Cooking Session 34
Rosemary Anzac Biscuits, Prawn Hokkien Noodles, Tandoori Chicken Bowls With My Secret Sauce, Things To Cook, Read And Watch.
Welcome to another weekly cooking session. Asian cooking has been dominating my right brain at the moment and has been the muse for all my creations and explorations lately.
We spent an afternoon dining at Mr. Wong in Sydney last week and it was divine. Chilli garlic crab, Honk Kong Typhoon shelter style Crab Fried Rice smothered in a crispy chilli garlic crisp (that I am now on a mission to recreate!), really good dumplings and steamed veggies and an amazing mango pudding smothered with lychee granita, coconut tapioca and mango pearls!
Today, I have some fresh new recipes for you today and a bunch of great links for you to explore. A brand new veg-forward recipe will be going out via email for my paid subscribers on Tuesday. Enjoy today’s delicious newsletter. Happy cooking! x
Fresh Recipe
Prawn Hokkien Noodles
Hokkien noodles are thick, chewy, wheat noodles made with lye water to give them their signature yellow colour. Found in abundance across hawker centres of Malaysia and Singapore, this noodle dish is usually stir-fried with Asian greens, cabbage, spicy chilli paste and a motley of Asian cooking sauces to give it its distinctive dark colour and sweet-salty taste. They are delicious, ready in about 10 minutes, and thoroughly satisfying.
The spice comes from Sambal oelek, an Indonesian chilli paste made of spicy red chilli peppers. It packs a generous amount of heat and must be used sparingly. Sriracha is the best substitute. If you are hankering good, takeout-style noodles, make these!
What I am Cooking This Weekend
Rosemary Anzac Biscuits - These are golden, crispy, and buttery with caramel tones and the aroma of fresh-cut rosemary. Absolutely delicious! One of the most baked biscuits on the blog and perfect for Anzac Day coming up next week. Recipe »
Vegan Dal Makhani - If you are a fan of Indian cooking and haven’t yet tasted or cooked Dal Makhani, you haven’t lived! Rich, creamy, luscious and fondly known as the king of dals, my Dal Makhani has been made lighter and healthier but with the same traditional, restaurant-style delicious taste. Believe me, I have blind taste-tested this and people couldn’t tell the difference. The best thing about this recipe is that it all gets chucked in a slow cooker where it pretty much cooks by itself! Easy peasy! Try my recipe, you will love it. Recipe »
Brown Butter Lemon Friand Cake - As plain cakes go, this one is divine! It is a giant friand kissed by browned butter, lots of lemon and nutmeg. Smells like a warm hug from autumn. Put this on your baking list this weekend! Recipe »
Crispy Zucchini Halloumi Fritters - Making a batch of these glorious, salty, golden zucchini fritters to smoosh as burgers in fresh bakery rolls along with this salsa verde, a glop of tomato relish, lots of rocket and caramelized onion! Recipe »
From elsewhere
Airfryer Chicken Wings With Thai Dipping Sauce
Sauteed Zucchini With Mint, Pinenuts, Basil
Honey Mustard Potatoes
Lemony Shaved Fennel Asparagus Salad
Peruvian Chicken
Creamy Garlic Paprika Prawns
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Good Things To Read
Reading this breezy article about “Which tinned tomato is the best?” confirmed that I was cooking with the best ones.
If you are a cookbook lover, you’ll enjoy this All The Cookbooks Released in April 2023 article. There are a LOT of interesting finds here (non-Australian but still exciting books and cuisines to discover).
And if you are feeling a tad artsy, 8 Cookbook Covers That Broke The Mold is very interesting.
Why are so many vegans and vegetarians starting to eat meat again?
I have been working with Lilydale Chicken to create some delicious, exciting chicken recipes. These gorgeous Tandoori Chicken Bowls are my latest offering and are made with my secret blender tandoori marinade. Enjoy!
Recipe »
Tandoori Chicken Bowls
Serves 3
for the chicken
3 Lilydale free-range chicken breasts
¼ cup full-fat Greek yoghurt
Juice of 1 lemon
2 tsps ginger garlic paste
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp sweet paprika
½ tsp turmeric powder
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground cardamom
1 tablespoon kasoori methi
2 tsps flaky salt
¼ tsp crushed black pepper
6 cloves
1 tbsp olive oil
for the beetroot sauce
1 beetroot, boiled for 25 mins, peeled, chopped.
1 tsp grated ginger
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp ground cumin
Pinch of salt
½ cup warm water
for the mint sauce
½ cup full-fat Greek yoghurt
1 cup packed mint leaves
½ cup packed coriander leaves
½ green cayenne chilli
1 tsp flaky salt
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp ground cumin
Sliced pickled onion, coriander and mint leaves, lemon wedges.
Tenderize the chicken breasts. Pound the thickest part to 1 inch high with a meat mallet. Add the rest of the ingredients for the chicken in a small blender and blend until smooth. Place in a wide shallow container and pour over the marinade. Rub it in and coat it completely. Cover and rest for an hour or overnight in the fridge.
When ready to cook, preheat the oven to 220°C. Spray a grill with cooking oil and place chicken breasts on top. Roast for 20 mins until golden. Remove from oven and rest for 5 mins.
Make beetroot sauce by mixing all ingredients in a small blender until smooth. Make the mint sauce by blending all ingredients in a small blender until smooth.
spoon beetroot sauce in the centre of 3 shallow serving bowls. Place chicken breasts over the sauce in each bowl. Pour mint sauce into each bowl to surround the chicken breasts. Top with onion, coriander and mint. Serve hot.
Food in Prose and Art
Look, the only thing I’d like to cook at seven in the morning - as I lie in bed with residual resentments from the day before and looming despair about the day ahead - is the people who say they love cooking breakfast. Who are these people? I imagine their breakfasts taste like denial buttered up with overcompensating enthusiasm. So, no. These recipes are not for breakast. They are not for mornings. Both are equally and grossly overrated ideas and thus undeserving of your efforts here.
Instead, this chapter is designed for those days when you finally get to stay horizontal until the very last second that your heart damn well please, for when you feel that the world owes you something for all the uncalled-for bullshit it dumped on your face the week before. Something compensatory, something corrective….
~ Mandy Lee (from The Art Of Escapism Cooking)
I love Mandy Lee and her blog Lady And Pups. Her cookbook The Art Of Escapism Cooking is gloriously bold and abrasive. It is pure art! It reminds me of Netflix’s newest show Beef, which I binged into the early hours of the morning and absolutely loved. I must say, I was first drawn to it simply because of its title (food .. hello?). But the repressed, slow-simmering, tethered rage the two central characters hold onto, evident only by a twitch of the corner of the mouth, a forced smile that doesn’t quite reach their eyes and the promise of an emotional explosion .. was absolutely beautiful to watch!
Have you watched it?