LoMaiGai (Steamed Glutinous Rice with Chicken)

by ThingsWeLike

Have you ever experienced awkward silence in a conversation? Wish that you could react fast enough to break the icy cold silence? Fear not, start memorising a few "Fill The Silence"-s from here, or if you think that the squiggly words are too challenging to read, try OMGfacts. You'll be surprise how the conversation can roll from there!

Thesilenttiger LOVES to read fun facts, and she always have a couple up in her sleeve during a conversation. Except, wrong timing, always. The conversations were rolling fine, but she have this randomness in her, and she couldn't stop herself from blurting them out, causing a short awkward silence with a burst of laughter after that. Well well, she's still our favourite joker. *smiles*

So, today we're gonna introduce this dish/ all time favourite/ snack/ gymfreakwillnotgetclose to you guys, steamed glutinous rice with chicken or best known as Lo Mai Gai (in Cantonese). This dish is usually served in chinese "high-tea" places, such as the coffee shops or dim sum places, where all yummy food secretly gather together to plan on conquering the world. The version we made was rather plain compared to the authentic ones, as we've removed the Chinese sausages and dried shrimps (thesilenttiger dislikes them).

Ingredients:
2 pcs chicken thighs
2 pcs shiitake mushrooms
1 cup glutinous rice
3 cloves garlic (minced)
3/4 cup water

Marinate (make double serves for both chicken and rice)
1/2 tsp oyster sauce
1/4 tsp light soy sauce
pepper
1/2 tsp chinese cooking wine
1/2 tsp five spice powder
1/4 tsp dark soy sauce

1. Soak to soften the chicken thighs and shiitake mushroomn and cut them to half.
2. Add in the marinates and mix well.
3. Cover with plastic wrap before putting into the refrigerator. The marination process have to be taken for at least two hours, but we recommend you to leave it overnight and cook it first thing in the morning.
4. As for the rice, the amount of marinates is the same, but also add in 3/4 cups of water.
5. Stir evenly and cover with plastic wrap, then into the fridge it goes.

6. The next morning, heat up oil in a pan and add in the chopped garlic.
7. Sauté until fragrant and slightly browned, then throw in the chicken and mushrooms.
8. Stir fry for a minute, then add in a quarter cup of water. Place the lid over the pan and simmer on medium low heat for 2 minutes.
9. Set the dish aside after 2 minutes as we assemble the dish. The chicken should be half cooked for now, as you will still need to cook it another round together with the rice.
10. Prepare a porcelain bowl and add a drop of oil into the bowl. (If you follow traditional recipe, you will need an aluminium bowl, but porcelain works as well)
11. Using a paper towel to coat the sides of the bowl for easier removal later.
12. Place one chicken thigh and 2 mushroom pieces to the base of the bowl and some sauce that didn't get absorbed.
13. Then, divide the rice into two portions and scoop one portion into the bowl, also adding the leftover marinate.If the marinate does not cover till slightly above the rice level, add in plain water.
14. Place the bowl in the steamer and cook for 20 minutes on medium heat.
15. After 20 minutes, place a plate over the bowl and carefully turn it over to remove the rice from the bowl to serve. If you've forgotten to oil the bowl, you'll find it hard to separate the rice from the bowl, so don't forget to oil the bowl!

Watch the video recipe:

Enjoy the steamed glutinous rice with a cup of coffee (click here for recipe!) and your Chinese life would be complete!

Fun Fact #1: Do you know that many airlines require the pilot and copilot eat different meals on flights to ensure the safety of at least one of them in the rare occurrence of a food related illness?

Bet you don't know that! Oh, wait. Do you? Fine.

Inside Out Sushi Roll

Things We Like

Typing this while waiting for the arrival of thesilenttiger. She left me alone at home while she travel lovingly with her other half in the city of civilization. *cue home alone movie soundtrack, or maybe sad violin song?*

Well, this post is loooooonnnnggg overdue, due to none other than.................procrastination. Hello? it's holiday yo, I have thousands of pla...........nah, I don't have any, except for eat, sleep and shit, and of course, making some delicious, yummy in my tummy food!

So today, we are going to introduce you guys inside out sushi roll!

and here's a video tutorial!

