Korean Style Beef Bowl (韩式牛肉饭)

Apart from the traditional food which I learnt from my mother, sometimes I also tried to cook on food which I saw on TV or ate from somewhere before.  The following dish is Korean Style Beef Bowl which I have eaten in food courts.  The exact ingredients might be different as I have not much information about it.  How I cook it is based on the taste I have experienced.

Ingredients :-

切牛片，洋葱，饭，萝卜，黄瓜，灯笼椒，韩式调味

Beef slice, onion, carrot, cucumber, capsican, Korean style sauce and rice are the ingredients for the dish.  All these ingredients can be easily found in supermarket.  The Korean style sauce I'm using here is those ready made for use in stir fry of pork, beef or chicken.  There is a little spicy taste to it for the sauce.  The quantity for 4 serving of beef bowl will be a packet of beef slice, half an onion, 1 carrot, 1 cucumber (here I am using the Japanese cucumber) and 1 capsican (yellow, red or green color all up to you).

Cooking Instruction :-

1. Wash the beef slice and marinate them with the Korean style sauce for at least half an hour.  For me, I did it for 1 hour.

2. Wash and cut the capsican to small pieces.

3. Peel, wash and cut the onion.

4. Peel, wash and cut the carrot into long thin slices.

5. Wash and cut the cucumber into long thin slices.  The center portion of the cucumber which mostly the seeds can be discarded or if you do not want to waste, dip with some salt and eat it.

6. Cook the rice and normally will take you at least 45 minutes to be cooked.

7. Heat up the frying pan with oil, once hot enough, put in the marinated beef slice to stir fry a bit.  Next add in the cut onion and capsican and stir fry all of them for about 3 to 5 minutes.  You do not want to over cooked the beef slice as they will became very elastic to chew.

8. The carrot and cucumber are going to eat it raw so make sure they are properly washed.

9. Filled up bowl with the cooked rice, add in the stir fried beef slices, onion and capsican and put in the raw carrot and cucumber and there it is done.

Once you get the correct Korean style sauce, the taste cannot be wronged :)

Japanese Curry Rice (日式咖喱饭)

We'll try something different this time.  Well not really something unusual though.  Most have heard of it and even try it in Japanese restaurants before.  It is Japanese Curry Rice.  In general, the curry is not particular spicy and they even have a rating system for its spiciness.  That is great as you could choose the level of spiciness to suit for the kids.

Ingredients :-
米，萝卜，马铃薯，牛肉，洋葱，日式咖喱
Rice, Carrot, Potatoes, Beef Cube, Onion and Japanese Curry pack are all the ingredients.  Most of these ingredients can be easily found in Supermarket.  For the Beef Cube, they usually cut it out and pack it nicely for you.  there are couple of brands for the Japanese Curry pack out in the market, I try not to promote any particular brand and the most important is choose the one in which the spiciness is what you wanted.  Usually, I choose the medium rating for spiciness as it is just nice for kids.  2 or 3 Carrots, 2 or 3 Potatoes, 1 bulk of Onion, 1 pack of Beef Cube and 4-6 cubes of the Japanese Curry are needed to cook for a meal of 4 (2 adults and 2 children).  4 to 6 cubes of the Japanese Curry depend on how thick you want the curry to be.  For the Rice, you can choose the typical Japanese grain rice (softer but slightly more expensive) or just those normal rice you eat everyday.

Cooking Instructions :-
1. Peel off the skins for the Carrots, Potatoes and Onions.  Wash them and cut the Carrot and Potatoes into cubes.  Cut the Onions into slices.

2. Wash the Beef Cubes and if you wish you can further cut them into smaller cubes.  Note, to cut the Beef cube easily, you have to cut along the grooves line of the cube using those teeth type of knife.

3. Boil 1/2 or slightly less than that a pot of water (medium size of pot) as eventually you want to get 1/4 pot.

4. Once the water boils, put in the Beef Cubes, Carrots, Potatoes and Onions, cover up the pot and slow cook it for at least 3 hours.

5. 3 hours later, cook your rice.

6. Now all the ingredients inside the pot should be well cooked.  Carrot and Potatoes soften, Onions probably dissolves and Beef Cubes well done and this is the time to put in the Japanese Curry cubes.

7. Depending how many cubes of the Japanese Curry you want to use (4 to 6), slowly one by one put in.  Each time 1 cube is in, stir it to make sure it is fully dissolved then put in the next.  By doing so, you can also judge the thickness of the Japanese Curry.  Don't make it too thick or too dilute and that is why putting in 1 by 1 is a good idea.

8. By then the Rice should be cooked and everything are ready to be served.

Sure your kids will like it :)

Fried Rice With Prawn and Chinese Sausage (腊肠虾抄饭)

I came across a hawker stall just selling fried rice with various combination like eggs only, eggs with prawns, eggs with char siew and eggs with salted fish.  Fried rice in Singapore is very common but to really fried it nice is not so simple.  Basically, you can add anything to fried rice and so far the most famous one is Yangzhou Fried Rice (杨州抄饭), in which it has prawns, eggs, char siew and spring onions as its ingredients.  Also what I personally find is that those fried rice selling outside tends to be very oily which I don't really like.  Here, what I'm going to introduce is a fried rice that is not so oily and probably is the next best combination of ingredients after Yangzhou Fried Rice.

Ingredients :-
饭，鸡蛋，虾，腊肠
Overnight cooked rice, eggs, prawns and Chinese sausage are the ingredients for the fried rice which I'm introducing.  Overnight cooked rice as in left over rice cooked the day before ( you can put in the fridge once it is cooled down the day before), eggs normally would suggest between 3 to 5 ( hey be generous with eggs ok, your kids will love it ), prawns probably a dozen of them is enough to serve 3 to 5 person share of the fried rice and Chinese sausage 1 or 2 stick will enough.  All these ingredients can be easily found in supermarket.  By the way, through my experience, the essential ingredients in any type of fried rice are eggs and prawns, these 2 can't be short of in any fried rice.

