Kanto style Sukiyaki すき焼き, Japanese hotpot

Tags

bacon, black pig, cast iron pot, easy, grilled tofu, Home Cooking, hot plate, hotpot, japanese, kanto style sukiyaki, kanto sukiyaki, kurobuta, leeks, mizuna, nabe, nabemono, pork, pork shoulder, raw eggs, seared tofu, shirataki, streaky pork, sukiyaki, udon, yaki tofu, yaki-dofu

On a recent trip to Hokkaido, I finally got to try sukiyaki. It’s a pretty commonplace dish, one that I’ve never tried because most of the time sukiyaki tends to be a quintessential beef hotpot dish. I don’t eat beef so I could never have it. In Hokkaido however, I found a sukiyaki place that offers the pork option. After cooking the pork in the sauce and dipping it in raw egg, I fell immediately in love with sukiyaki.

Many cooking videos and recipes later I discovered that there are two main types of sukiyaki; kansai style sukiyaki and kanto style sukiyaki. Kansai style sukiyaki calls for the method of frying the meat in some rendered fat and sugar before adding the sauce and the rest of the ingredients to the pot. Kanto style is where the sauce, called warishita (割り下）, is prepared beforehand and everything is thrown in. This is what I am more familiar with. Normal chinese hotpot sessions normally have large boiling tubs of soup with various vegetables, fishballs and meat thrown in. I guess sukiyaki is a little more special as it seems to be geared towards good cuts of meat. It is also sweet and savory making the cooked meat perfect with a bowl of white rice.

I was initially worried about the idea of using raw egg back here in Malaysia. Salmonella and all. Then I discovered that pasteurized eggs are safe for raw consumption as they eliminate risk of Salmonella and Avian flu virus. Make sure you do your research before buying and consuming raw eggs in any circumstance! I bought mine from safeegg at Aeon:-

http://www.safegg.com.my/subContent/what_is_safegg.swf

Ingredients (feeds 6 people)

warishita (割り下）sauce

• 3/4 cup sake
• 3/4 cup mirin
• 3/4 cup sugar and 1-2 tbsps extra sugar in case you want it sweeter (*edit* I used less sugar and found it so much better, around 2/3 cup. I’d recommend 2/3 cup of sugar  rather than 3/4 cup as it is less cloying and enhances the taste of the ingredients better)
• 1.5 cups light soy sauce (I got the low sodium Kikkoman soy sauce, which is why I still had to add a little salt afterwards; it wasn’t salty enough ;p)
• 2 tsp salt
• 4.5 cups water

Other ingredients 

• 1.5 kg of sliced meat (I got some sliced pork belly, pork shoulder and even managed to get some kurobuta meat)
• 1 leek
• 4 stalks of spring onion
• 6 pasteurized eggs
• 1 carrot
• 1 large onion
• 1 pack firm tofu
• 1 pack enoji mushroom
• 10-12 fresh shiitake mushrooms
• 1 pack other mushrooms (whichever you like)
• Shungiku leaves – I couldn’t find these so I used mizuna. You can use any other preferred leafy vegetables
• 1/2 chinese cabbage
• Udon (I used 3 packets but since we also had rice we couldn’t finish all the udon. Cook as much as you think you need)

For sukiyaki it would be sufficient if you had a multi-purpose cooker placed in the center of the table so as to cook all the food as you eat. I do NOT think it is a good idea to throw in all the ingredients and cook it in the kitchen and brought over to the table. It pretty much defeats the purpose of sukiyaki and more often than not your ingredients will be overcooked and will lack the “freshly cooked” taste to it. I used a cast iron pot with sides high enough so that I can fit all the vegetables comfortably, as well as a hot plate.

Cooking Instructions

• Wash all the vegetables and mushrooms.
• Cut off the roots of the spring onions and cut the spring onions into 3 sections.
• Cut off the roots of the enoki mushrooms and separate them
• Cut off the stems of the shiitake mushrooms and create star shape patterns onto the cap of the mushrooms

It’s also a good idea to arrange the vegetables in large plates as you go along. Presentation is always important in Japanese cuisine!

• Slice the carrot thickly
• Slice onion
• Cut the chinese cabbage into bite sized pieces
• Pour a tablespoon of oil into a frying pan and fry/sear the surface of the tofu. What we are making here is yaki-dofu or grilled tofu. This is a good step-by-step on how to make it:http://japanese-kitchen.net/yaki-dofu-grilled-tofu/
• Once you’re done searing the tofu, cut it into bite sized pieces

Tadahhh! All that effort of cleaning and cutting those vegetables! Not to mention searing tofu. I accidentally broke off some of the edges T___T

• Prepare the udon according to instructions and set aside
• Drain the shirataki and set aside

Next, combine all the wareshita ingredients in the pot and simmer to dissolve sugar.

