My friend Amy is living out in China at the moment and has sent me an article about noodles that she has written and had published by Good Food magazine in the Middle East. An interesting insite into the life of noodles and time in China!

So I haven’t posted at all over the last couple of months, the reason being that my website has been a work in progress and in the meanwhile I have been directing people to my last blog entry to give them an idea of what I do and to help them decide if they want to go ahead with a cooking demonstration.

I have aptly named my business ‘Annabel’s Kitchen’.  www.annabelskitchen.co.uk was launched last week through my facebook page. Annabel’s Kitchen on facebook has received just short of 100 ‘likes’ this past week!

In the last couple of months I have given various kinds of lessons and demonstrations.

Recently I was invited into Maidenhill school where I did a demonstration and then cooked with 45 of their pupils during their cultural awareness days. It was a great experience and was something totally different for the pupils. Most of them had not tried Thai food before! I cooked with the pupils over two sessions, just over 20 in each group and with the help of two assistants. I showed them first how to fry prawn crackers, they were totally amazing that this was how you made them and they didn’t just come ready in a bag. They then sampled them with sweet chilli sauce. After that they watched me make a curry paste which I then turned into a curry. The pupils were very suspicious of some of the ingredients that went into the paste and curry, mainly the shrimp paste and fish sauce due to their extremely unusual smell (’unusual’ being an understatement!)

After watching the demonstration they got to work  measuring out ingredients and making their curries with the paste I had made. They were extremely enthusiastic but required a vigilant eye whilst they worked out the difference between all the ingredients they had never used before! I put some rice on to steam whilst running round helping all the groups of cooking students. I sampled their curries and they were all very good, all slightly different, some sweeter, some saltier some more herby flavoured yet totally edible. Were there any disasters!? Just a tin of coconut milk exploding all over the kitchen and a couple of woks of burnt paste, but we remedied that by starting again with a lower temperature. They all sat down and ate their chicken curries with rice, and inspite of their suspicions all thoroughly loved it, with the exception of one vegetarian!

I definately plan to do more work in schools, and in October I’ve been invited to give a demonstration at the regions food technology teachers networking meeting, I look forward to it!

So I went from teaching 45 thirteen year olds one week to giving a demonstration for a group of 8 at a house on the luxury gated complex in Cirencester water park the next. Everything went extremely well and I employed my first assistant to help with the evening. Janine did a fantastic job and I’ll definitely be working with her again.

I’ve also given practical cooking lessons to various people, did a demo and tasting for 16 people from the Cleeve Hill society and had the Stanton Guildhouse host a demonstration and tasting open to members of the public. They plan to host another on October 21st. See Annabel’s Kitchen for more details.

I’ll keep you posted as to what’s coming up next.

 

 

 

Last week a group of 7 gathered at my house for a Thai cooking demonstration and dinner. As they sat around the dining table  nibbling on prawn crackers I demonstrated several dishes whilst they followed what I was cooking on their copies of my recipes.

 I provided them with information on buying their ingredients, all of which are available in Cheltenham. I gave them details of equipment that I find useful, provided tips on techniques to use and shortcuts to take if time is limited. I also answered any questions that they had as we went along.

This culminated in a delicious dinner of all the dishes cooked and a dessert that I had prepared earlier. Here is a copy of the recipes and photos.

 

 

THAI GREEN CURRY PASTE

THAI GREEN CHICKEN CURRY (Keaw Wan Kai)

STEAMED RICE

GREEN PAPAYA SALAD (Som Tam)

THAI STIR FRIED VEGETABLES (Phad Phak)

COCONUT ICE CREAM

SPICED BERRIES

                                                                           

 

 

THAI GREEN CURRY PASTE

 Making your own curry paste produces such a fresh tasting curry as well as lending to a wonderful colour. This is my own version of the recipe as kaffir lime zest; an ingredient used in green curry paste in Thailand is unavailable in the UK.

