Put to good use, No waste

Lessons learnt from my mum always stays with me. My mum never let me waste food. She would make sure I finished every bit in my bowl. I was taught to take what I can eat only and leaving food and let it waste is totally unacceptable. She even scared me by saying if I leave a grain of rice in my bowl, I will marry a husband who have a face full of scars. LOL!

Nowadays, children are raised in an environment where parents rushed to fulfil their desire so they grow up to be indifferent towards what they get or own, including food. My mum said, it is the parents’ doing that they developed this behavior. I think she is right. So it is the parents’ responsibility to eduate their children that they must not waste food.

So under the training of my mum, I could never stand leftovers food starring at me when I open my refrigerator. I had this Tupperware of left over pulled pork which I could have make pulled pork burgers again but then I wanted to do something different with it. What I came up with is this.

Pulled pork and spinach penne

Largely adapted from epicurious.com

Ingredients:

1 cup left over pulled pork

1 tbs unsalted butter

2 medium leeks, white and pale-green parts only, diced

sea salt to taste

3/4 cup heavy cream

2 tsp chopped fresh rosemary

2 cups penne

½ cup shaved Parmesan

parsley for garnishing

Method:

Heat butter in pan over medium heat. Add leeks and season with sea salt. Increase heat to medium-high and cook, stirring often, until leeks begin to caramelized. Add pulled pork. Add cream and chopped rosemary. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer, stirring occasionally, until sauce is thickened and coats the back of a spoon. Meanwhile, cook pasta in a large pot of boiling salted water, stirring occasionally, until al dente. Drain pasta, reserving 1cup pasta cooking liquid. Add pasta and 1/2 cup pasta cooking liquid to sauce and stir to coat. Increase heat to medium and continue stirring, adding more cooking liquid as needed, until sauce coats pasta.

How to prepare and roast a turkey with all the trimmings

Hi everyone, Quay Lo here. When it comes to making turkey for the holidays Quay Po surrenders her apron to me. She takes it back again when it comes to preparing the many other dishes we serve, especially the pies.

I’ll start with a promise. If you follow the recipes below you will make a perfect turkey, perfect gravy, and a perfect side dish called “dressing” not to be confused with “stuffing” which I will explain below.  In my family Thanksgiving and Christmas were crowned by the dinner at which the turkey was featured. It was highly anticipated and with all of the various recipes for ways to use the left overs we ate turkey for a week beyond the holidays as well. Those were my favorite two weeks of the year. The smell of sage and roasting bird in the house is enough to almost bring tears to my eyes (or was that the onions I’ve just chopped?)   

Let’s start with preparing the turkey. If you want a moist, savory roast turkey, marinating the whole bird in a brine solution for several hours before the roasting will provide the best results. Since most turkeys come frozen in the market, we’ll start about 3 days before the big event by placing the frozen turkey in the regular side of the refrigerator to allow it to thaw slowly. Another solution that will make more room in the fridge is to simply put the turkey in an ice chest, and cover with ice. This keeps big bird safely out of the way, as long as you don’t have a very clever dog.  

                    

The TURKEY

About 16 hours before you are ready to pop the bird in the oven, we are going to prep it with a soak in a brine solution. You will need a large, deep soup pot with a lid or a bucket that can be covered and is large enough for the whole bird plus the brine solution.

Brine Ingredients

• 12 cups water, divided
• 1 cup sea salt
• 1 cup apple cider vinegar
• 2 cups brown sugar
• 1 cup chopped candied ginger
• Herbs (rosemary, sage, thyme, 2 bay leafs) any mix ratios, up to one cup.
• Black pepper
• 6 cups ice or one block of ice