Prepare all the meat and have it on standby with the vegetables.

Start the sukiyaki feast!   

Place your pot on the hot plate and bring the sauce to a simmer. Cook the meat, dip into raw beaten egg and eat with fresh white rice. Throw the ingredients in according to your preference but I’d suggest putting in the leeks, onions and carrots first along with the meat as it lends more sweetness to the sauce. Not that it matters much, the sauce is already sweet enough, it’s just that these vegetables also take more time to cook. Enjoy!!

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Leonardo’s, Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur Malaysia

Tags

bacon and eggs, bacon wrapped, bangsar, bangsar restaurants, black pig, chocolate lava cake, chocolate molten cake, iberian black pig, KL, Kuala Lumpur, Kuala Lumpur restaurants, Leonardo, leonardos, malaysia, Malaysia restaurants, molten chocolate cake, Pasta, pork balls, pork loin, pork loin steak, pork steak, restaurant review, www.leonardos.my/; pork

I’ve been meaning to do a review on Leonardo’s since last year! It has become one of my favorite restaurants in KL. There aren’t many restaurants in KL that serves really good pork. This was a good find!

This post includes pictures from two trips to Leonardo’s. Might make another trip sometime soon just for the molten chocolate cake. Nice and cosy ambience, perfect for a chilled and relaxing dinner.

Yeah, prices are on the steep side ;( If you do come here though, order the pork. That’s what Leonardo’s is known for.

First up, the pork balls. This is a really fun dish, like a fried meatball on a stick but a more refined version.

Chunks of pork meat and fat. You eat it like you would a meatball, but that first crunch obviously puts it heads and shoulders (and whole body) above the average meatball. It’s got a good balance of flavor, rich but not overpowering.

We had the scallop and lychee salad as well. I can’t exactly remember what it tastes like now but I remember not being disappointed with any of the dishes. Good thing is, this place is pretty consistent. Over a span of 7-8 months the quality remains at the same standard, really good stuff.

Pasta with mushrooms, bacon, chilli padi and garlic. A bacon aglio olio XD. Al dente on the noodles, all the flavors have been well absorbed and each strand is well-coated and well-seasoned. Love the little kick that the chill lends to it too!

Spanish Iberico Black Pig shoulder loin steak. As tender and juicy as you can imagine it. The meat from an Iberian black pig tends to be more tender than the regular pig and is obviously not going to be as tough. The steak is served medium done with truffle oil mash potatoes and some vegetables. Yes please do away with the notion that pork has to be well cooked to be safe for consumption. That isn’t necessarily true. An internal temperature of 145 degrees Fahrenheit is deemed safe by the USDA. So a pink middle is fine as long as the internal temperature is 145 Fahrenheit. A relief to pork eaters as we never liked tough cuts of thoroughly cooked pork either. Same concept as beef well done I suppose?

Anyway, this loin steak and the truffle mash? Yummy-licious! I’ve a dire weakness for meat and potatoes like that. Beef eaters would say I’m missing out on all the good steak and mash but I’m very content if I have this instead. Meat craving satisfied!And a glass of cloudy bay. Lovely and easy to drink. One of my favourite wines for a chilled dinner with friends. I tend to veer towards the more complicated French wines when I’m with colleagues. 

And helloooo slice of heaven!

I can’t even begin… will you look at that? It’s so molten it oozed bittersweet chocolatey glaze as we dug into the cake. The vanilla ice cream was pretty good as well but I didn’t even notice cuz of the cake!!! We didn’t have to dig to deep before we hit the chocolate gold so I’d say perfect ratio of cake to molten chocolate. Neither the cake or the molten chocolate has that cloyingly overly sweet commercial vanilla note that most chocolate cakes do. They’ve hit the perfect note with bitter and sweet and rich. The outer layer of the cake is also slightly crisp which makes this dessert texturally perfect for me. 

Onto the 2nd dinner at Leonardo’s. Above is the watermelon and feta cheese salad with a ball of soft mozzarella in the middle. I love soft mozzarella! Watermelon and feta cheese is pretty good too, very refreshing. But I’m not a big fan of olives so I left those alone.

