Home Sweet Home 2010 - Part 2

It did not stop raining all Friday. We booked for a hot pot meal at Kampung Nelayan Floating Market Seafood Restaurant, Tun Fuad Park.

Hot pot, also known as steamboat, refers to several East Asian varieties of stew, consisting of a simmering metal pot of stock at the center of the dining table. While the hot pot is kept simmering, ingredients are placed into the pot and are cooked at the table (wikipedia).

Hot Pot filled with Chicken Soup and grill pan

Fish balls, squid rings, stuffed tofu, fish cakes etc

Tofu and Veg.

Hot Pot cooking

The floating seafood market restaurant

 Hot pot is a fun way for family and friends to cook together, chat and have fun. The process of putting raw food into the pot or grill pan, cooking and waiting for the food to cook is fun and entertaining. All the seafood, meat and veg cooked in the soup add lots of flavours for cooking soup noodles at the end! Another fun part of having a hot pot is that you can basically add any edible food into the pot/grill and cook to your liking - seafood, meat, veg, mushrooms, dumplings etc.


Lunch next day-

Roast Duck rice

Roast Pork Belly rice

Roast Pork Rice

Bought from a popular shop in Lido, there was a long queue, partly due to Hari Raya holiday, but mostly due to the very nicely roasted meat. Despite all, my mom managed to buy the very last pack of roast pork belly rice! It does not only look good, it tastes absolutely fabulicious!

Roast pork belly - The crispy first layer of pork belly skin, the soft second layer of fat and the tender third layer of meat is absolutely mind-blowingly delicious!

Roast duck - The crispy thin layer of skin, taste of thick juicy duck meat teamed with the specially made sauce...eeemmmmmm...

Roast Pork - Roasted to tenderness with a little bit of charcoal taste to the meat. Served with thick dark soya sauce mixed with leftover sauce from the roasting pan. The sweet and savoury taste is a perfect match!

Dinnertime!

Carrot and pork rib soup

Mom's very own home-cooked radish and carrot soup shimmered with pork rib and peanuts. Cooked for more than an hour to enhance the sweetness of the soup! Absolutely homely and warm to have...

香芋扣肉 - Steamed pork and yam

One slice pork, one slice yam

Another one of my favourite Hakka dish! Three layered pork belly slices and yam slices. This dish has always been passed on from generation to generation within Hakka families. Steamed with a concoction of sauces, spices, herbs and other ingredients, one has to try it to know how delicious it really is!

more to come in part 3..perhaps more Hakka dishes to come...

Home Sweet Home 2010 - Part 1

Home, the best place to be, and of course, the best food to have!

From coffee shops to restaurants, from hawker store to home cooked food. Where every new shopping mall opens, the first businesses to open up is definitely food places! You can always find food anywhere in KK no matter what time it is. Here are the few food I had in the first few days upon arriving home.

A coffee shop in Penampang New Township

Pork chop noodles

The pork chop served in this shop is absolutely delicious, very thin layer of crusted skin fried almost to perfection. Crunchy at the first bite and the meat is tender when you chew further into it.

Fried banana and cempedak fritters

Chocolate Deluxe Waffle - Chocolate syrup and Peanut butter

Chicken floss and mayonaise waffle

Amongst the hawker stalls food that I have tried, this is one of my favourite hawker stall food - banana and cempedak fritters! Every trip back home, I must have this food!

Big Apple Doughnut (USA) serves many different flavoured doughnuts including, strawberry, green tea, chocolate hazelnut, cheese and chocolate + peanut butter! yumm!

油条

肉骨茶

Another one of my favourite dish, Bah Kut Teh, pork meat, ribs, internals cooked in chinese herbs. This dish is also served with tofu and the 'fried flour sticks' above.

Stuffed tofu - raw

Stuffed tofu, egg and beancurd sheets

Home cooked food

Curry chicken

Surely, my favourite among the favourites is my mom's home cooked food! The stuffed tofu is one of the famous Hakka delicacies. The stuffing is made of minced pork, prawns (sometimes minced fish), shitake mushrooms and seasonings. Tofu is also known as beancurd, according to Wikipedia, Tofu is a food made by coagulating soy milk, and then pressing the resulting curds into soft white blocks.

That's all for now, and more to come!

Singapore Food Adventure

Singapore 5th-7th September 2010

Singapore, first impression, very clean. Second thing that came in to mind, buildings are very impressively built, unique architecural design. Thirdly, of course...the food. As with many big cities, you can basically find any cuisines from around the world in this small and vibrant city.

The few that I have the privilege to taste are as below:

新加坡大虾面 - Singapore Big Prawn Noodle

Singapore big prawn noodle (literally translated from it's chinese given name). We found a cafe specialising in this dish right below the hotel we stayed in. We ordered one with pork ribs added and that gave another dimension to the taste of the soup. The prawns were really fresh while the pork ribs were cooked well until tender.
 

Mixture of deep fried items

A mixture of fried items including fishball, dumplings (云吞） and stuffed beancurd sheets. A simple plate of food but absolutely delicious!

Crab roe sushi

Friends always told me that one can get really nice and cheap Japanese food, especially sushi, in Singapore. Of course, I must find some whilst I am in Singapore! Hence, we walked into one while browsing in Funan Digitallife Mall. The place is called Sushi Don. It has a 'sushi train' running in the middle of the restaurant but one can also order from the menu. This restaurant also serves Thai and Korean Food. During our stay in Singapore, we found many Japanese restaurants doting the city. You can find at least 2 to 3 in every shopping mall!

Unagi Nigiri

Salmon Ball

Of course, on the final evening before we leave Singapore, we had food in a really nice restaurant called Cafe 2000, M Hotel.

The restaurant serves semi buffet dinner featuring over 30 appetisers and desserts. The appetisers include fresh seafood on ice, soup, sate, fried chicken, salad bar, pasta ordered to cook and so on. While the dessert section features cakes and pastries.

A selection of fresh seafood as appetiser

Medium cooked Angus steak served with mashed potato and stewed seasonal veg.

A selection of cake, pastry and mousse for dessert

Two days trip in Singapore is just not enough for me to try all the cuisins, so, Singapore, I shall be back for more in the future!