27 Sep 20 (Sun) - Kimchi Jjigae

Watched "House on Wheels" and learnt a lot of Korean dishes which I have never eaten before. One of them is Kimchi Jjigae. Re-watched that particular episode a few times to copy the ingredients and steps.

  1) Sauté minced garlic

  2) Add thinly sliced pork belly and stir fry till half cooked

  3) Add bite-size kimchi

  4) Add enough water to cover

  5) Add soy bean paste, oil, Korean chili powder and sugar (optional)

  6) Cut green chili and scallion to 1" length and add in to boil

  7) Cut firm tofu to 1" cube and add in to boil till cooked

  8) Serve hot with rice

Of course, this means that it will not be very accurate and given that I have not eaten the dish before, I do not know exactly how it should taste like. Therefore, I googled for a proper recipe online and found one by "My Korean Kitchen". Modified the recipe I copied from the tv program with the recipe I found online and created this.

 1) Sauté minced garlic

  2) Add thinly sliced pork belly and stir fry till half cooked

  3) Add bite-size kimchi

  4) Add enough water to cover

  5) Add 1 tbsp chili powder, 1 tbsp light soy sauce, 1 tsp Korean chili paste and some sugar

  6) Cut firm tofu to 1" cube and add in to boil till cooked

  7) Cut spring onion to 1" length and add in to boil

  8) Serve hot with rice

The recipe from My Korean Kitchen asked for Korean chili flakes but I do not have it so replaced with chili powder instead. The recipe from the tv program used scallion which I also do not have so replaced with spring onion instead.

Taste-wise, really cannot comment since I do not know how the actual dish should taste like. Haha... Perhaps I should try to eat this dish in a restaurant one day and I will know the answer.

22 Sep 20 (Tue) - Kongnamul Muchim (Soybean Sprout Side Dish)

Went to the K-fresh zone at the NTUC Finest over at Tiong Bahru Plaza last weekend and bought a packet of soybean sprouts. Have always wanted to try making Korean side dish also know as Banchan and decided to attempt this one called Kongnamul Muchim (Soybean Sprout Side Dish) by Korean Babsang.

The steps were very easy and this dish can be kept for 3-4 days.

21 Sep 20 (Mon) - Pad Krapow Moo and Pickled Radish & Carrot

Been stuck at home (and work from home) most of the time since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and thought of trying to grow some edibles at home since I cook more often nowadays. Started with mint which is relatively easy to propagate. Then I decided to grow dill and basil. Went to the NTUC to look for them in the chilled section and bought a box each. Used water to try to propagate some cuttings and used the rest for cooking. So what can I cook using basil? Went back to my favourite dish, pad krapow moo, since I cannot visit Thailand anytime soon. Guess I got to work hard on my plating and cooking of the sunny side up. Heh.

There were some radish and carrot left in the fridge from last week so googled for a recipe to use them. Found one from "My Korean Kitchen" which was easy to follow. Tweaked the recipe to use 75g sugar, 75ml water, 75ml apple cider vinegar and a pinch of salt for a 500g honey jar. Used half of a small radish and half of a carrot. The amount turned out to be just nice. Now just need to chill it in the fridge before eating.

27 Aug 20 (Thu) - Modified Gimbap

Have always been into Korean cuisine and recently saw a post on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page that mentioned replacing rice with potato in the making of Korean Gimbap. This is just what I need since I don't have short grain rice. Bought things like cucumber, carrot, potato and seaweed over the weekend for today's attempt. Found my sushi mat hidden away in the corner of my cupboard. Then another idea popped into my head and that is to cook some rice and add to the mashed potato.

Got down to work early in the morning, cutting the cucumber and carrot into strips. Cut and boiled the potatoes, cooked some rice, sliced the leftover smoked duck breast and fried an egg to make egg strips. Then mashed the potatoes, added the cooked rice, seasoned them with some grated cheese and sesame oil. Once all the ingredients were done, it was down to do the rolling. Think I need more practice on that.

It was not too bad for a first attempt but there is always room for improvements. Think I will need to season the potato/rice mixture a bit more the next time.

20 Aug 20 (Thu) - Gochujang Pork Belly Rice Bowl

 Ever since I read a CNA article on Yeo Jin-goo last month and learnt about his new reality TV program "House on Wheels", I have been following each and every episode of the program faithfully. Each episode brings the viewers to different parts of Korea and the hosts, Song Dong-il, Kim Hee-won and Yeo Jin-goo, will cook meals for themselves and their guests.

