Post natal confinement should be an enjoyable time not a drag

I am sure most of you already knew that our friend Wendy of Table for two or more has a new addition to her family. Hi Wendy, I made this card specially for you. Hope you like it.

For those of you who just got this good news, do hop over to her blog and congratulate her. She is now on confinement and I am sure she is enjoying her time with her new baby boy. This reminds me of my own confinement back in 1988. Here is a very old photo of "the happy me" feeding my baby. Nick was only 2 weeks old. He was the flawless baby to me. Don't we mothers always see our babies that way?

Did anyone of you had problem following the confinement practice like, avoiding bath, not washing hair, covered with thick clothings and stay indoor for the whole confinement period of thirty days? I did not because I told my mum I won't do that and knowing that her daughter is stubborn, she did not insist so as to keep the peace. I think we should not follow primitive practice blindly. As long as we know we are doing the right thing, we should be fine. Furthermore, confinement period should be an enjoyable time for the mother and the new born, not a drag. One thing I did not mind following was the diet because my mum is the best confinement lady. She had a wide variety of confinement healthy soups and dishes up her sleeve. I had different dishes and soups everyday and almost every one of them was delicious. One of my favorites was braised pork trotters in vinegar with lots of ginger. I LOVE it so much that I requested for it every week during my confinement! Here is her recipe, try it and I am very sure you will love it as much as I do.

Braised pork trotters in vinegar 

Ingredient:

1.5 kg pork trotters

1 ½ bottle of 625ml sweetened vinegar

½ bottle 625ml  black vinegar

250gm rock sugar

220gm old or young ginger

3 tbs sesame oil

Method:

Put pork hocks in a large pan. Peel ginger and cut it into 2 cm pieces. Pour Sweetened vinegar ad black vinegar and rock sugar into the pot. Par boil the pork hocks and then rinse with cold water.  Drop ginger in sesame oil and fry till fragrant and slightly brown. Add pork hock and stir fry till pork hocks looks opague. Heat up the vinegar to boil.  Add the pork hocks and ginger into the pot of vinegar and simmer in low heat for 1 ½ to 2 hours till pork hocks are tender. Taste and see if more rock sugar need to be added. This is rather subjective because some people prefer more sour but other prefer it more sweet.  Adjust the taste to your liking.

This dish taste even better the next day.

Ravioli with spinach white wine creamy gravy

This dish comes from a combination of few recipes that I found on the web sometime ago and I forgot to write down the url addresses so I could not credit the owners of the recipes.  A thousand apologies.


When I was making this, my mum walked into the kitchen and she stayed and watch a bit. She asked me for the name for what I was making, I told her "Ravioli". This is her reply in Cantonese which I have translated into English.  "Why so hard to pronounce?, Haiyah, nevermind lah, I call it Quay Lo wantan." Isn't she a piece of work?

The good thing about ravioli is that you can make a big batch and freeze whatever the balance that are not used. You can use different kind of gravy to create a new taste each time.  I used spinach white wine creamy gravy for the first batch of ravioli. Then, few nights ago, Stitch suggested that I put the ravioli in minestrone soup and he said it was fantastic combintion and he loved it.  That is so easy, just heat up a can of minestrone soup and throw in the cooked ravioli.

For the benefit of those who are new to making ravioli like me, I have also made a short video on "how to".  I hope that makes it easier to understand the method better. Please bear with me for the poor production of the video for I am a beginner. I welcome advice for improvement. 

Make 30 - 35 Ravioli (2in x 2in square)

Ingredients:

3-1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt 3 whole beaten large eggs 


2-1/2 tablespoons cooking oil 


1/2 cup of lukewarm water 



Sift flour in large bowl, make a well in center and add salt, oil, eggs and water. Mix liquid and flour gradually until absorbed. Place dough on floured board and knead dough thoroughly for 3 to 5 minutes until dry and smooth. (Add more flour if dough is still sticky). Cover and set aside 10 to 15 minutes.

For ease of mixing and kneading your dough, use an automatic bread maker or dough mixer.

Method to assemble the Ravioli:

Divide dough into 4 balls.   Refer to video on how to make the ravioli.

Method to cook the Ravioli:

Boil a big pot of water with salt and a tsp of olive oil.  When water is boiling, put in the ravioli.  When they float to the top, it should be cooked. Drain off the water and put them in the serving plates to be ready for the gravy.

Filling – Option 1

Spinach and ricotta cheese

1 lb (450 g) fresh spinach

1 lb (450 g) ricotta cheese, thoroughly drained

4 oz gouda cheese, freshly grated

salt and pepper

¼ tsp of nutmeg

Filling – Option 2

Capsicum, black olive, tomato and blue cheese

½ green capsicum finely diced

1/ 2 cup black olive, sliced into thin rings

1 medium tomato, remove seed and finely diced

¼ cup thinly sliced sundried tomatoes

¼ cup blue cheese

1 tbs olive oil

½ tsp paprika

salt and pepper to taste


Garnish:
brocolli, steamed
rocket

Method to make the filling Option 1:

Boil the spinach in lightly salted water. Place the boiled spinach in a cheese cloth and form a small sack. Squeeze the sack to expel as much water as possible. Chop the spinach finely. Place the spinach in a bowl. Combine the drained ricotta, gouda cheese, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.  Taste and adjust the salt, pepper, and nutmeg if necessary.

Method to make the filling Option 2:

Heat olive oil in pan and add capsicum and sauté for a minute. Add black olive, diced tomatoes, sliced sundried tomatoes, paprika, salt and pepper and mix well. Turn of heat and blend in blue cheese and set aside.

Ingredients for Spinach white wine cream gravy:

200 gm spinach

1/2 small onion, cut into small pieces

3 roasted garlic cloves

2 tbsp butter

2 tsp chopped thyme

1 tbs butter

¼ cup white wine

1/4 cup whipping cream

salt & pepper - to taste

Method:

Wash spinach and steam for 15 mins till soft. Add spinach, onion, garlic, to the blender and make puree.  Melt butter in pan and add puree and let it boil on medium-flame. Add the chopped thyme, salt and pepper, and let it simmer. Reduce flame to low and add white wine and whipping cream. Mix well and pour it over cooked ravioli. Garnished with steamed brocolli and fresh rocket and serve.

TIPS:

* Drain the filling ingredients very well to prevent the ravioli from breaking while boiling.

* If you would like the stuffing to be aromatic, add more freshly grated nutmeg.

* Sometimes the dough will dry too much while you are working, which prevents the pasta sheets from being “gluey” enough to stick to each other. If this happens, brush the surface of the bottom pasta sheet with egg whites. To prevent the pasta sheets from drying too much, cover them with plastic wrap.