Sakae @ Orchard Central

Christmas is a wonderful time to spend with friends and family to enjoy a feast while at the same time admiring the Christmas decoration and lighting along Orchard area. This year there are a lot of interesting design Christmas Tree in or outside the shopping mall of Orchard road. Today we are going to have our dinner at the newly open Sakae outlet at Orchard Central. As usual this outlet brings out an fresh and bright outlook which brighten up the whole dinning atmosphere.

From the menu, we order Root Beer which to our surprised comes in glass bottle form which is almost obsolete compare to the usual can drinks that we used to see nowsaday. Seeing this drink serves in glass bottle really brings back some of our childhood memories....... And before we went back, Rey also grab another new "Froggy Cushion" from Sakae which he used it as his supporting pillow......

For the starter, we had Asari Miso Soup which is just nice and cosy for the raining weather outside. The soup is nice and full of flavour while the Clams are just nicely cooked which brings out it's sweetness.

These Renkon Chips (lotus root chips) is one of Rey's favourite. But the chip that served in this outlet seems to be a bit different from the other outlets. As you can see from the photo, the chips seems to be a bit soggy, and it doesn't taste light and crispy from those that we had tried before. I think it is either being soak in the oil for too long or the quality of the lotus root is different.

Although Ebiko Sushi is not a must in our list, we will still pick it up on and off whenever we find that it is fresh from the conveyor belt. I am sure you will get to fall in love with those tiny, bouncy and juicy egg roe that is served on top of the wrapped sushi rice.

The Potato Salad at Sakae is always one of my desire choice whenever I feel like having some cold Salad dish. The mashed potato is smooth and tasty with some addition of carrot cubes. It is served together with some salad green as well as some crispy deep-fried "Salmon Skin" if I am not wrong.

Lastly, we sure can't go without Rey's favourite Ebi Tempura, but today we have ordered the Tempura Moriawse instead of all prawns. Tempura Moriawse consists of a mixture of Prawns, Imitation Crabstick, Mushroom, Capsicum and etc. The combination of the mix vegetables will varies from time to time depend on the availability.

Fish And Watercress Soup

Watercress is widely used in either Asian or Western cuisine. Mostly in Asian countries, we used it to boil soup with different ingredients like chicken or pork ribs. It sometime refer to as a cooling soup for heaty weather. Whereas in Western cuisine, Watercress is usually eaten raw or appears as a garnish, in salads or on sandwiches. This is a great vegetables that is loaded with iron, calcium, folic acid and vitamins A.

No matter which method you prefer to consumed this leafy vegetables. Today, I am going to share with you another way of cooking watercress soup with Fish instead of the common ingredients we used to add like "Chicken or Pork ribs". I am sure you will like this new way of preparing your usual watercress soup.

Ingredients: (serves 2 -4)
500g of Fish Fillet
1 Bunch of Watercress
2 Slices of Ginger
4 Red Dates
Some Wolfberries
800ml Water

Method:
1. Cut off the stem portion of the watercress, rinse it well and reserve it for the boiling soup.
2. As for the leaves portion, removed those wilted leaves, rinse a few times to get rid of the soild and dirts then set aside for later use.
3. Clean and cut the fish fillet into big portion, marinate it with some cornstarch and light soy sauce and set aside in the fridge.
4. Cut the tailbone into halves, fry it with 1/2 teaspoon of oil and ginger slices till fragrant.
5. Pour in water and sprinkle some salt, bring to boil together with the watercress stem and red dates, then lower the heat and continue to simmer for another 20 minutes.
6. When done, strained the soup, add in the watercress leaves and boil briefly.
7. Lastly add in the marinated fish fillet and wolfberries, cook until done.
8. Season with salt and pepper serve hot with rice.

Note:
~ I bought the tail portion of sea bass from the wet market, and I ask the fishmonger to separate the tailbone and fillet for me.
~ For this soup, try to get a bunch of young watercress because of the short cooking time.

I have tried cooking a few version of the watercress soup in this blog before and this is indeed a new taste that you might want to try it out. It is full of Nutrition by adding fish and vegetable in a one pot soup. And I am sure this will add to your collection of making a new watercress soup than the usual one.

Seafood Mui Fan

 "Mui Fan" is one of the common local Zhi-Cha" (煮炒摊) dish found in either food center or coffee shop around Singapore. But sometime you can also spot this similar dish in some high-end Chinese restaurants where they added some premium ingredients such as scallop, abalone and etc.

Although I used to cook this dish often but it didn't came across my mind to do a recipe post on this until I was chatting with one of my blogger friend about this a few weeks back. So after the conversation, I thought getting this recipe up might be of some use for those reader who wish to try replicate this dish.

