: : IMBB 8th ed. ~ Lift your spirits high! : :
UPDATE : I forgot to mention one very important ingredient!! Argh!! The beging @ MSG to put in!
Phew! After such an extremely busy day, I finally had time to sit down and blog a posting for the 8th edition of IMBB (Is My Blog Burning?) hosted by Donna. The theme this time is : LIFT YOUR SPIRITS HIGH!
The posting below is a Sarawakian favourite dish for cold rainy days as well as for mothers recovering from giving birth to their child (known to eat buckets of it during post pregnancy period for at least a few months!). Granny makes a mean dish i.e. she pours in a lot of samsu @ hard liquor for Chinese cooking. So, here is how to make a delicious dish of kacangma.
First, Granny cut the ginger into strips and started pounding them using a pestle and mortar. She then squeezed the juice out of the ginger paste. Here, you can see that we got quite a fair bit of juice out of the ginger. Granny mentioned that it’s because the ginger is from China. Local ginger doesn’t produce so much juice. We saved the juice and paste for making the soup later on.
The liquor : Chinese samsu. This portent stuff is used for quite a number of Chinese cooking and is extremely strong. Something similar to tequila and vodka but with a rough taste to it. And this is the amount of samsu we used for one entire chicken.
One whole chicken cut into pieces.
Now comes the part for cooking it. The ginger paste is first fried until it’s dry. Do this under a slow fire as not to burn it all up. Once the paste is dried, take it out of the wok and put it aside. Some folks used sesame oil but that’s the only cooking oil you can use to make kacangma. Do not use any other oil for cooking this dish as it will not taste nice afterwards.
Next, under a medium-sized fire, the chicken is cooked until all the water comes out of the meat and has completely evaporated. Note that while doing this, keep stirring the chicken as not to burn it or let it stick to the wok too much. Again, no oil mind you. Do this using a wok to bring out the chicken flavour. Cooking it in a pot will not be the same.
Transfer the chicken into a pot and add in the ginger juice as well as the ginger paste. Mix it all up together under a low to medium sized fire. The fire must not be hot enough to burn something!
Now, add in the kacangma herbs. Note that the herbs were prepared in advance. The herbs are stir-fried dry to remove the water and make it more crispy. It is then pounded into powder form using a pestle and mortar.
Some samsu @ hard liquor is added at this point. You can also use brandy to make this dish but I would recommend a rather good quality brandy if you want to do this.
A little bit of water is also added into the pot. It is then left to simmer for about 30-60 min until the chicken is cooked.
Once the chicken is cooked, add in the rest of the samsu and let it boil for awhile. Also, add in some MSG into the soup. Salt is not added as it gives a very distasteful taste to the entire dish. (Was on strict orders to put this part in from Granny and I forgot!) This last part is to give the soup a slightly stronger samsu taste to it as alcohol will start to evaporate during the boiling period. If you look closely at the picture, the herbs have also settle down towards the bottom once it’s been completely soaked in the soup. The samsu also penetrates into the chicken so it tastes quite good.
Now, a little bit of information about kacangma. During a blogmeet today, someone mentioned that it’s actually a type of hemp i.e. marijuana. Wow! So that means that everyone is eating this thing! Well, it’s not the marijuana that people smoke but rather, it’s from the same family of plants. The name of it is Leonurus sibiricus.
Digging around a bit tonite, here are some information regarding the herb that is commonly found everywhere in Sarawak. It’s either packed into plastic packets at shops+supermarkets or glass bottles.
Reconfirmed Experiences :Leonurus sibiricus & Leonotis leonurus by K. J.Buzz
Leonurus sibiricus “marahuanilla”
Leonurus sibiricus (Marihuanilla)
More links from a Google Search
Now remember, this is not cannabis but rather, it’s from the same family, just not the same species. In fact, in most of the articles above, it is said that it is known as the Chinese motherwort and used for relieving pain.
As for the kacangma dish, I’m not sure whether the pain relieving effect is from the kacangma herbs, the alcohol or the ginger itself. However, it’s a dish that Granny and I are careful not to have too much because the samsu can seriously make one more than a bit tipsy.
Granny : Remember ah! Don’t eat too much ah! You’re driving ah!
This dish is found in many hawker stalls selling herbal soup. Mind you, they do not add in so much liquor or herbs into it so you’re going to end up with a milder version of it.
Granny : Eh! I tell you ah! Last time, I put in only samsu and no water loh! Strong oh!
I shudder at that thought.
