Sous Vide Iberico Rack of Pork

Ingredients:

Rack of Pork (I use Iberico one because they are more tender and juicy)
Herbs you like (I like sage and rosemary for pork)
Minced garlic
salt, black pepper and olive oil
Gravy
Apple Sauce

How to Make:

1. Preheat water bath at 65'C.

2. Season pork rack with salt, pepper, olive oil and rub with minced garlic and covered with the herbs you choose.

3. Vacuum packed the pork and place the bags in preheated water bath and cook for 2 hours.

4. Remove pork from bags and wipe dry pork.

5. Slice up the pork rack per bones (like a pork chop) and heat up a frying pan. Seared and browned pork chops on all sides then serve immediately.

Serve with gravy and apple sauce. The pork should taste crispy on the outside and soft and tender on the inside.

Enjoy with a glass of your favourite white wine!

Herb Crusted Rack of Lamb

This recipe is adopted from Gordon Ramsay. You can find his demonstration video at Youtube. Really easy to make and lovely to eat.

Ingredients:

2 racks of lamb cut in half with 3 bones serving
salt, black pepper and olive oil to marinate the lamb
Dijon mustard

Crust Ingredient:
4 slices of stale white bread cut into small pieces
1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese
a few sprigs of parsley
a few sprigs of rosemary
a few sprigs of thymes

How to Make:

1. Preheat oven to 200'C.

2. Wash and wipe dry cut lamb racks.

3. Lightly score fat layer (top side) with a sharp knife.

4. Marinate with salt, pepper and olive oil.

5. Heat up a frying pan (which you can put to oven later) and add olive oil. Sear and brown lamb on all sides.

6. Transfer whole pan with the lamb to the oven and cook for 10-15 minutes.

7. Meanwhile, place all crust ingredients to a blender and pulse a few times until it becomes crumbles.Pour mixture to a plate and mix well.

8. When lamb is ready, take out and brush all sides with mustard. Then roll the lamb on the crumbles plate. Allow meat to rest. When ready to serve, place lamb back to the oven for 3-5 minutes.

Serve with your favourite white wine!  

Milk Braised Dijon Chicken

Ingredients:
1 Chicken of your choice, rinsed n patted dry with legs tied
1/2 cup (140g) Dijon mustard
2tbsp mustard powder
2 cups (500ml) milk
1 1/4 cups (310ml) chicken stock
1 tsp fennel seeds
Lemon rind  from 1 lemon
6 sprigs marojam
4 pickled onions, halved

How to make:
1. Preheat oven to 200'C.

2. Season chicken with salt and pepper.

3. Heat up a heavy based ovenproof pot, add olive oil. Brown Chicken on all sides for 5-10 mins.

4. While chicken is cooking, whisk mustard, mustard powder, milk, chicken stock together with fennel seeds, marojam and lemon rind. Add this mixture to the pot.

5. Once boiled, place pot to oven and cook for 1 hour.

6. Add pickled onions and cook for a further 30 min.

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Carve and serve n enjoy with a nice glass of white wine.

Clams in White Wine Tomato Sauce

Ingredients (for 6 persons portion):
Fresh Clams of your choice x approx 50-60pc (as some clams might have cracked shells or do not open up while cooking and you will need to discard them, so better make provision for more than less)
Plum Tomato x 2 - remove skins and seeds and cut into cubes
Onion x 1 - diced
Minced garlic x 2 tbsp
White wine - 1 cup (Select one which you like to drink yourself!)
Minced Parsley for garnish
Butter x 1 tbsp
Whipping Cream

How to Make:
1. Wash the clams one by one under running water using a tooth brush. Then put them into a big bowl fill with water and some salt. Then add a steel knife inside the bowl. This will help the clams to release the sands inside them. Soak them for at least 3 hours if possible.

2. When ready to cook, pour away all water in the clams bowl and rinse the clams again under running water and drain.

3. Heat up a wok, add the butter and some olive oil, then the minced garlic. Once fragrant, add the onion, once onion becomes soft, then add the tomato. Once all is quite mixed well, add the clams, mix them well. Then add the wine. Let it evaporate for a short while like 1-2 minute, then cover the wok with a glass cover which you can see through.

