There was once upon in my life when I had an obsession with cookbooks… I bought cookbook after cookbook because there simply wasn’t a cookbook I didn’t think was uninteresting. I had a list of cookbooks I absolutely must have, and at least a cookbook I was reading cover to cover. There were cookbooks everywhere at home; beside the bed, under the bed, in the living room, in the kitchen, in the spare rooms (I have more than one), and even in my mother’s house in Penang.

And I was of course too busy reading cookbooks to actually cook from them… although there were some recipes I wouldn’t have tried if not for those cookbooks.  I went through a Claudia Roden phase, so I cooked Middle Eastern for awhile, and a  Madhur Jaffrey phase when I tried quite a few lamb recipes. I am now re-discovering Donna Hay, an interest rekindled not by her cookbook but her iPad apps… but that’s another story – suffice to say my favourite dessert recipe is her lemon meringue pie.

But for all my cookbooks and bouts of experimentation, the dish I cook most often is A-B-C soup.  I don’t know why it’s called A-B-C soup – it’s what my mother and aunts call it – but just maybe, it’s because it’s as easy as A-B-C to make. Sometimes it’s the only dish my daughter is fed with, and sometimes she is fed that weekend after weekend – especially when I am too guilt-ridden to feed her fast food and hawker food and too busy (ok, lazy) to cook anything more elaborate. The best thing about A-B-C soup is it’s not too shabby – it is wholesome and nutritious, and tastes good. And if the kid refuses to eat the potatoes and carrot, you can always mash them up, add some minced pork and onions, and make cutlets.

There really isn’t a recipe to this soup; it’s basically boiling together meat, potatoes and carrots. I like to use pork spare ribs or chicken, and I also usually add a big onion, two tomatoes and half a teaspoon of black/white peppercorns. I usually use about 500g pork ribs or half a chicken, with 2-3 potatoes and a big carrot. I then boil everything with about half a pot of water for about an hour or so – bring the water to a boil, and then add the ingredients. Then, turn down the heat and let it simmer slowly till the meat is tender, and the potatoes and carrots soft. Serve hot with rice, and a saucer of light soy sauce and cut chilli padi for the meat.

I didn’t think my friend Niki Cheong was all that serious about cooking, but he has been making the one bowl rice I posted eons ago regularly  (someone has been coming to me and repeating the title of my last post… takes nagging to a whole new level… she needs to nag me to loftier goals).

And when Niki told me his “one-bowl rice” is in the microwave cooking even as we were on whatsapp, I promised to post another recipe – out of guilt and being flattered someone tried my recipe…but of course I got distracted by zombies on my roof (seriously googling and planting), cats above my ceiling (seriously freaking me out) and a bitch on my tail (seriously pathetic). I have also been watching Walking Dead, not the best viewing choice with cats scraping and clawing away on the ceiling but wth…

Anyway, I am up-ping the notch and Niki’s Nikella-ness in the kitchen… with a recipe for chicken rice. It’s the easiest chicken rice (and doesn’t taste too bad) ever – just bring a big pot of water to the boil and then drop a whole/half chicken in with a knob of ginger and a stalk of spring onion. Scoop away the grit that floats to the top, and then turn the heat all the way low, cover and leave it be for half an hour or so. The chicken should be cooked by then. Don’t be tempted to turn up the fire because it should be cooked slowly and gently.

Remove the chicken, and drain. Leave aside. When it has cooled down, chop and serve with rice.

Use the remaining stock (in place of water) to cook the rice, to make the accompanying condiment, and boil down further to serve as soup.

So, boiling chicken and cooking rice are easy enough.

What makes this a good meal is the condiment, and it’s not your usual chilli and garlic sauce. I’ll post the recipe for chilli and garlic sauce but I have only ever made it by instincts and lots of tasting and correcting – that’s basically a handful of deseeded red chillies, 5-6 cloves of garlic, sugar (lots), rice vinegar and a pinch of salt.

I like this chicken rice with a condiment of spring onions and ginger, fragranced with sesame oil. I cook chicken this way, or steam it, just so I can have lots of this condiment. It’s pretty common in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but not so much in Malaysia where we prefer chilli sauce.

