spicy chicken soup

today, i'm going to feature my favourite dish which i often cook since i was in my secondary school. it is *drumrolls* spicy chicken soup. i reallllllly love this dish and everytime i made this, i will cook together my grandmother's special sambal ikan bilis tumbuk. so, i'm going to share with you recipe for this dish!

ingredients:

above are the pictures of ingredients (a bit different approach i use this time) :P

dry spices:
1 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
3 cardamom

2 onions
2 garlic
2 cm ginger
*blend all together

2 tbsp soup powder
1 tbsp kurma powder
*mix with 1 tbsp water

half chicken - cut into small pieces
1 tbsp black pepper - pound
*marinade chicken with pounded black pepper for 1 hour

vegetables:
2 potatoes - cut into large cube
1 carrot - cut into small pieces
2 celery stick - cut into large cube

500 ml water

to garnish:
spring onions
soup leaves
dried fried shallot - bawang goreng

methods:
1 - heat oil in a pot. pour in star anise, cardamom and cinnamon. stir until all those spices become slightly large.
2 - pour in the onion paste and keep on stirring until the aroma arises.
3 - add in the powder paste and keep on stirring until spices are cooked it forms an oil. do not let it burned!
4 - add in marinated chicken and stir to blend the spices with chicken. after chicken has release its juices, pour in water.
5 - add in the vegetables except for celery and let it simmer until the vegetables become tender.
6 - season with salt.
7 - after chicken and vegetables are tender, add in celery. stir for a while and turn off the heat. this is to maintain the crispiness of celery.
8 - garnish with spring onion, soup leaves and dried fried shallots before serving.

yellow kiwi

yummmmm~ seriously, i do not know how to use that kiwi knife!

whenever people say kiwi, in our mind, we must think of sweet-sourly-green little fruit right? or is it only me? haha. so, while i was having my Raya at my hometown, my grandmother bought this. i was shocked and excited to see this yellow kiwi as i never seen it before. well, my grandmother eats this yellow kiwi as part of her diet. you see...she knows better about this fruit compared to me who were trained in culinary school. what an ignorance i am. haha. i fall in love with this fruit from my first bite. it is sooooo fresh and delicious and not too sour. it is sweet yet soooooo refreshing especially when we eat it chilled. sooooo good, seriously!! especially for me who doesn't really like eating sour food/fruit. so, those who never tasted this fruit, please do so! but, those who are used to sourly-tasted normal kiwi may not like it. perfect example is my mother. i bought a box for her, but she prefers the green one because she loves kiwi sourly taste. it's ok, because i get the chance to finish them all by myself! haha.

can someone buy me a box of this??? heeeeeee

Pappa Rich

hello..today i went for the interview at Italiennies at The Gardens, well, you can read it at my other blog here:www.meowmiu.blogspot.com. so, while waiting for their GM to arrive, i browsed around at The Gardens to have lunch. i spotted Pappa Rich restaurant and settled down there. i thought Pappa Rich was some kind of Western restaurant, but it just another kopitiam restaurants as in the same line with Old Town and Pak Li.

so, i ordered this, Nasi Lemak with Chicken Curry with Honey Lime drink. i love the drink, but i am not really satisfied with their Nasi Lemak. while it is obviously straightly heated in microwave, the taste is not what i was expecting. i guess Old Town and Pak Li's nasi lemak is better. oh no oh no. microwave-heated food is bad for you ok!! sambal tasted weird and the curry also tasted way too strong. overall comment, it just ok to feed your starving stomach.

vivo

last week bb and i went to The Curve for to spend time together and we decided to dine at Vivo as we had a good experience during our first time being there before. so, this were what we had ordered:

onion rings & calamari

chicken lasagna

baked cheesy chicken spaghetti

what i can say about the food is, it wasn't what i was expecting. last time i ate the lasagna, it tasted real good. but this time, i felt that the tomato sauce kind of weird. i love bb's food, but it turned out too cheesy that make us full too fast. but overall, it think, it isn't that bad. still ok with the price offered.

beriani again!

remember my previous post about briyani in Batu Pahat? well, to refresh your memory, you can go here. last weekend, once again, we dropped there to have lunch while sending off my youngest sister back to her college. it tasted good as they always do and this time i managed to get their business card. so, to my readers (if i have any), here goes the details:

RESTORAN BP BERIANI POWER SDN. BHD

Mohamed bin Mahmood (manager) - 012-7384277

Addresses:
(Batu Pahat branch)
No. 18, Jln Tukas 2, Taman Soga, 83000 Batu Pahat, Johor D. Takzim.
Tel/Fax: 07-4388987, 4331225

