Thursday, May 29, 2014

Hearty Homemade Sui Gao Recipe

Not too long ago, we redeemed a hot pot set with our credit card's points and told ourselves in stead of paying crazy price for steamboat outside, we can do it at home. Boy oh boy, judge all you want but both of us are total steamboat freaks that we had steamboat for a few weekends in a row after having the hot pot set! :p
Anyway, while we bought a lot of frozen meatballs, cuttlefish balls, etc, I thought it would be healthier if we make our own Sui Gao (dumpling), which I assumed and later confirmed it to be super easy to make! I googgled up recipes and found most of them having quite the same methods and ingredients. One thing I took out was black vinegar cos I didn't want to buy a black vinegar just for the sake of making Sui Gao and don't know what to do with the rest of it. 

Anyway, here are what you need:
Stack of Sui Gao skins, minced pork (preferably meat that are with some fat), chopped Shitake/Chinese mushrooms, chopped carrot, chop water chestnut (I had to replace with sengkuang/turnip since I couldn't find water chestnut the other day), chopped spring onion, soya sauce, white pepper (I always use Ajishio), sesame oil, black vinegar, Chinese rice wine and corn flour.

What to do:
1) Put the minced pork in a big bowl. 
2) Dump all you chopped ingredients into it.
3) Mix them well.
4) Now, add in soya sauce, pepper, sesame oil, black vinegar and rice wine to taste.
5) Add in corn flour to make mixture a bit more starchy and to soften the meat a bit. 
6) Stir the mixture well. Keep the marinated ingredients in the fridge for at least three hours. 
7) Now that you are ready to make the Sui Gao, on a tabletop/chopping board/plate, lay a piece of the Sui Gao skin.
8) With a spoon or chopsticks put a decent amount of the mixture in the middle of the skin. 
9) Now with your finger, tap some water around the tip of the skin. 
10) Now fold the skin into half, squeezing out air carefully (to avoid bubble or the Sui Gao to open when cooking), then carefully seal the Sui Gao by pressing both sides of the skin together. 
11) That's all, next thing is just either boil or steam the Sui Gao for maybe about a minute and serve! 

My plate of Sui Gao looks really beautiful, don't they?
As you can see, I had some leftover filling which I eventually stuffed them into some Tofu Pok to make like a Yong Tofu Pok (Stuffed Tofu Pok) and just like the Sui Gao, they look beautiful too!
Lovely and yummy! :)
Taste wise, of course my Sui Gao doesn't taste like the typical Sui Gao that has vinegar in it but fortunately they still tasted awesome! The sesame oil and rice wine gave the Sui Gao a very nice fragrant while the carrot, turnip and mushrooms added some crunchiness and chewy texture to the Sui Gao! Not only that, the ingredients make the dumpling look amazing with a ray of colours! 
Our steamboat dinners with our homemade Sui Gao yo!
Both Deardo and I are totally in love with these homemade Sui Gao and best of all we can just keep them in the freezer and have them whenever we want! Definitely making more of these lovely Sui Gao in the future! :)

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Food Not Enough @ BBQ, The Curve

It was a random pick as we decided to give BBQ (what a Google-unfriendly name by the way), since it says pretty bravely that they are Korea's No. 1 Chicken Restaurant (still sounds a bit weird lol). 
We appreciate the efforts they put into the interior design of the restaurant - contemporary and very comfortable to dine-in at. Of course, there will be Korean songs accompanying you as you have your meal.
A glance at the menu saw their dishes are basically serve just like what you can find at the likes of Nando's and Kenny Rogers. The only difference though, here you get your chicken in Korean flavours and you can only have chicken thigh, no breast. The meal has a chicken and a side salad, while you can choose two other sides from the list of sides.
So here are what we had...
Korean Charbroiled (Meal) with corn and calamari rings, RM17.90.
Jerk BBQ (Meal) with rice and calamari rings, RM19.90.
Korean Tea, RM3.90.
In comparison, we both prefer the Jerk BBQ flavour than the Korean Charbroiled, perhaps just because we are not really use to the Korean marinate. The chicken though, although quite a small piece, was tender and juicy. We have a very big and obvious problem with their pathetic portion, both the chicken and sides. Just look at the photos and you'll know what I mean. I mean, for the price of RM17.90-RM19.90 per plate (without any drinks) I'm expecting my plate of food to have more than that. 
I think we were trying to show how shocked we were at the portion! :p
For the three items and service charge, the bill came up to RM45.43. Honestly, taste and atmosphere wise, I'm not complaining much, but the small portion is certainly a let down and is probably why the restaurant is not so happening. We were joking about blogging about this as soon as possible before it close down! Yes, that is how serious I am talking about the portion/price!
So I hope there will be improvement in the portion and I shall visit again if there are good changes. :)

BBQ
The Curve
Lot 152A, 1st Floor,
Jalan PJU 7/3,
Mutiara Damansara,
47800 KL
Tel: 03-77320017