Instructions 10 -14 lb turkey

1. In a pot larger than the turkey simmer 6-8 cups of  water and add salt, sugar, and candied ginger. Stir until dissolved.
2. Stir in 6 cups cold water, 1 cup apple cider vinegar, herbs and 4-6 cups of ice cubes.
3. Remove giblets and neck from the thawed bird’s cavity. Rinse the outside and inside of the turkey under a cold faucet. Completely submerge the turkey in brine solution without the turkey rubbing the sides. Cover with a lid. Marinate for 12 hours for a small turkey (8-10 lbs), 16 hours for a 12 – 16 lb. and a full 24 hours for a bigger bird. You can wrap wet towels around the pot and keep it inside an air conditioned room as long as you replenish the ice before you sleep. Overnight it should be fine, just pack it full with ice before retiring and again in the morning.
4. Pre heat your oven to 165ᴼC (325ᴼF). Rinse turkey inside and out thoroughly. Pat dry with paper towels. Chop some herbs, (sage, rosemary, and thyme) and add them, and some black pepper, to a ½ cup of butter and rub every part of the turkey. The herbs and butter will eventually join the natural juices at the bottom of the baking pan and become the basis for your flavorful gravy. Place a whole orange or a lemon, halved, plus four stalks of celery halved, fresh herbs (not chopped), and 3 large carrots split length wise and halved, inside the cavity of the bird.
5. Place a rack inside a large roasting pan. Place the prepared bird on the rack, breast side up. Place a meat thermometer in the thickest part of the breast, taking care not to touch a bone. The thermometer should read 74ᴼC or 164ᴼ F to be done and still moist. (It will continue to cook a bit as it rests out of the oven and that is fine, it is in the calculation) A 12 pound turkey should take about 3 hours or a little over to reach the desired temperature. Be sure to monitor for surface doneness. Most often, the turkey will get a nice golden brown on the surface but still require some baking time. If your bird gets that lovely lacquered appearance, but still needs time, just baste it again then lay a piece of aluminum foil, with the shiny side out, on top and loosely formed over the bird, and let it continue until the temperature is reached.
6. Remove and discard the aromatics in the cavity, place the turkey on a platter and cover with aluminum foil (shiny side facing the bird this time) and allow it to rest for 30 minutes before carving. Do NOT discard the roasting pan drippings. While your bird rests, move on to make the gravy. You are going to perform wizardry with the pan drippings.

Notes:

Most stores sell heavy gage aluminum foil roasting pans during the holidays and they work just fine. Place the bird on a small rack set inside the pan.

Throughout the baking process, baste the turkey every twenty minutes or so, drawing from the juices collected in the pan. If the turkey gets a nice golden brown but the thermometer suggests there is still more baking time required, lay a sheet of aluminum foil, with the shiny side facing outward, over the turkey and continue baking until done. Be sure to monitor this closely as it can happen

We’ve had better luck with smaller birds in the 12 – 14 lb range. Much larger turkeys tend to be more tough and sinewy. If you need more meat,  just bake a second turkey the day before and warm up the pre-sliced meat in an oven or microwave before serving.

THE GRAVY

• 24 ounces chicken broth
• 8 ounces red wine
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon fresh herbs such as oregano, thyme or rosemary
• Salt
• Freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

1. After you remove the turkey from the roasting pan and set aside to rest, leave the drippings from the turkey in the pan and place the roasting pan over medium heat. If you’ve used a temporary aluminum foil pan transfer the contents into a large frying pan. Heat up the drippings, then transfer to a quart size, heat resistant measuring cup or a jar. Allow it to sit for 5 -8 minutes to allow the fat to separate and to rise to the top.
2. Return 2/3 cup of the fat to the roasting pan and place over medium-high heat. Skim any remaining fat from the pan drippings liquid and save while discarding the excess fat.
3. With the fat heated up in the pan, add the flour and whisk to combine into a roux. Cook, whisking continuously, until the mixture starts to thicken and becomes smooth and brown, approximately 3 to 4 minutes. Once this happens, gradually add the reserved liquid back to the pan and whisk until smooth.
4. Add 1 cup of red wine and 3 cups of chicken stock, all at once. Whisk to combine, continuing to scrape the bottom of the pan until all of the bits have come loose and you have reached your desired consistency, approximately 5 to 6 minutes.
5. Season the finished gravy with salt and pepper but be sure to taste before that.

