves. Harrod's was ridiculously overpriced, though the famed hot chocolate is apparently to die for. Other foodie highlights weren't much to speak of, except for a fantastic £4.5 full English brekkie at a random cafe - two pieces of toast generously buttered, sausage, fried egg, mushrooms, baked beans and bacon. Deliciously greasy and satisfying. C also managed to find the perfect muffin at EAT whilst waiting for our flight to Ibiza from Gatwick airport - i think it was something like bran, cherry and oatmeal. Absolutely wholesomely delicious. Despite all this, I'm not fully convinced by London. I've seen enough big cities, and with the exception of the history behind it, London seems to me just like any other big city - large, packed with people, sometimes unfriendly.
After arriving in the beautiful little town of Oxford, I have been impressed with the charm of this small town as well as the quaint little cobblestone streets and the beautiful Oxford campus that spans across the whole Oxford CBD. I'm living at St. Catherine's College, which, as a 'conference' guest, we have been getting the best treatment, and this means 3 meals a day, catered fully. Breakfast is a full smogasboard of cereals, pastries, cold meats, fruit and toast as well as hot breakfasts with sausages, beans, mushrooms, eggs and bacon. After our morning classes, we have coffee/tea with biscuits. At lunch, we have starters, then the main meal (yesterday was seared swordfish steak with some sort of creamy sauce, salad on the side, bread roll, cheese and crackers and icecream for dessert). And if that's not enough, dinner is pretty much the same as lunch. I mean seriously, yesterday was confit of duck with honey and ginger glaze, served with creamy mashed potatoes, green beans and gravy; topped off with banana cheesecake with caramel sauce. We are so well fed here that I'm positive if I eat everything, I will go home with added weight (the complete opposite of what I was hoping for), so I've taken to skipping lunch just so I will at least be hungry for dinner. That seems to have backfired against me today, as its 6.10pm (dinner's in 50 minutes) and I've been absolutely starving for the past 2 hours. It's been lovely recapping what I've been doing, but I've missed the foodie world. I'll keep you guys, whoever you are, posted on the highlights of English cuisine. Till then, cheerio!
The beautifully green Hyde Park Corner.
Leaving Melbourne about 3 weeks ago, C and I took 3 days in Hong Kong to see my family. Noy many (if any) of you may know this, but I lived in HK for 8 years after moving from Adelaide at the age of 10, after which I headed to Melbourne for uni. HK is possible THE BEST place for authentic Chinese food of any kind, and there is just so much of it everywhere. The entire culture is built around eating, resulting in a bustling, cosmopolitan city where East meets West, especially with regards to the food. I know you guys are hanging out for the food talk, so I'll get right down into it. We literally ate and ate and ate for those 3 days. We had authemtic yum cha in the morning surrounded by lots of old retired men and women gossiping and reading the paper, as steaming bamboo containers of har gow (prawn dumplings), mini glutinous rice packets wrapped in lotus leaves, malay cake (a beautifully spongy Chinese.. well, sponge, cake) and char siu pao were put before our hungry mouths as the smells wafted into our noses. The most unusual dim sum they had was a black and white sesame seed paste bun. I LOVE sesame seed generally, and sesame seed paste filled dumplings are my favourite Chinese dessert, so this was an absolute winner in my book. Beautiful.
We also had Shanghainese food, another one of my all-time favourite cuisines (right up there with Indian). We had succulent xiao loong baos (steamed pork dumplings - the special part is that there's a bit of tasty soup enclosed inside the dumpling when they steam it, so be careful when you bite into it lest a hot stream of soup squirts out onto your clothing, or even worse, into your eye) and dan dan noodles (Shanghai 'pulled' noodles in a spicy peanut-y soup), both favourites of mine.
Our last meal was at a local restaurant in Shen Zheng, an area whose restaurants specialise in roast goose. In my opinion, roast goose is a hell of a lot better than duck. The meat is more moist, there's a great depth of flavour and when you roast it the chinese way, the honey-glazed crispy skin (fat and all) is an essential part of the taste when eaten with the dark meat. Taken simply with plum sauce, steamed rice and some green veggies to balance it out, it makes one hell of a satisfying meal.
