STIR FRIED RICE NOODLES ~ MEE HOON GORENG

 
There's a reason why 'prawn brain' or 'otak udang' (oh-tuck oo-dung) is  a Malaysian idiom used to describe an extremely stupid person. It's because prawns pile poop in their heads. And along a little vein on their backs too.

So the next time you're cleaning prawns snip the front half of their heads off in addition to removing the little 'vein' along the curve of their backs. 

The reason I'm telling you this is because this recipe for fried rice noodles uses a sweet, rich and creamy pink prawn stock made by blending the shells and heads of sauteed prawns to a mush and the juice drained and squeezed out. So it is a pretty good idea to make sure your prawns are poop free. Agree?

Having said that, can you imagine how delicious this noodle dish is? Prawn/prawn juice is one of the many natural flavour enhancers....it contains umami......the fifth primary taste in addition to sweet, sour, salty and bitter. Put simply umami is a pleasant savoury taste imparted by glutamate that makes food taste delicious. Click here if you would like to learn more about umami or if the grey cells are feeling exceptionally  frisky today.

I love umami but I love not chemistry. Or was that biology? (( boggle )). Anyway what I'm trying to say is .........Stir Fried Rice Noodles is not rocket science. It's not even science...........it is Art.

Now to the art. Fried rice noodles is a street food. It's disgustingly cheap and may be stir fried,  soup-ed up or sauced up in countless ways. Usually bought in its dried form, it is given a soak for an hour or so to soften up. It's then drained, given a few shakes in a colander and tossed into a  sweet, spicy seasoned sauce, bubbling away deliriously in the wok waiting to be puckered up by the noodles.  

How to clean the prawns. Well.

Using a small paring knife, make a little incision between where the head joins the body. You'll be able to see the 'vein' joining up into the head. See how the poop track is connected to their heads?

With the tip of your knife lift off a tiny bit of the 'vein' and then tug gently at it. The 'vein' will slide out quite easily like a little grey thread. You have just removed prawn poop ~ in a very cool way. Then snip off the front half of their heads to get rid of the rest. Now your prawns are really clean and ready to be cooked.Woo-hoooo..........

 
The recipe ~
The amount of rice noodles is an estimate. I had forgotten to weigh them in their dried form before soaking. But its was more than enough for 2 persons.

About 150 - 180 gm of dried rice vermicelli/skinny rice noodles, soaked in cold water for an hour and drained. Keep aside. Note : The noodles will not go completely soft. But don't worry. It will soften further in the cooking.

6-7 medium sized prawns, cleaned as above leaving the shells and heads intact.
Some thinly sliced beef, seasoned with a little light soy sauce, salt pepper 


Some sliced cabbage or any green you like
Chinese chives, chopped into 1 inch lengths ( I LOVE chives in stir fried noodles dishes)
Some bean sprouts if you like
Some sliced shitake mushrooms

1/2 large red onion
2 pips garlic
1//2 inch fresh ginger

1 tsp or more chillie paste (store-bought or made like here)

1 1/2 T oyster sauce
1 T light soy sauce
1 T dark soy sauce
1 cup or more water or chicken/beef stock
salt 'n pepper


2- 3 T cooking oil


Blend or pound the onion, garlic and ginger to a paste. Prepare and clean the vegetables and keep aside. Prepare the prawns as above and season the beef slices.


Heat up a wok. Pour in 1 T of the cooking oil. When hot stir fry the prawns for a minute or two, adding salt n pepper to season, until they go completely pink and are cooked. Lift out and keep aside on a plate to cool a while. 


When cool, peel prawns and place all shell and heads into a small food processor and blitz until very fine. You may add a little water to help it along. Take the mush out and strain, squeezing out the juice into a small bowl. Discard the squeezed ground prawn shells. Keep the juice.


Pour the remainder of the oil into the wok and warm it up till fairly hot. Throw in the ground onions, garlic and ginger and chillie paste and stir fry until aromatic and the paste is cooked. About 2-3 minutes. 