I make this condiment without a recipe too. But here are the steps, adjust the amount of young ginger and spring onions accordingly.

RECIPE

SPRING ONION AND GINGER CONDIMENT

Ingredients

2 big knobs of young ginger, about 1ocm,  - scrape off the skin, and julienne

2-3 stalks of spring onion, sliced

1/2 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2 tablespoon sesame oil

2-3 tablespoon chicken stock, from boiling the chicken

Mix the ginger, spring onion, sugar and salt. Heat the sesame oil over low heat till aromatic – it burns easily and quickly, so don’t leave it for even a second.

Pour the hot sesame oil over the mixture, and stir.

Check the seasoning, and add the chicken stock.

I started a blog with grand promises of providing easy recipes for a friend who was overseas and missing home-cooked meals. I think I must have gone on and on about how cooking is not that hard… (which is true), but blogging is a little hard going these days. Another friend recently went overseas, and I promised to post easy recipes he could use – he has been away two months and has complained about tasteless English food, and I have yet to post a recipe.

Anyway I somehow got my act together (and it’s a three-day weekend), and so here goes the first easy recipe…

This is actually a one pot rice that my mother used to make in a rice cooker. It’s a common Chinese dish, and the hawker version is the claypot chicken rice. This dish is essentially chicken marinated with soy sauce which is then added to the rice, and cooked together. It tastes much better if you add Chinese sausages and mushroom, and a small piece of the best quality salted fish.

As I was only cooking for two, I prefer to steam the rice in individual bowls. You could also microwave the rice instead of steaming it.

First thing to do is to marinate the chicken. I usually use chicken thigh and drumstick, and it’s better to debone them. You could also use chicken breast fillet for a healthier version. The marinade is usually light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, ground white pepper, a little sugar and some oil. If you don’t have all these condiments in your pantry, just use light soy sauce, salt, white pepper and oil. Sesame seed oil lends a nice aroma, so use it if you can. It’s also good to add some ginger juice. This is home cooking at its simplest, so just make do with what you have.

Chicken is the main ingredient, but it’s nice to add Chinese sausage and mushrooms. You could also used waxed meat, like duck, that’s available during the Chinese New Year season.

Once you have marinated the chicken for about half an hour, it’s just a matter of assembling your bowl. Put the chicken, mushroom and sausages at the bottom of the bowl. Then spoon the rice, and add enough water to cook the rice. Steam over high heat for half an hour. You could also microwave it, and cook it like you’d cook rice. It should take about 25 minutes.

My mother cooked this dish in the rice cooker. She’d stir fry the marinated chicken with the mushroom and sausages, and only add them to the rice after it’s half cooked. I prefer the rice steamed because it’s much softer, but cooking it in the rice cooker is better if you are catering to a bigger family.

I like my rice with lots of chopped spring onions, and with soy sauce and bird’s eye chiili. My daughter’s plate must be clear of even the tiniest speck of green, so I suspect that’s how the boys would like it too – one less item in their shopping list.

RECIPE

ONE BOWL RICE

(makes 4 bowls)

2 cups rice, washed

1 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

300g boneless chicken

4 dried Chinese mushroom, sliced

1 Chinese sausage, sliced

Marinade for chicken

1 tsp light soy sauce

1 tsp dark soy sauce

1/2 tsp ground white pepper

1 tsp ginger juice, or 4 slices young ginger

1 tsb oyster sauce

1 tablespoon oil

Add 1 tsp salt and and 1 tsp sugar to the washed rice.

Marinate the chicken for 15-30 minutes, then add the mushroom and sausages.

Divide the mixture into four, and spoon them into a bowl.

Add half a cup of rice to the bowl, and add water till about half the bowl (abt 1/4 cup).

Steam for half an hour, or until rice is cooked.

Garnish with chopped spring onions and sliced red chilli. Serve with a saucer of soy sauce and chopped bird’s eye chilli. You could also make sauce by mixing together 1 tablespoon of light soy sauce, 1 tablespoon of dark sauce and 1 tablespoon oil.