THE CORNBREAD, SAGE 

AND  SAUSAGE DRESSING

There are two terms used to describe this favorite side dish; “dressing” or “stuffing”. In general it is called stuffing if, in fact, you cook it inside the turkey’s chest and stomach cavity along with the turkey. The resulting combo can be delicious as the seasoning of both the bird and the stuffing co-mingle along with the roasting juices absorbed by the stuffing.  However, I don’t recommend this approach for a couple of reasons. One is that the pan juices are not going be as generous for gravy making because the stuffing absorbs much of it.  Secondly, it takes longer for the stuffing to reach a safe 165ᴼ. In the meantime, the turkey itself risks becoming considerably overdone.  That would be tragic in my humble opinion given all of the effort to brine the turkey for exactly the opposite. Besides, no one wants to try to eat a “tough old bird”. So let’s talk “dressing” which is named that simply because it is specifically designed to accompany and complement the turkey, carrying it savory notes into a carbohydrate side dish. (Not that we need one as typically there will be mashed potatoes, roasted sweet potatoes, and hot dinner rolls also served. I once heard it said that Thanksgiving and Christmas were holidays invented so that Americans could eat four or five kinds of starchy dishes at one meal.

So while I would concede that the following recipe may be easily sacrificed by families here in Asia, I must also stipulate that if I am cooking, I will make it every time. The fact is that two days later, when half a pan of dressing is in the fridge and you need something right then, the dressing will taste like it has transformed into something far more exquisite than you imagined.

Ingredients

• 3 cups cubed dry bread
• 3 cups cubed or crumbled cornbread
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 1  cup chopped celery
• ¼ cup finely chopped fresh sage leaves
• 6  tablespoons melted butter
• 500g pork sausage, crumbled
• 2 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 2  eggs, beaten
• 1 tablespoon each dried sage and poultry seasoning
• ½  teaspoon seasoned salt

Note: Serves 8, double recipe if you are feeding more people and if you want some generous leftovers. Hint: You DO!

PREHEAT oven to 375°F (190ᴼC).

Directions:

1. Grease with butter or olive oil, a 13x9x2-inch baking pan.
2. COMBINE bread and cornbread in large bowl, set aside.
3. COOK onion, celery, and 2 tablespoons butter in a large skillet over medium heat until onion is softened. Add crumbled sausage; continue cooking, stirring frequently, until sausage is half done.
4. STIR sausage mixture into cornbread and bread bread cubes.
5. Stir in remaining ingredients; mix well.
6. BAKE 40 to 45 minutes until lightly browned.
7. If there is still some time to go to finish the baking and the top is already golden brown, just lay a piece of aluminum foil over the pan with the reflective side out.

Note: Sausage is a matter of taste and tradition. We’ve tried making our own by chopping a pound of pork shoulder and adding a bit of red cayenne pepper, 2 tbs of chopped sage, salt, and pepper. This carries the sage flavor profile all the way through the meal, which I am fond of. However, we have also tried purchased chorizo, removed from the skin, and cooked in the manner prescribed above. This gives the dish a definite spicy boost and works in contrast to the sage in the turkey which can be equally pleasant. Someday I want to try merguez sausage, the quite spicy lamb sausage thought to originate in Morocco.

Round pie with square puff pastry

My Quay Lo often said he is a square peg in a round hole living in Malaysia. However, he said he learned a lot about the Asian culture over the years. For example, he loves Chinese, Malay and Indian food. He used to eat our local spicy fare,, sometimes even exceeding my own threshold for the heat,, but now, though he still loves it, his system is not so tolerant as it once was. He has also observed how, in our culture, a hundred conversations can go on at the same time in a gathering, and that we don't mean to be rude or exclude him. Now, when he wants to be  heard, he just speaks the loudest. He observes that it isn't often that he feels the need to be the loudest and still believes that it is far better to simply remain silent and listen. Though he has learned to use some common phrases in Cantonese, like, “Hai Lor” (Right) or “MM goy lay ah” (Thank you), even those he uses only based on the situation.

