Vegetarian Boiled Bee Hoon - Healthier Version

Today is 15th of Lunar Month again. Many buddhists and taoists will usually turn vegan on the 1st and 15th. Aside from religious beliefs, I find this a healthy practice as consuming too much meat is generally not good for our bodies. 

However, food from vegetarian stalls can be very oily whereby a lot are deep fried. Different preservatives are commonly used as well to make some of the ingredients to look and taste like meat. These will not help us become healthier at all and to me, sort of clashed with the idea of not craving for meat. So one has to carefully choose the type of dishes if turning vegan is for health purpose. Hence, I tend to choose the purely vegetables ones when I want to eat vegetarian on those two days. 

There is this vegetarian stall in Clementi Hawker Centre which I have been frequenting for the past countless number of years. It is my favourite because their beehoon is not stir fried and the ingredients are not oily. However the taste standard seems to have dropped and I did not find as much vegetables  in my plate of beehoon as last time. Price per plate has risen as well.. this is Singapore I guess. A lot of "good old taste" have been sacrificed due to rising rents and ingredients prices. Anyway, I thought I could try to cook a similar vegetarian beehoon dish myself. The gravy that I cooked could never match that of the stall uncle's but it is acceptable and pleasant. Anyone interested can try too, hope it makes you feel healthier :)

My Vegetarian Boiled Bee Hoon

Fresh Mushrooms N Garlic sauté - Fusion Style on Bee Hoon!

My friend, S, was cooking a full meal for the first time for her husband. So I suggested that she do a garlic and mushroom sauté to top over her spaghetti. Anyway she did a great job with her husband giving her 7.4 points out of 10! Seeing the picture of her food made me want to cook and eat it too. Just a few pieces of mushrooms for me though.

I did not pick this recipe up from anywhere, not even through googling. It was  just created from the memory of my one and only Italian restaurant meal with my family almost 20 years ago. The taste has never left my mind since. Anyway I have lots of beehoon inside the fridge so I will use that instead of spaghetti. It becomes a western-chinese fusion then... :S

My Fresh Mushrooms N Garlic saute - on Beehoon!

Claypot Braised Chicken N Yam - Who is Bigger?

Recently, my friend was telling me that she ate Duck with Yam Rice. Just YAM alone was enough to trigger off a chain of thoughts on food like Yam Milkshake, Yam Ice Cream, Taro Balls and so forth. And there was one particular yam dish that I super loved and I could not stop thinking about it for the next 1 week. As schedule was busy of late, I decided to cook it instead of going through the hassle to travel to eat it to satisfy my craving! Just the image of the Yam and Chicken in my mind made me drool even in my sleep. It could be the Yam, it could also be the Chicken. I just gotta have it for real... RAWRZZZ!

Claypot Braised Chicken and Yam, that I almost ate in dreams!

Omelettes on Bread - Neopets Version

There were times when I played Neopets and felt hungry due to all the yummy looking food in there. One of the most common food that I fed my pet was the Giant Omelette. I will never know what type of omelette my pet would get for that day. 

The most common types of omelettes my neopet would get

Anyway I had been craving for omelettes last Friday, so decided to cook some over the weekend (based on inspiration from Neopets) :] Looking at the list above, "Bacon and Broccoli", "Cheese and Onion", "Tomato" and "Ham and Cheese" seemed the best. But cooking up 4 omelettes would be a real hassle and I wouldn't want Neopets to sue me for any infringement of copyright... :X So I have decided to mix some ingredients together and come up with my 2 versions of omelettes, and put them on bread to eat as snack!

My Draft Omelettes - Guess what flavours? lol

My Cooked Omelettes 

"Broccoli, Tomato N Bacon" and "Ham, Onion N Cheese"

Black Bean Sauce Fish Slices Stir Fry - Ginger and Onions

The rainy season is here again. The weather is cooling and sleeping becomes more comfortable too. However, friends have been falling sick and coming down with flu. The best preventive measure will be to keep our bodies warm inside out during this time of the year. 

Eating a hot bowl of plain porridge on cold, rainy days will bring warm comfort to our bodies. I do know that not everyone likes plain porridge as it is too bland unless eaten with more savoury dishes. Salty and spicy ones go best with it. 

I cooked some plain porridge for lunch today, not just because weather has been cold the past few days but also due to my craving for Stir Fry Black Bean Sauce Fish Slices to go with it... It had been years since I ate this dish and I have never tried cooking it myself before. Let's see how it will turn out!  :S

Black Bean Sauce Fish Slices Stir Fry, with Ginger and Onions

Fresh Yellow Noodles Soup - Simple Tradition

I did not like fresh yellow noodles since young because of the strong ghee taste and smell. Even those sold for 30cents per bowl back then (in my Primary school's canteen) tasted horrid to me. Mum rarely cooked it for us too,  and the final straw came when she tried to whip up prawn noodles soup which made me give up on eating fresh yellow noodles completely. 

It was only in recent years when I went to IL's place and FIL cooked me a bowl of fresh yellow noodles soup. I was sceptical at first and stared at it for at least 5min before deciding whether or not to tuck in. I have never eaten  nor seen a bowl of fresh noodles soup mixed with so many ingredients in a yellowish soup stock. Then I was told by him that this was how the older generation (grandparents) used to cook their fresh noodles at home. Hence I took my first mouthful, and in less than 3 minutes realized that I had gobbled up the whole bowl of noodles including the soup.

Their place is an hour's journey away and it is not that feasible to go back for this dish whenever I crave for it. I guess the only way is to learn to cook it myself. It is not exactly a healthy dish as frying with lard and pork belly is needed in the original recipe. So I had a few tries at tweaking the recipe (to be much healthier) and finally got close to the taste I had at IL's. Hereby, I will like to share with all of you reading. It's nice. Really! Lol.. :D

My bowl of Fresh Yellow Noodles Soup

Fried Kway Teow with Black Sauce - Singaporean home version

Fried Kway Teow aka Char Kway Teow/Char Koay Teow (CKT) is a common dish with many variations in Southeast Asian countries like Singapore and Malaysia. It is considered one of the most savoury street delicacies. My favourite ones are Singapore CKT and Penang CKT. The Singapore version is darker in color and is sweet-salty , while the Penang version is lighter in color and salty.

Standard Singapore Foodcourt CKT (Picture credit to Food)

Standard Penang Stall Version (Picture credit to Lil Pinky)

In fact, I find that CKT serves as a good culinary dish in defining the tastebuds of the people of different countries as heavy sauces and wide range of ingredients are found in it. I know that there are a lot more types of CKT out there eg. Pad Thai, the hotplate CKT in Kuching, and KT Goreng Mamak. Many people tend to compare the different types of CKT and see which comes out tops. However, no matter what the reviews are and how people raved about other types of CKT, I still find the one that I grew up eating the best. I believe that this is the same for most of us. 

Anyway, I don't eat much CKT as it is considered an unhealthy dish as it is very oily and due to the seasonings used. But when the craving for it comes, it becomes unstoppable. So it is good to be able to cook CKT myself at home, though not as savoury as the ones sold outside, it is way healthier. Below is the healthier CKT cooked from home during the weekend and I am sharing with everyone reading this post. :) Hope that you will give it a try some time and tweak the ingredients according to your likes!

- A Singaporean Home Version Char Kway Teow -