Ingredients:

1 cup rice

1 cup water

2 1/2 tbsp sushi vinegar

3/4 cup tuna

3 tbsp mayonnaise

1 tsp sugar

1 1/2 tsp sesame oil

1 tsp worcestershire sauce

1/2 cucumber

1/2 carrot

2 pcs nori sheet

sesame seeds (for sprinkle)

1. Add the rice into a bowl and add a cup of water into the bowl.

2. Shake to even out the water.

3. Place the rice into a steamer and cook for 20 minutes on medium heat.

4. While the rice is cooking, you can start preparing the filling. Place the mayonnaise into a bowl and add in the sugar, sesame oil, worcestershire sauce and stir well. You can also spice it up with some cyan pepper if you want.
5. Add in the tuna and mix well.
6. Leave this in the refrigerator and you can prepare the vegetables.

7. Cut up the cucumber half and then half, and slice them into 3 strips.
8. Slice the carrots using peeler for thinner slice, or you could use a grater instead.
9. Pour the prepared vinegar into steamed rice and mix well.
10. Wrap a layer of clinging wrap over the sushi mat (to prevent sushi rice from sticking onto the mat during the process of flipping over, yes, we are flipping over the rice) and bend over the sides of the clinging wrap.
11. Place a sheet of nori sheet on top and spread the rice evenly, make sure to fill the rice up till the edges of the sheet,
12. Sprinkle sesame seeds on top.
13. Gently lift up the sushi and flip it over.
14. Spread the tuna at one edge and add in vegetables.
15. Carefully roll the sushi and press firmly to secure the fillings.
16. Slice the sushi to about 3 cm thick with a wet knife, to prevent the rice sticking onto it.

The picture above is definitely not the egg sushi you normally buy out there/ see from the internet. We were just experimenting to see if we can successfully roll the egg in an egg pan, but we failed. The egg should be rolled the other way round, like this

image sourced from google.

Yeah, go ahead, laugh all you want. *Sulks*

On an unrelated note, have you ever had the thought that how nice it would be, if you wake up to a warm and nicely laid out breakfast, everyday? Bliss?

I must have done a lot of good deeds and collected karma points to receive this hospitality from thesilenttiger in this life. Now I shall keep collecting points so I get to upgrade to presidential-suite-butler-service from her in my next life.

Sometimes, she creates all these cute coffee art, and your morning grogginess get swept away in that very instance, and you will go "aaaaawwwwwwww.......!"

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The milk foam was so thick that I can actually touch its ears and it didn't even move a bit! So it stayed till the bottom of the cup, and looked up to me, like it was comfortably covered with a warm, fluffy, white blanket. *pokes pokes*

Now I should be expecting this for my breakfast tomorrow, shouldn't I?

Kopi (Black Coffee)

By ThingsWeLike

Thesilenttiger was really excited in sharing this unique way of brewing coffee, so I just have to do a post the very minute she successfully uploaded on youtube, if not she'll haunt me in my dreams. This beverage is the all time favourite in traditional coffee shops that are extremely popular in Southeast Asia, and it is best served with toasted bread spread with kaya (coconut jam) or soft boiled eggs. Gorsh, typing this is making me hungry. 

I wasn't a fan of coffee until I became thesilenttiger's house mate. She started introducing me all the different types of coffee (even though they still appears to me as the same ingredients) and ways to brew them. Eventually, she flew a few bags of this traditional roasted beans 80079087985 miles down south and they landed in front of me. Thus, I'm thiiiisssssss near to being a coffee addict now. Damn.

As usual, she who likes to experiment, tried making the coffee by adding milk into it, but they tasted so weird that we concluded it's still best to retain the original way of making kopi.

So, please click the video below to view the brewing process, whilst I make myself a midnight supper! Ta!

Pan Fried Dumplings

By ThingsWeLike

Finally, the long awaited moment.........PAN FRIED DUMPLINGS! *cricket sound*

Oh well, at least I know there's readers out there judging by the page views (yes, I'm that paranoid in knowing how many page views every seconds that ticked off the clock), just that you guys are too shy to start a conversation with me? 

Ohkay, fine. I don't update that frequently as those girls who posts thousands of self-taken photos everyday (I'm not criticizing their acts, I'm one of the stalkers who likes to look at beautiful pictures too.)

So, back to the topic of fried dumplings. This recipe was invented long time ago by Thesilenttiger, as you can watch her video here. But we made a lot of a little tweak to the original recipe when we did it for a fish-themed potluck few weeks back (gasp! THAT long ago!?) 