I remember once we were in a taxi in Singapore and the driver was a Chinese old uncle and spoke very little English. 
Listen to the conversation between my Quay Lo and him:

Old Uncle: “Today, hot ar?”

My Quay Lo : “Hai Lor.” (Right).

Old Uncle was so impressed and asked : You speak Chinese?”

My Quay Lo: “Siu, siu, ngor kay tai tai kow ngor.”  (A little, my wife taught me).

Old uncle was even more impressed and started to speak to him in Cantonese, the whole trip from then on, and my Quay Lo kept saying “Hai Lor, Hai Lor." (Right, Right). When we reached our destination and alighted from the taxi,  he thanked the old uncle in Cantonese, “MM koi lay ar.” (Thank you.) That put a big smile on the old man’s face. As we walked away,  I asked him if he knew what the old uncle was talking about. "Some of it" he replied, "but mostly I had no idea".  So tell me, do you think he is a square peg in a round hole, living here? I don't think so, he fit right in. He is just like my pie, he fits in although not uniformly.  He managed to make the old uncle think that he had a nice conversation with a friendly Quay Lo. Which of course, he had. Maybe it even made the uncle's day.  I guess as long as one accepts their own shape, one will always find a way to fit in. Just don’t let your shape box you in. I did not let the shape of my puff pastry box me in, I went ahead and made the pie anyway.

My Quay Lo said this pie looked like it had been repaired but then I still made a round pie with square puff pastries and, as he testified,  a very delicious one! A little stretch here, and a tuck there, and it seemed to work. Isn't it true that in life we all occasionally have to do that? If we don't have the right shape, no big deal. As my Quay Lo says, humans are the most adaptable creatures on earth. That is a very good principle for the kitchen I think. Quay Lo loves savory pastries. I made this one with a touch of Asian spices and he raved about it. Sometimes the little stretches and tucks we do in life are not as apparent as the patchwork pie pastry, but are more subtle and meaningful like the spices in this pie.

Chicken pot pie

Adapted from allrecipes.com

Ingredients:

300gm skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, diced

1/2  cup carrots, diced

½ cup frozen green peas

1 tbs butter

½ cup water

1/2 cup onion, chopped

¼  tsp salt

¼ tsp black pepper

1/4 tsp mustard seeds (pre toast in a dry hot pan for 2 minutes, tossing frequently)

1 tbs garam masala
1/4 tsp ground red chili

1 can creamy chicken soup

2 (9 inch) unbaked puff pastry (I did not have the round puff pastry so I used 9 inch square ones)

Optional: Use 1/4 cup dry white wine instead of water for more flavor or add one tsp fresh lemon

Method:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C.)

Marinate chicken with a dry rub of the garam masala, ground red chili, salt and pepper for 1 hour or more. In a saucepan, add butter. Sauté onions till translucent and soft. Add mustard seed, chicken, carrots, and peas and stir fry till chicken meat becomes somewhat opaque. Add the creamy chicken soup and water and stir in. Bring back to a simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from heat, set aside. Place the chicken mixture in bottom pie crust. Cover with top crust, seal edges, and cut away excess dough. Make several small slits in the top to allow steam to escape.

Bake in the preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cool for 10 minutes before serving.

My humble apple crumble, can you tell I cheated? SSSH!!

I think in order to do anything well, one has to love doing it otherwise the result will not be as rewarding. Maybe I still do not love baking enough to produce good results.  I admire bakers who bake beautiful and delicious pastries, cakes, breads and cookies. Some of my fellow bloggers are so talented and I can spend hours at their blogs admiring their fabulous photos and quietly wish I can bake like them. To me, they are not only fantastic bakers, they are food artists. 