In episode 8, Jin-goo cooked Gochujang Pork Belly Rice Bowl for P.O of Block B, his guest and co-star in Hotel Del Luna. Watched that episode and that particular segment a few times to jot down the recipe for it.

Finally got down to cooking it with some modifications to the steps. I like the taste of it but just not sure if it was supposed to taste like this.

Ingredients:

300g pork belly, sliced thinly 2 tbsp oil 4 garlic cloves, minced 2 shallot, minced 1 onion, diced

1.5 tbsp honey                    1.5 tbsp light soy sauce                    1.5 tbsp vinegar                    Few heapful of gochujang sauce                    1 egg, beaten

Method:
1.  Heat up the oil in a frying pan.
2.  Add garlic and shallot and stir fry till fragrant.
3.  Add pork belly and continue to stir fry on medium heat until almost ready.
4.  Add honey, light soy sauce, vinegar, gochujang and onion and continue to stir fry till well mixed.
5.  Increase the heat to high for the sauce to boil down and bubble.

6.  Add beaten egg and continue to stir fry for few seconds then off the heat.

7.  Pour sauce and pork belly over a bowl of rice and serve hot.

22 Jul 20 (Wed) - Castella Sponge Cake

Have been practicing baking this cake since my first attempt back in early-June and failed many times over. Took a break from it for the past couple of weeks and decided to attempt it again.

Baked a one-egg portion cake based on the recipe from the first attempt using a smaller baking tin and baked in an oven. Then adapted the baking time (i.e., 1hr 15mins) and method (i.e., bake at 130 degree Celsius with water bath, aluminium foil over the baking tin and drop the cake a few times after taking out from the oven) from another recipe I found on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page.

One-egg Portion...

... with height about one small yogurt cup.

Happy to say that the result was satisfactory. The top of the cake was still wrinkled but at least not too brown or burnt. The cake managed to rise fully without sinking after taking out from the oven.

19 Jul 20 (Sun) - Pan-fry Salmon on Rosti with Chicken Ham Spring Onion Egg Roll

Craved for salmon so cooking it again. Have potato and chicken ham to clear so squeezed my brain for ideas. In the end, decided to just have fun with whatever ingredients I have on hand. Turned the potato into rosti, pan-fry the salmon and cooked the chicken ham with spring onion and egg to make into egg roll.

14 Jul 20 (Tue) - Lemon Yogurt Cake with Sakura

Have been practicing on baking castella cake for a while now but still unable to quite get it right. Felt a bit disheartened and decided to bake something familiar. Dug out the Lemon Yogurt Cake recipe and added some salted sakura that I have in the pantry. Now I will have cakes for afternoon tea over the next couple of days.

12 Jul 20 (Sun) - Teriyaki Salmon, Roast Eggplant and Egg with Sesame Sauce

Have not cooked salmon for a while. Bought a big piece recently and decided to cook it with teriyaki sauce. Bought some mini eggplants too but have never cooked them before. Googled on how to cook eggplants and most of the recipes were on steaming them with garlic and soy sauce. Searched further and found a couple on roasting eggplants.

Gave one of the roasting recipes a shot but the eggplants did not turn out as expected. Instead of becoming crispy, they were soft even though I flipped them over half way through cooking as instructed in the recipe. Fortunately, they were not soggy so it was not too bad. Taste-wise, I guess I can develop a taste for eggplants now.

06 Jul 20 (Mon) - Stir-fry Kimchi Pork Belly (Second Attempt)

Was not happy with the Stir-fry Kimchi Pork Belly that I cooked last month and so decided to give it another shot. This time round I managed to cut the pork belly into thinner slices and did not marinate them before cooking.

Instead, all I did was stir-fry the pork belly slices for a few minutes before adding kimchi, a dash of light soy sauce and rice wine. Turns out to be even better than the first attempt. So I guess cooking without recipe sometimes works better than following one blindly.

21 Jun 20 (Sun) - Stir-fry Kimchi Pork Belly

Watched this episode from "I Live Alone" featuring Song Seung-heon where he cooked for his friends when he was filming on Jeju Island. One of the dishes was stir-fry kimchi pork belly and he seemed to just really cooked with just the kimchi with pork belly and no other seasoning. It looked easy enough and I thought of trying it out myself. It was a few weeks ago and I finally got the chance to try the dish out today.

Bought a slab of pork belly from the market and sliced it myself. My knife-work needs more polishing. Tried my best to cut as thin as possible but still not thin enough I think.

