Satay for the meat lovers~

Do you like to eat meat? Do you like grilled meat? Well, most people love eating meat and what's more if it's grilled! If you do love eating meat, you must try one of our Malaysian exotic delicacy - satay. Usually, satay is a popular dish in Malaysia especially during celebrations and could be found throughout the country.

Satay consists of slices of meat on bamboo spine skewers, which are grilled over (usually)charcoal fire. Tumeric is often used to marinate the meat which gives its characteristic yellow colour. We usually have a variety of meat to choose from such as chicken, beef, mutton, pork(available in Malacca and Johor), venison, rabbit meat, ostrich meat and fish.

Satay is usually served with spicy peanut sauce dip, slivers of onions and cucumbers and ketupat. Pork satay can be served with pineapple based sauce. The ketupat is boiled rice wrapped in palm leaves.

The most popular types of ketupat found in Malaysia are ketupat nasi (made with plain rice) and ketupat daun palas (made with glutinous rice). Both varieties are wrapped in palm leaves and then boiled in water until cooked. It is said that ketupat daun palas originated from the northern states of Penang, Kedah and Perlis while ketupat nasi is more popular in Perak.

Satay Ingredients:

• 1 lb. meat- chicken, beef or pork
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 cup shallots
• 1 teaspoon coriander seeds
• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 1/4 inch piece turmeric root
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1/4 cup evaporated milk
• 1 tablespoon cooking oil
• about 35 bamboo sticks

Directions:
Cut meat into small thin pieces. Grind together the shallots, garlic, coriander seeds, cumin seeds & turmericuntil very fine. Combine ground spices with salt & sugar. Season meat with the ground spices and let marinate overnight(in a refrigerator of course).

When you are ready to grill soak the bamboo sticks in water so they won't burn, skewer the meat with the sticks, don't overcrowd.

Grill satay sticks over a charcoal fire (barbeque grill), basting occasionally with oil using lemon grass, smash and flatten to resemble a brush. Turn the skewers often to avoid the meat from getting burnt.

Ketupat ingredients:

• Rice, washed and drained- 2 cups
  
• Water - 4 cups
• Pandan(screwpine) leaves - 2
  
• Palm leaves(usually that is how they serve it in the picture shown above)

Directions:
Cook rice in water with a pandan leaves. When rice is soft, transfer it to a shallow square or rectangular dish.

Place a layer of plastic wrap over it. Place a folded clean dish cloth over it to compress the rice downwards until the dish is firmly packed. Put weight over the rice layer by placing a tray to fit and put some weights on it such as any can food.

Allow the rice to firm up into cake and cool it overnight in the refrigerator. Turn it out and cut into 2inches cubes.

Spicy Peanut Sauce ingredients:'

• Dry roasted peanuts - 2 cups
• Peanut oil or canola - 1/3 cup
• Water - 2-3 cups
• Sugar - 2 tbsp
• Tamarind Paste juice - 4 tbsp
• Salt to taste

Spice paste:

• Dried chillies, soaked in hot water - 6-8
• Garlic - 6 cloves
• Shallots - 6
  
• Candlenute(kemiri nuts) or macadamia nuts - 3
• Lemon grass stalks - 3
• Galangal(a type of ginger, a.k.a thai ginger) - 1 inch piece
• Coriander - 2 tbsp
• Cumin powder - 1 tsp

Directions:
Crush peanuts coarsely. Chop spice paste ingredients and blend until fine.
Heat oil and fry the spice paste with tamarind juice until fragrant on medium high heat. Add water slowly to thin mixture. Add sugar, salt and peanuts and stir frequently for 3-5 minutes.

Simmer for 15-20 minutes, or longer, stirring every few minutes until oil begins to separate. Taste and don't be afraid to add any extra ingredients to achieve the level of sweetness, tartness or heat you prefer. Serve sauce with sticks of satay, ketupat and sliced cubes of fresh cucumber and red onions.

Hope you'll enjoy the recipe~!

How to prepare Nasi Lemak

If you wish to prepare Nasi Lemak and try it out, here are the ingredients:

• Rice - 3 cups
• Coconut milk - 1/2 cup
• Water - 3 cups
• Pandan(screwpine) leaves, cleaned and knotted - 4 pieces

For sweet chilli paste(sambal):

• Dried chillies, softened and pounded - 50g
• Shallots - 50g
• Shrimp paste - 1 tsp
• Anchovies(ikan bilis) - 30g
• Sugar - 2tbsp
• Tamarind, soaked in 4tbsp water, squeezed and strained - 1 tbsp
• Salt to taste

Method
For sweet chilli paste:
Heat 8 tbsp oil in a wok, fry the anchovies until golden brown then put in chilli paste and fry till fragrant. Add sugar and tamrind water and stir fry it. Taste the paste with a spoon and add salt to taste. Continue to cook till paste thickens. Cool and serve with coconut rice.