Sunday, May 25, 2014

Japanese Dinner @ Hanazen, Jaya One

We were at Jaya One one evening after work to celebrate something he achieved at work when we decided to give Hanazen a try (Deardo has been there and love the food).
Stole this from Malaysia Most Wanted's site as we forgot to take a picture of the entrance.
To be honest, the restaurant doesn't have the best atmosphere, operating very casually I believe by a family or at least mother and son with lack of properly trained staff. I was in doubt at first but half way through dinner I saw the said 'son' started to cut up a lot of Sashimi for some regular customers (I'm assuming), I knew there must be some quality in the restaurant.
We didn't order Sashimi that night though. Here are what we had...
Sake Kawa, RM8.
Unagi Yanagawa, RM35.
Mentaiko Ochazuke, RM18.
The Sake Kawa here is probably the best salmon skins that I've ever tried so far. They tasted extremely fresh, smell great and were crunchy like keropok! The colour of the dish also shows that the oil they used must be clean! Thumb-up! :) The Unagi Yanagawa was a bit of a let down though. The Unagi was pretty fresh but the crazy amount of onion were a bit too much. Don't get me wrong, I love onion but this is way too much. I also went adventurous ordering the Ochazuke, something completely new to me. It's rice with green tea soup and I chose to go with Mentaiko (Spicy Cod Roe). It also comes with some condiments which I'm not sure what are them. While it tasted quite unique, the Mentaiko are too salty to my liking.
Deardo had his usual Salmon Teppanyaki Set (RM35) and a Sake Kabuto Shio (RM18), which we forgot to snap pictures of) but they are both quite satisfying.
Us enjoying our Japanese dinner!!! :)
Including service charge and tax, the bill came up to RM132.25. Definitely not the cheapest meal but the dishes we ordered were of course not the cheapest ones. In my opinion, there are nice dishes here but there are some that are no-no. Next time around, I'll make sure I order some of those fresh-looking Sashimi!

Hanazen Japanese Restaurant
43-G, Block C, Jaya One,
72A, Jalan Universiti,
46200 Petaling Jaya, Selangor
Tel: 03-7954 8000

Friday, May 23, 2014

We had Fun @ Ben & Lynette, Ipoh

I was back in Taiping just a weekend before the Mother's Day weekend and decided to give Mamo her well-deserved Mother's Day treat in advanced. I wanted to bring her to somewhere I know she will enjoy and somewhere new.
So in the end we made a road trip down to Ipoh and had our breakfast (not brunch because we went to have our favourite Chicken Hor Fun and Custard Pudding after that for lunch) at Ben & Lynette, a cafe in a bungalow house.
I would say they have a modern+vintage concept, with contemporary set-up at their coffee and sandwich bars but with some old school decoration items on display too. Concept and the entire design is really on par, if not, better than what we can find in KL.
The place is big and cozy, offering not only coffee and cakes, but also hot food and a special sandwich bar very much similar to Subway where you can choose what to have in your sandwich.
We ordered these to share:
Egg Benedict, RM18.
Big Breakfast, RM20.
Croissant (here replaced with corn bread), Scrambled Eggs, Mushrooms, Mixed Salad., RM15.
The Egg Benedict was not up to expectation because the egg yolk was already over-cooked, hence we didn't have much yolk flowing down to the bottom, something that is compulsory in a Egg Benedict. The Big Breakfast was pretty good though, except for the fact that it wasn't big at all. We also ordered the Croissant, Scrambled Eggs, Mushrooms, Mixed Salad which they later told me they ran out of croissant (at 9 something in the morning). Disappointed, I chose a corn bread from their sandwich bar which turned out to be awesome! It's moist, flavourful and was especially nice to eat cos it was served warm! Yumzzzz... The Mixed salad though was just few pieces of slightly grilled tomatoes. It would also be better if they use fresh mushrooms rather than canned ones.
Cappuccino (front), RM10 and Brilliant Breakfast, RM8.
Cafe Latte, RM10.
While overall the food wasn't that impressive, the coffee there were pretty satisfying! It's the type of coffee that are 'kaw' and smooth, with a pretty nice aroma to it. I truly enjoyed my cuppa that I ordered another Latte to go with our dessert - Durian Cheese Cake!
Durian Cheese Cake, RM14.90.
It was pretty forgettable though...
Fooling around with Mamo! :p
Anyway, we really had fun hanging out at the cafe because it was not overly-packed, pretty quiet and comfortable. And that's the point of me bringing Mamo there! :)
So all together we paid RM112.25, including government tax. Quite the standard price I'd say. They also serve other hot food like pasta and pizza after breakfast hours so you may want to have a try when you visit them. But the coffee is definitely a must try. :)

Ben & Lynette
B & L Maison Patisserie
42, Lorong Cheah Cheang Lim,
30350 Ipoh, Perak
Tel: 05-2423 3777