I tried making ayam kalasan because I liked the recipe when it was first recited to me – boil the chicken in coconut water, and then deep-fry. It turned out good the first time I tried it, and the recipe is in today’s StarTwo. Fried chicken is my all time favourite, and this Indonesian version is full of flavours. Even the breast meat is tender because it’s gently boiled. But the next time I make it, I’d probably just use thighs instead of a whole chicken.

But as delicious as the ayam kalasan is, it’s not why I wiped off two plates of rice. It’s the sambal tomat, recommended as the accompaniment for the chicken, that really whetted my appetite. I have always liked a little condiment or side accompaniment to my dishes. I actually ask what kind of accompaniment is available before I order my food – pickled green chillies for Cantonese stir fry, sambal belacan for nasi pattaya, pan mee, Thai fried rice, chilli and garlic sauce for chicken rice, garlic sauce for loh mi, shrimp paste for asam laksa, mint for lamb chops, mustard for roast beef….

At the very least, I need my saucer of soy sauce and chopped bird’s eye chilli.

Sambal belacan is a staple; I always have a jar in the refrigerator. A simple meal of fried fish and sambal belacan with a little kalamansi juice is satisfying enough for me. It’s also good with fried rice, or fried noodles. Sambal belacan is also the base for kerabu..

Lately, I am into sambal, Indonesian-style. It started when I began eating at Nasi Padang stalls, and I found myself looking forward more to the sambal merah and sambal hijau than the curries. My friend’s mother shared her sambal merah recipe, and it has become one of my favourites. This sambal tomat, with tomatoes as its main ingredient, is also fast becoming a favourite.

I followed a recipe the first time I made this, but I have since just made it intuitively. I use cili padi instead of red chilli because I love how its sharpness laces the sweetness of the tomatoes. You could adjust the flavours to your liking, use more tomatoes for a gentler sambal or more chilli for a sambal full of kick.

RECIPE

SAMBAL TOMAT

6-8 red chillies, or 3-4 bird’s eye chillies
2 shallots
1 garlic
1 tablespoon cooking oil
2 tomatoes, chopped
salt and sugar to taste

Pound chillies, shallots and garlic roughly.
Heat the cooking oil, and add the pounded ingredients and chopped tomatoes.
Saute till tomatoes are soft.
Season.

My daughter is of course unimpressed with my sambal tomat, sambal belacan, sambal merah…. whatever; they are all too hot for her although she has no such problem when it comes to curry chicken or beef rendang. She is happy with kecap manis… another obsession I think I taught her.j

Milan was all grey and cold in late winter, and I love it. I was there earlier this year many many months ago – my blogging mojo has kind of waned this year, and that’s why this late posting – for Milan Fashion Week. It was my first trip to Italy, and I had expected to love Italy – everyone else raves about it, and the photographs are always beautiful.

It was Milan Fashion Week, and lots of fashionable people were in town for the shows. I think I went to every designer shop in the fashion district.

I was only interested in the fashion for so long… I like nice things, but the fascination wears off when the price tags are ridiculous (as in I couldn’t afford them, and I’d rather buy a new laptop or a macro lens rather than pay the same amount for a handbag I’d have to love).

It’s true though what they say about Italians being stylish – they make it seem so effortless, a red silk scarf tucked around the neck of a man bundled up in a grey overcoat, or the guy with the matching coral spectacle frame and tie, and the women with their gorgeous boots, bags and clothes. Sometimes, it’s in the little details but mostly it’s about caring about their appearance as though it’s the most natural thing to do. I want to look like that chic woman with the shades, and I love the redhead’s hair and handbag. I want to be cool like the guy on the scooter, and carry off a black shirt and belt like the blonde.

There are many things to enjoy about Milan – the beautiful architecture, the stunning Duomo cathedral, the Galleria Vittori0 Emanuelle II. The weather was a cool 10 C, so it was nice to bundle up and walk outdoors in the cold. Most people could speak some English, and my few qords of Spanish actually got me by. And of course the food is good, as to be expected in Italy. Italian cuisine is so universally loved, and pasta has become such a staple it almost didn’t feel like we were eating in a foreign country.