Now this was a surprise! When we ordered bacon and egg we didn’t expect this succulent, tender braised pork belly at all! It just melted in our mouths. The molten egg was a delight as well. Put them both together and you have a luxuriously smooth and sexy combination melting together in your mouth. xoxo 

Pork balls again! Different presentation, same delicious taste. I especially like the balsamic glaze to go with it just because I could never resist the thick black shiny sweet stuff.

And here we have the grilled pork tenderloin wrapped in bacon in garlic au jus. It was perfectly cooked and tender but I prefer the Iberico loin steak as it was more… juicy I would say. Good nonetheless. I don’t remember how the sauce tasted like as I didn’t take much of it. All the calories are in the sauce! (well, the bacon too but I’d rather meat over sauce).

Yes this was what I’ve been waiting for the whole night. My molten cake !!!! Our greedy faces. Very very satisfied indeed.

Website and Contact details for Leonardos:-

www.leonardos.my/

61 Jalan Bangkung, Taman Bandaraya, 59100 Kuala Lumpur, Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur
03-2093 2226

 

Pork loin tonkatsu

Tags

breaded, deep fried, easy, easy recipes, flour, japanese, japanese cuisine, katsu, panko, pork, pork loin, pork tonkatsu, potato flour, tonkatsu

Pork tonkatsu is a deep-fried, breaded pork dish, very common dish in Japanese cuisine and generally comes in two types;  pork fillet (ヒレ, hire) or pork loin (ロース, rōsu) cut. It goes well with Japanese curries or on its own with some lemon or tonkatsu sauce (you can get these at your local Japanese grocer). I opted for mayonnaise and english mustard for mine. This is the basic pork tonkatsu, using pork loin. First you dust the meat in flour, then in an egg batter and finally some Japanese panko breadcrumbs before frying them until golden brown. You can play around with the fillings using this concept, some restaurants roll up some sliced meats and layer them with cheese, mentaiko etc. to make tonkatsu, and those are amazing as well!

Ingredients (3 pax: 1 pork loin per pax)

• 3 pork loin cuts
• 1 beaten egg lightly seasoned with salt and pepper
• 1/4 cup of potato flour
• 3/4 cup or more of Japanese panko breadcrumbs (adjust as you see fit, I normally eyeball the amount and add when I feel that the loins could do with more breadcrumbs)
• enough cooking oil to submerge the pork cutlets

Cooking Instructions

• In preparing the pork, remove the excess fat if you’re not a fan. If you like it then by all means leave the fat on. Either way, you will need to make several cuts on the side where the fat/tendon is. Make sure the fat/tendon is cut through in each incision made. This ensures that the pork does not curl up during the cooking process
• Next, use a meat tenderizer and pound at the meat on each side. It will flatten out a little after the pounding. Don’t go overboard as you might end up with pork shreds! Just enough pounding to ensure that the pork will be juicy and tender after cooking. Rearrange the pork back into its original shape (pat it back into shape!)
• Season both sides of the pork loin with some salt and pepper.

• Press the pork into the flour, lightly covering all surfaces of the meat, and tap off the excess flour
• Next, dip the pork into the egg mixture, lightly coating the pork in egg
• Lastly coat the pork in panko breadcrumbs. It should look like this when you’re done:-

• Heat up some oil in  wok or a pot on high heat. Ensure that there’s enough oil to completely submerge the pork, otherwise it will not have an even colouring.
• Before placing the pork into the oil, test it with a pair of cooking chopsticks. Tiny bubbles should form around it, as shown in the following photo:

• Gently place your pork into the oil. It is very important NOT to overcrowd the pan as that again will lead to uneven colouring and the tendency to overcook the pork is pretty high. We all have moments where we think the heat is not high enough and end up leaving the meat to cook way longer than it should. Lesson learnt, do not overcrowd the pan so that the temperature remains high and food cooks as it should.
• Cook until the pork turns golden brown.

• Flip the pork once halfway through cooking so that the top part of the pork gets a chance to brown evenly too!

• Remove the pork cutlets and place them on a wire rack to drain off the excess oil.

• If you are going to make another batch of tonkatsu, make sure you skim off all the burnt bits from the oil before frying the next batch. Otherwise, other than uneven colouring on the next batch of tonkatsu, you risk burning them too. It’s not what I’d call appetizing 😉

• Slice it up and take a moment to appreciate that satisfying *cruncchhh*~ when you cut through the crispy golden layer.