For coconut rice:
Wash rice and drain it. Mix coconut milk with 3 cups of water and 1 tablespoon of salt.
Then, add the coconut milk and pandan leaves to the rice and cook. When the rice is almost dry, lower the heat. Let the rice to stand over low heat for 15 - 20 minutes. Serve hot(best for it's fragrance and taste) with peanuts, crispy anchovies(I personally like anchovies a lot that's why i have anchovies in my sweet chilli paste too!), cucumber slices, omelette or hard boiled egg and not to forget, the sweet chilli paste!

Servings: 4 persons

Enjoy this recipe! Hope you will be able to have a feel on one of Malaysia's breakfast~

Malaysian's favourite breakfast!!!

Well, well ,well, how should I start on this? Basically, reading this blog, I'll write about food, recipes and reviews of restaurants that I've tried, tasted, make and dine. I've not written any reviews on any restaurants because I do not have a digital camera >.<(don't laugh, it's really true!), and I have not been going to restaurants lately due to my busy working life~ Back to the topic. As a malaysian, I dare to say that most of us will have their own favourite breakfast. And I think that most malaysians like to have a breakfast of their own kind - Nasi Lemak!

Nasi Lemak, derived from the cooking process, the rice soaked in rich coconut cream and the mixture steamed with knotted screwpine(pandan) leaves for more fragrance. Occasionally, herbs such as ginger and lemon grass may also be added for additional fragrance.

This dish is served with cucumber slices, small dried anchovies(ikan bilis), roasted peanuts, hot spicy sauce (sambal), hard boiled egg, sometimes with pickled vegetables (achar) and stir fried water convolvulus (kangkong). Nasi lemak can also come with any other accompaniments such as chicken, cuttlefish, cockle, beef curry(beef stewed in coconut milk and spices). Most of these curry are spicy in nature.

You can find nasi lemak nearly anywhere as they are sold at roadsides, petrolstations, mamak stalls and restaurants. You can have it as breakfast or lunch or even dinner as you like because this dish is certainly going to be a love to your taste buds!

A Curry A Day Keeps Your Taste Buds Awake!

Hello! It's been really a long while since my last post on recipes. Been buzzing around with work and studies and the internet was out of my reach for 5months or so. That's why...

Anyway, I woke up early in the morning today and my dad told me he needed to use the car. Hence, he accompanied me to work as I drove to my office. We stopped by a mamak stall nearby my office and had breakfast. I had a roti telur with dahl curry.

I wasn't quite happy with the curry. Liquid, too clear, can't taste a good dahl for sure. It was one of the worse dahl curries ever made out of the hands of the mamaks! I have known quite a few mamak stalls who actually cook good dahl curry. So, I thought why not share the curry recipe with everyone?

Here it goes, it's really simple:

• 1 cup skinned dahl or yellow split peas

• 1/8 tsp. ground tumeric

• 1 tbls. peeled and very finely chopped shallots

• 1 tsp. ground cumin seeds

• 3-4 whole fresh green chillies slit down their middle

• 4 tbls. vegetable oil or 2 tbls. coconut oil and 2 tbls. ghee

• 1/2 tsp. whole black mustard seeds

• 10-12 fresh or dried curry leaves

• 1-2 whole hot dried red chillies broken up into 2-4 pieces each

• 2 tbls. peeled and finely sliced shallots

• 2 cloves garlic peeled and finely chopped

• 5 oz. (1 medium) sized tomato chopped

• 3/4 - 1 tsp. salt

• 1 1/4 cups tinned or fresh unsweetened coconut milk

Pick over the dahl and wash it in several changes of water and drain. Put in a pot and add 3 3/4 cups water as well as the tumeric. Stir to a boil. Turn the heat to low and cover, leaving the lid slightly ajar. Simmer the dahl for about 45 minutes.

Now put in the chopped shallots and ground cumin. Stir, cover in the same way as before and cook for another 15 minutes. Add the green chillies and cook for 10-15 minutes or until the dahl is tender. If the dahl seems too thick at any point, add up to 1/2 cup of boiling water.

The dal, at this stage should be like a thick paste-like soup. Leave on a very low heat as you complete the final step.

Heat the oil in a small frying pan over a medium flame. When hot put in the mustard seeds. As soon as the mustard seeds begin to pop. (this take a few seconds) put in the curry leaves and the red chillies. When the red chillies darken (this happens almost immediately) put in all the sliced shallots and garlic. Stir and fry until the shallots turn a reddish-brown color. Now add the tomato pieces. Stir and fry until they soften.

Pour the entire contents of the small frying pan into the dahl. Add the salt and mix. Add the coconut milk and stir it in. The dahl may be cooked several hours ahead of time and then reheated.

Hope you enjoy the recipe~