I also love the pizza – I love anchovies, so I ordered one with anchovies, capers and olives – in a pizzeria with the most friendly people.

There was a big supermarket in front of our hotel, and I browse through the aisles everyday I was there… oggling at the groceries, and to stock up on my staples – olives, strawberries and taralli (a pretzel-shaped bread that I just couldn’t stop chewing on).

It’s easy to eat well in Milan. There are delicatessens on every other street to get sandwiches and pastries. It’s also easy to make your own meals as it’s easy to buy bread, cured meat, ham, antopasti etc in the supermarkets. But it’s also nice to eat in trattorias and restaurants; a decent meal is actually pretty affordable.

I had some good pasta dishes in Milan, but I don’t think I am likely to start cooking filled pasta like ravioli or tortelloni as much I as loved them. But there was one dish I had in Milan that I loved and tried making when I came home. It’s the simplest of dishes – roast broccoli, which was new to me because I usually have my broccoli steamed or stir-fried. But when roasted with some butter or oliv oil, the broccoli turned sweet and nutty.

RECIPE

Roasted Broccoli

2 heads broccoli, separated into florets

1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

1 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp ground black pepper

2 cloves garlic, minced

50g shaved parmesan cheese

Method
Preheat the oven to 200°C.

Toss the broccoli florets with the olive oil, sea salt, pepper and garlic. Spread the broccoli out in an even layer on a baking sheet.

Bake in the preheated oven for 15-20 minutes or until florets are tender enough to pierce the stems with a fork. Sprinkle with the cheese.

Remove and transfer to a serving platter.

THE recent weeks haven’t been so good in the kitchen for me. I haven’t had much success trying out new recipes, especially in baking bread. I wanted to try to cook pad thai, just so I could have a noodle dish that I can add condiments to, the way they do in Thailand. I finally found the dried rice noodles used in pad thai and followed a recipe I found online. It turned out tasty, but I am obviously an amateur at stir-frying noodles cos I ended up massacring the strands. By the time I was done manhandling them, the noodles were in bits…. don’t ask why or how!!!

I wanted to try making the pad thai again. The dried pad thai rice noodles is actually like keow teow; just not so oily and smooth. Looking at them, I just decided at the spur of the moment that I’d rather eat char keow teow. When I go back to Penang, I hardly eat char keow teow from the hawker stalls because my mother fries good ones for us. She’d fry the char keow teow for us individually, and we will stand next to her and specify how we want ours – mine used to be with lots of chilli, barely cooked cockles, lots of beansprouts and no chives. I like chives these days, so I’d ask for lots of chives too if I were to order char keow teow from my mother. And since she was not around, I had to fry my own.

So, I went and bought the beansprouts, chives and the most important ingredient of all, the cockles. People are wary of eating cockles these days, but we used to have so much of it when were kids. We’d go to the provision shop and buy a bag. Then we’d come home and blanch it quickly in boiling water. We’d all gather around and dig in while they were still hot, deftly cracking open the shells and dipping the bloody cockles in chilli sauce… such simple pleasures.

Anyway, I cooked my char keow teow the way I remember watching my mother do it thousands of times. I prepared the condiment of dark soy sauce, thin soy sauce, sugar and white pepper. First, I fried the chopped garlic, then I added the prawns and then the blended chilli. When it’s fragrant, I threw in the noodles and stir it around (gently), and added the condiment. Then, I cracked an egg in the middle and stir the noodles around it. Then, I added the beansprout and chives, and finally the cockles.

It doesn’t taste like my mother’s char keow teow – the noodles is wrong, for one. And it didn’t have the wok hei, don’t think the wok was hot enough. But it didn’t taste too bad, and I think I prefer my version than the ones sold at the hawker stalls manned by foreign workers. Of course, I am totally biased. But I won’t give a recipe because because it’s not exactly what char keow teow should be.

