: : Granny’s Cooking : :

I’m amazed at the amount of different dishes my granny cooks everyday. The variety, the taste, yum. So, here’s a look at the dinner menu for today :

Stir-fried Bittergourd

Beancurd Soup

Sweet and Sour Fishball

Kacangma

Chicken Kurma

Stir-fried Bittergourd

To tell you the truth, I do not like bitter stuff. Still, it look delicious enough so here it is. Granny cooked it with pork, some garlic and I think some black beans.

Bean Curd Soup

Another favourite clear soup. The bean curd is actually from dried soy bean. The bean curd is sold dry and needs to be soak in water. Then it’ll become soft. Granny also added in black fungus : soft and crunchy. Apparently, the black fungus to good to prevent heart problems.

Sweet and Sour Fishball

A Westernised Chinese Dish. At a Chinese Restaurant, one can find sweet and sour chicken, sweet and sour beer, sweet and sour fish, sweet and sour pork. Boring. But still, this one tasted good. Simple to do as Granny used Maggi’s tomato sauce. She also added in strips of cucumber and onions. Note that the cucumber core must be removed. No need to add water as a lot of it will come out from the cucumber.

Kacang Ma

This is an extremely potent dish!! It’s a herbal soup mostly taken by mothers during post pregnancy. Auntie Lucy gave us a pot and it really knocked us out tonight! This one was totally cooked in samsu(Chinese Rice Wine : used for cooking only)!! Definitely full of alcohol. The herbs are bought in bottles at cheap prices. It is fried dry and later grinded. Pounded ginger and the ginger juice is also added in with chicken. The alcohol can be substituted with more ginger to get a non-alcoholic wallop! Looks like I cannot sleep tonight.

Chicken Kurma

My sister’s favourite. Kurma is a type of curry that is not hot at all. The curry is actually a grey-brownish colour but still very tasty. A cholesterol bomb because of the coconut milk that is added. The curry is simmered until it thickens but by then, the kurma taste would have already been in the chicken. Yummy yummy!

: : Red Peach : :

Bad day at work starting with yesterday’s emergency. So, decided to pamper myself a bit with some Asian junk food. Got it from the nearby timbang place at Big Fresh Supermarket, Tabuan Jaya. Loved this SO much when I was young. Yep, the amount of things that can be eaten by a child is simply amazing. Granny gets the credit for introducing all the preserve fruits and snacks to me. But since she’s missing her teeth, well, harder for her now to eat these things. Also makes you wonder whether it’s healthy to eat it. :p

Anyway, this is preserved fruit is called Ang Tho or translated as Red Peach. It’s both sweet and sour at the same time. Can’t really describe the taste without one actually trying it. Years back, there were concerns regarding the red colouring used as it might be harmful for health. This particular one was okay as the colour was only on the skin. If you are looking to try out the different Asian junk food, this is a good choice.

: : Granny’s Cooking : :

Was so tired last night that did not put up any pics of granny’s cooking. However, it’s going up today. Typically, a meal would have soup, stew or curry, fish (common for us as Uncle C is usually out fishing during the weekends), one or two veggie dishes and rice. Last nite’s menu was :

Bak Choi Soup with Fishballs

Stir-Fried French Beans with Slice Carrots and Fish Cake

Assam Fish Curry

Bak Choi Soup with Fish Balls

Another clear soup that is easy to make. Bak Choi is like a cross between a lettuce and cabbage. The leaf is very wrinkled but the stem is firm. Granny added in fish balls to it. Basically, it’s cutting the vegetables into rectagular pieces, boiling the water, put in the veggie and fishballs, add salt and pepper and boil until the veggie is soft. Easy.

Stir-Fried French Beans with Slice Carrots and Fish Cake

One of my favourite veggie dish. The French beans is sliced diagonally into small pieces whereas the carrot is sliced very thinly. Although not seen here, chopped garlic is added into the dish. Garlic is added to any Chinese veggie dish to get rid of any unwanted smells and tastes but at the same time acts flavour to it. About 1 teaspoon of chopped garlic is sufficient for this dish. Fish cake was also added in. It’s actually made from fishball paste which is rolled into a rectangle and then deep fried. It is sliced thinly here.

