Ginseng Root & Yok Chok Soup

I bought a packet of Ginseng Root & Yok Chok the other day. I was actually hunting for some ingredients to prepare Samgyetang - Korean Ginseng Chicken Soup.But I thought buying a whole chicken for three people is such a waste. I thought, I should prepare a Ginseng Root & Yok Chok soup instead. 

It was really easy too.

Boil some water and add in the ingredients (Wolfberry, yok chok and ginseng root) and bring to boil (I added in some red dates too!). Then, add in chicken or any other kind of meat to simmer until meat is tender. Add salt to taste. Serve with rice. The soup taste really good too! It has a really mild taste. 

Pai Tee (Top Hats) with Sauce

Pai Tee would taste really good with fillings and the sweet sauce. Since I already have my Pai Tee skins (You could keep your skins in an air tight container so they would stay crispy), it's time to prepare the fillings and sauce. Pai Tee fillings would usually consist of carrots, jicama, tofu, bean sprout, mushroom, shrimp or chicken. You could use any of the ingredients based on your taste preference. 

Pai Tee Filling

1.5kg carrot - cut julienne

200g shrimp - chopped

2 tbsp chopped garlic

50g bean sprout

50 ml chicken stock

Pai Tee skins/cases

1. Heat a skillet over a medium fire.

2. Stir garlic with oil until golden. Add in carrot and chopped shrimp.

3. Add in chicken stock and let it simmer and reduce for two minutes. Then, stir  in bean sprout.

4. Season to taste.

5. Add in the fillings into the case. Top with Pai Tee chili sauce, and garnish with chopped spring onion, or sliced cherry tomato.

Pai Tee Sauce

6# red chilies.

1 inch ginger

4-5 clove garlic

1/2 tbsp salt

1 tbsp vinegar

2tbsp salt

1. Blend red chillies with ginger and garlic.

2. Cook the blended ingredients with sugar, vinegar and salt over medium heat.

Pai Tee (Top Hats) Skin

My mother been saying that I haven't made Pai Tee for a while. Pai Tee is a delicious dish crispy shell shaped like top hat, with usually savory ingredients inside. They makes great hors d'ourves. These days I've seen variations of Pai Tee. Some of them used salads to stuff in the shell. Making Pai Tee, however was quite tricky. The frying process is quite time consuming. The recipe I've always had requires some flour, and corn flour. My mother thought that the shell isn't that good. I browse on the internet and noticed that many were using the combination of flour and corn flour. So, I combined those two  recipe for a tryout.

Pai Tee Skin

100g flour

1tbsp rice flour

2tbsp corn flour

1# egg

180ml water/milk

salt

Pai Tee Mold

1. Heat the pot over medium fire. You need a deep pot with plenty of oil for deep frying. Make sure the Pai Tee mold could be covered in oil while frying.

2. Mix well all ingredients in a bowl.

3. Heat your mold in the oil for 2 minutes.

4. Dip the mold into the batter, make sure that the batter cover the sides of mold and the batter isn't too thick.

5. Slowly dip the batter coated mold into the hot oil. The Pai Tee skin will separate itself from the mold. If it didn't separate, you may use a toothpick to separate them.

6. Fry them for a bit more until they're golden.

Experimenting: Prawn Siu Mai

I saw this nice dim sum steamer the other day, when I went shopping with my brother. I've always wanted to try making dim sum! So, I made my brother paid for the steamer  ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ

The nice dim sum steamer.

First steamed dim sum. It looks good, doesn't it? However, they seemed to be sticking with each other due to my the arrangement. Lesson learned: don't arrange it so closely together! ☆⌒(＞。≪)

Second batch of the steamed dim sum. Those dim sum was sticking on the cloth ＿|￣|○ I used towel as I couldn't find any other suitable cloths. Maybe I shouldn't be using towel the next time I made this? （￣へ￣）

The recipe is basically as follows:

Yellow skin wonton  30nos.

Fillings:

200 g     Prawn

4g          Salt

12g        Corn Starch (dissolve with a bit water)

20g        Onion

50g        Carrot (diced, small)

50g        Chinese Turnip

Heat oil, add in onion. Let it sweat. Stir in prawn and vegetable. Then, pour in the corn starch. Season with salt and pepper.

Lay a piece of wonton skin. Wet the edges. Put 2 to 3 teaspoons of filling in the middle. Gather up the edges of the wrapper and gently pleat so that it forms a basket shape, with the top of the filling exposed.

Steam over boiling water for five minutes. Steaming for more than five minutes would ruin the taste a bit (as according to the chef).