Scallop Congee is one of my most oft cooked congee for weekend lunch. Okay, make it Scallop Porridge for those who are more familiar with the word porridge. Actually, it’s the same. And whichever name you call it, it will still taste as good though I suspect the word “congee” sounds much more sophisticated and refined to be used.

For this congee, I use dried scallops which I purchase from the wet market. You can get them from supermarkets and some chinese herbal shops or even, dried sea produce. I use those which are relatively small in size – perhaps about the size of half a pop corn as they are cheap and easy to cook.

In the picture above, the scallop congee appears white in colour. I have a habit of eating my scallop congee with an egg. What I would do is to break an egg into the bowl and pour boiling congee over it before giving it a good stir. The egg gives the congee a much smoother texture and definitely tastes better. Game for a bowl?

This is my recipe for Scallop Congee

Ingredients

• 3/4 bowl of rice
• about 15 to 20 pieces of dried scallops (rinsed and soaked in water for 30 minutes. Do not discard water)
• 100 grammes of minced pork
• Chopped spring onions
• Sesame oil

Seasoning

• Salt and white pepper powder to taste
• 1 tablespoon light soya sauce

Method

Rinse the rice before placing it into a pot. Add 10 bowls of water plus the water previously used to soak the dried scallops and bring to boil.

Once it starts to boil, add scallops and reduce heat to low. Partially cover with lid and ensure the bubbles do not boil over the pot. Stir once a while.

Simmer until rice is completely cooked (starts to break up) which will take approximately 30 minutes. Add a little boiling water every now and then to keep it runny. Turn off heat and cover lid. Allow to cool for 1 hour.

Before serving, bring congee to boil. Add more boiling water to keep it runny as the congee would have absorb much of the water during the cooling process. Once it boils, add minced pork and stir well. Add seasoning.

Dish up and drizzle a little sesame oil over the congee.

Serve hot and garnish with chopped spring onions and yau char kuey (if available).

[Serves approximately 4 adults - soup bowl size]

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Scallop Congee

Another lala recipe? Forgive me but I am quite a fan of lala clams and since the lala clams were looking really fresh in the wet market, I couldn’t resist getting my hands on 1 kg of these sweet tasting clams. Initially, I had wanted to whip up a kamheong lala dish but later realised that I’d forgotten to get two of the essential kamheong lala ingredients : curry powder and curry leaves. Without those two ingredients, kamheong lala just won’t be kamheong lala. I’ll kamheong another day then.

Thankfully, as I rummaged through my kitchen, I found some lemongrass and ginger as well as freshly grown bird’s eye chillis. Mum recently moved to my old apartment and I am now babysitting two of her prized bird’s eye chilli plants. In case you are still wondering what is bird’s eye chilli, it is also known as cili padi – probably the hottest local chilli available in this region.

This recipe uses simple but aromatic ingredients which help to lend the dish a sweet and fragrant taste whilst masking any potential “fishy” smell – which is unlikely unless your lala clams are not fresh. Read this post to find out how to prepare lala clams before cooking. Now, though this recipe looks like a stirfry dish, with a little bit of imagination, you can turn this into a sweat inducing and appetising soup. Just add more of the ingredients and water

This is my recipe for Stir Fried Lala with LemonGrass and Bird’s Eye Chilli

Ingredients

• 1 kg lala clams (rinsed and washed thoroughly to remove mud, sand and grime)
• 2 stalks lemongrass (hammered with the flat side of a knife to bruise it)
• 5 cm of ginger (slivered)
• 3 shallots (chopped finely)
• 4 to 10 bird’s eye chilli / cili padi (cut lengthwise, remove seeds to reduce hotness)
• 1/2 to 1 cup hot water
• 2 tablespoons cooking oil

Seasoning

• Salt to taste

Method

Heat oil in wok. Add shallots, ginger, lemongrass and bird’s eye chilli. Stir briskly until shallots just starts to brown.

Add lala clams and stir well. Add 1/2 to 1 cup water and close the lid of the wok allowing water to reboil. Stir occasionally until lala clams open up.

Add salt to taste and dish up. Do not overcook the lala clams or they will turn rubbery.

Serve hot with steamed rice.

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Stir Fried Lala with LemonGrass and Bird’s Eye Chilli

This is a delicious and easy vegetable side dish, easy to cook and tastes really good. I used kailan (aka jie lan, Chinese broccoli, Chinese kale) – which is a popular vegetable in Chinese cooking. It is highly nutritious and has an inherently slight bitter taste (hence sugar is added during boiling to neutralize the slight bitterness).