THIS tattered recipe book is almost 30 years, yes I am ancient. It was the first thing we had to do when we started our Sains Rumahtangga (SRT) or domestic science classin Form One. At that time, students were streamed into either Commerce or SRT. Traditionally the best students study commerce, and the weaker ones learn domestic science. Maybe the smart ones were being equipped with skills to conquer the commercial world, and the less bright ones are supposed to prepare for marriage and looking after the household.

The year that I entered Form One, my school decided that it was not such a great idea to segregate students like that – and they started a new policy whereby the first class did SRT, second class commerce, third class SRT…. you get the idea. Of course, the idea didn’t go down well with many students and parents, especially the top scorers. There was a flurry of furious parents in school that first week requesting that their daughters learn more useful stuff than domestic science… except for my father who was quite oblivious to how detrimental being deprived from learning to do accounts will have on my future.

I was 13, and I guessed I also didn’t care all that much… and besides, all the kiasu girls were gone. I had always helped at home, but it was a bit different learning domestic science formally. I think we learnt theory, and the practical classes were divided into cooking and sewing. I messed up the sewing big time, but the cooking classes were my favourite school periods. I loved the work stations – it was like playing masak masak but with proper tools. It was the one subject I didn’t have to study hard at.

I looked at the domestic science text book recently – my sister who is a teacher bought it for me last year – and realised that it was actually a good syllabus. We were taught different cooking methods, but at that time all I remembered was that I learnt to make food that we didn’t cook at home – rock buns, sago pudding, agar agar keminyan, kuih cara…. and of course sardine rolls. It was one of my favourite recipes from domestic science class – I thought it was most sophisticated to be able to make pastry.

For SRP (the equivalent of KBSM now?) we had to do up a menu and cook up a meal all on our own in three hours (I think). I remember I made a fish roll – fish paste rolled up in a thin omelette, and steamed. I thought it was pretty fancy…. I was probably not all that deluded because I scored A1 for my domestic science paper. Then, we all went on to form four and quickly got immersed in new subjects like chemistry and Add Maths (which I loved) and Physics (which I totally sucked at).

But I kept that recipe book, and scribbled more recipes in it. There were many years that I didn’t look at that book, but it was always tucked away at some shelf and I never had the heart to chuck it away. I made sardine rolls for our feature in Don’t Call Us Chef on road trip treats, and I found myself leafing through the book for other recipes to try. I was of course only limited by whatever ingredients I have at home because it was too hot and muggy an afternoon to go out shopping.

In the end, I decided to make cucur bawang, prawn and onions fritters. It wasn’t too bad, but I have had better fritters. And it got me thinking of corn fritters, Padang-style – I’ll post that recipe soon…. errrr, maybe later, considering how infrequently I blog now …. yeah, life is not as carefree as in those days when my biggest worry was if my teacher would scold me for my bad handwriting jotting down recipes.

RECIPE

Cucur Bawang

120g flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg
150ml water
160g prawns
1 onion, diced
2 chilli, diced
2-3 stalks spring onion
oil for frying

Sieve the flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl. Make a hole in the middle, and add the egg. Dilute the mixture with the water, and beat the batter well.
Add the prawns, onion, chilli, and spring onion. Mix well.
Heat the cooking oil, and spoon the batter in the wok.
Fry till golden brown.
Serve with chilli sauce.

OUR short holiday in Taipei was kind of impromptu, although my sisters and I have been talking about going on a trip together for ages. We wanted an easy trip, and Taipei turned out to be an incredibly easy and uncomplicated city. It is not a flashy big city, but they’ve got all the important things right – an efficient public transportation system, clean streets and toilets, modern shopping malls and shopping streets, nice restaurants and good street food.

Most importantly, the Taiwanese are so polite and friendly. It’s easy to get help with directions, and service in the airport, bus and MRT station, restaurants and shops are pleasant and efficient. It’s just such a refreshing change to be able to ride in taxis without worrying about exorbitant fares and dishonest drivers.