Googled a bit about the dish and most recipes called for the pork belly to be marinated with light soy sauce and rice wine. In addition to marinating the pork belly, some recipes called for gochujang (Korean chili paste) and gochujang (Korean chili powder) to be added while stir-frying the dish. As I have neither the gochujang nor the gochujang, I just marinated the pork belly with light soy sauce and rice wine.

The cooking steps were simple. Just add in the pork belly to stir-fry for awhile till half-cooked and then add in the kimchi to cook till the meat is done. Taste-wise, I think the marinate overpowered the kimchi taste. Maybe next round I will not marinate the pork belly and also to use the shabu-shabu sliced pork instead. Nevertheless, it is still a taste of Korea. Hahaha...

After I was done with that, I went on to make the castella sponge cake again. This time round, I made them as cupcakes instead but forgot to lower the temperature some more compared to the previous round and hence, they became wrinkled again. Will need more practice.

13 Jun 20 (Sat) - Castella Sponge Cake

There has been a lot of posts on castella sponge cake lately on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page. My sis also makes quite a mean castella sponge cake using her airfryer. So follow their footsteps to try and make one. Found this recipe that bakes the cake in a rice cooker and gave it a try last week.

Unfortunately my cheap rice cooker wasn't able to bake the cake well. It kept jumping from the cook function to the keep-warm function. In the end, the edge of the cake rose well but the middle didn't. The fortunate thing was that at least it wasn't too dense in the middle either.

Not satisfy with the result and gave it another attempt today. This time I only played with one egg portion and baked in an oven. I tried baking it at 150 degree Celsius for 18 mins. As usual, the cake rose while in the oven and sank after it cooled down resulting in wrinkles. I guess I should have baked them as cupcakes instead because the cake turned out to be very short.

Wonder if it would be better if I bake it at 140 degree Celsius for longer time say maybe 20-25 mins. Shall try again.

Whole cake

One slice

26 May 20 (Tue) - Marble Butter Cupcakes (2nd attempt)

Attempted this recipe the second time with the suggestions received previously. The cakes didn't crack this round but they still sink and created wrinkles. Oh well... at least some improvements from the first round. Shall attempt it again to try and get cakes with smooth top.

11 May 20 (Mon) - Mini Chocolate Croissants

There have been many posts on using frozen prata for a lot of pastries on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page. Since there are some frozen prata sitting in the freezer, decided to also jump onto the bandwagon.

Experimented by making mini chocolate croissants. The result was rather good.

10 May 20 (Sun) - Honeydew Sago

There were a lot of soy milk in the fridge and the honeydew bought recently wasn't sweet. So what to do to finish all these items? Honeydew Sago dessert! Googled for a recipe to use as a base to follow and found this recipe by Roti & Rice.

Improvised to suit my needs and the result was a refreshing dessert just nice for a hot, hot day.

01 May 20 (Fri - Labour Day) - No-mixer Double Chocolate Banana Cake

There were three very ripe bananas at home so put them to use by baking a banana cake. Googled for easy recipe and found this no-mixer double chocolate banana cake recipe by Foodie Baker. The top of the cake was rather hard but fortunately the inside of the cake was moist and soft. Probably need to reduce the temperature and bake longer instead.

I reduced the amount of cocoa powder and it was a good thing I did because otherwise the cake would be rather bitter. Overall, it was quite good except that I will need to reduce the amount of cocoa powder some more the next time or omit it totally since the recipe already called for chocolate chips/chunks.

22 Apr 20 (Wed) - Marble Butter Cupcake

My sis found this marble butter cupcake recipe by Kimiya Lim and told me to give it a try. The steps seem simple enough to follow so gave it a try.

Don't know why my bakes always rose and crack in the oven then sink after cool. Posted on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page to ask for advice and some members told me to try to lower the temperature and bake longer as well as to only fill 2/3 of the baking cup.

Shall give this recipe another try with the suggestions given.

20 Apr 20 (Mon) - Easy Jam Doughnut Muffin

Have been craving for doughnuts for a while now so googled for a simple recipe to try to satisfy my craving. Found this easy jam doughnut muffin recipe by Baking TaiTai and gave it a try. Didn't have any jam around but I have some chocolate chips so improvised as I go along.

Taste-wise, I should have increased the sugar level by a little given the lack of jam. Fortunately, I added chocolate chips, at least not too bland. The doughnut muffins are very crispy though. Hee...

10 Apr 20 (Fri) - Cotton Cheesecake

More time at home due to the circuit breaker so decided to use the time to try and do more baking to improve my skill. Found this cotton cheesecake recipe by Josephine's Recipes and gave it a try. Don't know why the top crack. Wonder if it was because the oven temperature was too high.