My first attempt on baking apple crumble was a failure.  Why?  That is because I was neither interested in baking or cooking but that was one year ago.  Now, I would say I have improved to a state where I am not ashamed to share with you this humble apple crumble recipe of mine. I usually serve it with vanilla ice cream and there is no doubt the combination of flavors is very pleasing to the palette. 

Before we move on to the recipe, I am curious to know if you have ever wonder how professional photographers take photos of ice cream?  The last time when I photographed my banana foster with vanilla ice cream, the scoop of ice cream melted before I could get the settings right on my camera. You can see it in the picture below. Look pathetic right? This photo did not do justice to the recipe. If you like banana foster, you must try this.  It is an original recipe from Chef Paul and to me, the best! Just click on the photo and it will bring you to the post.

When you look at my apple crumble with vanilla ice cream, you will must be thinking, "Oh, Quay Po has master the skill of taking photo of ice cream or how come the ice cream did not melt?" Want to know why? Please read on.

A friend, who is a professional photographer told me that some of the fantastic shots of ice creams in magazines were not ice cream. They are mashed potato mixed with lard, karo syrup and food coloring. If I did not tell you that I cheated, would you know that the ice-cream on my apple crumble is mashed potato?

If you want to take photos of real ice creams instead of fake, perhaps some preparation in advance may help. Make sure your camera, the right lens including the tripod are in place. Check that the lighting is what you want. Place whatever you are going to used to hold the ice cream in the freezer for at least half an hour before taking the shot. This will provide you with more time to make adjustments before the ice cream melts. My next project is to take photo of real ice cream. Wish me luck. 

Apple crumble 

Ingredients:

(A)

3 medium size apples, peeled, cored and sliced or cube

25 g brown sugar

25 g raisins

¼ tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp nutmeg

½ tsp vanilla extract

(B)

100 g plain flour

¼ tsp salt

60 g cold butter, cut into small pieces

25 g castor sugar

10g chopped almonds

Method:

Preheat oven to 200 C or 400 F.  Cook A for 5 – 8 mins till apple is slightly soft.  Pour into an ovenproof dish.  B - Sift flour with salt. Rub in butter till it resembles fine bread crumbs.  Lightly mix in sugar and almonds.  Sprinkle B over A.  Bake for 30 mins or until golden brown.  Serve hot with vanilla ice cream or thickened cream.

A Guest post by my Quaylo - The fruits of seasons and a family kitchen

A high point in my earliest food memories was an oft featured treasure from my mother’s ovens that caused ripples of delight any time we became aware that she was baking these. So fragrant were the smells that permeated our small home when my mother was baking that, in my recall, we all became a little giddy. Never more so than when we knew she was baking pie. It almost didn’t matter to us what kind of pie she was making, they were all great. Mom was a master at taking advantage of the best available ingredients. In this way her pies were woven into our sense of the seasons. In hindsight it isn't any wonder why I still love pie so much. Pie is a part of my biorhythms. It is a little sad that today's hot house production and global supply lines have rendered these seasonal dependencies a thing of the past. We can have any pie, any time we want. That is a substantial dilution to anticipation, that thrill when something we are waiting for gets closer and closer. Examples of pies that marked our seasons are distinct in my memory. For example the salad days of summer were made all the richer by the freshly picked peaches, which, when cradled in one of my mother's unbelievably flaky, lard based, crusts, was elevated to a culinary status that paid homage to mother nature's wonders. Since we helped pick the peaches at the orchard my father would drive us too each year, we had a connection to these pies that went beyond the simple enjoyment of eating them. It was almost transcendental. However, it wasn't just peaches, but also cherries, strawberries, and blueberry pies that marked our summer days as much as the warm sultry evenings during which we ate them. Today, a home-made summer fruit pie invokes memories of heading for the patio to escape the hot house, and the smell of freshly mowed lawns, the sounds of crickets, and the feel of cooling grass between our toes. Of course, after the weather had turned, and our care free days yielded to school days, there were pumpkin pies at Thanksgiving. They joined the fresh apple and pecan pies that became the standards of late fall and winter. Again, we were often the agents of the harvest, going back to the same pick-your-own orchards for apples, or finding pecan trees under which to gather the fallen bounty, or selecting the large pumpkins for our Halloween from the farmer’s market. My father had several prime pecan trees we went to each year, and they had an abundant output. Two of these were huge, ancient sentinels in the largest of the city parks. I often wondered why we were the only ones that hiked back to these trees to gather the pecans that had begun to litter the floor with the first cool fall winds. The pumpkins so deftly carved for Halloween were never allowed to wilt on the porch and instead were cleaned and stewed to put by for Thanksgiving pies. My mother never wasted anything.