4. Around 5-6 minutes later, you will start see clams opening their shells. Immediately remove those opened clams into serving plates, one by one. Some at the bottom will take longer to cook and open. But those opened shall be moved to serving plates immediately to avoid it over-cooked.

5. After all clams are opened and moved to serving plates, you will see the soup/sauce remaining on the wok. Check taste and season as you like, then add a round/dash of whipping cream, no need too much. Usually, no need any more salt. If you like, maybe some pepper or a little bit of sugar. Spoon the soup to each serving plate and then garnish with minced parsley and serve!

Best to enjoy this dish with some bread and nice white wine! Enjoy!

Claypot Rice with Fish and Onsen egg

 Ingredients:

Dashi stock

Fish Fillet

Rice Crispies

Eggs (preferably Italian eggs)

How to Make:

Dashi stock:

1. wipe Konbu with a set cloth, then soak it in a pot of water for at least 30 minutes.

2. Boil the above pot of water. Once you see air bubbles around the konbu, remove them. Then add a big bunch of bonito flakes. Once the water is boiled, turn off heat and let bonito flakes all dropped to the bottom of the pot. 

3. Drain bonito flakes away and you will have a clear dashi soup stock!

Claypot Rice:

1. Wash rice under tap until the water is no more milky but clear.

2. Put rice to the claypot. For every 1 cup of rice, add 1 cup + a little bit more dashi stock into the claypot. Soak the rice in the dashi stock for at least 30 minutes.

3. Put rice pot to stove and heat it up. Once water is boiled, put the fish fillet on top of the rice and cover the pot and turn heat to medium to medium low and cook for 15 minutes.

4. Then switch off heat and keep it covered and do not open it for at least 15-30 minutes. Then the rice is ready to be served by mixing fish fillet with the rice and adding rice crispies on top.

* Time when you should start cook the rice as the claypot cannot keep the rice forever hot. 

Onsen Egg:

cook eggs in slow cooker at 65'C for 30 minutes. Once done, remove eggs from water and keep in a bowl. Crack it on top of rice. Yum!

Baked Ise-Ebi (japanese Lobster)

Ingredients:

Japanese Lobster - halved
White Miso - 4 tbsp
Mayonnaise - 2 tbsp
Philadelphia cream cheese - 2 tbsp
mirin - 2 tbsp


How to make:

1. Preheat oven to 230'C.

2. Beat the above paste ingredients together with a fork until they are even. Check taste and adjust seasoning to your liking.

3. Spoon paste mixture above lobster meat. It's better to have more paste than less. So be generous.

4. Bake in oven for 15 minutes or until the paste becomes golden.

Serve immediately and enjoy with a glass of sake!

Deep Fried Potato Balls

Ingredients:

Baking Potato x 3 pc
some milk
some cream
salt and pepper
flour
egg
breadcrumbs

optional:
crabmeat or cooked minced beef

How to Make:

1. Wash and peel potato.

2. Put potato in a pot of cold water and boil. Once boiled, turn to medium heat and cook potato for around 30 min or until they are soft. Remember to add some salt to the water.

3. Drain the water, reheat the potato in the same pot for 1 min to ensure all moisture inside potato are gone.

4. Use a masher to mash all potato. Add a dash or milk and cream. Check taste and adjust seasoning. Most important is we do not want this to be too creamy soft. We need it to be more solid and easier for shaping and deep frying.

5. If you prefer, you can add some crab meat or minced beef to the minced potato.

6. Once cool down, shape the potato into ball shape.

7. Prepare a pot of oil, once oil is hot enough, dip potato balls into flour, then egg mixture, then breadcrumbs and put inside pot to deep fry until golden.

Serve with mayo or brown sauce or ketchup.

Enjoy!

Japanese Egg Roll

Ingredients:

3 eggs (preferably Italian eggs as they have very nice yellow color)
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
some milk
a dash of vegetable oil

How to Make:

1. Mix the eggs with the ingredients above.

2. Prepare a rectangular pan for making this kind of omelette roll. Heat it up, add oil, then use a kitchen napkin to remove excess oil.

3. Pour egg mixture enough to form a thin layer on pan. Use chopsticks to stir the egg mixture at frying pan to make it cook faster. Once it's almost cooked, push and roll the omelette to the end of the pan like a block.

4. Use the kitchen towel and dap oil to the empty space of the frying pan, then add new egg mixture to the empty space of the frying pan and repeat above step a few times until all egg mixture are cooked.

