Muah chee 麻芝

Muah chee is a Malaysian-Chinese snack originated from Penang. This is made with small lumps of glutinous dough coated with a ground peanut mixture, soft and chewy similar texture to Japanese Mochi or Cantonese sticky rice balls (lui sa tong yuen 擂沙湯丸 or lo mai chee 糯米糍).

Not the prettiest snack but yummylicious. It's easy to make. Best eaten within few hours at room temperature, if keep in the fridge the dough texture will turn hard.


Ingredients:

dough batter:
200g glutinous flour
2 tsp of sugar
0.5 tsp of salt
250 ml water
1 tbsp cooking oil or shallot oil*

1 tsp of oil or shallot oil for brushing the cooked dough

150g roasted peanuts
40g dry roasted sesame
75g sugar

Brush the steamed dough with shallot oil and leave to cool slightly.

scoop small pieces of dough onto the peanut mixture.

Method:

1. Make the peanut mix by putting peanuts, sesame and sugar in a food processor and blitz to a fine mixture.
   
2. Mix the dough batter ingredients together. Pour into a deep dish and steam for about 25 minutes. Test the centre to make sure it is cooked through before taking it out of the steamer.
3. Brush the dough with a little oil. Leave to cool down slightly.
4. Spread the peanut mix on a tray. Scoop small pieces of the dough onto the peanut mix then toss to thoroughly coat them. Can press the dough pieces lightly to coat with more peanut mix. Ready to enjoy.
   

* to make shallot oil, thinly sliced one or two shallots. Fry with 2 parts the oil to 1 part shallot till golden brown.

Carrot and daikon soup 紅白蘿蔔羹

Carrot and daikon thick soup (hong bak lo bak guern 紅白蘿蔔羹) is quick and simple with few ingredients, nice steaming hot or warm. Perfect for lunch or light meal.

This recipe makes 3 large bowls of soup.

Ingredients:

Meat and marinade
140 - 150g minced pork or beef
1.5 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp chinese cooking wine (shaoshing)
1 tsp sesame oil
0.5 tsp chicken granule powder, like Knorr (optional)
1 heap tsp cornflour


300g carrot
300g daikon or mooli
5 cups vegetable/chicken/pork/beef stock (homemade or from stock powder/granules)
a little salt
2.5 - 3 tbsp cornflour slackened with 1/4 cup of water
pinch ground pepper
2 - 3 stalks spring onion
1 tsp sesame oil


Methods:

1. Mix minced pork or beef with marinade. Leave aside for 15 - 20 minutes.
   
2. Dice carrot and daikon.
3. Put stock, daikon and carrot into a saucepan, cover and simmer for about 20 - 25 minutes till carrot and daikon are tender.
4. Add meat. Use a spoon scoop tiny bit of meat into the hot soup to form tiny meatballs before adding to soup. Simmer for a little while till pork/beef is cooked.
5. Season with salt and pepper. Add in slackened cornflour to thicken.
   
6. Stir in sesame oil and spring onion.
   

Macanese style Portuguese chicken (Po Kok Gai 葡國雞)

Macau is part of China now, it was the first and last European colony within China. Portuguese traders had settled and colonised Macau from the 16th century till its handover to China in 1999. Because of this, Portuguese had strongly influenced Macau's architectural buildings, culture and food. Macau has long famous for its tourism, gambling and food.

I'd been to Macau few times while I was working in Hong Kong. It's easy to get there from Hong Kong, just hop on the ferry. I love this place a lot. Every time we went there we were food crawling all day and all night till we dropped. My favourite Macanese food are fried pork chop buns, crab congee (rice soup), Portuguese style egg custard tart called 'po tart', all the Macanese snacks, Macanese chilli crab, African Chicken and Portuguese Chicken.

Macanese food many are Chinese - Portuguese fusion. I am very surprised not to find many Macanese recipes in books and on the internet.

Portuguese chicken (Po Kok Gai 葡國雞) is Chinese - Portuguese fusion. I don't think anyone can find this recipe in Portugal. This dish is like a mild chicken curry with Portuguese/Spanish ingredients like chorizo and olive. Very unusual combination, it works and delicious.




Here is the recipe, will feed 5 - 6 people. Can reduce quantity to make a smaller portion.

Ingredients:

900g chicken pieces (thighs and drumsticks)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp chicken stock powder (bouillon)
pinch of pepper

50g (about 0.5 cup) plain flour
1.5 tbsp turmeric
2 - 3 tsp paprika
2 - 3 tbsp water
0.5 cup cooking oil

450 - 500g potato, cut into small chunks
1 large onion, cut into chunks
125g Chorizo, sliced
70g pitted black olive
2 large tomatoes, about 350g, cut into bite size
2 - 3 bay leaves

200ml or more fresh milk (for richer flavour can use evaporated milk)
175ml coconut milk
1 tsp salt
0.5 - 1 tsp chilli powder

few tbsp dessicated coconut


Method:

1. If chicken pieces are large cut into half. Season chicken with salt and pepper and leave for 30 minutes - 1 hour. Then mix with plain flour, turmeric powder, paprika and some water to evenly coat chicken.
2. Boil potatoes for few minutes till almost cooked through. Drain and set aside.
3. Heat wok with oil. Fry chicken pieces in two batches till brown for few minutes. Do worry if not cooked through. Take them out to drain off excess oil on kitchen paper. Remove oil from wok and clean wok.
   