❤

Serve!! In Japanese restaurants, this is normally served with some steaming hot white rice, miso soup and some pickles with some lemon and sauce on the side. Along with a mountain of shredded cabbage. Makes you feel a lot better about all the deep fried food you’re about to have ;D

Er…. but the Malaysian that I am decided to serve it with a variety of other foods. Made a simple fried omelette dish, some deep fried breaded silverfish, stir fried green vegetables and my favorite garlic soy lamb!

Spicy and Sour Szechuan Pork glass noodles

Tags

Chinese, dinner, glass noodles, hot and spicy noodles, lunch, ma la, Noodles, pork, sichuan, sichuan glass noodles, sichuan hot and sour noodles, sichuan peppercorns, sweet and sour, szechuan, szechuan peppercorns, vinegar, zhejiang vinegar

Spicy and Sour Szechuan Pork glass Noodles

Back at Warwick I ate a lot of junk food. By junk food I mean instant noodles and pre-frozen meals. There’s one particular type of instant noodles that I used to love, some sort of Szechuan spicy glass noodles in numbing, vinegary soup and peanuts. I used to add lots of bacon to it, a sinful, spicy bowl on a cold winter day.

I don’t know where I can find this particular brand of instant noodles anymore so I searched online to see if there’s a recipe that comes close to the description of “Szechuan, spicy, numbing and sour” and I was pleased to come across this recipe ;D I adapted it slightly, not much change, and I loved the result! I must say though that there’s quite a bit of seasoning that goes into the noodles.

Ingredients (recipe taken and adapted from http://tofoodwithluv.blogspot.sg)

• 150g sliced pork tenderloin (or minced pork if you prefer it)
• 80g glass noodles
• 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 1 tsp grated ginger
• 1 1/2 cups chinese cabbage, cut into 1.5″ x 1.5″ squares
• Oil for frying

• 1 tbsp chilli powder (or more)
• 1 tbsp chilli oil (“la yu”)
• 1/2 tsp chilli bean paste (“Douban Jiang”)
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tbsp Shaoxing wine
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• 1/2 tsp chicken stock powder
• 1/3 cup water
• 2-3 tbsp Chinkiang black vinegar
• 1 tbsp rice vinegar
• 1/4 tsp sesame oil
• 1/2 tsp finely ground toasted Szechuan peppercorns/ or about 3-4 kernels crushed whole Szechuan peppercorn (or more if you like that numbing taste)
• 1 spring onion, sliced
• A handful of Chinese coriander/cilantro for topping

• Marinade:
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1/4 tsp sesame oil
• 1 tsp cornflour
• 1 tbsp water

Method

1. Marinade the pork and set aside for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, cook noodles in boiling water for 10 minutes or until cooked. Rinse under cold running water for a minute until all the starch is gone. Leave it to sit in a bowl of iced water so the strands don’t stick.
2. Heat up 1 tbsp oil in a wok and brown the meat, if you are using minced meat, break it up as you go along. Push the meat aside and add 1 1/2 tbsp oil. Fry the garlic and ginger, then add the chilli powder, chilli oil and chilli bean paste. Fry for about a minute, then mix through with the pork.
3. Add the soy, wine, sugar, vinegars, chicken stock powder and water. Bring to a boil and simmer 1-2 minutes until the sauce is slightly reduced. Add sesame oil, Szechuan pepper and turn off the heat.
4. Toss the blanched vegetables and cooked noodles in the sauce until it’s thoroughly incorporated and transfer to a serving dish. Top with some chopped spring onions and cilantro.

Stir fried pork tenderloin in dark sauce and onions

Tags

Chinese, healthy, Home Cooking, mains, onions, pork, tenderloin

 

This is one of my brother’s favourite foods. As he’s a picky eater, I thought I’d make this for dinner. Made this in Whistler, Canada during the christmas holidays. We go almost every year and there’s always a kitchen in the winter lodging where we can cook our meals. Of course, the kitchen was probably not made for serious cooking… probably meant for stuff like heating up soups, making instant noodles and the such but not that we cared 😉 We’re Asians! We like our stir fry and rice! This year I even brought my own condiments and essential ingredients like soy sauce, dark sauce, ABC sauce, corn flour, sesame oil etc. I was almost asleep on my feet, cooking in the kitchen after putting in a long day of snowboarding in the powder, but I enjoyed myself 🙂

Ingredients (Serves 6-8)

1) 500g pork tenderloin at room temperature

2) 1 tbsp ABC sauce (kicap manis)

3) 1 tbsp dark soy sauce

4) 1/2 tbsp soy sauce

5) 2 tbsp sugar

6) 2 tsp cornflour

7) 1/2 tsp sesame oil (optional)