As a result of brief boiling to cook the kailan, the vegetable is nicely cooked and retains its crunchiness while the dried scallops (kan bei) jazzes up the dish by making it sweeter and more interesting. I learnt this recipe from watching the local (Singapore) variety show三菜一汤and this was one of the dishes whipped up by Mediacorp artiste Michelle Chong. I was impressed with both her culinary skills and her recipe. I tried the recipe soon after watching the show and I really love it, so yummy. I made this from memory after watching the show so I am probably not following her recipe 100% but the end result is still good. Hope you like the recipe too.

This is the recipe for Kailan with Shredded Scallops

Ingredients (Serves 2-3)

• 300g kailan leaves
• ½ tablespoon chopped garlic
• 4 dried scallops
• Cornstarch solution (about ½ tbsp cornstarch mixed with 2 tbsp plain water)
• 50ml stock/plain water
• Olive oil/vegetable oil
• Sugar

Directions

Give scallops a clean rinse, then soak them in a dish of water (just enough to cover) for at least half an hour to soften them.

In a wok or saucepan, add water (just about enough to cover the kalian), a bit of vegetable/olive oil and a bit of sugar. When water boils, add in kailan to cook for about 3-5 minutes until cooked (do not overcook). Take out the cooked kalian and arrange on a plate.

In a clean wok, heat a bit of oil and sauté garlic till fragrant. Use your fingers to separate the scallops strands and add in wok. Reserve the water from soaking the scallops.

Add water previously used for soaking the scallops, as well as some stock/plain water. Bring to a boil for about 2 minutes and thicken with cornstarch solution till the desired consistency. Drizzle the mixture over the cooked kailan.

Wiffy, a cheerful Singaporean lady who describes herself as a NoobCook dished out this recipe as my Guest Chef this time around. Yet, the food that she whips up certainly shows that she is not a noobcook as her recipes (which comes with great looking photographs) have been featured in a number of websites. Do check out the droolicious recipes on her site.

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Kailan with Shredded Scallops

Back in the fishermen village of Pontian (well, it’s quite a bustling town now) and Kukup, seafood especially prawns and crabs are cooked in tomato sauce. Sometimes, a little bit of chilli is added to make it spicier. Lala clams are treated no different. Some might say that cooking seafood in tomato sauce masks the natural taste and sweetness of the fresh seafood, but some say that it’s an unforgettable experience sucking up the delicious tomato sauce from the seafood. Well, we can’t please everyone, can we?

I decided to cook my final batch of lala clams last Saturday in tomato sauce because, well, that’s about the most suitable ingredient I could lay my hands on in my kitchen. I didn’t have curry powder or leaves and that means cooking lala kam-heong style is out of the question. Besides, it has been a long time since I had seafood home-cooked style and this was one golden opportunity to whip up something quick and simple.

Before cooking lala clams, you will need to give it a good rinse. Rub or scrub the outer shells and place them in a deep bowl. Submerge them in tap water for 2 minutes before draining them. Do this a couple of times until you are fully satisfied that there are no more mud or grime in the lala clams. One trick is to drain the water completely and leave the lala clams in the bowl for 10 minutes. The lala clams will open up slightly until you can see the flesh. When you rinse it with water, they will spew or cough up the mud within them and clamp up. Repeat the process. That’s how I rinse and clean the fresh lala clams which I bought.

This is my recipe for Stir Fried Lala Clams Home-Cooked Style

Ingredients

• 400 grammes lala clams (rinse and drained)
• Generous amount of scallions / spring onions (cut into 2 inches length)
• 3 to 4 slices of ginger
• 2 teaspoons of chopped garlic
• 200 ml hot water
• 2 tablespoons cooking oil

Seasoning

• 3 to 5 tablespoons tomato ketchup
• Sugar to taste
• a pinch of salt

Method

Heat oil in wok until smoky. Add ginger and garlic and saute very quickly. As the ginger and garlic starts to give its aroma, add lala clams, water and seasoning.

Stir well before covering the wok. Allow to cook for 30 seconds. Open lid and stir again. Repeat process until the lala clams have opened up indicating that they are cooked.

Finally, add scallions and stir well before dishing up.

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Stir-Fried Lala Clams Home-cooked Style

Tis’ the season to be jolly, fa la la la la, la la la la. I’ve been extremely busy of late and will be as busy for the next 3 months or so. Something is coming up and by the middle of next year, there will be a wide variety of dishes coming right up on Delicious Asian Food.