This is one of my favourite dish that I have learn from my late dad. He used to cook this for me whenever I am in a rush for work or coming back late for dinner. Often he will add in my favourite ingredients to make the egg sauce and spoon it over some pipping hot rice to create a hearty home cook meal. For this dish you can use whatever ingredients you prefer from seafood, meat or poultry to create different version according to your liking.

For this recipe I will use prawn, fishcake, crabmeat stick and bunch of choy sum(菜心).

Ingredients: (serves 2)
8-10 Medium Size Prawns
1 Large Fried Fish cake, cut into slices
4 Imitation Crabstick, cut into halves
1 Bunch of Choy Sum
1 Medium Rice Onion, cut into wedge
3 Cloves Garlic, finely chopped
2 Eggs
2 Rice Bowl of Cooked Rice
100 ml Water
1 Tablespoon Cornstarch Solution

Method:
1. Wash, clean the prawns, removed the shell of the body(head retain), slit the back of the prawn and remove the dirty or vein.
2. Marinate prawns with some cornstarch, pepper and cooking wine. Set aside.
3. Trim and wash the choy sum and set aside to drain well.
4. Preheat the pan with 1/2 tablespoon of oil, saute the minced garlic and onion till fragrant, add in the marinated prawns.
5. Give it a quick stir for about 10 - 15 seconds, till it slightly changed colour, add in the choy sum and stir-fry for another 5 seconds.
6. Next add in the fish cake slices and crabstick, and give it another quick stir before add in the water.
7. When the water comes to boil again, crack in the eggs, gently give it a few stir to separate the egg then stir it the cornstarch water to thicken the sauce.
8. Off the heat, season it with some salt and pepper before spooning it on top of the rice.
9. Serve hot with some cut chilli in light soy sauce.

Note:
~ If you are not sure what is "Fish cake", refer to the picture above(2nd row, on the left). It usually come in either rectangle or oval shapes.
~ Mixed 1 Tablespoon Water with 1/2 Teaspoon Cornstarch

This will come in handy when you run out of idea on what to cook or when you are feeling too tired to do all the preparations or washing. All you need is to gather anything that you can find in your fridge to make into a sauce base to go with your rice. 

AZUR @ Crowne Plaza Hotel

Christmas Season is around the corner, and this is always a wonderful time for family members to get around together to have meal and at the same time update on each others latest progress. Since this weekend, Church service is at Indoor stadium, we decided to go for an High-Tea Buffet at Changi Airport, T3.

Azur is located on the 2nd level of the Lobby Lounge of the Crowne Plaza at Changi Airport Terminal 3. It has two show kitchens with chefs serving the best of the Eastern and Western international cuisines. The environment and layout is great for family gathering of food and chat.

The High-Tea Buffet starts from 12.30pm to 4.00pm. You can choose from finger foods like deep-fry fish fillet to spices chicken drumlets to Japanese Ramen. Or you might fancy some of their cold seafood like prawn, crayfish and mussels.

I am those who will always go for the dessert section in any buffet instead of the main eatery. I love to try out all kind of their special in-house dessert. Since now is festive season, they are having some Christmas Pudding and Pumpkin Logcake. Out of the local Singapore Kueh and dessert, we love the Durian Pengat(which is sort of like durian puree mixed with coconut milk and coconut sugar). This is sure a great dessert for the day for those Durian lover like us. Other than Durian Pengat, there is this Mango & Passion fruit gel/jelly that caught our attention. It has a very light and refreshing taste and Mum alone can take about 5 portions of this.

Since this is a High-Tea Buffet, you can see a lot of different kind of Nonya Kueh in the pictures. But personally I still perfect the western cakes and pudding, especially during this Christmas Season.

We also managed to take a few shots of these cute little Christmas Cookies and Gingerbread Man house. My son was so thrill when he saw all these cute goodies. I think this is really a good time for kids to enjoy with food and gifts.

Overall, the food served at Azur is of their standard and with Citibank Credit Card, you will still enjoy a 20% discount over the total bill.

Tomato Chicken Stew

Recently I saw this dish in one of my favourite TCS Channel 8, TV show known as "星期二特写之《家传菜7》". In this show, they actually shares about family tie and pass-down homecook food from older generation. I remember, about two years ago, I have a chance to chat with one of the producer who is interested to find out on what are the traditional pass-down homecook food that I would like to share with the viewer if I will to be invited on this show :) But too bad, at that time I am still a novice in cooking so I dare not agreed on their invitation.....

But in this particular series that I saw that day, I was very impressed by this simple and yet nutritious homecook dish that is shared by columnist, Ng Wai Choy on his beloved grandmother Tomato Chicken. Upon viewing that show, my memories on my late, grandmother also vividly appears in my version with all her lovely dishes for us. So I decided to give this dish a try since it only require very basic ingredients.