Ingredients:

250g of minced pork
2 tsp of finely grated ginger
5 cloves of garlic
2 cups of finely chopped cabbage
1 packet of dumpling pastry
cooking oil

1 1/2  tbsp of shaoxing wine
1 1/2 tbsp of light soy sauce
1 tbsp of sesame oil
1 tbsp of cornstarch
few dashes of white pepper


1. (Picture 1&2) Place minced pork in bowl and mix in grated ginger.
2. (Picture 3-5) Finely chop the garlics and cabbage, then combine into the meat mixture.
3. Place 1 sheet of dumpling pastry on palm and scoop a teaspoon of meat mixture at the centre of pastry.
4. Fold up the sides of pastry as shown in picture 7.
5. Heat up cooking oil on a non-stick pan and place dumplings into the pan for a minute. (You could use more oil to deep fry the dumplings)
6. Pour in water into pan and close with lid. (To evenly cook the whole dumpling)
7. The dumplings are ready to serve when the water in the pan dries up.

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And this was the dish we cooked for the fish-themed potluck! FYI. All the fish you can spot on the table are freshly caught by our friends! I'm amazed by their patience and talents in fishing. I can barely stay still at one spot to feed the fish with my bait. No, wait, I think even a fish is smarter than me, I'm better off cooking them after they're dead. 

Lemongrass Lime Steam Fish!

Chocolate Banana Smoothie

By ThingsWeLike

Our household members, which consists of only TheSilentTiger and me, become very health conscious ever since we went through a hair loss phase last year (that explains the stir fry veges without salt). We got even more health fanatic this year when our university schedule isn't as packed as previous years. 

Being in a design course really drains the youth out from us. Not only dark eye circles, wrinkles, acne popping up as if they paid rent to stay on our face, but also rapid weight loss because we can't afford to feel hungry or obesity due to high intake of junk food. Try asking a few architecture students if they remember what do they eat for the last few days, I bet they can't even remember. They would most probably say: "Hello.? We don't even have time to shit and you expect us to fill our stomachs?"

But, as health freak architecture students, we overturn the conception of the unhealthy lifestyle a design student could have. We hold back ourselves from those mouth-watering unhealthy cooking outside food (occasionally breaking the rule), oats (for snacks), constant supply of vege and fruits aaannndddddd now we discovered SMOOTHIE!

Ingredients:

1 banana
1 tbsp of milo/ cocoa powder
2 tbsp of oats
4 tsp yogurt
2/3 cup of soy millk
1/3 cup boiling water

1. Cut the banana into pieces and put aside.
2. Prepare a drinking cup and put in milo/ chocolate powder and oats.
3. Pour in hot water and mix well.
4. Fill the cup with soy milk.
5. Put in the cut up banana into blender and pour in the milo/ chocolate oats mixture.
6. Add in the yogurt and start the blender with pulse for the fruit to come down to the blade.
7. Continue with mode 1 and 2 for a while, and you're done.

And here's the video recipe:

 Coming up next..............

What health crap talk I just gave.  Now that I notice the unglam scene of oil swimming across the plate, I think we have the tendency to become obese.

HO MAI GAWD. *runs off to gym and do weightlifting* 

Stir-Fry Asparagus

By ThingsWeLike

Well, uni started weeks ago, which explains the lack of updates, due to the insufficient time to grow mold and to develop stuck-in-front-of-the-computer-all-day disorder. To avoid having our blog heading towards abandonment, we got our butts back into the chair and present to you stir fry asparagus. 

As mentioned in the "About Us" entry, we do occasionally bring packed lunches to uni, not because we're that reluctant to boost the consumption growth of the country's economy, but really we're that health conscious to avoid eating out so often. Did I mention we stir fry our veges without using salt? But the Aussies grow their vegetables so well that they taste absolutely fine without seasoning. Ohkay, back to the packed lunch topic, we as typical Asians can't live without rice, and stir fry dishes goes well with it and they don't exude odd smell when we reheat them. (no, we can't live with just salads and fruits, our stomachs will be growling even before the start of lectures)

Asparagus taste really nice whether it's simple boiled or stir-fried with fresh garlics so that you get to taste its original flavour. But we got bored with that and decided to try an Asian style cooking with it. What's more when steam white rice goes really well with it! (TheSilentTiger did a video on how to make steamed rice in our ThingsWeLike TV, do check it out here!)

Ingredients:
4 fresh asparagus
1 carrot
2 garlic cloves
2 shitake mushrooms
1/2 chicken breast meat (sliced into quater inch think)

1 tbsp toasted sesame seed
1 tsp of corn starch mixed with 1 teaspoon of water
handful of toasted cashew nuts to be sprinkled on top (optional)

Seasoning:
1 1/2 tsp oyster sauce
1 1/2 tsp light soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
white pepper
1 tsp sugar


1. Toast the sesame seeds and cashew nuts. At the meantime, slice the asparagus and cut up the carrot using a peeler in order to get the thin elongated appearance. Prepare the ingredients and put aside.
2. Sauté the garlics and put in the sliced meat.
3. Pan fry the breast meat till brown for both side.
4. Put in the rest of the ingredients and combine with the seasoning.
5. Pour in a little bit amount of water and cover with a lid for a couple of minutes on medium heat.
6. Pour in the mixed corn starch and mix well. Sprinkle the toasted sesame seeds after that.
7. Lastly, you could serve the dish with some toasted cashew nuts.