In the meantime, I haven’t been cooking much but last weekend, I chanced upon some fresh lala clams at the wet market and could not resist getting myself a pound (600 grammes) of them. I am not sure what they are called in other parts of the world, let alone whether they can be found but these lala clams are a local delicacy especially amongst the chinese community in Malaysia.

Lala clams are relatively cheap and is sold in most chinese restaurants which specialises in seafood. If you get them from the wet market or supermarket, they are definitely cheaper than eating out. There are many ways to cook lala clams and some of the popular style of cooking includes stir-fried lala with ginger and scallions, stir-fried lala kam-heong style, chilli lala, ginger lala soup or adding lala into other seafood dishes.

My 600 grammes of lala clams allowed me to cook 2 different dishes with them and you shall see them in the next two posts. Watch this space!

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Lala Clams

What a name! Sure, this dish may be common but did you know that simply by putting in a little effort to carve your vegetables, you can create give a new and beautiful breathe of life to an ordinary dish? My little daughters were fascinated with the carrots and broccoli stems which were cut to resemble flowers sitting in the midst of a bed of freshly blanched green broccoli. To give it a more “garden feel”, I used orchid mushrooms as well in this dish. I bought the orchid mushrooms in can and they are quite delicious with a light crunch. You can also use any other suitable mushrooms such as straw mushrooms.

The prawns were cut to resemble like butterflies but being an amateur, I can’t say they look like one. What I did was to remove the heads, middle shell and legs by fingers and leave the tails attached. Next, I use a knife to make a slit down the centre back of each prawn and removed the guts (brownish black thread running down the back of the prawn). When the prawn is cooked, it will give a nice slightly opened shape.

To cut the carrots or broccoli stems into flower-like shapes, you will need to first scrape off the outer layer. Next, cut the carrots into 6 cm lengths. You will need thick broccoli stems for the same purpose. Then, lay the carrot onto a chopping board and make a slanted cut (about 5mm deep or lesser) length-wise along the carrot. Then make another parallel slanted cut just next to it so that both cuts resemble a V shape. You will then be able to remove the whole strip thus leaving you a length-wise groove. Repeat this over the other parts of the carrot until you get at least 5 grooves. Then, slice the carrot sideways and voila! You’ll get the flower-shaped carrots.

Get creative. It makes a whole world of difference to the eating experience!

This is my recipe for Butterflied Prawns in Eden

Ingredients

• 8 to 10 pieces medium sized prawn (butterflied)
• 150 grammes broccoli (cut into florets. stems cut into flower-shape)
• 1 medium sized carrot (cut into flower-shape)
• 1/2 tin of orchid mushrooms
• 3 cloves garlic (chopped finely)
• some cornstarch
• 300 ml hot water
• a pot of water
• 3 tablespoons cooking oil

Seasoning

• 1 1/2 tablespoons oyster sauce
• salt to taste
• a couple of dashes of white pepper powder
• 1 teaspoon of light soya sauce

Method

Bring a pot of water (about 2 litres) to boil. Once boiling, add 2 teaspoons of salt and drizzle some cooking oil. Then blanch broccoli florets till your desired softness. Remove and drain. Place aside to cool. Repeat process with carrots and broccoli stems.

Heat oil in wok. Add half the chopped garlic into the wok together with prawns. Stir fry briskly and add 1 teaspoon of light soya sauce. Remove prawns once it has completely cooked and curled up. Set aside.

Add oil into wok followed by garlic and orchid mushrooms. Stir fry briskly for about 30 seconds before adding 300 ml hot water. Bring to boil and add seasoning to taste. Cover with lid and reduce heat to medium. Allow gravy to reduce to half.

Meanwhile, arrange broccoli florets in a ring on a deep plate. Place carrot and broccoli stem flowers on top of the broccoli florets. Place remaining flowers in the middle.

Check the orchid mushrooms and add some cornstarch to thicken the gravy a little. It should be slightly runny but not watery. Remove from heat.

Scoop some orchid mushrooms and place on centre of the dish. Place prawns on top of orchid mushrooms and flowers before pouring the gravy over the whole dish.

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Butterflied Prawns in Eden

This is my first foray into XO sauce territory. I have previously heard of the XO sauce but before I actually looked further into it, I thought it had something to do with the X.O. Cognac. Actually, XO sauce is supposed to be a premium sauce made up of ingredients such as dried shrimps, chilli, scallops, shallots and garlic amongst others. It is no wonder that it is one of the more expensive sauces around in chinese cuisine.