Makes approx. 200g (8-10 tbsp)

2 tsp coriander seeds

1 tsp cumin seeds

6 big green chillies – deseeded if you do not want the paste to be too spicy

1 stem of lemon grass, finely sliced

5 cm piece of galangal, sliced thinly

5 kaffir lime leaves

30g coriander root and 10cm of stem, roughly chopped

1 tbsp coriander leaves

3 large cloves of garlic, roughly chopped

60G (3) shallots, roughly chopped

2 tsp shrimp paste

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

3 tbsp oil

 

Toast the cumin and coriander seeds in separate batches in a pan. Grind in a pestle and mortar.

Blend chillies, lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime leaves, coriander root, stem and leaves along with the ground coriander and cumin seeds.

Add the rest of the ingredients and continue to blend until smooth.

 

 

 

THAI GREEN CHICKEN CURRY (Keaw Wan Kai)

 

Thai green curry is one of the most popular dishes in Thailand. This is probably one of the most authentic recipes you will find. It is a slight adaption of a recipe that I learnt whilst at the Blue Elephant cooking school in Bangkok.

Serves 1

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1tbsp green curry paste

½ tsp roasted ground cumin seeds

½ tsp roasted ground coriander seeds

150ml coconut milk

50ml water or stock

70g-100g chicken, sliced finely

2 small Thai aubergines, quartered

10 pea aubergines

2 kaffir lime leaves

3 Thai sweet basil leaves

1 tbsp chopped coriander

1 tsp caster sugar

1 tbsp fish sauce

Heat the oil in a wok until hot. Add the curry paste, cumin and coriander and fry for around 2 minutes until an aroma develops.  Lower the heat and add half of the coconut milk a little at a time. Allow to simmer for 2 minutes, add the chicken and cook until cooked through, and then add the other half of the coconut milk. Gradually add the water/stock until the curry has reached the desired consistency.

Add the green aubergines and the pea aubergines, the sugar, fish sauce, kaffir lime leaves and basil. Simmer for 5 minutes.

Sprinkle with the coriander.

 

 

STEAMED RICE

 

Serves 1

100ml-150ml Thai rice- measured in a measuring jug

100ml-150ml water-equal volume to the rice

 

Wash the rice well in a sieve until the water runs clear.

Place rice and water in a rice cooker and press the ‘cook’ button.

If cooking in a pan, place the rice and water in the pan and bring to the boil. Simmer gently until the water has reduced to the level of the rice. Then place the lid on and cook on the lowest heat for 15-20 minutes or until cooked.

Fluff up with a folk before serving.

 

GREEN PAPAYA SALAD (Som Tam)

 

 

Green papaya salad is a delicious traditional raw salad with mildly spicy, sweet, sour and salty flavours. Green papaya is totally unlike the fruit that we know. The texture of the green papaya is like a white crunchy vegetable.

Serves 1

70g green papaya, peeled and grated into long thin strips

½ -1clove garlic

½ -3 green birds’ eye chillies

30cm yard long beans, broken into 3cm pieces

1 tbsp roasted unsalted peanuts

1 tbsp dried shrimps

3 cherry tomatoes cut in half

2 tbsp palm sugar

1 tbsp fish sauce

1 tbsp lime juice

Pound the garlic and chillies in a pestle and mortar.

Add the dried shrimps and pound until crushed. Add the beans and peanuts and pound.

Add the sugar, fish sauce and lime juice and stir together. Then add the tomatoes and press with a pestle.

Finally add the papaya and stir until well mixed in.

Serve at room temperature.

 

 

THAI STIR FRIED VEGETABLES (Phad Phak)

 

Serves 1

Stir fried vegetables are a great accompaniment to eat alongside all Asian dishes. Or for a healthy meal, eat the dish on its own with steamed rice.