And here's the video recipe:

subscribe to ThingsWeLike TV here.

Even though we fail in assisting the consumption growth in Australia, but we'd like to do our part in boosting the tourism industry by promoting the beautiful sceneries you get when you come for a visit   in Australia!

Bays of Fires, Tasmania

Bays of Fires, Tasmania

Snakey New Year

 by TheSilentTiger.

 Happy Chinese New Year to all readers!

Being far from home this Chinese New Year we too did not miss much of this awesome celebration. There were no public holidays, no elaborate decorations along streets and malls neither were there any 'DONG DONG DONG QIANG' music around. It was just another normal week and another normal few days of our uni summer break.

Chinese New Year is my favourite time of the year, that's because it's the only time of the year where every family member puts all their effort in decorating their houses and meet together for a feast during new year's eve, also the abundance cookies and the standard CNY agenda which is eat, eat and eat. And then the fun part is of course meeting up with friends, spending the whole day going house to house, chatting and eating(again) all the way till midnight. It was clear that I won't be experiencing all of that this year, but it wasn't too bad after all.

 The only decoration in our unit. I wonder whether the calligraphy word '春' which means spring should actually be '夏' (summer).....


As I mention earlier that apart from family gatherings and visiting and angpaus, CNY is all about food and eating (we all know that) so be prepared for a series of food pictures.

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As mention by Yuan in the kuih bahulu recipe post, she says I have a very weird tradition where we actually have bahulu during CNY. Haha, I never knew this fact, but it is true that my grandmother makes tins and tins of bahulu every CNY! While others enjoy prawn crackers, chocolate chip cookies, starch cookies (whatever that white cookie is called in english, the one that melts in your mouth), pork jerky etc, I enjoy indulging in my grandmother's homemade bahulu and kau kau! Now I do not know whether there is a proper word for kau kau, maybe my grandmother created this cookie, basically it is a biscuit made from egg, sugar and flour and cut into diamond shape pieces then deep fry in oil. I heard the word kau kau resembles the crispy sound when you bite into it. So this CNY, while people were enjoying eating cookies, we enjoyed making AND eating them!

kuih bahulu

kau kau

On CNY's eve we had steamboat with our friends over at his house. Look at the amount of food! There's assorted fishballs, tofu, fishcakes, potato, crab-stick, mushrooms, bean curd  shao mai, veges and meat. And I made my grandmother's signature meatball to go with the steamboat too! Yummers, there were 8 of us, and we couldn't finish all these so we decided to have Round 2 the next day.

 grandma's signature meatball!

I am not sure whether it is a culture to actually have steamboat during CNY, at least not in Malaysia I suppose.... don't know about that, but it is certainly not what me and my family have back home. So this was actually my first time having steamboat for reunion dinner, a very special thing to experience.

This is Mimi the feral/stray/house cat. He's tame (maybe feral isn't the right word) and comes in and out while we were having our meal. Give him a hug, he'll give you a soft headbutt or a kiss! Continue to pet him and he'll start drooling!!!

 O.O

Huge strawberries fresh from the farm!

The next day both of us invited 2 of our friends over for a simple dinner. Here's again my grandma's signature meatball (it keeps appearing I think I should really do a recipe for it), zai choi and a simple stir fry vege, after which was followed with my very own home made bubble milk tea!

 Chocolate flavoured milk tea.

And the following day was super random, as the both of us made another round of steamboat, this time much simpler and healthier(I think), there's just some mushrooms, vege, corn, prawns, and we also wrapped some wonton, I apologise for not having any pictures of the delicious pan fried wonton! They were too good we dug in before anyone thought of taking pictures of it. Steamboat and beer is the best combination, especially during summer.

Here's another bubble tea I made few days ago. I name it four layer ice coffee. The four layers are: pearl, evaporated milk, chilled coffee and milk foam.

Have you tried cold water process when brewing coffee? It is the best process to use for iced coffee. Cold water process produces coffee that does not smell very strong, but has a very strong and unique taste when you drink it, however it is also said to have very low acidity, which is good!

......I've saved the best for last......

