Opor Sotong

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Ingredients:
1 kg sotong (squid) - cleaned and cut
thumb size piece galangal (laos) - bruised
2 lemon grass - bruised
salt to taste
msg (optional)
several lime leaves
a few spoonful graded coconut - roasted
oil
grind the following:
4 cloves garlic
1 red onion
1/2 tea spoon tumeric (or powder)
some dried chillies - soaked
2 tablespoon ketumbar (coriander) powder
1 teaspoon jintan puteh (cumin) powder

Directions:
Heat oil in wok and fry ground ingredients till fragrant, add coconut milk and season with salt and msg. Cook till thick, add sotong and cook for several minutes till it's done.

Mee Siam

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Ingredients:
Mee Siam and Sambal
water for scalding vermicelli
1 packet coarse rice vermicelli (Hokkien: bee hoon)
250 9 beansprouts
100 g Chinese chives (Hokkien: koo chye)
500 9 small prawns
3 tablespoons oil
4 firm soybean cakes (Hokkien: taukwa)
5 tablespoons oil
1 large onion, sliced
250 millilitres water
2 tablespoons tamarind powder mi e
4 hardboiled eggs, sliced

Rempah:
5 tablespoons dried prawns (pounded separately)
5 large onions
4 cloves garlic
6 candlenuts
20 dried chillies
3 tablespoons belacan powder
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt

Gravy:
2 litres water
4 tablespoons tamarind powder
3 tablespoons fried rempah (see method)
2 tablespoons preserved soy beans (Hokkien: taucheo), mashed a little
2 teaspoons sugar
1/4 coconut, grated
150 millilitres water

Directions:
Boil a large kettle of water and scald vermi- celli for 10 minutes, longer if necessary to soften until strands are pliable and soft to the touch. Wash and tail beansprouts. Cut chives into 4 cm lengths. Wash and drain. Wash and peel prawns. Heat 3 tablespoons oil and fry firm soybean cakes until brown. Cut into pieces 1 x2x 1/2 cm.

Sambal Heat 5 tablespoons oil and fry pounded dried prawns for 3 minutes. Add all other rempah ingredients except sugar and salt and fry until oil seeps out again. Add sugar and salt and stir once. Remove about half the amount of rempah and put aside. In remaining rempah, add sliced onion and fry for 2 minutes. Add prawns and tamarind liquid and simmer for five minutes. Remove and set aside.


How to Fry Vermicelli Putting all but 3 tablespoons of the reserved rempah in a kwali, fry vermicelli and bean- sprouts for 8-10 minutes, stirring all the time until cooked. Moisten occasionally with tamarind liquid from the gravy allow- ance if vermicelli gets dry during frying. Add about 3 tablespoons of fried soybean pieces and half the chives to this fried vermicelli. Dish up and arrange on a large plate with sliced hardboiled eggs, remaining chives and remaining soybean pieces for garnish.


Gravy Bring tamarind liquid to a boil. Put all ingre- dients in. Adjust seasoning to suit your taste. Serve Mee Siam with sambal prawns and as much gravy as each person wants from a gravy boat.

Singapore Noodles

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Singapore Noodles
Ingredients:
1/4 cup cooking oil
4-6 garlic cloves, minced
2 Tbsp slivered ginger strips (optional)
2 qts water
1 tbsp cooking oil
2 tsp salt
4-6 vermicelli nests (rice vermicelli worked great)
2 cups cooked pork, chicken, shrimp or beef, cut-up
1/3 cup slivered green onions
2 tsp crushed red pepper (may be halved)
1/4 cup oyster sauce
3 Tbsp curry powder
2 tsp soy sauce

Directions:
Heat first amount of cooking oil in wok or frying pan. Add garlic and ginger. Cook until tender.
Heat water, second amount of cooking oil and salt in a large uncovered saucepan until boiling. Add vermicelli. Make sure nests are covered with water. Turn off heat and let stand.

Add meat, green onion and red pepper to wok. Stir-fry until hot.

Add oyster sauce, curry powder and soy sauce. stir and toss well to mix thoroughly. Drain noodles. Add and toss. May be served now or cover and place in 250F oven to hold until ready. Makes 2 good sized plates if 4 nexts are used, 3 plates if 6 are used.

