Homemade Char Siew (without artificial colouring)-updated 2/4/11

550 gm Pork shoulder butt meat (or whatever meat cut it's called) - marinated with 1/4 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp soy sauce, 1 tsp wine/liquor, 1/1/2 tsp five spice.

Marinade :

6 tbsp red wine husk/sediments (Hong Guk) (leftover sediments from making red rice wine)

400 ml water

6 tbsp rice wine

150 gm gula keping (Pin Tong)/ brown sugar (light)

4 tbsp chinese parsley/yim sai , very finely chopped
2tbsp coriander seeds powder

1.5 tbsp five spice powder

7 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp cooking oil/peanut oil

1 tbsp shao xing wine or 1 tsp whisky

1. Add 300 ml water with wine husk. Mix well and strain onto a bowl.

2. Mix the remaining sediments with 100 ml water and do the same.

3. Mix the strained sediment mixture with chinese parlsley, five spice, soy sauce, and rice wine

4. Heat the mixture in wok or pot (stainless steel only) and melt the sugar/pin tong.

5. simmer under medium low heat, stirring constantly until it is reduced to a 250 ml glaze.

6. Turn off heat and add in oil and shao xing wine.

7. Meanwhile, sliced pork into thinner strip if the whole shoulder butt is too thick, and marinade with salt and spices for a while before mixing in the cooled marinade.

8. Marinade for at least 3 hours before grilling it in the preheated oven under medium high heat. (Line the botton pan with aluminium foil and place below the grill so that the excess oil or liquid drips onto the aluminium foil). Bake (gas mark 3-4/170 degrees celcius) until it is cooked and slightly charcoaled at the sides, turning and brushing it twice or so and (actually...the more the better) with the marinade.

Note: The uncooked pieces may be kept in individual zip-lock packs and kept frozen until it is needed.

Beef Rendang

Well, this turned out really nice ...

Ingredients:

120 gm shallots

1 bulb garlic

1.5 inch galangal, sliced

4-5 slices ginger, sliced

1/2 - 1 tbsp chilli giling

3/4 tbsp asam jawa with 300 ml water, strain

1 cinnamon

1 star anise

1-2 tbsp garam marsala

2 lemon grass, bruised

1 whole turmeric leaf (daun kunyit), knotted

200 ml thick coconut cream (santan) - harmuni/ayam brand

4-5 lime leaves, thinly shredded

3-3.5 tbsp kerisik

500 gm beef, cut into 1 - 2 cm cubes each

Method:

1. Grind ginger, shallots, garlic and galangal/lengkuas with chilli giling.

2. Heat 2 tbsp oil and "tumis"/stir fry grinded items with cinamon and anise, garam marsala for 1-2 minutes before adding in coconut milk. Bring to boil (stirring constantly)

3. Add in strained asam jawa juice , lemon grass, turmeric leaves, lime leaves and bring to boil.

4. Add in beef and alow to simmer for 10-15 minues uncovered

5. Add in kerisik and mix well and allow to simmer, closed lid, until the meat is cooked to the desired tenderness. (You may need to add more water in batches when it dries up too quickly, and stir constantly so that it doesn't get burnt.)

6. When its done, turn up the heat and cook intil the gravy dries up to coat the pieces of meat and when the oil separates.

Deep-fried "Lam Yu" Pork Rib

Ingredients:

8 pcs pork rib

3 cubes "lam Yu"/fermented beancurds (red)

2 tbsp Ginger Juice

2 tbsp chopped garlic

1 tbsp Shao Xing Wine/Rum

t tbsp Tapioca Flour

2 tbsp oil

1 Lime

Oil for deep-frying

Methods:

1. Marinate pork rib with ginger juice, wine, "Lam Yu" and flour for half a day (in a chiller)

2. Heat oil for deepfrying until little bubbles forms.

3. Reduce heat (to medium) and place in the marinated ribs slowly into hot oil. (do not stir)

4. Let it cook for 2 minutes before turning it round or it will stick and its juice leaked.

5. Continue frying until it turns golden brown in color and drain the oil with absorbent paper.

6. In a pan, add in 2 tbsp oil and stirfry garlic until lightly golden in color (not burnt) and quickly add in the ribs.

7. Briefly stir for a few seconds before arranging onto a platter. Squeeze some lime juice over it b4 serving.

Note: Its safer to fry the ribs longer. Itt will not be dry and tough as the ginger juice works as a meat tenderizer (for most red meat). Plus the cornstarch helps seals in its juice...

Vinegar-Trotter (updated 1/4/11)

The ingredients for this dish is really simple but loads of work. The trick is to maintan a BALANCE in the usage of ingredients. Otherwise the the VT will end up being either too sweet or unbearably sour.

In my recipe, I use cane sugar(CS) (Light yellow in color) instead of plain sugar(PS)/ brown sugar(BS) for a few reasons. Firstly, CS's sweetness is milder and tastes better than that of the PS/BS. Secondly, the resulting vinegar stock will be clearer (meaning no floating objects or foams). The choice of black vinegar is important. The brand that I use is "teen seong tin". There are of course brands that already had sugar mixed into it but with that, you have less control over the taste of the dish. Do not substitute it with "chit chou" or red (rice) vinegar. For those who are staying overseas and have problem buying this brand, you may use balsamic vinegar which is of course more expensive.

Lastly, you HAVE to have black beans. It is in my cooking terms called the 'filler'. For the trotter, try buying the fore legs instead of hind legs because it has lesser fat (healthier) and more tender. The resulting stock will be clearer too.

You will also need to prepare the dish about 1  day ahead.

Ingredients: (for 15-20 pax)

3 trotters (3.5 kg) chopped into smaller pieces (abt 1/2 size of the fist). Not too small or it will melt into nothing.

1.5 kg of old ginger - cleaned (do not peel) and briefly smashed.

350 gm of cane sugar/brown sugar

150-160 ml light soy sauce

1750 ml black vinegar

3 ltr of water

500- 600 gm beans (preferably 600 gm)

15-20 hard boiled eggs, peeled

1. In a LARGE pot mix all ingredients (except trotters & eggs) and bring to boil. Then let it simmer for about an hour or so. Turn of fire add in peeled hard boil eggs and set aside for one day. 

2. Don't worry if by this time, the mixture taste too sour (not sweet enough) or not salty enough. Once you add the trotter in, it should balance up. So if you add in more sugar or salt and balance it at this stage, the final result will be too sweet.

Clean the trotters (next day)

1. Bring to boil a large wok of water with 2 handful of coarse salt.

2. Meanwhile, briefly rub the chopped trotters with 2 handful of coarse salt and and wash away the salt under running tap.

3. Once the water in the wok boils, place 1/2 the trotters in it (the water temperatture will fall, so bring it to boil again) to get rid of the scums. Once the water boils, remove the the trotters dump it into ice water.

4. Use a the blade of the knife and briefly scrape on the skins to remove the whitish/yellowish layers on the skins AND peel off the white layers near the tips(fingers) of the trotters.

5. Wash the trotters again with clean water and set aside. Repeat step 3-5 again for the remaining half of the trotters.

6. In the pot of vinegar mixture, bring mixture to boil and add in all the trotters. Simmer the trotters for 20 minutes. The trotters will shrink when its fats has melted into the vinegar mixture.

7. Turn off fire and set aside and let it soak in the vinegar.

Serving

1. Before serving, reheat the VT and simmer for 30 minutes or so, (depending on desired texture)

IMPORTANT : must be served hot.

General rule : 1 trotter = 580/600ml vinegar = 1Ltr water = 110 gm sugar = 50 ml soy sauce