Cooking Instruction :-

1.  Cooked the rice 1 day beforehand and place the cooked rice in the fridge once it is cooled down.  By doing so, the rice will kind of harden and the moisture in the cooked rice will be all gone. 

2. Peel off the shell of the prawns, wash them and then cut them into smaller pieces.  

3. For the Chinese sausages, peel off the skin, yes if you look carefully, there is a layer of skin in the Chinese sausages, need to peel that off and then cut into slices; not too thin and not too thick the slice.

4. Heat up the wok/frying pan with oil and once hot enough, crack the eggs into the wok/frying pans.  Use the spatular/ladle to mix the egg yolk and egg white together in the wok/frying pan ( something like doing a scramble egg type ) and once the eggs are cooked, you can smell the nice smell of the fried eggs and look carefully, the oil in the wok/frying pan probably all gone as absorbed by the fried eggs.

5. Put in the prawns, the prawns can get instantly cooked if your wok/frying pan is hot enough and again the nice smell of the cooked prawns emits.

6. Put in the slices of Chinese sausages.  By default Chinese sausages are already cooked and when you put them in to fry, they can give out oil.  Now you see, the originally oil all being absorbed by the fried eggs and now we use the oil given out by the Chinese sausages to fry the rice.

7. After using the spatular/ladle to mix the fried eggs, prawns and the Chinese sausages, pour in the overnight cooked rice.  The overnight cooked rice is a bit the hard and kind of in a lump also and you have to use the spatular/ladle to fry the rice and at the same time loosen them.  Need some strength to do it in this stage.

8. Optionally can put in a few drop of soy sauce to add some taste and since soy sauce is a form of liquid, it can help to loosen the cooked rice.

9. What I normally do is to use the spatular/ladle flip the rice and press them to loosen it and hence often can hear the "cling cling cling" sound as the spatular/ladle hit the wok/frying pan.  Hmm....sound pro right ? 

10. When the fried rice is done ? Normally, after frying for about 5 to 10 minute will get done.  For me, I wait till I can see the rice particle popping/dancing up from the very hot wok/frying pan then it is considered done.  Why so ? When you see those rice particle popping/dancing up that means most of the oil already gone and that will make the fried rice not so oily and at the same time the fried rice is a bit the "crispy" type.  Once done, scoop up and ready to serve.

Fried Rice best to eat while hot !!!
It is a simple dish but choosing the right combination of ingredients and the technique to fry it make a lot of difference.

Cooking White Rice (白饭)

Cooking rice, the most basic step in preparing a meal but yet could be complicated if some details are not being meticulous enough.  Hey don't be scared by that statement, just relax follow the instruction and problem will be resolved.

Ingredient :-
白米
Rice grains of course !  Can easily buy at any of the supermarket or hypermarket.  Do be careful of what type of rice grains you will be buying nevertheless.  Those local brand/housebrand which has a price range of below $10 for 5kg bag suggest avoid.  Yes, I know it is cheap but the rice you cook from it could be became hard and rough to eat.  Those premium type of rice grains like long grain, Japanese type, etc yap you can go for it if you don't mind the prices.  Typically, the mid-range type of rice grains which cost between $10 - $15 per 5kg bag will be ok and most of the people are eating those type of rice.  Brands like Songhe, Golden Phoenix, Royal Umbrella, New Moon, Golden Pineapple, Golden Eagle and Double FP are some of those mid-range rice grains and I'm using one of those too myself.

Cooking Instruction :-
1. Determine how many people you are serving.  Typically, 1/2 cup or about 80ml of rice grains is 1 adult person serving.  If you have toddlers, he/she probably could eat 1/4 cup or about 40ml of rice grains.  Where to find the cup ? It comes with the Rice Cooker when you purchase it.

2. Washing the rice grains will be next.  Need to rinse the rice grains before use.  I remember one brand of rice grains claims you just need to rinse once and personally I tried that before on that brand and so far no issue with that.  Typically, I will rinse twice.

3. Now the meticulous part in cooking rice.  How much water to put !!!.  Well just have to say, if you put too little water, the rice after cooked will be hard and rough.  If put too much water, it will become soggy and sticky.  There are many methods to decide how much water to put in.  Firstly, the so-called standard that is using measuring cup to do it, how many ml of rice grains will require how many ml of water.  Secondly, the housewife method, using your hand !!!.  For me, all along I stick with the housewife method as that probably was what my mum thought me.  Placing my finger at the top of the rice grains (not the base of the rice pot) after filling into the rice cooker and the water level to be used is about 90% from the tip of your finger to the first joint of the finger ( see the picture below ).  By doing so, regardless of how many cups or ml of rice grains you have, it is always like that.  There is another method that is placing you palm down on top of the rice grains and water level should like just covering the whole of your palm.  Personally, I have not used this palm method before and should anyone has detail, can inform me so that I could add that to the instruction step.  Many thanks.

4. After settling with the amount of water needed, next and final step, put the rice pot in the rice cooker to cook.  This perhaps is the easiest step as rice cooker is automatic !!! Just press down the cook button and once that rice is cooked, the button will jump on and there you are done with cooking the rice.  Should the water level be correct, the rice will be soft and non-sticky or soggy ( see picture below ).

To clean up the rice pot, there should still be some rice stick to the rice pot, please DO NOT scrub the rice pot, instead SOAK the rice pot with water overnight and the next day the cleaning will be piece of cake.