So here's the epic story of our pineapple tarts:

You've seen our successful recipes, so here's a little bit of 'behind the scenes' of how much pain(and laughter) we sometimes go through. We all know CNY is well associated with pineapple, the colour yellow means gold or prosperity. So pineapple tarts are always part of the goodies you'll see and eat during this festive season.



First was to make the pineapple jam.... that wasn't too difficult, there were two of us to stir for one hour, not too bad, not too bad....

The next day was to make the pastry. Till today, we still have no idea what was wrong with the pastry. Was it too much butter, too little flour? Seems like the pastry melts during the baking process... So screw whatever fantasies we had on our successful pineapple tarts *the moment of joy and success when we open the oven door and see those beautiful shining tarts beacon like gold.......* In reality, it was a moment of shock and disappointment  when we saw the 'melted' tarts, yuck so unappealing....

But they tasted great to our surprise! The other down side is that we have to be careful eating as the tart tend to brittle and crumble. Eating with a spoon is a wise option. I just couldn't stop laughing at these..... even now.

The rest of CNY was mostly spent at home, working on recipes and enjoying our holidays to the max, playing the keyboard, singing, reading.... Uni will resume next week, feeling heavy about going back to the same daily routine, but I believe it is going to be a good year. And I hope the same for all of you, may you all have a splendid year!

Kuih Bahulu

By ThingsWeLike

To ease our homesickness+cravings for chinese new year delicacies, we decided to whip up some eggs and flour, to make the silenttiger's grandma's recipe of kuih bahulu. "Kuih" is a malay word that means cakes, pastries, biscuits, cookies etc in english and "bahulu" is the term coined for this recipe we're bringing to you today.
Apparently, kuih bahulu is a traditional Malay sponge cake, but thesilentiger's grandma does endless tins and cans of kuih bahulu for her family during chinese new year..........which is......a very exceptional mix of culture (that explains her wierd mixing of ingredients sometimes, don't be surprise if there's milo, green tea and even savoury bahulu later on)

Ingredients:
1 cup of eggs (roughly 4 to 5 depending on the sizes of the eggs)
1 1/2 cups of sugar
1 cup of flour


1. Pour the eggs and sugar into the bowl and whisk till the batter becomes fluffy and white ( the fluffier it is the softer the outcome will be, we have yet to try out whisking machine, so do tell us if it works!)
2. Add in the flour and stir till combine.
3. Stir the batter instead of whisking it till it reaches the ribbon stage as shown in image 4.
4. Heat up the pop cake maker and brush with margarine on the heated surfaces.
5. Pour the batter inside and wait for around 3-5 minutes. (The first batch would be longer compare to  the batches after that, as the maker would be well heated after that)
6. The underside of the bahulu would be golden brown when it's ready, use a skewer to remove from the maker. Leave cool before keeping them into containers.

Here's the video on this recipe:

Also be sure to check out our ThingsWeLike TV here!



And this was the breakfast we had before we made the bahulu. Homemade banana muffins with cappunico and latte. (Gluten overload for the day, maybe?)

I personally felt like a working adult reading newspapers and sipping coffee in the morning, but, in fact, I've got no work nor meetings to attend............not a single important thing to do for the rest of the day. *life as a student on holiday*

Review: Fuller's bookshop cafe (Hobart, Tasmania)

by TheSilentTiger.

You know they say good things are always hard to find, because they are always located at small/secluded/ hidden/ far places. Being unfamiliar with Hobart city, I felt as if we have walked for so long before we found the bookshop, which was actually just a simple walk down from our backpackers....

Location of the bookshop:

View Larger Map

From the outside its just another ordinary bookshop, but once you step into the shop, you are immediately welcomed by, not just the smell of books, but the clanking sound of spoons and plates and then the sound of steaming milk from the espresso machine. It is until you walk towards the back of the shop only you see the cafe! Not a very huge cafe though, but just nice for you to enjoy a cup of coffee while reading your newly bought book (you know the excitement you have when you just purchased a book and can't wait to read them?)

 A cup of cappuccino and a cup of mocha. In my opinion, the coffee itself is much thicker and richer, and of course a more roasty fragrant, I fell in love with the taste in the first sip, because it is so different from those that I have drank around Launceston. And we found out their coffee beans are from Villino Espresso here's the link to it.

And click HERE to the bookshop's website!














Lastly, picture of the day:

We were lucky to be able to watch the cruise leaving Hobart to dunno where (probably down south?) I've never had the chance to be on a cruise, so I was kinda amazed by the size of the cruise and its massive engine at the top (not sure if that's the engine or not...)

Looks like the cruise is shooting at us. PEW PEW PEW!!!