One particular pie stood out. The fruit came from my father’s annual garden, along with the early asparagus which was another product of a rhizome plant. These popped up and grew as early as mid April, making it a sure bet for spring time. I am talking about the rhubarb, which traces its cultivation back thousands of years. The Chinese prized its root ball and stalks for medicinal qualities. Rhubarb roots are harvested in the fall from plants that are at least six years old. The roots are then dried for later use. The root was used in various preparations for use as an anticholesterolemic, antiseptic, antispasmodic, antitumor, aspirant, astringent, cholagogue, demulcent, diuretic, laxative, purgative, general tonic [1]. My father was an avid reader and world traveler, and he may have known all of this. But there was only one thing on his mind when he came into the house triumphantly carrying the earliest stalks of this remarkable plant. PIE!

Only the red stalks of the Rhubarb plant are used as an edible "fruit"

Today rhubarb is widely grown in hot houses year around. One rhizome can yield as many as three harvests per year. It isn’t a very popular pie filling here in Southeast Asia, but then pie is not particularly a popular dish except in kitchens that see western baking. Still, during a recent visit to Singapore, a friend of ours purchased some for us from a local market after I spoke about it the night before at dinner. Carefully wrapping the fruit and carrying them back on her return flight to Kuala Lumpur, Quaypo made sure the treasure was secured. In the meantime, I stayed on to finish my work, and almost forgot about the rhubarb until my own return a few days later. As soon as Quaypo reminded me I was on it. I chose to mix some strawberries into the filling I made, and wisely recruited Quaypo to make her crust as she has the same golden fingers for pie crust that my mother had, even though she is handicapped by the out of favor lard, in favor of a vegetable based alternate. My father loved the sharp tartness of a full rhubarb pie, but I favor a milder blend. The result was far better than I expected. The very tart rhubarb stewed up plump and juicy, and was balanced by the less tart strawberries and the sugar in the recipe. The pastry was typical of Quaypo’s talents. The memories of those pies of my youth were, well…priceless, which is why I am sharing them with you.

Best,

Stitch aka "Simplifried"

Strawberrie – Rhubarb Pie

Ingredients:

1 1/4 c Sugar

1/8 ts Salt

1/3 c Flour

Zest of 1 lemon

1 T fresh lemon juice

2 ts vanilla extract or 1 pod scraped

2 c Fresh strawberries

2 c Fresh rhubarb, cut in 1" pieces

3 T cold butter

1 T Coarse sugar

Pastry for 2-crust pie

Procedure:

Combine 1 1/4 cup sugar, salt, and flour. Arrange half the strawberries and rhubarb in a pastry-lined 9 inch pie pan. Sprinkle with half the sugar mixture. Repeat with remaining fruit and sugar mixture. Dot with butter. Drape top crust and flute edges to make high-standing rim. Brush top of pie with cold water and sprinkle on coarse sugar. Cut steam vents in top crust. “Collar the edge of the pie with aluminum foil. Bake in hot oven (425 F) 40 to 50 minutes or until rhubarb is tender and crust is browned.