After leaving HK, our original plan was to head to London for a week. Whilst in HK, however, we decided that this, being both our first times in Europe, would be a great opportunity to see other parts of Europe. Somehow, with the help of lastminute.com, we found ourselves a few days later in Ibiza, Spain. Now this place is known mainly for the crazy insane all-night discos, beautiful beaches, hoardes of English tourists and the origin of many a Ministry of Sound music album. Those of you who know, the original Cafe Del Mar is actually here. I'm not really into techno or house music at all, so me? I was just there for the sun. Our days consisted of waking at noon, having a huge meal with sangria, margaritas, pina coladas or daiquaris, falling asleep on the beach for several hours in the afternoon, wandering amongst the rambling windy cobblestoned streets to do some shopping, snacking on some fresh watermelon, more cocktails or homemade icecream, tanning some more, watching the sun set with yet more cocktails, then heading to a club till sunrise when we would flop into bed - then do it all over again 6 hours later. Trust me, the best and surest way of getting over jetlag. But the food, oh, the food. We feasted on paellas, fresh calamari, fish and other seafood caught earlier that morning. We had some rather touristy, b ut still excelent, Tex-Mex food - burritos with chorizo, nachos with beans, cheese, sour cream and guacamole, tacos with chilli con carne. To commemorate our last night there, C and I indulged in the best Spanish food we've ever had at El Rincon de Pepe, allegedly the first tapas bar in Spain. Whether this is true or not, it was the best tapas I'd certainly ever had, and judging by the number of locals there, it was probably true in the town of San Antonio (and possibly Ibiza). Accompanied with a lovely white wine, we started with some bread and olive oil, as well as a marinated eggplant, peppers and capsicum salad. Gazpacho then arrived, as did a Spanish spinich omelette (more like a frittata than anything else). The best deepfried baby squid then arrived, all crispy and hot and tart from the lemon juice. Mussels cooked with vinegar followed, as did lamb kebabs with home-cut fries. Full as we were, C insisted on trying at least Spanish dessert, which turned out to be a version of creme brulee. It was served cold, but with a crisp toffee top and tasted deliciously cool, feeling more like a firm custard. We rolled home after that, perfectly content.
Sunset with sangria
Paella, dispersed with beautiful prawns and mussels; and deep-fried calamari rings, eaten surrounded by a bunch of Spanish middle-aged men drinking coffees and no doubt gossiping about the 2 obviously foreign girls in their midst.
El Rincon de pepe - Best tapas EVER. Unfortunately, all holidays must come to an end at some point, and ours unfortunately did. Heading into London was an interesting experience. I admit we were a bit biased against London, having just had the holiday of our lives in Ibiza. C was definitely not impressed with London, wanting to get out of there as soon as possible. As for myself, I enjoyed the architecture, the history, the museums and found everything fascinating. The British Museum and Library was awesome, as was Westminster Abbey and Cathedral. Hamley's, a children's toy store, was fun, even for grown-ups such as ourselves. Harrod's was ridiculously overpriced, though the famed hot chocolate is apparently to die for. Other foodie highlights weren't much to speak of, except for a fantastic £4.5 full English brekkie at a random cafe - two pieces of toast generously buttered, sausage, fried egg, mushrooms, baked beans and bacon. Deliciously greasy and satisfying. C also managed to find the perfect muffin at EAT whilst waiting for our flight to Ibiza from Gatwick airport - i think it was something like bran, cherry and oatmeal. Absolutely wholesomely delicious. Despite all this, I'm not fully convinced by London. I've seen enough big cities, and with the exception of the history behind it, London seems to me just like any other big city - large, packed with people, sometimes unfriendly.
After arriving in the beautiful little town of Oxford, I have been impressed with the charm of this small town as well as the quaint little cobblestone streets and the beautiful Oxford campus that spans across the whole Oxford CBD. I'm living at St. Catherine's College, which, as a 'conference' guest, we have been getting the best treatment, and this means 3 meals a day, catered fully. Breakfast is a full smogasboard of cereals, pastries, cold meats, fruit and toast as well as hot breakfasts with sausages, beans, mushrooms, eggs and bacon. After our morning classes, we have coffee/tea with biscuits. At lunch, we have starters, then the main meal (yesterday was seared swordfish steak with some sort of creamy sauce, salad on the side, bread roll, cheese and crackers and icecream for dessert). And if that's not enough, dinner is pretty much the same as lunch. I mean seriously, yesterday was confit of duck with honey and ginger glaze, served with creamy mashed potatoes, green beans and gravy; topped off with banana cheesecake with caramel sauce. We are so well fed here that I'm positive if I eat everything, I will go home with added weight (the complete opposite of what I was hoping for), so I've taken to skipping lunch just so I will at least be hungry for dinner. That seems to have backfired against me today, as its 6.10pm (dinner's in 50 minutes) and I've been absolutely starving for the past 2 hours. It's been lovely recapping what I've been doing, but I've missed the foodie world. I'll keep you guys, whoever you are, posted on the highlights of English cuisine. Till then, cheerio!
The beautifully green Hyde Park Corner.
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