The XO sauce is touted to be a good sauce to use with seafood. As I love mussels, I decided to give it a stir fry using the XO sauce to see how it would turn out. I have never tried the sauce, let alone know how it would eventually taste like. So, prior to cooking, I dipped a spoon into the sauce and then tried out the chilli-oil based sauce just to have an idea what XO sauce tastes like. It is actually hard to describe the taste but I do remember that it was kinda oily. Being conscious of not using too much oil in my cooking, I made it a point not to scoop unnecessary oil from the bottle for otherwise, the dish might end up too oily for my liking.

Mussels cook easily. If you cook too much, it would turn slightly chewy and rubbery. I bought some frozen and vacuum-packed NZ Mussels from the supermarket and defrosted them overnight in the lower compartment of the fridge. When I added the mussels into the wok, I could smell the sweet aroma coming from the mussels. Each bite into the juicy mussels reveal a natural sweetness from the mussels nicely paired with the subtle hint of spicy XO sauce. My wife and I polished the whole plate with steamed white rice and stir-fried french beans with egg. A simple, quick and satisfying meal. Aren’t all meals supposed to be like that?

This is my quick recipe for Stir Fried Mussels with XO Sauce

Ingredients

• 200 grammes mussels (shelled or with shell)
• 1 large onion (sliced into rings)
• Spring onions (cut into inch lengths)
• 200 ml hot water
• 1 tablespoon cooking oil

Seasoning

• 2 to 3 teaspoons XO sauce
• Salt to taste

Method

Heat oil in wok and saute onion for 30 seconds. Add XO sauce and stir till aromatic. Add mussels and stir briskly for about 30 seconds.

Add water and cover lid. Allow mussels to cook for approximately 1 minute covered (mussels with shell are cooked when the shells open fully). Add salt to taste followed by spring onions.

Dish up and serve hot.

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Stir Fried Mussels in XO Sauce

Ngor Hiang is also known as 5 spices in Hokkien. Ground into powder, you get the 5-spice powder. However, the funny thing is that Ngor Hiang also refers to this dish – which is essentially prawn and pork rolled in a soya skin. In Penang, they call it Lor Bak or Lobak whilst for us from Johor, we call it Heh Chor. There are many variants for the ingredients used but the main ingredients are prawns, pork and of course, the 5-spice powder. The 5 spice powder is popularly used for dishes like Chinese Stewed Duck and Kong Bak.

This Ngor Hiang recipe makes about 13 rolls using 1 piece of soya skin (fuchok). The soft soya skin is used rather than the usual hard-type which is commonly used for other dishes like Ginkgo Barley Dessert. It is not an easy dish to prepare as it can be a bit labourious preparing the ingredients, rolling them up and finally, frying them. However, this tasty Ngor Hiang is bound to make you eat non-stop. It is delicious on its own or a great accompaniment to steamed white rice. For added taste, give it a dip into chilli or tomato sauce.

This is my wife’s recipe for Ngor Hiang / Prawn and Pork Roll

Ingredients

• 1 kg medium prawns (shelled and deveined. Cut into small cubes)
• 600 grammes pork (choose pork with a bit of fat and mince it)
• 15 pieces water chestnut (diced finely – leave to drain on colander)
• 170 grammes of dried winter melon (diced finely)
• 1/2 piece carrot (diced finely)
• 1 large onion (diced finely)
• 4 teaspoons potato starch
• 1 egg (separate egg yolk from egg white)
• 1 piece soya skin (cut into 6 x 6 inches – about 12 to 13 pieces for rolling)
• Oil for deep frying

Seasoning

• 3 teaspoons 5 spice powder
• 1 teaspoon white pepper powder
• 4 to 6 teaspoons salt

Method

Mix prawns, pork, water chestnut, winter melon, carrots, onion, egg yolk and seasoning together in a large bowl. Using hands, combine the ingredients by mixing them in one direction (clockwise or anti-clockwise) whilst sprinkling potato starch. Allow mixture to stand for 30 minutes covered.

Lay a piece of soya skin on the table. Take about 2 tablespoons of mixture and place them like a log on one end of the skin, leaving about 2 cm from the edge of soya skin. Dab a little egg white on fingers and run the egg white along the soya skin edges.

While holding the edge of the soya skin, roll over the mixture and fold in the side edges. Repeat with other soya skin till all complete.

Heat oil in wok at medium heat. Gently place one or two pieces of Ngor Hiang roll at a time and allow to deep fry slowly till soya skin is golden brown. It takes approximately 5 to 8 minutes per roll to cook.

Dish up and drain on kitchen napkin to absorb excess oil.

Browse through more recipes of mine at the All Recipes page.

Ngor Hiang