Chinese Feast for Dinner - Chilli Paste Steam Fish, Mix Vegetable & Prawns with Hoisin Sauce

Yesterday we had a Chinese feast not so much of actual preparation ,Red Snapper Chilli Paste Steam Fish, Stir Fry Mix Vegetable (Click Here) and Prawns with Hoisin Sauce (Click Here)

The ready made sauce that I used for the fish was a product from Mas Food. It is called Kam Heong Chilli All Purpose Paste.  It is made of blended red chilli with dried shrimps, shallots, garlic and lemon grass.   I guess I should try the same when I am done with my supply.

I used red snapper, it was about 800gm.  You can also use sea bass, tilapia


Chilli Paste Steam Fish

What you need
1 mid size fish
1 tbs ginger garlic paste
1 tbs of sesame oil
1 packet of Kam Heong Chilli All Purpose Paste
3- 4 birds eye chilli
1-2sprig of curry leaves
1 tsp of soya sauce
2 tbs of milk


How to prepare

1.  Prepare your steamer.   If you do not have one, you can actually setup a deep pan/wok, fill in with water, a small stand that can hold your bowl of fish and a cover enough to cover the wok.

2.  Prepare the fish by cleaning, make a cut over the fish on both side, marinate the fish with sesame oil and with ginger garlic paste.

2.  In a different wok, heat oil, add in the paste, stir fry on slow fire for a few minutes, then add in chill and curry leaves, keep stirring till you get nice aroma from the chilli paste.

3.  Finally add in soya sauce and milk, stir for few more minutes and add in to steamed fish and allowed to be steamed for another 5 minutes.

Serve immediately.

Marinated with sesame oil, salt and ginger garlic paste in a wok steamer

MasFood Kam Heong Chilli All Purpose Paste

The final product - Red Snapper Chilli Paste

Our dinner complete with rice, vegetable, fish and prawns

Steam Prune(Dates) Cake

I brought along some dates from Qatar.  So I thought of making some cakes with it and I remember making this cake long before I started to blog.  It is easy and all it takes about 1 1/2 hours and the cake is done.  Lets enjoy the cakes.

Recipe courtesy of Resipi.Net

Ingredients
250 gm butter
2 cups of self raising flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 big tin  or 1/3 if using small tin of condensed milk
20 prunes
5 prunes (slice fine) - i omitted this.
5 eggs

Method

1. Boil water in a steamer
2. Beat butter, sugar and condensed milk till mix well
3. Add egg one at a time. Mix well
4. Stir in the prunes. mix well.
5. Add flour a little by little stir till mix well.
6. Add in the blended prunes mix well.  Do not over mix.
7. Grease pan with butter & line with grease paper, pour in the batter and steam for about 1.5hrs.  Cover the pan with tin foil to avoid water dripping into the batter.
8. If you like you can decorate with some prunes on the batter.

Hints

• If you need to refill the steamer, ensure it is with hot water so that the steaming continues.
• You can add have a mixture of half cup brown sugar and half cup sugar to give an added colour to the cake.

Steamed Brownies

I was in a mood to baking (or actually steaming off...).  My new neighbour Marida from Indonesia, shared a delicious recipe, Steamed Brownies.  Then I made another cake  - Steamed Chocolate Cake. After the steaming marathon, it was time for some baking ~ Honey Cornflakes.

Lets first look at Steamed Brownies...

Steam Brownies
source : Marida Nababan

What you need:
10 eggs
420gm sugar
1/2 tsp of salt
1/2 tsp vanilla
250gm flour
100gm chocolate powder
350gm butter
250gm dark cooking chocolate
chopped almonds, optional 

How to do:

1. Melt butter and dark chocolate.  Once fully melted, stir well, remove from heat and cool it.
2. Whisk eggs, sugar, salt and vanilla essence till smooth and well mixed.
3. Add flour and chocolate powder gradually into the mixture  till well blended.
4. Add melted butter/chocolate mixture in and stir well.
5. Stir almond, if desired.
6. Cover the mixture with aluminium foil before steaming to avoid the water dripping into the mixture.
7. Steam over high heat for 1 ~ 1.5hours or till the cake is well done.

Steamed Chocolate Cake

I found this recipe from Izah's blog. was tempted to try and so the baking starts (or actually the steaming of the cake).  Steaming is a processed where bowl/pan filled with water is boiled to a point of steaming oozing out.  Normally steaming for cakes takes approximately an hour to 2 hours, there are instances where they are steamed for 4 hours...

Tips when steaming, when you need to add more water to your steaming pot, use only hot water....cold water slows down the whole process as the cold water reduces the heat of the existing water, thereby taking time to heat and thus the steaming process is not effective..

When pouring into lined pan, make sure it is about half of the pan.

Cover with aluminium foil to avoid water droplets onto the cake mixture...

Steamed Chocolate Cake
source : http://www.izahdaut.blogspot.com/

What you need:
2 eggs
1 cup oil ( I used sunflower oil)
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sugar
(A)  1 tsp vanilla essence
      1 1/2 cup of coklat milk
      1/2 cup of water + 2tsp of nescafe
(B)  2 tsp sodium bicarbonate
      1 tsp of baking powder
      1/2 cup of cocoa
      2 cups of flour
(Topping)  1/2 cup cocoa
               1/2 cup condensed milk
               1 tbs oil

How to do:

1. Whisk egg till fluffy.  Add sugar and whisk further.
2. Add oil and stir well.
3. Mix all ingredients of (A).  Sieve (B).
4. Add gradually alternating with A into egg mixture.
5. Pour into lined pan and steam for an hour or so or till the cake is done.  You may also bake them at 170C for an hour.

Topping : Whisk together ina  pan on slow fire till the mixtures turns shiny/glossy.  Glaze over the cake when cool.

Enjoy.........

Steam Fruit Cake

My dad has been pestering me for fruit cake since I am back for the holidays. Emm thought of looking out for something fast and found this recipe -Amy Beh's (www.kuali.com) Steam Fruit Cake.

What shall I say about the cake - its moist and soft, just the right taste of sweetness and my dad loves it...The only problem was that the fruit were much settled at the midway downwards instead of all over the cake..

Steam Fruit Cake

Ingredients

3 eggs

1/4 chup UHT milk

1 tsp brandy (I subsituted this to Sunquick Orange Juice)

325gm mixed fruits

1/2 cup water

250gm butter

150gm castor sugar

1/2tsp vanilla essence

175gm plain flour

2tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp bicarbonate soda

Method

1. Boil mixed fruits and water over gentle heat until the it is dry. Leave it to cool completely.

2. Beat butter/sugar/vanilla essence till pale and light. Add eggs one at a time and ensure it is mix well.

3. Fold in the flour, stir well and add in the milk, mix. Finally add in the orange juice.

4. Next add in the cooled fruit mixture. Stir well the fruits and the batter. Pour in a greased, floured pan. Cover the the tin with aluminium foil and steam for 2 hours till the cake is done.

Note :-

a. Use hot water if you need to add water for the steamer. Adding cold water to the steamer while in process of baking will slow down the cooking process.

Next time I shall rolled the cooled mixed fruits with some flour to have an evenly distributed fruits....