Posts Tagged ‘salted fish’

Kerabu Cekur and Salted Fish

Sunday, May 1st, 2011

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.

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Posted in Peranakan Food, Uncategorized | 4 Comments »

Teochew Porridge

Wednesday, November 17th, 2010

I went to bed reading Nigella Lawson’s latest book, Nigella’s Kitchen, and dreaming about her Greek Lamb with Potatoes and Lemon. But we all woke up with scratchy throats, hacking coughs, aching bones, woozy heads. And when my imp is lying limply on the sofa instead of jumping up and down on her new trampoline, there is just no denying that this is a household too sick to bite on lamb. So, plain watery porridge it is for lunch.

The must-have accompaniments are, of course, fried salted fish and salted duck’s eggs. These are the staples.

I usually make chai poh (salted radish) omelette, but decided to make cincaluk omelette instead for a change. Then, we have leftover chicken with soy sauce and ginger from the weekend.

We also have nam yue, fermented bean curd and canned preserved mustard leaves.


Because the little girl couldn’t muster the strength to walk to the table, I brought everything to her. She was however not too drowsy to monitor that there was always a pinch of salted fish and duck’s egg yolk in every spoonful of porridge I fed her. Oh well, everyone needs a little pampering when they are sick.

I am a pro at serving up plain porridge because that’s what we have for Sunday lunch when we were growing up. The cardinal rule was that the porridge must be served in small bowls so that we’ll have them piping hot …the idea being that we’ll finish the porridge before it gets cold. We eat the porridge slowly, picking at the many many condiments with our chopsticks. When we are done with a bowl, we just ladle a second bowl and then a third bowl….I also like my porridge real watery.

And I must have my plain watery white porridge with this condiment. I don’t know what it’s called, or recall when it first appeared on our table. But I think my father came back one day and described it to my mother, and we have had it since. It’s got the building blocks of a kerabu dressing – thinly sliced shallots and bird’s eye chilli and lime juice, mixed with taucheo (yellow bean paste), chopped garlic and lightly ounded dried shrimps. It’s very appetising as it is hot, sour and salty. I haven’t had it anywhere else but at home, but then again I hardly eat Teowchew porridge outside because it’s so ridiculously expensive for a meal so easily put together.

GARLIC TAUCHEO CONDIMENT

2-3 shallots, sliced thinly

5 bird’s eye chilli, sliced

1/4 teaspoon sugar

juice from 1 small lime

2-3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 tablespoon dried shrimps, soaked in water, drained and lightly pounded

1/2 tablespoon taucheo, yellow bean paste

Marinate the shallots and bird’s eye chilli with the sugar and lime juice for five minutes. Then add the chopped garlic, dried shrimps and taucheo. Mix well.

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Posted in Chinese Food, Home Fares | 7 Comments »

Salted Fish from Beserah, Pahang

Thursday, September 23rd, 2010

If you grew up in a typical Chinese family, your grandparents would have probably told you that story of how they or some ancestor or the trishaw peddler used to be so poor they could only afford to eat salted fish. The poorest of the poor wouldn’t even have that luxury. He’d dangle his salted fish so he could smell it while he ate his meal of plain porridge…he couldn’t taste the salted fish, but the aroma would whet his appetite and sustain him. Fortunately, most of us are much less deprived or impoverished now. But I completely get sniffing at salted fish…it’s actually pretty narcotic for the aroma of frying salted fish always makes me greedy and hungry.

We were in Beserah, Pahang recently and saw how salted fish is made. Chit Lip Trading and Salted Fish processing centre is not visible from the road because it is hidden at the end of a row of wooden shophouses. But it’s not hard to find, just let your nose lead the way. The fishy smell can be a tad overwhelming at first, but soon enough you won’t notice it.

The lady boss, Yeoh Watt Kim, told us the best way to choose salted fish is to smell it… and that it must be “fragrant”. Good quality salted fish does not smell fishy, but clean and clear with a depth that perks up your senses. When you smell fragrant salted fish, you can literally taste it.

Salted fish is called ikan masin (salted fish) or ikan kering (dried fish) in Malay, and they describe exactly how salted fish is made. Fishes are gutted and scaled, and then preserved in salt or brine for a few days, and then dried under the sun.

This family in the fishing village of Beserah has been making salted fish for over a hundred years. They get their supply of fishes from the fishermen, and their own fishing boats. But these days, they also get supplies of frozen fish from further afield. Salting fish is still done pretty much how it has always been done, even though they have modern gadgets like freezers to keep the fish from going bad on cloudy days when there is no sun to dry them. The bulk of the work is in gutting and scaling the fishes, but these ladies are such pros.

At Beserah, salted fish are laid out on raised bamboo platforms to dry under the sun. On the east cost, salted fish making comes to a halt during the monsoon season at the end of the year.

In the local film Woo Hoo which tells the story of how the people in Beserah were trying to revive their tiger dance tradition, the apprentices practise their moves on these wobbly salted fish drying platforms.

Salted fish are made from all kinds of fish. The cheaper ones are those made from small fishes like kembung and gelama. The best salted fish, mui heong, is those made from ikan kurau (threadfin)…the flesh is soft, and it is fragrant and gently salted.