Smoked Spicy Chicken

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Ingredients:
1 chicken ( 1.5 kg )
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp wine
1 tsp sesame oil

Spicy sauce:
1 star aniseed
1/2 tsp brown peppercorn
1/2 tsp clove
1 piece cinnamon stick
1 cardamom
1/4 dried tangerine peel
5 cups water
2 tbsp sugar
Smoking ingredients for chicken
1/2 cup Jasmine tea leaf
1/2 cup soft brown sugar
1/2 cup cooked rice

Directions:
Wash chicken and remove its legs. Rub chicken cavity and skin with salt and wine. Hang it for 40 minutes.
Bring spicy sauce to the boil until 4 cups of water is left. Strain. Add light soy sauce and sugar. Bring to the boil again. Put chicken in spicy sauce. Simmer over low heat for 20 minutes.
Cover wok with aluminum foil. Put in tea leaf, soft brown sugar and rice. Heat wok. Place an iron rack on wok. Put chicken on rack. Cover with lid. Remove from heat when smoke emits from wok. Bake for 5 minutes. Take out chicken. Brush seame oil on it and allow to cool. Chop up and serve.

Stewed Pork in Claypot

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Ingredients:
450 grams of pork frank
1 tbspn of tamarind paste
2 tbspn of peanut oil

Marinate:
2 tbspn of oyster sauce
2 tbspn of light soy sauce
1 tbspn of dark soy sauce
1 tbspn of black bean paste
1 tspn of sesame oil
1 tspn of Shao Shin wine
pepper to taste
1 tspn of minced garlic
1 tbspn of cornflour

Directions:
Cut pork into cubes and add in marinate mixture. Set aside to marinate for 30 minutes.
Heat wok up and add in 2 tbspn of peanut oil. Stir-fry marinated pork for 3 minutes.
Pour stir-fried pork into a claypot and add in tamarind paste and a cup of water. Cover claypot and simmer for 1 to 2 hours or until meat is tender and the soup is thicken.
Serve hot with rice.

Sayor Loday

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Ingredients:
300 grammes (10 oz) jicama
300 grammes (10 oz) long beans
240 grammes (8 oz) French beans
300 grammes (10 oz) cabbage
4 hard bean curd cakes
180 grammes (6 oz) small prawns, peeled
60 grammes (One-and-a-half oz) galangal, peeled and smashed
One lemon grass, cleaned and smashed
One cup dried prawns, washed, soaked and pounded or ground
20 shallots, peeled
2 tsp shrimp paste (belacan)
One-and-a-half to two coconuts, grated or one-and-a-half cups processed coconut milk
6 cups water
2 tsp salt
One tsp sugar
6-10 dried chillies
One cup vegetable oil

Directions:
Cut cabbage into bite-sized pieces. String French beans and cut into finger lengths diagonally. Cut long beans into finger lengths. Peel jicama and shred into finger lengths.
Soak dried chillies till soft for half hour in warm water. Pound till fine. Cut each bean curd diagonally. Place wok over high heat and when smoking, add oil. When hot, deep fry the bean curd cakes till golden. Drain. Remove all but 6 Tbs oil and stir fry the pounded chillies till fragrant. Keep aside.
Mix coconut with half cup water and squeeze for thick milk. Set aside. Mix with remaining water and squeeze fot thin milk. Or mix half cup processed coconut milk with water.
Pound or grind shallots and shrimp paste coarsely.
Place thin coconut milk in a suacepan and turn on high heat. Add shallot mixture, dried prawns, galangal and lemon grass. When boiling, add jicama, long beans, French beans, cabbage and prawns. When boiling again, add bean curd and seasoning. Add thick coconut milk and chillies and oil mixture. Boil 10 minutes and serve.

Chilli Crabs or Lobster

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This is a popular dish amongst Singaporeans. It is also a common feature in the menus of famous seafood restaurants (along East Coast and Punggol).
The abundance of fresh chillies and garlic makes this a very spicy and full-bodied dish. Chilli crabs/lobster bears testimony to the great love Chinese have for spicy Malay food.
The real way to eat this dish is with a serving of large square chuncks of bread to dip into the delicious sauce.