8) 1 large green onion, sliced

9) 5-6 tbsp Chicken stock

Cooking method

1) Prepare the pork by cutting it into slices. The way you cut it is important to retain the succulence and tenderness of the pork. As you can see from the photo below, I’m cutting it lengthwise, or “along the grain“. To do this, I cut up the tenderloin into four separate pieces so I can cut along the grain for each of the hunks of meat to result in bite sized slices (see pictures below). I find that if you cut horizontally, the meat tends to dry up quickly and would become rubbery and harder in texture. If you follow this method there is absolutely no need to use a meat tenderizer and the meat stays tender even after a night in the fridge and a reheat! The other important bit is that the pork has to be at room temperature when you cook it.

2) Marinade the meat with soy sauce, dark sauce, ABC sauce, sesame oil, sugar and flour. Leave for about half an hour at room temperature.

3) Fry the onions first until translucent and gold around the edges (they turned out kinda white in the photos but it’s supposed to be a little golden!) and set aside in the serving plate.

4) Station your chicken stock next to the frying pan (I used half of the chicken stock in the bowl below)

4) Heat up your pan to medium-high heat and add some oil to cover the surface of the pan.

5) Once your pan is hot (doesn’t need to be smoking hot as it tends to burn fast), place your pork in the pan (yes I’ve overcrowded it but it still came out awesome ;p) and brown both sides. The pork should not be sticking to the pan.

6) Add the stock to the pan and cover for 30 seconds.

7) Remove cover, stir through, cover again and lower the heat to medium.

8) Stir every 30 seconds for another minute or two until the gravy thickens and pork is cooked through.

9) Ladle the pork onto the serving plate atop the onions and spoon the sauce all over the pork and onions

The result is really juicy pork in sweet dark sauce, the perfect accompaniment for fluffy white rice.

 

The rest of the dinner I made that day:

Fried Pork on kimchi with rice

Tags

dinner, fried, fusion, Home Cooking, kimchi, pork, rice

 

I love reading up on food, it’s been a bad habit of mine ever since I was a kid. I’d dig out books on food in the library and spend my lunch breaks sitting and reading cook books or food in general. Why? It’s because I’m a glutton. I don’t know what I was in my previous life but I won’t be surprised if I often was hungry or just pure greedy back then.

One of my recent reads include this food manga called Oishinbo. It spans through several volumes and each volume would cover different topics, such as “Raw Fish, Sashimi” , “Vegetables”, “Rice”, “Izakaya” and so on so forth. In one of the volumes, I came across this dish where they fried breaded oysters and put it on top of kimchi and rice. It sounded strange but drool worthy enough. I love kimchi and love fried oysters or anything fried.

The thing that I didn’t really like was that I had to fry something if I were to try out this recipe. I’ve got this thing about using large quantities of oil, spluttering hot oil and stinking up my kitchen as well as my living room while frying. So I rarely deep-fry if I can help it. I only extend enough effort to fry simple things like eggs and vegetables but rarely anything else. So my frying skills are worse than my other cooking skills which are bad enough as it is already.

But the thought of fried meat and kimchi was just too alluring….

 

Ingredients (3-4 pax)

1. 750 gram of fatty meat (pork belly, fat cuts of pork meant for sweet and sour pork etc)
2. Panko Breadcrumbs (enough to coat the fatty meat in)
3. Plain flour (to coat the fatty meat)
4. 2 eggs, beaten
5. 1 tbsp soy sauce
6. A heaping tablespoon per person of Japanese Mayo
7. Kimchi
8. 3 tbsp chopped spring onions
9. Cooking oil

Cooking Instructions

1. Cut the meat into 1 inch chunks and marinate with the soy sauce. Set aside
2. Spread the panko onto a plate so it’s easier to coat the meat later. Do the same with the flour on another plate.
3. Coat each piece of meat with flour and shake off the excess before dunking it in the beaten eggs and lastly rolling it in breadcrumbs.
4. Heat up the oil and place the breaded meat in the pan, making sure that you don’t overcrowd the pan. I suppose you should deep fry it but I couldn’t bring myself to so I pan fried it instead.
5. When the meat turns golden brown on each side, remove from the pan and onto a small wire rack that will hold the meat. This is to drain out the oil. You could also put the fried meat onto some kitchen towel but it will cause the crunchy panko layer to become soggy faster.
6. Ladle rice into the bowls and add however much kimchi you like. Then top with your fried meat, mayo and lastly the spring onions.