[i] The Rhubarb Compendium

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Poached pear in spiced red wine

I have posted a poached pear recipe last year when I first started my blog.  Back then, I was a newbie and not even sure how to write a proper recipe. Today I found a better recipe than what I used before. It is from Sara Buenfeld. This is a good one and I would love to share with you.

Largely adapted from Sara Buenfeld’s recipe

Ingredients:

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 bottle red wine

225g caster sugar

1 cinnamon stick

1 star anise

6 pears, peeled, but kept whole with stalk intact

Method:

In a large saucepan, put in the wine, sugar, cinnamon, star anise and vanilla extract and bring to boil until sugar dissolved. Turn heat to medium and add pears into the pan.Poach the pears, covered, for 20-30 mins, making sure they are covered in the wine. The cooking time will very much depend on the ripeness of your pears - they should be tender all the way through when pierced with a cocktail stick. Take the pears out of the pan and let it cool before putting them in the fridge. Boil the liquid to reduce it by half so that it's syrupy. Serve each pear with the cooled syrup and a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Enjoy!


Note: You can make these up to 2 days ahead and chill.

Spinach Bacon mini quiche

Do you have days that you just want to eat something simple? Here is a recipe for a quick, simple and delicious meal. You can make a big batch of this and keep in the freezer. They come very handy on days when you just want to drop on your couch and eat your meal in front of the TV watching your favorite show.  Don’t even have dishes or cutlery to wash.

Ingredients:

4 eggs

2 cups milk

1 1/4 cups shredded Asiago cheese

1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1/4 red capsicum, thinly sliced (if want spicy, replace with 1 red chilli)

2 to 3 bacon strips, cooked and crumbled

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon dry wasabi

1/4 teaspoon paprika

1 (10 ounce) package spinach, cooked, chopped and drained

1 (9 inch) short crust pastry (divide by 4 make 4 mini pie shell)

Method:

In a large bowl, beat eggs; whisk in milk, 1 cup cheese, capsicum,onion, bacon, salt, mustard and paprika. Add spinach. Pour into pie shell. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Bake at 400 degrees F for 30 minutes or until a knife inserted halfway between the center and the edge comes out clean.

Braised Lamb Shank in garlic foam – Big Disappointment!

First I do not eat lamb, and I just cannot stand the gamey taste. There have been many times when everybody told me the lamb at a certain restaurant had no gamey taste, and I've tried, but the musky "gamey" taste is always there. Since both my hubby and son love lamb, I want to learn how to make this dish for them. So I found a recipe for lamb shank in Chef Sam Leong's recipe book. I followed the recipe to the dot and cannot tell what went wrong. I am not happy with the result of this dish. My food critic said the flavor was good but my lamb shank is not tender enough. I did not know that it is so difficult to get it right. No wonder I don't like it. LOL! I would love to hear your opinion on this. Any of you dear friends have a good lamb shank recipe, please point me to it ok? Pretty please?

Adapted from Chef Sam Leong’s recipe

Ingredients:

60g lamb shank,

½ tsp cooking oil

40g Edmame beans

salt to taste

Sauce:

50g diced carrot

50g diced celery

3g rosemary

3g thyme

1 bay leaf

160ml chicken stock

¼ tsp salt

¼ tsp tomato paste

2 tsp red wine

Garlic Foam:

20g peeled garlic

50ml chicken stock

30g whipping cream

½ tsp salt

Garnish:

Pink peppercorns

Chives

Method:

Pan sear lamb shank until brown on all sides. Place a pot with sauce ingredients and braise for 1 hr. Reserve shanks but discard other ingredients. Deep fry whole garlic until brown. Steam with chicken stock for 30 mins until garlic is soft. Add cream and process mixture in a blender until foamy. Season with salt. Heat oil and sauté edamame beans. Sprinkle with salt to taste. Place edamame beans on a plate, top with lamb shanks and spoon garlic foam over. Sprinkle with pink peppercorns and chives.