So, even though it rained the entire three days we were in Taipei, it wasn’t a dampener at all. I wasn’t able to do much photography, but the rain didn’t stop us from shopping, eating, doing some sightseeing, and…. more eating. You must like Chinese food, and be somewhat Chinese-literate – I think – to be able to enjoy Taipei’s street grubs. The cuisine here is closer to Hokkien food than the more well-known and easier to accept Cantonese offerings that Hong Kong is famous for.

We had dinner at Taipei’s world renowned Din Tai Fung on our first night. We had to wait an hour for a table, but it wasn’t too bad because the restaurant was at the basement of the Sogo departmental store. But apart from that, we ate mostly at street stalls and small restaurants. Often, we just walked into restaurants that looked well patronised.

I like the simple lunch we had at this small restaurant on a side street near this building everyone goes to buy fabric for crafts. They serve zha jiang mien – noodles with minced meat and fermented bean paste – with side dishes. We basically looked at the tables around us and pointed at dishes that appealed to use – like the tender braised pork cheeks at the top of the page. That dish whtted our appetite for more, and we ordered liver, intestines, pickled cucumber, lettuce in garlic oil and even braised hard-boiled eggs. Wish we had room for the house specialty of ikan bilis, and pickled eggplants.

I love my trip to Taipei, and I knew I had eaten well because I didn’t miss Malaysian food at all. And when I was back, I actually craved for zha jiang mien. I first learnt to make zha jiang mien when we did a story on Datuk Seri Ng Yen Yen’s favourite Chinese New Year treat. Her mother is from Beijing, and zha jiang mien is also a staple there as well as in Korea. She specifically told me that the best yellow bean paste to use is the Angel brand. In Datuk Seri Ng’s family, they serve zha jiang mien with the minced meat sauce, julienned cucumber and carrots, blanched bean sprouts, chives and … raw cloves of garlic.

I serve two versions – with and without vegetables. My daughter wouldn’t touch the cucumbers and carrots, and would only have hers with meat sauce. Getting her to eat anything remotely green is a battle I lose, but I figured she gets her vitamins from fruits anyway. The recipe is in our column in today’s StarTwo.

My trip also got me curious to try the recipe for the Taiwanese classic dish three-cup chicken. I cooked it in a claypot because that’s what most people recommend.

RECIPE

Three-cup Chicken

1/2 cup sesame oil
2 inches young ginger, sliced
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped
3 chicken thigh and drumsticks, cut into medium pieces
1/2 cup Chinese wine
1/2 cup light soya sauce
a pinch of sugar
5-6 stalks Thai basil

In a claypot, heat up the sesame oil. Fry the ginger and garlic till fragrant.
Then add the chicken, and fry over high heat for about 5 minutes.
Add the Chinese wine soya sauce and sugar.
Leave to simmer gently till the chicken is cooked.
Then add the Thai basil

I WAS stressed out over work last weekend; mostly from not being sure of what I had to do. Instead of turning on my notebook and actually doing work, I procrastinated…. by reading cookbooks. I read Nigel Slater’s The 30-Minute Cook: The Best of the World’s Quick Cooking, and came across his recipe for plum on white bread. I didn’t have white bread but I had a few ripe plums that had been sitting on the kitchen counter for days.

So, I started Saturday morning lining a dish with slices of buttered sourdough bread (courtesy of Marty Thymes), and topping it with plum halves sprinkled with sugar. I baked that in the oven over medium heat, and I have something to bring to my friend’s house. We had that in the afternoon, after we have coloured each other’s hair, trying to keep the grey at bay.

I was still listless on Sunday, but there was kebab to make for StarTwo’s Don’t Call Me Chef column. The kebab was real quick to put together – it was just a matter of mincing the lamb and chopping up some onions and herbs. With a food processor, that was done in minutes.

And since I was already in the kitchen, it makes sense to cook curry chicken for lunch. My colleague Kalai gave me her curry recipe – something she has cooked for years and years, and she can do with one eye close – and it actually works for me. As usual, I over-cooked and there was enough for me to have for dinner three nights in a row this week. I worked late and microwaving the curry was the easiest, not that it was so good I had to have it everyday.

