Tamago in Microwave

If you are super busy person, but still need to cook for your family, this recipe can be super helpful. You can make this in 5 minutes, I swear!

You just have to sacrifice the presentation of the tamago, as it won't look so smooth and nice looking. But who cares, when the taste is the same, right? :)

Here's what you need:

1. 2 eggs

2. 1 tablespoon of Mirin (I don't have Mirin, so I use grain vinegar)

3. 3/4 tablespoon of sugar

4. 1/2 dashi stock (I don't have dashi stock as well, so I use chicken stock)

5. One or two small drops of light soysauce.

Here's how you make it:

1. Beat the eggs and mix all the ingredients into the egg, and mix all together.

2. Put the mixture on microwave container (preferably on the square-shaped container, if you want to make tamago sushi later)

3. Put inside the microwave, and heat it in high temp for 1 - 1.5 minutes.

And there you go the tamago...

You can cut the tamago nicely to make tamago sushi as well. Click here to see the recipe for sushi rice.

Happy trying!

Sushi Rice

You don't have to use Japanese rice to make sushi. Normal rice will do. All you need is, a few additional simple steps. Here's how:

1. Cook 2 cups of rice like normally you do it. If you never cook rice, here's some tips (Click here)

2. As soon as the rice is cooked, quickly scoop them out into a big bowl and separate them to cool it down.

3. While waiting for the rice to cool down, mix 5 tablespoons of rice/grain vinegar, 4 tablespoons of sugar and 2 tablespoons of salt into a pot.

4. Heat the pot in a small flame, and stir it, to mix those three ingredients together.

5. Once all are mixed together, pour it on the rice gradually, and mix it well.

6. Ensure that the rice is not too wet/sticky after mixing it.

And there you go, your sushi rice..... Isn't it easy? =)

Konnyaku Jelly

If you want to try some simple, healthy and nice dessert, you can try Konnyaku Jelly. Konnyaku is actually the brand of the jelly powder I normally use. Click here if you want to know what does Konnyaku Jelly look like.

Pre-requisite tips for making a more healthy jelly:

1. Use the colorless powder. It's always healthier choice to use the colorless rather than red, green, yellow color type of powder. With the colorless, it's always nicer presentation to fill in some cut fruits in the jelly.

2. Use jelly powder, instead of agar-agar. Jelly powder is more "elastic". Konnyaku brand is the most recommended.

3. Citric acid and liquid color are not really a must. You don't have to use it, if you just want a simple dessert.

What do you need:

- 1 sachet of Konnyaku jelly

- 950 ml water

- 200-250 grams of sugar

- cut fruits of your choice (My hubby and I prefer nata de coco)

- moulds for jelly (normally one sachet of jelly can be create 24 pieces of moulded jelly)

How to make the jelly:

1. Mix the powder and sugar together.

2. Pour the mixture into the water gradually, and keep stiring until the water is boiled.

3. Turn off the flame and keep stiring for around 5 min, until the bubble disappears.

4. Put the pieces of the cut fruits in the moulds, and pour the Konnyaku into the moulds.

5. Let it chilled inside the moulds, before refrigerating.

When it's done, take the jelly out of the moulds, and you can serve them like this...

Dried Beancurd Soup

This is my all time favorite homemade soup. If I remember correctly, my two brothers also love it. So, it's safe to say that, "Easy cooking soup to win your (boyfriend's) kids' heart can be beancurd soup." Well... Of course if you make it right. :)

Main ingredients:

- Beancurd

- Carrots

- Chicken Broth

- Salt

What you can add in:

- Meats (Chicken or pork)

- Tofu

- Pepper

How to make it:

1. Tear the dried beancurd into smaller pieces, and soak in the cool water.

2. Boil the water, and put the carrots in the boiled water.

3. When the carrots are half cooked, put the meat and(or) tofu.

4. Put the salt and chicken broth. The amount of chicken broth is normally more than salt.

And.... Your soup is done! Happy trying!

Stir-Fried Spinach

The simplest, healthy, yet my favorite dish is stir-fried spinach. It's really really easy. Let's get to the point on how to prepare =)

What do you need:

1. Spinach (of course)

2. Chopped Garlic

3. Salt

4. Chicken broth powder

5. Vegetable oil

Let's cook it!

1. Heat the oil up and stir fry the chopped garlic until it's fragrant. The amount of chopped garlic depends on your preference.

2. Add the spinach into the pan, and stir-fry it.

3. When the green is done, add a little bit of salt (half tea-spoon for the servings of 2) and chicken broth (about 1 to 1.5 teaspoon). Stir fry it and off the heat.

PS: For other greens, you may need to add in some water, but for spinach, water is not required.

And... you are ready to serve your healthy dish!

Cashew Chicken

This is one of my favorite dish and last week, hubby praised my cashew chicken has finally improved and tasted real good! *Proud*

I still got a few more dishes to blog about. So, here we go:

What you need:

1. Chicken fillet

2. Cashew Nuts

3. Dried Chili (Since my hubby doesn't like the smell of chili at all, so I substitute this with Green pepper, which he doesn't like either)

4. Dark Soy Sauce

5. Light Soy sauce

6. Black Pepper

7. Vegetable Oil

8. Corn Flour

How you cook it:

1. Cut the chicken fillet into dice-size and marinate it like this.


Click here to know how to marinate the meat.

2. While the meat is marinated, fry the cashews (if your cashew nuts are raw). Heat the frying pan, and fry the cashew (without oil) on a low heat. You have to keep stirring them, otherwise, the cashew will be overcooked at a side.

How much of cashew nuts really depend on you. I normally put this much (as per the picture) for 300 gr of chicken fillet.

3. After the cashew is done and the marinating is over 30 minutes, you can start cooking your cashew chicken. First, heat up the oil, then stir-fry the marinated chicken. When the chicken is almost cooked, add the green pepper (dried chili) and cashew nuts. Since hubby likes it a little bit saucy, I added a little bit of water (just a little bit).

If you like it salty, you can add a little bit of salt and stir fry it, before you off the flame.

And that's how the cashew chicken is done....

Key to Delicious Simple Chinese Food

My 3 months experience of cooking teaches me that, one of the keys to successfully delicious dish is, Marinate the meat. If you marinate the meat well, I would say that, you can guarantee that the dish is definitely nice, or at least, edible.

Let's say you want to make black pepper chicken/beef, cashew chicken, BBQ pork, etc, normally you need to marinate the meats first, to let the tastes and ingredients are absorbed by the meats.

So, what you need to prepare for basic marinating is:

1. Light soy sauce

2. Dark soy sauce

3. Black Pepper/Pepper

4. Corn Flour

Like this...

How you marinate is basically pouring all those ingredients on the meats, and mix all of them together. How much of the ingredients to use, is totally up to you and the amount of meat you want to cook. I like it a little sweet, so I will use the dark soy sauce slightly more than the light soy sauce. Black pepper is normally the last to mix (after light and dark soy sauce).

After marinating the meat, just let it be, for at least half an hour, then only you cook them.

Easy right? =)