Ingredients: (serves 2 -3)
5 Pairs of Chicken Wings with Drumlets
5 Medium Size Tomato, cut into wedges
2 - 3 Medium Size Red Onion, cut into wedges
3 Cloves of Garlic, lightly crushed
1/2 to 1 Tablespoon of Oyster Sauce
100ml water

Method:
1. Clean and wash the chicken wings and separate the wings and drumlet.
2. Preheat the pan and saute the onion and garlic with 1/2 tablespoon of oil till fragrance, add in the tomato wedges and continue to saute till the tomato wedges are soften.(about 3 - 5 minutes)
3. Next add in the chicken pieces, and give it a quick stir, then follow by the oyster sauce.
4. Continue to simmer for about 1 minute, add in water, bring to boil, covered and continue to simmer on low heat for another 10 minutes or so until the chicken pieces are cooked through and soften.
5. Remove from heat and served with warm rice.

As you can see from the steps, this is a very simple to prepare homecook food that is full of nutritious and vibrant. The use of Red Onion in this recipe adds extra fragrance and sweetness to the dish. So don't wait any longer, grab some extra red and big tomato and onion during your next visit to the grocery stall and try out this super easy one-pot dish.

The Pasta Shop By Sakae

The Pasta Shop at Wheelock Place branch is one of the sister company own by the popular sushi chain restaurant - Sakae Sushi. Since we are at Orchard area doing our last minutes Christmas Gifts shopping, we decided to pop-in and to try some of their chef recommended items.

As readers of my blogs, you will know that I simply love all kinds of soup. So whenever I visit any restaurant, I will sure order one of their soup. For today, I ordered their Clam Chowder soup which cost around S$7.90 per bowl. The texture of the soup was great and i not over powder by the taste of the clam chowder. And the bread sticks goes just well with the soup so I guess this is worth trying :)

We ordered two plates of pasta dish, one is the TPS Carbonara served in Wafu cream sauce with crispy bacon and sunny-side up egg. The taste of the sauce was great, it was slightly infused with the fragrance of the bacon and left it with a kind of smokey taste. The sunny-side up egg is so nicely done that it adds extra points to the dish as well as the overall appearance.

Rey choose this "Japanese Style - Braised Five Flower Pork Burger" from the menu list because he was aiming at the fries and bread......... While I was eying on the "Braised Pork Belly". When the manager placed the burger on the table, we will so shock. The burger was "HUGE", it was about 1.5 times or slightly bigger than the usual fast food burger that we use to have. The homemade bread was soft and nice, but we still find that the braised pork can be more soften as in and full of that special favour that melt in the mouth.

There are really too many selection to choose from the menu, so after much thinking and selecting, we settle for this chef recommendation of the Japanese Style Tsuyu Cream Sauce with Sea Urchin, Salmon Roe and Squid topped with extra shredded nori sheet. The waitress was very kind and thoughtful that she actually let us know before confirming our order that the 3 main ingredients are all RAW. Personally, this is our very first time trying out Sea Urchin(also known as Uni), and the most challenging part is we have to eat this raw........ But at least, we took the courage to try it out and it has a very strong aroma and taste which might not be acceptable by most people.

As for refreshing, we ordered a cup of coffee and this Yuzu Ice Blended. Yuzu (柚子) has an aromatic zest that is used for garnishing some dishes or bakes while its juice is commonly used as a seasoning, somewhat like the way the lemon is used in other cuisines. This Yuzu Ice Blended has a very refreshing and fragrance taste that can "washed" away the grease of those creamy pasta and pork belly that we consumed :p And they also topped this drink with some fresh cut Aloe Vera to enhance the texture.

If love western pasta, you might wish to give this Japanese-style pasta shop a visit and try out their way of preparing these mouth-watering pasta dishes.

Assorted Decorated Christmas Cookies

Decorated Christmas cookies can be found easily during Christmas season in most bakery. It can be made as simple as a sugar cookie dusted with colored sprinkles, or an elaborate with different combination of decorating techniques to create an edible work of art. Whereas, each cookie is unique and it makes excellent as homemade gifts that work great for Christmas cookie exchanges.

A Gingerbread man is a cookie made of gingerbread, usually in the shape of a human. It started back to the 15th century where figural cookie-making was practiced and the first documented figure-shaped gingerbread cookies appearing was in the court of Elizabeth I of England. Today, gingerbread man cookies can take form in any shapes and colour depend on the ingredients used and some might only take after it's name but without adding spices or ginger as one of the traditional ingredients.

Although it might look and sound tedious on the making and decorating process but I am sure it worth all the time and effort just to bring a smile on the recipients' face. In this recipe, I omitted the use of spices because my boy don't really fancy the taste of it. Instead I used the 70% Dark chocolate and I sugar syrup using Kahlua(Coffee flavored liqueur) and sugar to enhance the fragrance and taste.

