Sunday, June 26, 2011

Bak Kut Teh

I used to live just a few blocks away from a Bak Kut Teh place along Balestier St. It was famous for night walkers and food shops, very similar to Geylang but not as crowded.

There was this food joint I would always drive past but never stop, not because I didn't want to, but rather, I could never get a spot near by to park. It would usually be my last stop before heading home after an evening enjoying the good spirit. Nice bowl of soup always was a good way to calm the stomach to sleep.

Tried it the first time several years ago when my Singaporean boss introduced it to me. We had it for breakfast before a game of golf and that began my love for it. I've had Bak kut teh in Changi, Bak kut teh at mall food courts. I like it, had an idea of what was good about it, but I still didn't get the taste I craved for until I finally found a place to park near Founder's restaurant. I tried the pork rib first and eventually moved on to the pig kidneys, pig intestine and my favorite, pig tail. Next thing you know, I started walking the 10min distance from my apartment to it.

Got the idea from Makasuntra raw which I saw at the net and tried it myself. Just could do the pork rib as the other more interesting parts are more difficult to do.

Ingredients:

   1 kilo       prime pork ribs.
1/2 kilo      raw garlic
  1 pork cube
   4 tbsp     white pepper grounded
1/2 cup     kinchay leaves
  
Par boil the pork ribs to remove the scum and other unwanted oils. Remove water and set aside. Prepare a pot big enough for the ribs with water to cover. Crush the garlic with skin, not to hard, but just enough to expose the inside and put into pot. Add the white pepper. Turn on stove to high and allow to boil. Once boiling put the ribs. Allow to simmer. Remove scum from water from time to time. This should take about an hour or until pork ribs are almost fork tender. Put kinchay leaves before serving.

Side sauce to your desire, dark soy sauce, birds eye chili or thai chili.

This is perfect with You Tiao but still figuring out how to do that. Had this with rice for now.

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Perfect Egg

I like my eggs almost raw for the yolk. Learned this from Jose' from AFC. Love it.

Step 1 - Separate the yolk from the egg whites.
Step 2 - Fry the egg whites on both sides till slightly brown.
Step 3 - Remove the fried egg whites from the pan and place the yolk.

* If you want the yolk slightly cooked, place the yolk right after turning the egg whites to fry the other side.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Caldo de Pata


Was watching Anthony Bourdain on youtube and I stumble on the No Reservations Chile episode. Anthony walks into a carinderia turo turo restaurant in Santiago City if I am not mistaken. As usual his guest host was bringing him to the restaurants which well represented the food of the country. And so they bring out the Caldo de Pata. Cow hoofs in its on broth. It looked so good on the little screen, glistening soup with the litid of the cow hoofs pretty much the majority of the bowl. They were eating it with such gusto that I just had to have a try.

Got this recipe of the net.

1 kilo ox feet or ox pata(you can usually get this on the frozen section of the meat department of your local supermarket).
5 stalks of celery root (keep the leaves, cut into strips)
1/2 kilo carrots sliced like a sausage.
1/4 kilo onions.
1 lime
1 beef bullion
2 lemons
sili to your desire
salt and pepper
cilantro to garnish

Any vegetable you would like to add. I used cut cabbage, about a cup.

Boil the ox feet in water for about 10 minutes to remove the scum. Make sure to clean well before and after boiling. Add half of the carrots, celery root, and onions. Boil in a simmer for about 3 to 4 hours until tender. I used a pressure cooker so it only took me about an hour. The good thing about slow cooking though is that it allows you to clean out any further scum which boils out. In a pressure cooker, you will have to do this only after the boiling process.

Remove as much of the celery, onion and carrot from the remaining broth. Then return the remaining portion of the uncooked carrot. Cook for about 10 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste. Then I added the cut cabbage to the broth for another minute. When serving. Sprinkle with some lime. Cut up the celery leaves and also put on the broth.

Really great with rice. Serve some sili on the side to make spicy.