5. Once all done, place the egg omelette to a bamboo sushi mat and roll it up to form a shape. Once cool down, place in fridge.

At first, it's not easy to manage to push and roll the eggs in the frying pan. But keep trying and practice makes perfect!

Enjoy!

Burdock, Carrot and Chicken Salad

Ingredients:

Organic Carrot - wash, wipe dry and shredded
Burdock - wash, use back of knife to remove skin, then shredded
Chicken thighs - steam until cooked. After cool down, shredded **
Sesame  - some for grinding
Sesame - some for garnish on top
Sesame Oil - choose a fragrant one
Sesame Salad Dressing of your choice

** for Vegetarian version, replace chicken with shredded 素雞

How to Make:

1. Stir fried the burdock in a frying pan adding a dash of soy sauce, mirin, Japanese cooking wine and sugar - i think around 5 minutes.

2. Add the shredded carrots to the frying pan, mix well with burdock for around 2 minutes. As we want to keep these all crunchy.

3. Drain the water/oil from the above mixture. Once cool down, can keep at fridge.

4. Before serving, best to take them out from fridge for a short time so they will not be too cold. Mix the shredded chicken thighs, the burdock and carrot mixture with the grounded sesame, sesame oil and sesame salad dressing to your liking. Garnish sesame on top and ready to serve.

Enjoy with a nice glass of sake!

Quiche Lorraine

Ingredients:
Ready made shortcrust pastry
flour
4 eggs
2 onions - sliced
bacon - diced
300 ml single cream
100 ml milk
100 g cheddar cheese - grated
salt & pepper

How to Make:

1. Preheat over to 200'C.

2. Heat up a pan with olive oil. Fried the bacon until fragrant, then add the sliced onions. Once all soft and fragrant, remove onions and bacon from pan, draining away the extra oil.

3. Roll the shortcrust pastry on top of a floured top and gently lift it up and place it on top of a 23 cm round, loose bottomed tart tin (best with holes on tin base), filling all the inside of the tin.

4. Trim off excess of pastry from edge of tin gently. Place tin on top of a baking tray.

5. Spread the onions and bacon on top of the pastry.

6. Beat eggs in a large jug, then mix together with the grated cheese, milk and cream, Season with a bit of salt and pepper. Then pour the egg mixture from the jug into the pastry. Then place the baking tray with the tart tin and pastry all ready to oven for baking for 30 minutes or until the filling is set and golden on top.

The egg tart will drop back once you take the tray out from the hot oven, upon then, the tart will be ready to be cut and enjoy!

Mushroom Tart

Ingredients:

For  the Tart:
ready-made all-butter puff pastry
1 egg yolk mix with a tsp of water to make eggwash

For the Mushroom Cream:
dried porcini mushrooms - a handful
onions x 2 - minced
300g chestnut mushrooms
thymes
a squeeze of lemon juice
3tbsp cream
1 egg yolk
chives - finely chopped
salt and black pepper

For the Topping:
200g chestnut mushroom - sliced
15g butter
a squeeze of lemon juice
chives - finely chopped

How to Make:
1. Preheat oven to 220'C.

2. Rinse dried porcini mushrooms, then soak them in hot water for 30 minutes or until soft. Drain water and minced the softened porcini mushrooms.

3. Wipe clean the chestnut mushrooms. Finely diced.

4. Heat up a frying pan with olive oil. First cook the minced onion until soft, then add the diced chestnut mushrooms, then the porcini mushrooms - until they are all soft and fragrant. Then add the thymes, season with salt and pepper and lemon juice.

5. Blend the above mixture to a paste using a blender. Remove mixture from blender to a bowl. Mix it with cream, egg yolk and chives. Leave to cool.

6. Roll our pastry on a floured board to a thickness of approximately 5 mm (1/4 inch).  Use a knife and mark a border of approx 1 inch from the sides (do not cut through!)

7. Spread the paste in the inner square (i.e within the knife marked borders). Arrange the sliced mushrooms on top, then squeeze lemon juice all over.

8. Use a pork to lightly press on the 1" border of the pastry and brush with eggwash so as to give a nice gloss of the border after baking.

9. Bake at 220'C for 15 minutes or until pastry turns golden.

10. Sprinkle with chopped chives before serving.

Enjoy!