Watt Kim told us that mui heong is expensive because it can only be made with the freshest fish – they literally hauled the fish from the fishing trawlers, clean them and salt them immediately before drying them for about two days.

Not all salted fish made from ikan kurau is mui heong; it’s also about how the fish is salted. At Chit Lip, they still make their mui heong using their grandfather’s recipe. There was no mui heong available for sale at Chit Lip while we were there, and we didn’t stop to buy some in Kuantan. But we got some in the Pudu Market in Kuala Lumpur where three slices cost RM25. Salted fish is definitely no longer food for the poor.

I like the simplicity of mui heong, or any other salted fish, simply fried and eaten with plain watery rice congee. A chunk or two of fragrant salted fish, with fermented bean paste, is good enough for me.

I also like salted fish bone and mixed vegetable curry with light coconut milk. Then, there is steamed pork with salted fish, and salted fish in fiery dry sambal. Taugeh or kailan stir-fried with salted fish is also good. And I also like salted fish fried rice with lots of cili padi.

And last night, my aunt cooked this salted fish dish that she said she last ate some 30 years ago. She actually called my mother, and they worked out the recipe between them because my late grandmother used to make it. It’s called masak titik, and it’s salted fish with slices of belly pork, dried red chillies and dried tamarind slices.

The sourness of the tamarind, the saltiness of the salted fish, and the richness of the pork belly was so appetising. The flavours were pretty intense, and I ate way too much rice, as usual.

RECIPE

SALTED FISH AND PORK BELLY MASAK TITIK

Ingredients

2 tablespoon cooking oil

2-3 cloves garlic, smashed

10 dried chillies

500g pork belly, sliced

1 teaspoon dark soya sauce

1/4 cup water

2 dried tamarind slices

1 salted fish fillet, cut into smaller pieces and fried till fragrant

Heat the oil, and saute the garlic and dried chillies till fragrant. Add the pork belly slices, and stir fry over high heat for few minutes. Lower the meat to medium, and add the dark soya sauce, water, tamrind slices and salted fish. Simmer over low heat till the pork is cooked and the liquid has been reduced.

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Posted in Chinese Food, Home Fares, Trips and Food | 8 Comments »

Ikan Terubuk Masin (Salted Terubuk Fish)

Saturday, July 17th, 2010

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The busiest section at the Satok weekend market in Kuching, Sarawak is at the fish section, and there is only one fish that everyone is interested in – terubuk. It’s known mostly for its bones – loads and loads of fine bones criss-crossing – but those in the know patiently pick through because the reward is firm, tender, fatty, sweet flesh. It’s also found in Peninsular Malaysia, but terubuk is synonymous with Sarawak.

I had my first terubuk fish from a Ramadhan bazaar – grilled till charred, and accompanied with sambal. It’s also really good in asam curry because of its high lemak content. In Kuching, I have had it steamed and deep-fried. But the most famous way of preparing terubuk in Sarawak is by salting it. At the Kuching airport, you’ll see travellers with boxes fashioned like a bag, complete with raffia handles, and chances are they are carrying ther precious cargo of salted terubuk fish.

satok - terubuk masin

I have heard of the salted terubuk from Satok but was never particularly interested because I assumed it was the typical salted fish. It wasn’t until I went to the Satok market that I realised the fish is salted differently. The usual way of salting fishes in Malaysia is by salting them, and then drying them in the sun for days. In Sarawak, they gut and clean the terubuk fish, and then liberally rub it with fine salt. The traders’ instructions was to just wash off the salt, and freeze the fish if we do not cook it within a week. Most people just fry the salted terubuk fish, but some also steam it.

The salted terubuk taste like salt baked fish… it’s not intensely salty like the typical dried salted fish, but a lot gentler. Because the terubuk is so rich and lemak, the salt does not overwhelm its sweetness but complements it. The flesh remains moist and tender, and it is quite a treat. Now I understand why the customers at the Satok market buys the salted terubuk so eagerly, and why they place such huge orders.

I only bought 3 salted terubuk fishes, even as I was wondering why the others were buying by the dozens. The salted terubuk comes in various sizes, so prices vary. But we found out that the Sunday prices are a lot steeper than the weekday prices, just so you know. The vendors here also sell terubuk fish roe, and (frozen) unsalted terubuk fish with and without roe. My colleague paid RM25 for an unsalted terubuk fish with roe, but there was no roe to be found when she cut open the fish….again, just so you know.

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Luckily, the vendors were a lot more reliable when it came to recommending their favourite way of eating salted terubuk. I just sliced some shallots, bird’s eye chilli and squeezed lime juice over them. Let this mixture sit fir ten minutes, and pour over the hot fried salted terubuk. I have also found that I prefer lime juice to kalamansi lime juice for this fish.

I also had with an accompaniment made of belimbing buluh (carambola), garlic and taucheo, and that was also really good. Salted or not, the terubuk is still full of bones. They are mostly fine fine bones though, so I just pick out whatever I can, and chew on the rest. With terubuk, it’s all about how willing you are to get through the bones to get to the bounty.

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