Ingredients:
125g Plain Flour
1/4 Teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 Teaspoon Baking Powder
1/4 Teaspoon Cinnamon Powder, optional
40g Caster Sugar
30ml Water
15ml Kahlua
50g Dark Chocolate
45g Butter

Method:
1. Sift flour, baking soda and baking powder together.
2. Combine sugar, water and Kahlua in a small sauce and simmer over low heat to form syrup(until sugar melted, stir on and off to prevent burning)
3. Melt the chocolate and butter in microwave (medium low for 15 - 20 sec), removed and stir the mixture till well combined.
4. Add the slightly cool chocolate into the flour mixture, mix well then pour in the sugar syrup to form a smooth dough.
5. Divide the dough into two portion in two different plastic bags and flatten slightly, keep in the fridge for about 30 minutes.
6. Roll out 1 portion of the dough between two sheets of baking paper to about 5mm thickness.
7. Cut out different shapes using the Christmas cookies cutters.
8. Bake for about 12 - 15 minutes till cooked.
9. Remove from oven, set aside to cool then decorate with royal icing.


When the cookies are completely cool to room temperature, you can make different colour of Royal Icing to decorate your Christmas cookies accordingly to your liking. And this is the fun part where you can get the kids at home to participate. I am sure they will enjoy decorating their favour cookies which make great bonding time for the family.

Ingredients:
65g Icing Sugar
1/2 Egg White
1/4 Teaspoon Lemon Juice
Assorted Food Colourings
Assorted Christmas Theme Sprinkles, optional

Method:
1. Sift the icing sugar and set aside.
2. Beat the egg white till foamy then add in lemon juice and icing sugar in a few batches till smooth. (about 5 - 8 minutes, it must be a spreadable consistency)
3. Divide the icing into a few portion then mixed with your desire colours.
4. Spoon icing into disposal piping bag, snip the tip off and pipe decorative outlines and design on each biscuit.


This is a "Stars Tower' done by boy where he stack up three different size of the star cookies to form the shape of a little Christmas Tree. He also sprinkle some Christmas Red, Green & White Nonpareils on it.

While playing one of the Facebook game - Pet Society, Rey has a virtual Christmas tree in it. So while decorating the cookies, he also insists of having a big Tree for him to decorate with his favourite toppings. So he used his favourite M&M with only green and red plus some Silver Dragees that we have in the pantry.

Finally, we have finished decorating our Christmas Cookies with all sort of designs that we can think of. And as you can see, these cookies will look just great for gifts during this season after decorated with these colourful icing and sprinkles.

Christmas Fruitcake

Fruitcake is a cake made with chopped candied fruit and/or dried fruit, nuts, and spices that soaked in spirits. Since Christmas is around the corner, it will be the time where you can spot all kinds of fruitcake in the bakery showcase. No matter which type you prefer, what ingredients you want it to be, I am sure there is always a kind to your liking.

From what I had read from books before, it shares that actually fruitcakes were consumed on the twelfth night which is the last day of Christmas traditionally. But despite of what it is, today, you can buy or even make a decent fruitcake at anytime of the year. So today what I wanted to share with you is this golden fruitcake which is full with antioxidants in yellow orange dried fruit like Mango, Apricot and Peach.

Ingredients:
125g Butter, soften
250g Dried Mixed Fruit
1 Orange Rind, roughly chopped
40ml Fresh Orange Juice
40ml RUM
1 Tablespoon Caster Sugar
2 Eggs
1 Cup(125g) Plain Flour

For Decor:
Some extra Dried Mixed Fruit/Candied Fruit

For Glace:
1 1/2 Tablespoon Apricot Jam with 1 Teaspoon Hot Water

Method:
1. In a bowl, combined dried mixed fruit and orange rind together, pour in the rum and orange juice.
2. Leave it to soak overnight in the fridge.
3. Grease a tube cake pan or 2 disposal small rectangle paper case.
4. Beat butter together with caster sugar till light and creamy, add in egg one at a time and beat well after each addition.
5. Fold in dried fruit alternately with flour and pour batter into cake pan and bake in a preheat oven of 150 degree for about 25 - 30 minutes or until cooked.
6. When the cake cooled down, brush with apricot jam and decorate with extra mixed fruit on top.

Note:
1) You can buy the pre-packed dried mixed fruit from any supermarket under dried fruit session.
2) I use the cold storage brand "Breakfast Mix" that consists of California Raisins and Cranberries. Other than these, I also add in chopped mango, apricot and peach.

For this fruitcake, it is infuse with a very light and fragrance citric and fruity taste due to the use of fresh orange juice, orange rind and Rum. You can see from the cross-section of the cake that it is fully packed with assorted mixed fruits. So what can be more meaning to make something like this and pack it up as this coming Christmas Gift and share it with your love ones.