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1 garlic clove, finely sliced

40g baby corn, halved

40g Chinese cabbage, coarsely chopped

50g broccoli florets

40g carrots, julienned

25ml vegetable stock

2 tsp soy sauce

2 tbsp oyster sauce

½ tsp sugar

40g beansprouts

Heat the oil until hot. Add the garlic and fry for a couple of seconds, then immediately  add all the vegetables except the beansprouts, stir fry for 30 seconds to 1minute, or until the vegetables are cooked to your taste.  Add the stock and the sauces and sugar. Mix well. Toss in the beansprouts just before serving.

 

 

 

COCONUT ICE CREAM

 

Serves 4

2 sheets of gelatine

560ml tinned coconut milk

250g caster sugar

Soak the sheets of gelatine in cold water for 15 minutes. Dissolve the sugar in half the coconut milk in a pan over a low heat. When the sugar has dissolved, remove the mixture from the heat and add the gelatine. Mix to allow the gelatine to dissolve.

Stir in the rest of the coconut milk and set aside (put in the fridge once the mixture is cool enough) until the mixture is completely cold.

Freeze in an ice cream machine or put it into a container in the freezer. If making it in the freezer, after an hour of freezing take it out and beat by hand or use a food processor, repeat this process again after another hour, and repeat until it is smooth and evenly frozen.

 

 

SPICED BERRIES

 

Serves 4

400g mixed berries

200g sugar

225ml water

1 cinnamon stick

1 star anise

 

Put the berries into a bowl.

Put the sugar, water, cinnamon stick and star anise into a pan and bring slowly to the boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Boil for just 2 minutes.

Cool for 4-5 minutes then pour the hot syrup over the fruit and allow the flavours to infuse for several hours in the fridge.

NB If using frozen berries, pour the boiling syrup straight onto the berries rather than allowing it to cool.

I thought I would post the recipes for various quick and easy meals I’ve been cooking whilst unpacking boxes, painting and filling holes in walls etc. I have to admit that it still looks like we moved in yesterday and when people call by they look amongst the boxes and say ‘ Oh it’s looking great!’. Filly our dog has just added to the list of chores by attacking the door frame to the utility room in an attempt to escape. It looks like a job for a carpenter. Her other antics have included climbing on the dining table and stealing three pork pies, to which she is highly allergic. As well as chasing the neighbours cat and she’s also showing a keen interest in their chickens!

The first two recipes are adapted from recipes I saw in this months Olive magazine (actually they are so adapted you probably wouldn’t recognise the recipe if you had the magazine, but that is where the inspiration came from – i guess I could call them my own recipes!) and the Pad Thai is a noodle dish we learnt in Thailand.

Linguine with green and black olives and feta cheese

Serves 2

Olive oil

Garlic 2 cloves sliced

Small onion 1 chopped

Chopped tomatoes 1 x 400g can

Tomato puree 2 tsp

Linguine 200g

Pitted green and black olives approx 12-15 halved

Feta cheese 2 tbsp cubed

Flat-leaf parsley a small bunch, chopped

Heat 2 tbs oil in a medium pan and add the onion and garlic. Cook gently for 2 minutes, without allowing them to brown. Add the tomatoes and tomato puree and season (including seasoning of 1 tsp of sugar to counteract the sourness of the tinned tomatoes). Bring to the boil and simmer for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile cook the linguine according to packet instructions. Drain well. Stir in the olives and parsley and heat through for 1 minutes. Add the feta to the sauce just before serving.

Toss the pasta with the sauce and serve.

Tip: I bought a pack of marinated olives and feta all together instead of buying them all separately

 

Roasted root vegetable and green lentil soup

Serves 4

Chantenay carrots 250g halved lengthways

 Potatos 2 peeled and cut into small chunks

Onion 1 cut into thin wedges

Olive oil

Dried chilli flakes a pinch

Ground cumin 2 tsp

Green lentils 200g

Vegetable stock 1.5 litres

Parsley a small bunch, chopped

Heat the oven to 190 degrees. Arrange all the vegetables in a single layer in a large roasting tin. Drizzle over 2 tbsp oil and spronkle over the chilli flakes, cumin and some salt and pepper. Toss the veg to coat in the oil and roast for 30-40 minutes until tender.