Throw in the seasoned beef, mushrooms, veggies (except chives) and finally the cooked prawns, stirring all the time. Put in the oyster sauce, the 2 soy sauces, salt and pepper to taste, the prawn juice and finally 1 cup of water or chicken/beef stock. Stir. Bring to the boil. throw in the drained noodles and mix well to ensure the noodles are enveloped by the sauce. Add in the chives at this point and continue to mix well, cutting through the noodles if necessary. The sauce will be soaked up by the noodles and the noodles will become softer and cooked through as you stir fry. If you find it a little dry add more stock or water. Season with more salt n pepper if necessary. 


Once everything is well mixed the final dish should be a little moist and not too dry. Serve hot.

PEANUT THUMBPRINT NUTELLA COOKIES

These cookies made the top 9 on Foodbuzz today, 26th May. Happy Buzz day!

I came up with a peanut thumbprint cookie with a nutella centre. Clever me. It was very very delicious. 

The recipe for the peanut cookie was adapted from...here's the Link and Credit Tree......

                                       Malaysia Best
                                                 |
                                     A Table for Two
                                                 |
                                    Citrus and Candy
                                                 |
                                    Cherry On A Cake

Yup. We're related. Through food. I made some changes though. Instead of using 250 ml of oil I halved the amount and used butter to replace. I also rolled the cookie dough balls in chopped peanuts and then made a thumbprint and after they had baked and cooled down I filled them with nutella. I was so pleased with myself (and the cookies) because I liked the way they looked, the taste and the variety of textures that I could get all in one cookie. *A big pat on my back*. Yes I'm that pleased :)))  And it is a fusion of an Asian and a Western cookie. 

These peanut cookies (Fah Sang Peng) are a popular must-have cookie during Chinese New Year and they have a distinctive Asian flavour because of the use of oil instead of butter. But with the replacement of half the oil with butter they developed a richer flavour. They were delicious as in very delicious. 

May I also add that my indecisiveness between making a thumbprint cookie and a peanut cookie had led to this. 

The recipe ~

Yield : 45 cookies


300 gm groudnuts, ground finely
200 gm castor sugar
250 gm AP flour
125 ml vegetable oil
125 gm butter, softened


Extra chopped peanuts for coating 
Egg white for dipping
Nutella for the centres


Place butter in the bowl of an electric mixer. Beat until soft and creamy. Add in ground peanuts, castor sugar, flour and mix until evenly combined. The mixture will still be dry and crumbly. Pour in the oil as the mixer runs and stop when the mixture comes together without being too soft and sticky. It should feel comfortable without being crumbly or too soft.

Roll in 1 inch balls. I used a melon baller. Roll into a smooth ball and dip in egg white and then in chopped peanuts. Place on a baking tray and make a depression in the centre either with your thumb or the end of the handle of a wooden spoon (I used the broader end of a chopstick).

Bake at 170 C for about 10 minutes or until light golden brown. Let cookies cool completely before filling with a swirl of Nutella using a teaspoon and swirling it with the teaspoon just before serving.

Or course you can just make them plain without the depression and serve them without Nutella. Just as delicious. 

FLOWER SUGAR COOKIES ~ A GUEST POST BY PEACE & LIGHT

What do you do when you have little kiddies, little grandkiddies or little great grandkiddies? You put them to work. That's what you do. (Aside: I'm a grandma with a dab of mean. And invisible eyes at the back of my head)

I waited a long time for this post.  I was excruciatingly eager to get this post up because colors just make my knees go all soft and translucent, like sauteed onions. I think Peace and Light knew that. They knew I would adore these candy coloured sugar cookies. And they were completely right. I do. My sweetie pies.


(Aside : We're such girlie girls, my girls and I)

At only 11 and 12 they made these all on their own. After their brother H had made the brownies, a few posts ago, Peace and Light thought candy coloured cookies would make a cool post too. And the rest they say ........is a baking tray and cookie dough.