4. Use 1 - 2 tbsp of the chicken frying oil and stir fry onion, garlic and chorizo till onion is softened. Then add chicken, bay leaves and potatoes. Then stir in milk, coconut milk, chilli powder and enough salt to taste. Stir and cook for a minute or two till the sauce is hot and thickened, if sauce looks too thick add some water or more milk. Then stir in tomotoes and olive.
   
5. Put all this in a large baking dish. Sprinkle with dessicated coconut. Sprinkle a little water on the dessicated coconut to prevent coconut browning too quickly. Bake at around 170 - 175 deg C for about 30 - 40 minutes till the whole dish is hot and bubbly and coconut is browned.
   

Serve this chicken with plain rice, egg fried rice or bread.

Chicken noodle salad 雞絲拌麵

I still got a piece of chicken breast left from the roast chicken the other day. Looking for something quick and easy with noodles.

To follow the same sort of salad like bang bang chicken, I thought of Beijingnese style chicken noodles (ji se pun mien 雞絲拌麵) . This is normally eaten warm or cold.

Recipe will feed two.

Ingredients:

150g dried noodles (I used Shanghai noodles like this picture on the right)
dash of sesame oil

1/3 cucumber
1 small carrot
1 chicken breast (I used roast chicken)


dressing:
4 - 5 tbsp chicken juice from roast chicken (if not use chicken stock)
2 tbsp warm water
0.5 tsp chicken stock powder (optional)
2 - 2.5 tbsp light soy sauce
1 - 2 tbsp Chinkiang black rice vinegar
1 - 2 tsp sugar
1 - 3 tsp chilli oil
2 - 3 tsp sesame oil
0.5 tsp ground roasted Sichuan pepper


1 fat clove garlic, finely chopped
1 - 2 stalk spring onion, chopped
2 tsp finely chopped ginger
1 - 3 tsp chopped red chilli
few sprigs of coriander, chopped


Method:

1. Cook the noodles. Rinse with warm water, drain thoroughly. Mix noodles with a dash of sesame oil to prevent sticking.
2. Shred chicken. Cut cucumber and carrot into fine shreds.
   
3. Prepare the garlic, spring onion, ginger and chilli.
4. Make the dressing by mixing all the ingredients together. If chicken juice has solidified in the fridge just warm to dissolve. Add most of the garlic, ginger, spring onion, coriander and chilli to the dressing and leave some for garnish.
   
5. Pile noodles on the dish. Scatter on carrot, cucumber and chicken.
   
6. Pour the sauce over. Garnish with the rest of ginger, garlic, spring onion, coriander and chilli.
   

Egg filled pancakes 雞蛋灌餅

Egg filled pancakes (ji dan guan bing 雞蛋灌餅) are Beijingnese breakfast sold mainly by street food vendors. It's cheap and tasty. Similar to Indian roti or tortilla wrap with a difference.

Need a bit of practice to get it right how to fill the pancake with egg. Here is how I make them.




This recipe makes 5 pancakes.

Ingredients:

A. pancakes

150g plain flour
75 - 80ml water
1/4 tsp salt

2 tbsp of sesame oil
about 3 tbsp of plain flour

3 - 4 beaten eggs

B. Filling
1 heap tbsp hoi sin sauce 海鮮醬 or sweet bean sauce 甜面醬
1 - 2 tsp chilli sauce
a little chopped spring onion
about 8 - 10 lettuce leaves (Romaine or other green crispy lettuce)


Method:

1. Dissolve salt with water then stir into flour to form a dough. Leave dough to rest for about 20 - 30 minutes. Then knead till smooth.
   
2. Divide dough into 5 equal parts.
3. Mix 2 tbsp sesame oil with enough flour to make a sticky paste.
4. Dust dough with flour. Spread it out to form 1 cm thick disc. Then add about 1 tsp of the oily paste, spread it on the disc. Wrap this up and seal like a filled bun. Then flatten it, dust with more flour and roll it out into a very thin about 15 - 16 cm round pancake.
5. Heat a pan till quite hot, brush with cooking oil and put the pancake on. Heat till lightly brown underside and top of pancake beginning to puff up. Turn over the pancake. The pancake should puff up quite quite high very quickly. Using a pair of chopsticks, punch the puffed ball, lift up the top layer with the chopsticks and pour some beaten egg inside the pancake very quickly before the pancake collapses. Let the pancake fry a little bit longer then flip over. Fry the pancake till both sides are brown and quite crisp.
   
6. Mix hoi sin sauce and chilli sauce together. Spread a thin layer on the pancake (not too much sauce, hoi sin sauce is quite salty), then sprinkle on a little chopped spring onion and put 1 - 2 lettuce leaves, wrap up and enjoy while hot.