Meanwhile put the lentils and stock in a large saucepan and bring to the boil. Cover and simmer for 15-20 minutes, until the lentils are tender. Stir in the roasted vegetables and parsley and serve with crusty bread.

 

Pad Thai

Serves 1

70g rice noodles

2 tbsp vegetable oil

1 large egg

3 prawns, deveined and headless but with tail attached

1 1/2 tbsp fish sauce

1 1/2 tbsp sugar

1 1/2 tbsp lemon juice

1 tbsp yellow bean curd, finely diced

1 tbsp ground dried shrimp ( soak in cold water for 5 minutes, drain and pound in a pestle and mortar)

1 tbsp ground roasted peanuts

1 stem spring onion, cut into 2 cm pieces

30g bean sprouts

Soak the rice noodles in hot water until soft, approx 10 minutes. Careful they don’t get too soft.

Heat the oil in a wok until hot, then break the egg into the oil and scramble it.

Add the prawns and noodles, stir-fry for 15 seconds.

Add the fish sauce, sugar and lemon juice. Stir-fry for a further 15 seconds.

Add the dried shrimps, peanuts and beancurd. Stir-fry for another 15 seconds.

The toss in the spring onion and bean sprouts. Mix and remove from the heat.

Garnish with a lemon wedge and sprinkle with coriander leaves.

I had my brother in-law, his girlfriend and a friend of mine over for dinner last night. I decided to cook Chinese ribs and used an old Chinese cookbook of my mums. The instructions were in Chinese but there was an English translation. We thought they tasted very authentic. Having just had some for lunch today Mark and I thought that the flavour had developed more and it had a slight taste of blackbean sauce. However there isn’t a blackbean insight in the recipe! You are supposed to reduce the sauce down completely so its thick and sticks to the ribs, which worked well last time I made the dish, but this time cooking it in a mass volume, (Mark was worried there wasn’t going to be enough food and told me I should probably cook a chicken too!) I thought the meat would be falling off the ribs by the time the sauce had thickened. So instead I thickened it with cornflour, which worked just as well. There are probably enough ribs left to eat everyday for the rest of the week!!

The recipe is as follows and is in US measurements as this is what the Chinese used:

The book is Chinese cooking favorite home dishes

Ingredients:

6006 spareribs ( I got baby back ribs from my butcher)

2 stalks of spring onions

3 slices ginger root

2 tablespoons white wine

1/4 cup soy sauce

1/2 tablespoon sugar

2 star anise

1 1/2 cups water

Chop the rips into 6cm pieces- a meat cleaver is good for this.

Heat 3 tablespoons of oil in a wok and fry the ribs until fragrant. Add all the ingredients and bring to the boil. (I held back half the spring onions to add at the end for some colour) Reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes until the ribs are tender. Increase heat to medium and cook until the liquid is almost absorbed. Or thicken with cornflour. Remove from heat.

Roast the ribs at 235 degrees for 10 minutes. ( I did not do this as they were nice as they were)

You can freeze these and then defrost before roasting in the oven to reheat.

Having been to the dentist 5 times in a week and being full of cold I have been on cooking strike. Last night I wanted to make something very quick and easy and I only had limited ingredients (ones that I would probably not usually use in a Chinese soup) as I haven’t done a grocery shop either! Inspite of being very simple it turned out to be pretty tasty. I’ll add the recipe below but I didn’t measure anything so if you want to make it add the ingredients to taste.

Serves 2

Ingredients:

1 litre Beef Stock

2 Star Anise

2 Sticks of celery

1 Leek

1/4 small cabbage

3 blocks of flattened egg noodles

1 piece of Salmon

Soya Sauce

Sesame Oil

Black Pepper

Bring beef stock to the boil with the 2 star anise. Meanwhile shred all the vegetables very finely, add to the stock with the egg noodles and boil for about 3/4 minutes. Season with pepper. Steam the piece of salmon and serve on top of the noodles.

