Food for the ill... or the very health-conscious

So many ingredients you can't see the thick bee hoon below!

A few days ago, I developed a sore throat but it went away, only to return with a vengeance this morning. Last night I also started to cough a little. There went my plans to cook laksa today (I always cook laksa using the Prima mix - it's really nice I tell ya). I had already bought the ingredients earlier on but my throat infection meant that laksa was definitely out of the question. Instead of letting the innocent packet of thick bee hoon and beansprouts go to waste, I decided to cook a soupy meal. Fortunately I wasn't feeling too ill to get out of bed to cook dinner...


This is definitely a meal that would go down well with someone who's ill... or if you're feeling a bit health-conscious...


Ingredients:

• 1 packet of thick bee hoon (serves 2) - or you can use other types of noodles (usually I use other types of noodles like ee fu noodles, vermicelli, or egg noodles)
• 4-5 handfuls of beansprouts, plucked (you can cut down on this - I bought a whole pack so I decided to use it all)
• 4 crabsticks - remove the plastic covering and cut each crabstick into half
• 1 packet of fishballs
• a couple yong tau foo items (depends on your preference)
• fish sauce/salt to taste
• ground white pepper
• spring onions (washed and cut into 1cm length pieces)

Soup base:

• 3 chicken breast bones
• $2-3 worth of pork ribs
• 1 dried scallop (rinse, place in small soup bag)
• a handful of ikan bilis (washed a few times)
• a few cloves of garlic (rinse)
• a soup pot of water

Method:

1. Clean the chicken breast bones and pork ribs, removing any visible fats.
2. Blanch the bones and ribs.
3. Place all the ingredients for the soup base in a soup pot or claypot. Bring to a boil then simmer for a few hours (I think I simmered it for about 4hrs today).
4. Sieve the bones and ikan bilis out of the soup and place the pork ribs (if desired) and the dried scallop (remove from soup bag) back into the soup. Set aside.
5. Steam the yong tau foo items (I do this for hygiene reasons). Set aside.
6. Bring a pot of water to boil and place the thick bee hoon into the boiling water.
7. Remove the thick bee hoon from the water and portion into serving bowls.
8. Add the beansprouts to the boiling water. Let it boil for awhile till it's cooked but yet still very crunchy. Remove from water and place in the serving bowls.
9. While cooking the bee hoon and beansprouts, bring the soup base to a boil.
10. Add the fishballs first and let them boil for awhile.
11. Add the yong tau foo items and add the crab sticks last as they cook very quickly. (The fishballs should be floating by now - which means they're cooked)
12. Season the soup with fish sauce and pepper.
13. Dish the fishballs, crabsticks, yong tau foo items, pork ribs and dried scallop into serving bowls and pour the soup into the bowls.
14. Garnish with spring onions.

I told my hubby that if there's a dish he's gotta learn to cook, it's gotta be this one.... so he can cook for me when I'm ill!! :)

Luffa (絲瓜) with prawns and egg

I was at the market a couple of days ago when this old lady brought a luffa to the vegetable stall owner and asked her how to cook it. And that was when I recalled how long I've not cooked this dish, and how much I miss it, really. It also brought to mind one of my mil's comments. She said (roughly translated from Mandarin) that "the zi char stall downstairs doesn't have good tasting food because they employed young cooks and young people can't cook." Of course I beg to differ. Not on the point that the food sold downstairs isn't good, but that young people know nuts about cooking. Well, I definitely can cook - and I'm young. So there. :D And obviously, we know that not all old people can cook well either. But I didn't bother to contest her statement with her. Some old people just have the deep-set notion that the young are too inexperienced to be able to cook well.

Anyway, here's the recipe to one of my favourite vegetable dishes.


Luffa (絲瓜) with prawns and egg

Ingredients:

• 1 luffa (skinned, the fluffy stuff within removed, then sliced thinly at an angle)
• 4 prawns (washed, shelled (keep the tail) and deveined)
• 1 egg (beaten)
• 1-2 cloves garlic (minced)
• Stock/ water
• salt to taste

Method:

1. Prepare the luffa and the rest of the ingredients as stated above.
2. Saute the garlic in a wok.
3. Add the prawns in and cook till they are 80% cooked. Remove prawns from wok.
4. Add in the luffa and fry for awhile. Add stock/water (I used water from parboiling the broccoli and carrot yesterday) and simmer till the luffa is cooked (just pick one slice up to try when you think the luffa maybe ready).
5. Add in the prawns and simmer till the prawns are cooked through (not allowing the prawns to over-simmer will prevent them from becoming overcooked)
6. Swirl in the beaten egg slowly, bit by bit.
7. Add salt to taste.
8. Dish and serve.

Yesterday's luffa dish was so flavourful and gosh, so sweet that my hubby actually thought I added sugar! Even though this time round I used only the water which was used to parboil the broccoli and carrots for another dish, the luffa still turned out so marvellously delish. Ooh, I can't wait to cook this again soon! Btw, I love luffa soup too!

For toddler's consumption:

• Serve as it is if you have sliced the luffa thinly enough.