: : Tea-time : :

One of Granny’s friend pop by to drop off some bak chang. Yum! She was making some for her daughter and had make extras. Granny immediately opened one and pop it into her mouth!

I’ve been pestering Granny for years to teach me how to do this but she has it’s too much of a bother. Bak Chang is pork meat, chestnuts and black mushrooms stuffed in glutinous rice. This little rice ball is then steamed after being wrapped up in pandan leaves. It is actually shaped as a triangular pyramid.

There are many versions to different kinds of bak chang available as different types of stuffing are used. Other than pork meat, there is the tau sa (red bean paste) and peanut version. Sometimes, bak chang without any filling except for the glutinous rice, is available. Granny makes a mean sweet sauce to go with this : mixed gula melaka (thickened brown sugar) with soy sauce. Sounds pretty disgusting but trust me when I say that it goes well with plain bak chang!

: : Breakfast : :

Good morning! It’s a really cool morning after yesterday’s cold and dreary day. Granny bought some mea sua when she went to do her grocery shopping. Yum! Mee sua is a popular FooChow dish. It’s actually just rice noodles with chicken soup with some Chinese red wine added in. Yep, potent stuff although this version didn’t have that much red wine in it. The noodles look like bee hoon but they aren’t. They’re softer and more filling to the stomach. Also, they’re thinner compared to bee hoon but have a flat surface.

It’s actually a very simple dish to do. Cook the noodles separately, then drain out the water. The soup is made by boiling pieces of chicken, black mushrooms, some ginger (to add in a spicy and tangy taste) and some red wine. If you like more red wine, then put more inside. For the black mushrooms, please un-dry the dried mushrooms first! You can do this by soaking them in water until they expand. Then, rinse the mushrooms a few times to get rid of the strong taste unless you like it that way. I would suggest that the noodles be cooked last.

I did promise some pictures this morning of Granny’s home-cook meals but couldn’t wake up early enough. *sheepish grin*