No-Frills Recipes ... cooking, baking & excerpts on travel

When I was little, I used to like to eat this steamed rice cake, maybe because it's soft and sweet and I believe most kids do.  Well, I still crave for this cake once in a while.  During this lock down, I hardly visit the wet market where this cake is sold at the kuih stalls and so I had to google for recipes and try my hand at making my own.  This cake is not too sweet, but soft, slightly bouncy and I like the amazing honeycomb pattern when you cut a cross section of the rice cake. Bak Tong Ko  ~   白糖糕                     Ingredients 150 gm rice flour 150 ml water 100 gm sugar 150 ml water 3 to 4 pandan/screwpine leaves 1/2 tsp cooking oil 1/2 tsp baking powder to be added to the rice mixture just before steaming 1 tsp instant dried yeast 1 tsp sugar 1 Tbsp warm water Method Put rice flour into a mixing bowl, whisk it.  Mix in water and stir till free of lumps.  Set aside. Boil water with sugar and pandan leaves till sugar has dissolved.  Discard pandan leaves. Pour this hot syrup

                                                            These spare ribs are juicy yet tender and this is a rather 'dry' dish without much sauce.  I use balsamic vinegar to give it a slightly tangy flavour and I cook till the sauce sticks to the ribs while the oil starts to separate at the bottom of the wok.   So you can imagine how tasty the ribs are ..... finger licking good! Red Braised Spare Ribs  ~    红烧排骨  Ingredients 1 kg spare ribs 1 Tbsp oil 2.1/2 Tbsp brown sugar 2 Tbsp soya sauce 3/4 Tbsp dark soya sauce 1.1/2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar 3 Tbsp Shaoxing wine 1/4 cup water or more to cover the ribs 2 slices ginger 3 cloves of garlic, lightly bruised white part of spring onions Spring onions and sesame seeds to garnish Method Blanch the spare ribs in hot water, remove, rinse, keep aside. In a wok, melt the brown sugar in the tablespoon of oil. Then stir in the ribs. Add light and dark soya sauces, balsamic vinegar, Shaoxing wine, ginger, garlic, spring onions and water. 

  Whenever we 'yum cha' in a Chinese dim sum restaurant we never fail to order and try their Ma Lai Ko, which is a brown sugar steamed fluffy sponge cake and what most kids would like to have.  I have been looking for a simple recipe to make this Ma Lai Ko.  Some recipes require a fermented starter dough which will result in streaky patterns in the Ma Lai Ko, some will just go with baking powder and sodium bicarbonate but I chance upon this recipe which requires yeast, baking powder and sodium bicarbonate. I made this on a cool, windy, day and was praying that the batter will rest and proof with bubbles after 2  hours and thankfully it did.  I was very pleased when the cake looked good after I opened the lid of my steamer and the taste was superb, not overly sweet and the texture, nice, soft and moist.  I kept the remaining pieces of 'ko' in a container, at room temperature and they stayed nice and moist even on the third day, maybe because the weather was cool and not

  This is an easy recipe with chicken marinated with  turmeric powder and some curry powder to give it a slightly spicy taste.  The addition of lemon grass and curry leaves lends a nice aroma to the dish and this can be ready to serve at the dining table in a relatively short time. Spicy Turmeric Chicken    ~   小辣姜黄鸡 Ingredients 2 whole chicken leg about 500 gm,cut into bite size 3 tsp curry powder (divided) 1/2 tsp turmeric powder 6 shallots, sliced 2 lemon grass, sliced 1 tsp salt to marinate the chicken Bit of sugar to enhance the taste Curry leaves Method Marinate the chicken with salt, 2 tsp curry powder and turmeric powder for a few hours or preferably overnight. Saute the sliced shallots with the curry leaves and lemon grass. Add in 1 tsp curry powder, toss in the chicken, add in some water and cook till chicken is tender and cooked through. Cook till semi-dry, add  bit of sugar to fine tune the taste. Dish out and serve.

  Happy New Year.  Hope 2021 will be a better year and will bring much cheer and joy to everyone and may the Covid 19 slowly fade away and life can resume normalcy. After successfully making the Steamed Cocoa Huat Kueh aka Fatt Koh  I went on to try making another type of Huat Kueh, this time to mix with another flavour and I opt for Pandan. Again I was delighted when the top of the kueh split into sections and 'smiled' at me. This is the result that I had wanted to achieve.  The kueh is soft, moist and crumbly and you can just steam them again if you have any leftovers. Two-Tone Huat Kueh ~  二种颜色发糕  Ingredients 250 gm plain flour 1/2 tsp salt 2 tsp baking powder 130 gm sugar 1 'L' egg 150 ml milk 100 ml cooking oil 1/8 tsp pandan paste Method Sieve and mix all the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Line the tart pans with paper cup liners. Using a handmixer whisk egg with sugar till creamy, add milk and continue to whisk. Gradually add in flour mixture alternating with