What I could have everyday is kerabu – and last Saturday and Sunday, I made kerabu with cekur leaves and salted fish. Cekur is my favourite ulam; it is aromatic and almost always used in nasi kerabu, and it has a bitter tinge. I find that it’s always sold out at the Pasar Tani, and I usually have to go early to buy it.

My sister Pamela solved the problem for me by planting cekur for me, and giving me a pot. I am glad to say I have managed to keep it alive and well. So, now I just have to walk put and snip off some leaves whenever I want this kerabu.

This is my grandmother’s recipe, and calls for freshly fried salted fish that is then pounded. I don’t use kerisik (fried grated coconut) but you can add some if you want. If you add more herbs and mix it with rice, you’ll have a nasi kerabu. But I like this kerabu with only daun cekur.

This kerabu is real moreish because it also has sambal belacan in it. It’s sour, sweet, salty… with an aromatic bitter edge. It’s not something I’d recommend you make if you are on a diet, because it’s best only with rice and I polished off two plates. Not good for the thickening waistline, but great for the soul.

RECIPE

KERABU CEKUR WITH SALTED FISH

3-4 shallots, thinly sliced
Juice from 2 kalamansi limes, or according to taste
1 tablespoon sugar, or according to taste
10-15 cekur leaves, rolled tightly and sliced thinly
2 tablespoons pounded fried salted fish
2 tablespoons sambal belacan, or 6-8 sliced cili padi

Marinate the shallots in the kalamansi lime juice and sugar for 5-10 minutes.
Then add the rest of the ingredients, and mix evenly.

I haven’t been cooking much lately. It’s been a whirl of trips and weekend excursions, and I am hoping things will start to settle down in April. But that doesn’t mean I have not been eating well. I had wonderful meals on my trip to Hatyai, Milan (will get around to posting about them) and in Kota Bharu (one my favourite food places), and we have also been eating out with our visitors from overseas.

In the midst of all that inactivity in my kitchen, I somehow still managed to feed my constant craving for tomato and cucumber salads. I don’t know if it’s just my body protesting against all the rich food that I have been indulging in, or this hot spell that we are going through, but all I really want to eat these days is tomato and cucumber salad. I always have tomatoes, cucumbers and lemons/limes in my refridgerator these days so that I can make the salad anytime I feel like it.

A tomato and cucumber salad is pretty versatile too as you can serve it with a meal of rice and curry, or as a side dish in Western meals such as roast chicken and pasta. I am happy to eat up a whole big bowl of this cool and refreshing salad as a meal. I have brought it to work for lunch and had it as a late night snack. But then I go through stages of obsession, although I think I’d be happy to keep this one around for awhile…

This is an easy salad to put together, as there isn’t really a dressing. I just cut up the tomatoes and cucumber, squeeze lime/lemon juice over them and sprinkle some salt in. I like adding mint and basil leaves in my salad because it makes them all the more refreshing, and the fragrance is so amazing. That’s also because I have planted mint, basil and Thai basil in my garden, and they are actually growing. I am a new gardener (or rather planter, since all I know of gardening is planting and watering), and I am pretty thrilled every time I harvest (ahem!!!) my mint and basil.

I added olives to my salad above, as I love olives (also obsessively) and some bread because I happened to have some leftovers. My colleague Marty Thyme who bakes bread like a pro – she makes her own yeast – has given me her homemade bread so I can make more of this salad. I brought that huge tupperware of tomato, cucumber and loads of olives salad to work last week, and we decided that it needed more bread to soak up the flavours and add bulk.

I am making this for lunch again today because I feel like I need to give my body a break – all I feel is my girth spilling out of my waistband and I don’t usually whinge about my weight….really.

I also like feta cheese in my tomato and cucumber salad sometimes, especially when I am serving it with pasta. That makes it almost like a Greek salad, but actually a tomato and cucumber salad is present in a lot of different cuisines. I like a tomato and cucumber salad with my briyani too, and I just add some onions and green chillies. The one I made below didn’t have cucumber because I ran out, and couldn’t be asked to run out to the stores.