(Melaka branch)
Lot 33, Tesco Melaka, no. 1, Jln Tun Abdul Razak, 75400 Peringgit, Melaka

other details, they accept reservation for catering, tent rental, event management, video & pictures and PA system.

i think this restaurant should pay me for this free promotion. haha. :P

butter prawn - adjusted recipe

hello! it's been almost a month i didn't update anything here. the thing is, i went back to my hometown a week before Raya and spent 2 weeks there. with no internet connection, of course, i couldn't write up anything. well, to tell the truth is, although i am having my internet connection, there is actually nothing to write about anyway. of course Raya is about feast, eat, food everywhere but to be honest, i didn't captured any photos on food. bad isn't it? too tired and too busy, thus, the mood wasn't in me. i am sorry. however, here, i want to post adjusted recipe of butter prawn. i made this during first Raya and i got many compliments on them. hehehehehe. in 2 weeks time, i made this about 4 times as per requested. *bangga! haha. ish, tak baik*.my relatives also asking for this recipe, making me to write it down on paper. it's quite a hard task since, i just created and throw anything possible in the mixture, so, forgive me if the measurement down here isn't accurate enough :P trust your instinct and hand! haha. anyway, it's not really originally created by me, but there are too many versions of butter prawn recipe on the internet and i use a little here and there and combine them together and voila! this recipe is healthy too because it uses oats. picture maybe will be uploaded later if with Allah's will if i make it again since like i said earlier, i didn't captured any during Raya.

A. ingredients (crispy prawn)
prawn. to marinate:
500g prawn
2 tbsp curry powder
salt to taste
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp black pepper
*sesame oil - optional

method
marinate for about 1 hour or up to overnight. before frying with deep oil, mix with cornstarch. fry over medium fire until golden brown. do not over fried or prawns will harden. set aside

B. ingredients (toasted oats)
3 tbsp oil
1 cup oatmeal

method
heat oil over medium heat. pour in oatmeal and keep on stirring until oats are crisp enough. set aside. this oat can be prepared early and keep in refrigerator.

C. ingredients (final step - to mix altogether)
sauce
2 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp condensed milk
1 tsp black pepper
salt and sugar to taste
1 tsp anchovies powder *serbuk pati ikan bilis
*mix all ingredients together in a bowl.

dried ingredients & spices
1 handful of bird-eyed chillies - sliced thinly
1 cup of curry leaves - wash thoroughly and dried
4 nos garlic - chopped
1 cup butter/margerine
1 onion - sliced thinly

methods:
heat butter in a pan. add in bird-eyed chillies and curry leaves. stir until it turns quite crisp and later, add in garlic and keep on stirring.
pour in the sauces mixture and stir until well combined.
add in fried prawn and toasted oats and mix well. you can turn off the heat at this point.
add in sliced onion as for decoration.

rose tart

hi everyone! how's your kuih raya project going on? mine, alhamdulillah, i managed to make 2 types of cookies already. planning to make another but too pack with many things recently. by the way, yesterday, i made this rose tart. as usual, i got this recipe from Mat Gebu blog, a.k.a tiffin biru. you can check it out here. this recipe quite easy to make, but the folding part, spreading jam, is very very very troublesome for me, because it involves too many steps. well, you can check how to make it step-by-step here.

the result? well, it tasted good! my mother said, it taste just like any other tart, but i insist it tasted gooooooooood. maybe because, i put all efforts in making this? i already weighing all ingredients 2 nights before, and yesterday, i made this from 7am to 12pm!! patah pinggang weyh!! anyway, good luck if you wish to make this. together, i attach the recipe. again, credit to Mat Gebu from Tiffin Biru.

ingredients:
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup margerine
3/4 cup icing sugar
1 egg yolk
1 cup cornstarch
1 3/4 cup wheat flour
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
strawberry jam

methods:
1- beat butter, margarine & icing sugar. pour in egg yolk and vanilla essence. beat until creamy. add in cornstarch and mix well.
2- pour in wheat flour little by little until it forms a soft dough. roll the dough to flatten about 1/2 cm thick. cut with cookie cutter (flower shape).
3- spread strawberry jam each of the already cut dough, fold it into 2 of each dough, make it into 'U' shape and glued to another dough. place it into cases and arrange on parchment lining baking tray.
4- bake at 170 degrees for about 10-15 minutes.

i attach the picture below to give a brief idea on how to do it :P

hahahah.

for better viewing and to get the idea of how to do it PROPERLY, again, visit here.