Friday, April 8, 2011

Foodie Fridays: How to enjoy your kway teow (and an easy risotto!)

Step 1: Make the discovery that kway teow sticks beautifully to the back of your hand.  Layer them nicely...

His hands were slimy from soup btw, not saliva!

Step 2: Then slurp them off the back of your hand...


Step 3: Repeat again and again, until most of your dinner is in your tummy.  Meanwhile, ignore all protests from Mama about using a spoon like a regular human being, but do show her how the kway teow sticks beautifully when she takes out the camera...


Step 4: Then when you get really full and bored, try a physics lesson and dangle them off the edge of your bowl.  If they drop, its due to this thing called gravity...


Kway teow always tastes better if you get to savour it.  Finger-licking good, yes?

(Lest you go tsk tsk at the boy making a mess at the table, he is usually much neater, and I did lecture him about eating properly.  However, properly to a 2 year old seems to have a different definition!  He finished his dinner though.  And I realize the photos may be a little gross to some, sorry... guess to someone who used to teach boys who thought the coolest thing on earth was to smuggle out a pig's heart after a dissection practical and throw it up at the classroom fan, a little mess from a meal is nothing. :p)


Ah yes, what was I supposed to write about?  Oh, yes, the meals.  This week has been a good one for the kitchen (in terms of usage, but not in terms of grime):  
Last Friday's beef soup (I call it our beta-carotene juice since I just stew beef with a can of plum tomatoes, carrots and corn to yield this sourish beefy soup), Sunday's shepherd's pie (the recipe says "easy" but I find it quite troublesome!), Tuesday's chicken with shitake mushroom soup, Wednesday's herb-baked salmon and pumpkin risotto (recipe below), and Thursday's kway teow soup with spinach and mince pork.  

5 home-cooked family dinners, out of 7 days... I guess its an improvement?  At least I still get a huge sense of satisfaction seeing the hubby slurp his soup and lean back with a sigh after a meal. :)  And I finally found a recipe for risotto that doesn't call for a torturous 45 minutes of stirring at the stove:


Oven-baked pumpkin risotto 
(Adapted from a tomato risotto recipe from Annabel Karmel's After School Meal Planner)

Serves 4

Ingredients:
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 medium onion, finely chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 tsp ground sea salt
- 185 g Arborio rice
- 375 ml chicken stock
- 250 g pumpkin, chopped into chunks
- 60 g grated Parmesan
- Black pepper

Steps:
1. Pre-heat oven to 200 degrees.
2. Saute onion and garlic for 4 minutes with salt.
3. Add rice and stir for 5 minutes.
4. Add stock and pumpkin, bring to simmering point, stirring occasionally.
5. Sprinkle with Parmesan and black pepper, cook for 2 minutes.
6. Cover and bake for 30 minutes or until rice is cooked (do open the oven periodically to give the rice a stir, or the top might burn).

(You could also stir in some butter right at the end, which was mentioned in the recipe, but I left it out as I was in a hurry.  If you do, cover for a few minutes before serving.)

I loved how this turned out, since you get your creamy risotto, without having to slave at the stove for a long time. :)  The actual recipe used tomatoes and courgettes, but I ran out of tomatoes and used pumpkin, which turned out quite nice with the rice.  Happy weekend everyone!

7 comments:

  1. Haha boys..

    Your food looks amazing! Must be quite delicious :))

    I'm now suitably hungry and ready to have my dinner! Haha

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  2. I'm amazed at the variety of dishes you managed in a week! Do you plan grocery shopping for the week? My Bubbles is much messier than your boy! LOL

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  3. hey there! i haven't been commenting! been sick with gastro and just super busy!

    read all your previous posts and read a post that hit the nail! WE ARE A CO-SLEEPING FAMILY! :) T is now 24.5months. Can I share my story? :) At 6months onwards, he wld feed feed feed and that was the only way he could get through the night when he was teething. I couldn't do with control crying. I just felt that hey, if i'm crying in the room, seeking for comfort whilst my mummy's a real bitch for not listening and instead choose to watch tv, i'd be hurt. I know, babies don't really remember the next day after their night of tears but i'm a softie. n babies are such sweet things, they still think u're their world though you insist on doing control crying. So he still feeds but lately cuz i've been so sick, i feed him before he sleeps but when he wakes up at night for a feed, i tell him in a very weak voice, mummy is sick and drained, pls go back to sleep..and errrm...he does?! :) i think cuz he understands what i'm saying now better. i hope he'll stop his feeds to sleep but i also know that i'll MISS IT TERRIBLY..cuz i've cuddled him that way since he was a bay-beeee....*ok, getting all misty-eyed now*

    anyways, long story short, would love to hear how you're going with the night weans..and boy, am i glad to know another woman who still bfs her toddler! once you continue to bf after 6 months, and nobody else does, u feel isolated and nobody understands why you'd want to continue bf-ing..i know i did.

    long story short, i agree, do what you feel is right for your family and you...now when somebody stares at me when i tell them that i'm still bf-ing, i tell them, do i judge you when you use control crying?

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  4. ooooh, love the photos of your dishes... im sure yummmmmy!

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  5. Madeline: Haha, thanks... hope you had a great dinner that day!

    Corsage: Errr, I tried those meal planning for a week, but found it too tough since our schedule keeps changing... so right now what works would be me having a vague idea of what I feel like eating for the week, then we do once a week grocery shopping where we stock up on stuff like milk and meat and stuff I can't get at the wet market. Then I just visit the market near my place every other day if necessary to get the veggies I need for the next two day...

    And Bubbles is messier? Thanks for comforting me, I thought our boy is really messy... both grandmas are always very aghast during mealtimes!

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  6. Just Me: Thanks for dropping by, and hope you've recovered! Thanks also for sharing... when you talk about control crying I take it you mean the Ferber method? I guess some mums do try to train their kids and let them cry a little, but I know most of my mummy friends who do that end up also crying outside the room for the first few nights, its pretty tough!

    And its nice to know another extended b'feeding mum who understands! :)

    Pooi: Thanks... I hope I'm getting better... :p

    Andy: Err... ok... I gotta cook more first though!

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