Fortunately, the cake still tasted good and soft. Happy!

28 Mar 20 (Sat) - Huat Kuih (发糕) and Dalgon Coffee

Saw someone posted her Huat Kuih photos on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page. Her Huat Kuihs looked very pretty in yellow and pink. The kind lady shared her recipe in her post and I decided to try it out myself this weekend since I just bought a pack of self-rising flour. Then saw many other people posting their Dalgon Coffee photos in the same group page and found it to be very interesting. Googled about Dalgon Coffee and realized that it is a current trend in Korea with very simple ingredients and steps to do. Just need instant coffee, white sugar and hot water at a ratio of 1:1:1, whipped till thick and foamy then pour over milk. So decided to try it out this weekend too. It was a crazy first quarter and I really need some cooking therapy to keep myself sane and happy.

Went to the market to get breakfast and finally I broke away from my usual routine of yong tau foo bee hoon mee dry and went for the pig intestines porridge which I haven't eaten for a long, long time. Felt very happy and took my own sweet time to savour the porridge.

Then went on to start my cooking of the day: Huat Kuih. Followed the steps closely and towards the last few steps where I had to mix the colouring, my mobile phone rang and I got a shock. I ended up with a big splash of red colouring in my batter. Continued to fill the cake cases with the batter while cursing. Finally put them into the steamer to steam for 15 minutes on high. My pot has a glass cover so I was able to see the Huat Kuih rose and split at the top. So happy!

After the Huat Kuih was done and left on a rack to cool. I went on to make the Dalgon Coffee using those sachets of instant coffee that I had collected during my last trip. Only managed to get 1 tablespoonful and 1 teaspoonful. Added them to a bowl, measured the same amount of sugar and poured in. Lastly, heated up the black coffee that I had set aside earlier in the morning, measured the same amount and poured into the bowl. Used the mini electric hand mixer which I had gotten from Daiso few years back to mix the ingredients.

Mixed them for quite a long time and still didn't manage to get the thick, foamy consistency. I almost wanted to give up, yet I was too stubborn to give up. So continued to mix in a slightly different way hoping that it will thicken and foam up faster. Finally my patience was rewarded. Poured some soy milk into a glass and topped it with the whipped coffee. Overestimated the amount of whipped coffee I had and thus underestimated the amount of soy milk poured in. In the end, the overall presentation wasn't as nice as I had imagined. Next round I shall try the matcha version.

Nevertheless, I managed to succeed in doing what I had planned to do for cooking to day and that's a win for me already.

15 Mar 20 (Sun) - Tteokbokki and Mini Oreo Cheesecake

Craved for tteobokki and I had rice cakes and sauce in the pantry. So went to get some flat fishcakes and wongbok to cook. Threw everything into the pot and let it boiled then simmered for another 10 minutes. Yummy!

Saw someone posted this Mini Oreo Cheesecake recipe in the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" recently. Watched the video and it seemed simple enough to follow. So went to get the cream cheese and cake cases.

As usual, I played around with the recipe. Instead of using the full 250g of cream cheese, I used 225g and topped up the balance 25g with greek yogurt. Had some blueberries in the fridge, so popped a couple of blueberries in each cake case.

Baked them in the pre-heated oven of 160 degree Celsius for 16 minutes. Took them out to check and popped them back in for another 1.5 minutes. Took them out and left to cool on the rack. Should have keep the duration as 16 minutes, by adding 1.5 minutes, the top of the some of the cheesecakes started to crack. Took one to check and taste. Noticed that it was a bit damp on the bottom, there was condensation. Should have removed them from the silicon cases before letting them cool on the rack.

Should have keep it at 16 minutes.	Just out from the oven.
After removing from the silicon cases.	After removing the cake case.

The cheesecake tasted great and easy to do, so the recipe is a keeper.

14 Mar 20 (Sat) - Baked Korean Spicy Chicken and Black Glutinous Rice [Bubur Pulut Hitam] Kueh (黑糯米糕)

Bought a bottle of spicy hot sauce from my trip to Busan last year and decided to try it out. Not very sure how to use it so just experimented with the usual chicken wings. Marinated the mid-joint wings overnight with some salt and sauce then baked at 200 degree Celsius for 25 minutes.

Not sure if it was because I was using it in the wrong method or cooking the chicken wings in the wrong method, the taste wasn't great. Just very spicy. Maybe next round, I will try cooking something else with the sauce.