Assam Fish Curry

Hmmmm…. This dish is sweet, sour and spicy at the same time. An all-time favourite. Usually, it’s cooked with fish head as well but as Uncle C didn’t come back with a big fish, Granny used normal fish instead. Assam? It’s a fruit that is extremely sour but adds great flavour in cooking. Assam can be preserved and eaten just like a pickle. Had a great time eating this curry. Did you know curry is great with bread? Try it. That’s why Indians always eat some sort of bread with their curries.

: : Halal? : :

A few friends brought up some concerns about places that are halal and non-halal that are mentioned on this blog. Well, I was thinking of doing it when I move over to my new home where I can have a bit more webspace to play around a bit. So, I didn’t want to put in too much effort to this website until the move over.

When will I be moving? Pretty soon. The space is up already but some problems with uploading the blogand files there. Am awaiting feedback from my cousins but since they’re busy, I can wait. No big deal.

Back to halal and non-halal eating spots. Actually, a number of restaurants do not cook pork but they do not put up the Halal sticker. Reason is that they do not have a chief Muslim cook. However, the ingredients that is used is, of course, halal. This can be seen from the noticeboard that is placed nearby the cashier.

While waiting for my website problems to be settled, I’ll just make a quick mention in my current blog on whether the place is halal or not.

: : Chilli Peppers : :

After yesterday’s dismal lunch, decided to follow some collegues out for lunch. Desperate times call for desperate measures!! Well, not so desperate.

Today’s lunch spot is a coffee shop called Chilli Peppers. It’s a halal coffee shop with a variety of food. Here are some of the drinks and meals we had.

Iced Barli

Iced Longan

Ice Lemon Tea

Thai Bee Hoon

Kolo Mee

Sambal Fried Rice

Thai Chicken Rice

Iced Barli

A really cooling drink when one is feeling hot and heaty. It’s also a nutritious drink that can be taken when one has sore throat or when one is feeling dehydrated. Also great for making ice lollies! Just put some in the freezy and take it out when it’s frozen. Think it’ll also make a great sherbet.

Iced Longan

Another great thirst quencher! Yummy! Longan is similar to laici but firmer and the skin of the seed doesn’t stick to the flesh. It’s usually just the fruit added with water and some syrup.

Iced Lemon Tea

An old-time favourite everywhere. The lime used has a similar taste to a lemon but not so sharp. At least this iced lemon tea was made from real tea and lime rather than the instant version. Nowadays, coffeshops in Kuching are using the instant one which is tasteless. Can’t even taste the tea.

Thai Bee Hoon

This is a slightly sour dished and not fried at all. The bee hoon is prepared before and water is drained away. Then, the garnishings are added on as shown with lime and chilli as well. Then, the entire meal is mixed up before being eaten. The noodles is made out of rice and has a lower cholesterol level compared to the yellow noodles.

Kolo Mee

Here is another version of the famous Sarawak Kolo Mee. This time, the noodles used are the curly ones. A favourite of an old friend in Penang. She couldn’t get enough of it.

Sambal Fried Rice

This is the normal fried rice cooked with shallots, egg and chicken. The secret to a great tasting fried rice is the shallots. The best one to use is the small purple ones. It’s hell to cut them up but the crying effort is worth it. Of course, there is the usual sunny-side fried egg and popadoms. Popadoms are the Indian crisps : light, thin and crunchy. Notice the sambal sauce on the right hand side? This is great! The chilli is fried with pounded dried prawn, onion and belachan (prawn paste). A great compliment to the meal. We kept asking for seconds!

Thai Chicken Rice

The rice was the normal chicken rice but it was the chicken that was different. Chicken is deep fried and a sweet sauce was later added on. Caution : Extremely sweet sauce! However, still very tasty and comes with soup.

The address for Chilli Peppers :

No. 12, Block B, King’s Centre,

Jalan Simpang Tiga,

93150 Kuching,

Sarawak, Malaysia.

Tel : 082-576910

Directions to get there : It’s located at King’s Centre, the location of many shophouses. It is a few shops down from Systematic College, near the Simpang Tiga roundabout.

: : Places to Eat : :

Just came across a directory for interesting food in Sarawak. Someone obviously has not been updating it. Yes, you can find German food in Kuching. Surprise? Arrangements can be made at Carvery a few days in advance. Also, Oktoberfest is a very big event every October with an omm-pa-pa band in Kuching and Miri.

There are at least 3 Japanese restaurant, 1 Italian restaurant, 3 Korean restaurants and countless seafood outlets! Good Western food is also available and many many hawker stalls!

Hmm… now I have an idea to set up a directory. Will start planning to do it once I’ve moved to another web server.