We only wanted one piece of salmon between us, but you could do 2. These quantities also made more than enough noodles and soup, so there is more for lunch today! We ate this dish with chilli sauce made by my Dad as he had a large crop of chillis from the garden this year. To make the chilli sauce mix the ingredients below to taste. I have made this before and have never measured quantities-it always works!

Chilli sauce ingredients:

Chillis-sliced finely

Vinegar

Garlic-crushed

Sugar

Back in 1990 on a family visit to Asia we were served CHICKEN RICE on what seemed like a daily basis. Whether it was a meal out at a restaurant, a meal from a street food stand or a home cooked meal in. It was so popular with the locals and it seemed they couldn’t get enough of it! We ate and loved it, but by the end of the long 8 week holiday we had had enough of our fair share of it! In fact we couldn’t face another bowl of it.

Eighteen years later when I returned to Asia with Mark we arrived to Singapore to be presented again with plates of chicken rice! It was delicious and brought back memories of that family holiday all those years ago. This time though we only had it a couple of times and on our return to England we had not had enough of it.

Nearly two years has past since the latest trip to Asia and we have not seen Chicken Rice available anywhere, neither restaurants or take-aways that we have been to in the UK have served this dish. The dish is deceptively plain sounding yet it is sometimes considered the ‘national dish’ of Singapore.

So i decided to recreate it at home. Having found no cookbooks with the recipe i researched the dish online and have recreated my own version of the recipe. Please do try it, it is suprisingly delicious for such a simple recipe!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHICKEN RICE

For the chicken:

1 whole chicken

2 garlic cloves

4 slices of ginger

2 spring onions

For the rice:

600g thai fragrant long grain rice

2 tbsp chicken skin and fat (removed from the chicken)

2 tbsp water

1 inch piece of ginger lightly smashed

2 garlic cloves lightly smashed

1/2 tsp of salt

3 cups chicken stock

2 pandan leaves if available

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the chilli dipping sauce:

10 large fresh red chillis

2cm piece of ginger

2 cloves garlic

1/4 tsp salt

juice of 1 lime

2 tbs chicken stock

1tsp rice vinegar

2 tsp granulated sugar

For the ginger dipping sauce:

60g ginger

4 cloves garlic

1/4 tsp salt

juice of 1 lemon

2 tbs chicken stock

For the soy dipping sauce:

1 tbs oil

1 tsp sesame oil

1 clove garlic

5 tbs light soy sauce

1 tbs sugar

3 tbs water

Garnish with fresh coriander leaves, sliced spring onion and sliced cucumber

Place the coarsely chopped spring onion, ginger and garlic inside the chicken. Place in a stock pot of boiling water and simmer uncovered for 15 minutes. Skim off any froth that rises to the top.

Turn the hob off. Cover the pot and let it stand for 25  minutes.

Remove the chicken and rinse with cold water until cool. Then rub the skin sparingly with sesame oil.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the meanwhile make the rice. Wash in a sieve until the water runs clear. In a wok add the chicken fat and 2 tbs waters. Bring to a low simmering boil until the oil is released from the fat. Add the ginger and garlic and fry well. Remove and discard the chicken fat and add the rice which has been well drained and the salt. Stir fry briskly for 1-2 minutes. Transfer the ingredients to a pan and add the chicken stock and pandan leaves. Bring to the boil and then simmer until the water reduces to the same level as the rice and when steam holes appear in the rice cover with a lid and turn to a very low heat and cook for 20-30 minutes or until the rice is cooked to taste.

To make the chilli sauce blend the ingredients in a liquidiser. Do the same for the ginger sauce.

To make the soy sauce combine all the ingredients in a small pan and heat the mixture until the sugar dissolves and then set aside to cool before use.

To serve, remove the wings (use for stock). Then remove the thigh and drumstick from the breast. Remove the breasts from the carcass and cut each joint and breast into 1 inch strips. Serve with rice and garnish.