Peace loves horses, she rides, she cooks, she bakes, she sews, she knits, she crochets (surpassing her Mom..........and me), she decorates cakes but she also has a deep passion for animals. So she might make a great a vet one day or perhaps a great pastry chef.....the way I see it.


Light did nanowrimo and completed the challenge of writing 40,000 words in a month and submitting her story. Light is the story teller, the writer, the artist, the dreamer. She is the main creator of Zoe and Bo, their one-day-to-be-very-famous-comic-strip-series she says. Now why do I get the feeling that that might just be true?

As if that isn't enough they surprised me by making some animations so that you , dear readers, will know how to put the spiral and flower cookies together. Thank god for grandkids!

And in between a million other things their mommy took the cookie photos in their lovely gravel and rock garden just before the sun went down. Aren't they gorgeous? I think she did a great job. Thank you so much dear. 

Its beginning to dawn on me, very vividly, that I may have found myself the perfect dream team. I could form a nice little blog company where I could put my feet up, sit back, relax, sit on a rocking chair, rock myself to sleep, snore, croak out orders, look flabulous, wither away and not have to slog blog away at the kitchen counter computer all by myself. My little kiddies will do all the work. heh

Take it from here sweeties ~

I am Light, and this is my first time making these cookies, and I made them with my sister Peace. They are sugar cookies, and you get to color the dough. (That might be a messy job.) These are cool, chewy cookies, and I hope you will like making them!

I've been wanting to make these cookies for a long time, and voila! Super, amazing colorful cookies just baked! I got this from a kiddish cookie cookbook, and there are five recipes for these cookies. You can freeze and color the dough one day, and bake the cookies the other day, but you can do it in all one day. 

This is how you make Spiral and Flower cookies.

Yield: 24

Sugar Cookie Dough

1 stick softened butter (unsalted)

3/4 cup sugar

1 egg

1 1/2 cup flour

1/4 tsp salt

You'll need this too:

Egg Wash

1 egg

Water

Crack the egg over a small bowl. Pour in some water and and beat with a fork, and that's it! 

The Cookies 

Preheat the oven to...hmmm...how about 375˚ F? Okay then, hurry up. 

Beep, beep, beep. 

Okay, next, cream the softened butter and sugar in a mixing bowl. (Use an electric mixer.) Did I say softened butter? Anyway, crack the egg into the butter-and-sugar mixture and blend very well. Then add the dry ingredients to the butter-sugar-egg mixture. Voila! Dough! Amazing! 

You have made Sugar Cookie dough all by yourself! 

Separate and color the dough. Roll it around in your hands or mix it in the electric mixer. Okay, anyway, wrap and chill the dough for 15 min. (Use a timer if needed.)  

To make the spirals, separate the dough into two blobs (or balls?). Color them and smash them equally into rectangles. Wrap and chill the rectangles for 20 minutes.

                                                 * * *

Unwrap the dough carefully _ it's delicate. With a pastry brush, brush egg wash between the two dough layers and stick them together. Wait for the dough to soften a bit, then roll the dough carefully into a log. Look at the side of the log to make sure you have a spiral pattern                                                            

Drumroll please...Okay! This is the waiting time. Freeze this spiral log for 2 hours. I repeat, 2 hours. 

Grease the cookie sheets. Unwrap the dough log and cut it into cookies about 1 centimeter thick. Put them on the cookie sheet and push it in the oven. Close the door. 

Bad cookie sheet! (Time-out for the cookie sheet!)

Well, you have made Spiral cookies! Congratulations!
 
Flowers
These might be hard.

Preheat the oven. Make the dough and Egg Wash. Separate the dough into two big ones and one small. Color and freeze them for 15 min. 

Roll the two big dough balls into snakes and stick them together with Egg Wash. Use the small blob for another snake and put it in the middle of the whole snake rectangle. Roll this whole thing together to make a log. Wrap it in plastic wrap and freeze it for two hours. 

Unwrap the log and cut it into cookies. (The flowers I made didn't turn out very well.) Put the cookies on the cookie sheet and put them into the oven. Slam the oven door!
 