Ingredients:
Lobster or crabs weighing about 450 grammes (1 lb)
6 fresh red chillies
5 cloves garlic
2 stalks spring onions
One coriander (cilantro) plant
3 Tbs vegetable oil
Sauce
3 Tbs tomato ketchup
One-and-a-half Tbs sugar, according to taste
Quarter tsp salt
One tsp pounded salted brown soya bean paste
One cup water
One-and-a-half tsp cornflour
Half tsp rice or malt vinegar of freshly squeezed lime juice
Quarter tsp dark soya sauce

Directions:
Wash uncooked shellfish well, break off the claws and crack the shell by gently hitting it with a pestle. When preparing crabs, chop the bodies in half and then each half into 3 pieces. Wash and retain the shells. When using lobsters, chop off the tail and head, and chop the body, with shell still on, into thumb length pieces.
Plunge head and tail of lobster into boiling water and cook till the shell turns red. Remove from water and set aside for decoration.
Peel garlic and pound coarsely. Pound chillies coarsely too. Or grind in a food processor.
Wash spring onions, discard roots, cut into finger lengths. Cut coriander into one-inch lengths.
Mix sauce ingredients except for the vinegar or lime juice.
Heat wok, add oil and when hot, add the garlic, stir fry for one minute, add chillies, stir fry for another minute and add crab or lobster pieces.
Stir fry for 2 to 3 minutes till shells turn slightly red. Stir sauce, add to the crabs or lobster and stir well for 2 minutes. Cover with a lid and simmer over high heat for 5 to 7 minutes till shells turn a bright red.
Remove cover, squeeze the lime juice over or add the vinegar, stir well and add spring onions. Turn heat off, stir well and serve, garnish with coriander leaves.

Crisp Curried Shrimp

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Ingredients:
2 Tbs All-purpose flour
1/2 tsp Curry powder
1/8 tsp Cayenne pepper
Salt
3/4 lb Shrimp (about 12), shelled and deveined
2 Tbs peanut oil
1 bunch Green onions, cut into
2-inch lengths
Lemon wedges for garnishing

Directions:
In a bowl combine the flour, curry powder, cayenne, and salt to taste. Add shrimp to flour mixture, tossing to coat.
In a heavy wok heat oil over moderately high heat until hot; saute green onions until almost tender.

Add shrimp to scallions and sauté, stirring occasionally, about 4 minutes, or until shrimp are opaque throughout.

Serve shrimp with lemon alongside rice or over crisp-fried rice noodles.

Pepper Crab

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Ingredients:
1 kg Crab
3 tbspn white pepper
1 tspn coriander seeds
1 tbspn minced garlic
1 stalk spring onion ( cut into 1 inch section )
1/2 tbspn cornflour
Seasoning
1/4 tbspn dark soy sauce
1 tbspn light soy sauce
1/2 tspn sesame oil

Directions:
Blend white pepper and coriander seeds in a blender until fine.
Wash and clean crabs, discards lung and organs. Chop crabs into 4 pieces. Scald crabs in 250g of hot cooking oil for about 30 secs. Remove from wok.
Stir-fry minced garlic in 2 tbspn of hot cooking oil until fragrant.
Add in 1 cup of water and 2 tspn of blended white pepper and coriander seeds, and mix well. Add seasoning and 1 tbspn of cornflour solution. Bring to a boil. Add crabs and cover the wok. Cook for 5 minutes or until crabs are cooked.
Remove the crabs from wok. Add sectioned spring onion into gravy and stir-fry for 2 minutes.
Serve hot.

Roast Duck, Melon and Mango Salad

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Ingredients:
Half roasted duck or boiled chicken
150 grammes (5 oz) honey dew melon
One pear
Half cucumber
150 grammes (5 oz) cantaloupe melon
One mango
120 grammes (4 oz) jicama
3 Tbs coarsely grounded toasted peanuts
2 Tbs toasted white seasame seeds
One coriander plant

Marinade for Duck:
Half Tbs light soya sauce
2 tsp fine sugar
One tsp oyster sauce
One Tbs cooked vegetable oil*
Sauce
3 Tbs water
Half tsp salt
One to 2 tsp sugar
Half tsp sesame oil
Half Tbs tomato ketchup
One tsp chilli sauce
One-and-a-half tsp cornflour
One-and-a-half Chinese plum sauce or apricot jam
2 tsp vegetable oil

Directions:
Remove flesh from duck and cut into fine strips. Cut flesh of melon, mango, cucumber, pear and jicama into fine strips, discarding skin and pulp first.
Arrange each vegetable and fruit neatly around a large serving platter, varying the colours. Put the duck in the centre, after first marinating it in the sauce. Top with a sprinkling of peanuts, sesame seeds and plucked coriander leaves. Chill in the fridge.
Mix all the sauce ingredients together except fro the oil and plum sauce. Heat oil in a wok and add the mixture, stir well till sauce thickens, add plum sauce or apricot jam and turn off heat. Cool in the fridge.
To serve, pour the sauce over the duck at the table and all the guests should toss the salad together.
* The oil should have been used to fry shallots first to remove any rawness of flavour.