Alicia busy at work...

Alicia's in love with colouring with her crayons and drawing too... She obviously can't colour very well yet and she's always asking us to do the colouring and sometimes, she'd ask us to hold her hand and colour/draw away! :)

She can identify the colours of the crayons I gave her so far and she's able to tell me which colour to use for the parts of the picture! *happy*

Concentrating hard...

Purple!!! Colour (with it)!!!

Please? :D

Time for some green in the picture....

Green radish and carrot soup

Adoring the beautiful green radish on my chopping board... :)

Green radish apparently reduces heatiness, alleviates stress, promotes urination and is good for expelling phelgm.

Green radish and carrot soup

Ingredients:

• 1 green radish (chop into chunks, remove skin)
• 2 small carrots (chop into chunks)
• 6 red dates
• 1 dried scallop (place in soup bag)
• 250g pork ribs
• 3 chicken breast bones
• 3 cloves garlic (with skin on)
• 1.5L water
• fish sauce/salt to taste

Method:

1. Blanch the pork ribs and chicken bones.
2. Rinse the red dates and garlic.
3. Add the red dates, garlic, pork ribs and chicken bones to the water in a slowcooker.
4. Let it cook on LOW for about 6hours.
5. Transfer the soup to a pot suitable for cooking on stovetop.
6. Boil on high heat for about 30min then remove the red dates, garlic and chicken breast bones. Retain the pork ribs if desired. Return the scallop to the soup.
7. Put the soup through oil filter paper to remove excess oil.
8. Add the green radish and carrots and boil for at least 30min till the green radish softens. (Don't expect them to be soft like carrots or even white radish. The texture's quite different!)
9. Add fish sauce to taste.

If cooking on stovetop,

1. Blanch the pork ribs and chicken bones.
2. Rinse the red dates and garlic.
3. Add the red dates, garlic, pork ribs and chicken bones to the water (2L instead of 1L) in a pot.
4. Boil on high heat for about 30min then simmer for 2-3hours.
5. Remove the red dates, garlic and chicken breast bones. Retain the pork ribs if desired. Return the scallop to the soup.
6. Put the soup through oil filter paper to remove excess oil.
7. Add the green radish and carrots and boil for at least 30min till the green radish softens. (Don't expect them to be soft like carrots or even white radish. The texture's quite different!)
8. Add fish sauce to taste.

For toddler's consumption:

• Cut the green radish into small cubes of about 0.5cm to make chewing easier. I found it ok to feed 2-3 such cubes to Alicia at one time, but it depends on your toddler of course... :)
• Cut carrots into cubes as well but there is no need to cut it as small as the green radish as carrots are much softer.

Stir-fried baby spinach with crispy whitebait

Mmmm.... tender bites of baby spinach with crispy whitebait!

The highlight of the dish... :)

Stir-fried baby spinach with crispy whitebait

Ingredients:

• 1-2 bunches of baby spinach
• 1 big handful of Japanese (dried) whitebait
• 100ml stock/water
• 2 cloves garlic (minced)
• shallot and garlic oil (made by frying shallot and garlic in oil till they brown)

Method:

1. In a wok, heat some shallot and garlic oil then add the whitebait and pan-fry till they turn golden brown and crisp.
2. Set aside the whitebait on a kitchen towel to remove any excess oil.
3. With the remaining oil in the wok, fry the garlic till fragrant.
4. Add the baby spinach and stir-fry for about half a minute.
5. Add the stock/water and simmer till the spinach is cooked.
6. Add fish sauce to taste.
7. Dish and top with crispy whitebait.

Alicia loves the crispy whitebait and she ate them neat. :)

For toddler's consumption:

• The whitebait from Japan is not salty and I highly recommend it for toddlers' consumption!
• Make sure the spinach is of appropriate length/size before serving to prevent choking.
• Serve the spinach and whitebait separately if preferred.

Mushroom and onion gravy

Mushroom and onion gravy anyone? :) I topped my baked chicken thighs with this last night and it was nice! :) hee...

*I've got quite a few posts to update so I'll just keep all short and succinct!*

Ooh.. look at the mushroom!!! :P

Mushroom and onion gravy

Mushroom and onion gravy on the chicken...

Ingredients:

• 5 mushrooms, sliced (choice of white button/swiss brown/shitake)
• 1/2-1 yellow/white onion, sliced (amount depending on your preference)
• unsalted butter (optional)
• 1L water

Seasoning:

• 1T oyster sauce
• 1/3T worcestershire sauce
• 1/3T hua diao jiu
• dashes of ground black pepper

Method:

1. Melt butter in a pot.
2. Fry the onions for awhile till slightly soft.
3. Add the water and let it come to a boil.
4. Add the mushrooms and let the mixture simmer till there's about half the amount of water left in the pot.
5. Add the seasoning and let it simmer some more till it reaches the consistency you like.
6. Add cornflour slurry if needed (optional).

*I'm more conscious about our diet recently so I skipped the butter and went straight to step 3 and boiled the onions together with the mushrooms and it still tasted ok.

Old cucumber soup (老黄瓜排骨汤)

The goodness of old cucumber soup awaits me....

Old cucumber soup (老黄瓜排骨汤)

Ingredients:

*Skip the dried scallop and dried cuttlefish for tots below 18mths*

• 1 small old cucumber (cut into chunks, leave skin on)
• 2 small carrots (cut into chunks)
• 250g pork ribs
• 3 chicken breast bones
• 6 red dates
• 1 dried scallop
• 1 dried cuttlefish (optional)
• 3 cloves garlic (with skin on)
• fish sauce/salt to taste
• 1L water

Method:

1. Blanch the pork ribs and chicken bones.
2. Rinse the red dates, scallop, cuttlefish and garlic and add these together with the pork ribs and chicken bones to the water in a slowcooker.
3. Let the soup base slowcook for about 6hours on LOW.
4. Add the old cucumber and carrots and cook for another 2 hours on HIGH.
5. Sieve out the bones, red dates and garlic and put the soup through oil filter paper to sieve out extra oil.
6. Return the pork ribs (if desired) and dried scallop to the soup.
7. Add fish sauce/ salt to taste.
8. Serve.

If cooking on stovetop,

1. Blanch the pork ribs and chicken bones.
2. Rinse the red dates, scallop, cuttlefish and garlic and add these together with the pork ribs and chicken bones to the water (2L instead of 1L) in a pot.
3. Bring the soup to a boil and let it boil on medium to high heat for 30min then simmer for 2-3hours on low heat.
4. Add the old cucumber and carrots in the last 30min.
5. Sieve out the bones, red dates and garlic and put the soup through oil filter paper to sieve out extra oil.
6. Return the pork ribs (if desired) and dried scallop to the soup.
7. Add fish sauce/ salt to taste.
8. Serve.

For toddler's consumption:

• Skip the dried scallop and dried cuttlefish for tots below 18mths.
• Remove the skin of the old cucumber before serving.