The flowers are done!

~Light~

Thank you Sweeties ~ I just LOVE the sugar cookies! You know that don't you?. Bite, crunch, chew and yummmmmm.

Lotsa HUGSSSSSSSSS

Grandma

Aside : Don't you think these cookies are cool? If you have anything sweet to say to Peace and Light or to ask about the recipe I'm sure Peace and light would be thrilled to bits to help you out.;)

A PAINTED CHALLAH

What is large, fat, soft, huggable and can be eaten? A look alike teddy bear with its arms and legs crossed. 


This Challah turned out so huge that Z was constantly exclaiming as I cajoled it from the oven. This is the hugest braided bread I've made. It sat diagonally on my largest jelly roll tray and it just grew and grew. I created a beast.


Then with a brush wielding hand (if you have read my earlier posts you'll know I'm on a bread painting binge) I painted it and I thought it looked all right until I saw the photos. The design was inspired by the two pots of ferns that stand guard on each side of our front door.

The longer I stared at the photos the more frightened I became. It looked reptile-ish because of the glaze-y and shiny finish. Oww. It's a Frankenstein. (I told you I preferred rustic). But I'm still posting this because  I'm not going to make another one so soon. It's huge! I don't think painted bread look too good glazed. Dusted with flour and rustic is so much better. In my opinion.

But as large as it is, it is very tender and soft and  delicious. A gentle beast. I was afraid of an egg-y smell and taste because of the number of eggs it used, so I had my apprehensions at first, but this had none of that.

This recipe uses 4 eggs ~ 2 whole and 2 yolks. Other recipes that I've looked at use at least 5. So that was the main reason I went with this one, from Cooking Bread. It turned out perfectly soft and rich and I'm very happy with the results.  I totally recommend it. 

I'm submitting this to Yeast Spotting. 

Enough said...here's the recipe ~

1 cup lukewarm water
2 eggs
2egg yolks
2 T oil
3 T honey
41/2 cups bread flour
1 tspsalt
11/2 tsp dry yeast (I used instant)


In a bowl combine water, eggs, honey and oil. Whisk.


Pour the egg oil water mixture into a large bowl and add 2 cups of bread flour, yeast and salt. Beat together. (I used the electric mixer with the paddle beater. Allow to rest 15 minutes uncovered. Then add the rest of the flour 1/2 a cup at a time until finished by which time you would get a sticky, soft dough.


Turn out onto lightly floured board and knead for 10 minutes. Although the dough is sticky and soft try to resist adding to much flour when kneading. As bread makers would always say ...it's better to err on the sticky side than the dry....


I would advise getting a metal scraper to scrape the dough off the board when you want to turn it over to knead. Rather than sprinkling flour onto the dough, flour your hands instead, and that way you will resist adding too much flour. There is no need to knead hard. Just some gentle kneading for 10 minutes continuously will do the job. (If you knead too hard you'll just get all the dough sticking and clinging to your hand).


When done kneading place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl cover with a damp cloth and allow to rise until double in size.


Once risen, turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and divide the dough into 3 equal pieces ( I weighed them so that I got really equal sizes...each were 350 gm).


Roll each piece of dough into a long strand about 11 or 12 inches long then braid it. Please look here for braiding. Once braided place on a ready lined baking tray and allow to rise until double in size. Brush with the left over egg whites twice to ensure a shiny finish. I understand Challahs are suppose to be shiny. Sprinkle with poppy seeds or other seeds that you like.


Bake for 20 minutes then rotate the bread and bake for another 15-20 minutes.

Note : 3 risings (the 3rd being a very slow rise in the refrigerator if possible) would bring out a better, more flavourful bread. I painted it so I baked it until lightly golden without the egg wash, took it out, painted it and returned it to oven for about 3 minutes to allow the paint to dry and then took it out again to glaze it with egg wash and then baked it again for the rest of the suggested time.


Paint : I used egg yolk mixed with a very small amount of thick black coffee.