Found a pack of coconut cream which was expiring soon. So had been googling the Internet for easy recipe to use. In the end, I decided to try modify some of the kueh recipes I found online. First, I used the bottom layer recipe from this Seri Muka recipe by Rasa Malaysia. For the top, I adapted the Steamed Coconut Custard recipe from Steam & Bake because I didn't have all-purpose flour to create the top layer from Rasa Malaysia's recipe.

The result was... I also don't know how to describe. The bottom layer was ok, the top not so much. Partly because it was very soft and also I was using the wrong baking tin to steam. When I tried to remove the kueh, the top layer was stuck to the side of the tin. The baking tin was the extendable type so when I extend the sides, the top layer broke.

Taste-wise, I guess I should have used the egg whites instead of the yolk, the yolk taste was a bit overpowering. Found some gula melaka in the fridge, so poured some over the kueh, turned out the taste improved when everything was mixed together.

Will I try again, I guess not.

07 Mar 20 (Sat) - Hakka Mei Cai Stewed Pork Belly (客家梅菜扣肉)

Was watching "On the Red Dot" last night. The theme was "The Food That Made Me" and the episode was on Chef Pang searching for his Hakka heritage food.

From the episode, I learnt more about the origin of the Hakka folks and their traditional dishes, most of which I like to eat. Dishes such as Yong Tau Foo (酿豆腐), Lei Cha Rice (擂茶饭), Suan Pan Zi (算盘子), etc. Out of the few dishes featured in the episode, decided to attempt the easiest of all, Hakka Mei Cai Stewed Pork Belly (客家梅菜扣肉).

Immediately googled for recipes on my mobile phone while still watching the show. My mum used to cook mei cai but her cooking method was stir-fry with chili padi and minced pork. Found one recipe by Kenneth Goh, the admin of the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭". His recipe seems easy enough and in his post, he suggested the use of store-bought roasted pork belly.

Went to the wet market to buy the mei cai and some roasted pork belly. This was my first time cooking this dish and first time buying these ingredients from the wet market so was a bit blur. Asked the roasted meat stall uncle how much roasted pork belly will $10 get me and he said about 400g so bought $10 worth. Then headed to the other stall to get the mei cai. Aunty recommended me to get the salted ones since this was my first time cooking with it. She asked me how many people eating and I told her just myself. She estimated the portion for me and the mei cai cost $0.60. Aunty even told me how to prepare the mei cai for cooking. So nice!

Happily came back from the wet market and started preparing the mei cai before I ate breakfast. Aunty said shake off the sand and salt then soak the mei cai for 30 minutes. After that rinsed and repeat for another 30 minutes.

Salted Mei Cai

Store-bought Roasted Pork Belly

While soaking, ate breakfast then prepared the other ingredients. After the soaking and cutting were done, started cooking. Basically was just stir-frying then simmering the minced garlic and mei cai with the seasoning. Then arranged the roasted pork belly in a steaming bowl with skin facing the bowl and stacking the mei cai on top before steaming over high heat for about 1.5 hours.

Mei Cai after stir-frying and simmering

Packed roasted pork belly and mei cai into a bowl

The result was pretty good and tasted great. As the dish can be kept for a few days, it will be my dish for lunch over the next few days.

22 Feb 20 (Sat) - Sago Cake with Gula Melaka

Found some small sago pearls in the pantry and decided to use it all up. So what's better way to use it all up than to make sago cake.

Simply soaked the sago pearls for 15 minutes then rinsed with running water for a few minutes before cooking. Cooked till sago pearls became translucent then removed from heat and drained. Transferred them to a bowl of cold water and let them sit for a few minutes. Lightly greased a bowl before transferring the drained sago pearls into the bowl. Chilled for a couple of hours or overnight.

Served with gula melaka. Even better if served together with coconut milk.

 

21 Feb 20 (Fri) - Mee Sua Kueh (面线糕)

Joined a Facebook group called "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" for a while now. It was introduced to me by my sis because the members in that group tend to post photos of old-school dishes which our mum used to cook.

Saw a post on "Mee Sua Kueh (面线糕)" recently by the admin, Kenneth Goh. Read his blog post with interest and since I am spending time with my sis, I decided to give this recipe a shot.

Tried to follow the recipe as closely as possible and it seemed to turn out well until I unmould the kueh from the tray. The bottom was still a bit wet.

Fortunately, the taste was still good. Not too bad for a first attempt.

---------------- Edited on 22 Feb 2020 ----------------

Pan-fried the leftover kueh as lunch and it tasted even better because some parts became crispy. Goes well with sambal belacan.