MALAYSIAN SATAY SKEWERS - MALAYSIAN HOME COOKING

Malaysian Satay Skewers

We've eaten a lot of Malaysian food over the years, and none more than the last year.

We've meandered through Malaysia grazing constantly, eaten at hawker stalls and tasted the great fresh food on offer.

We've also done the same thing here in Australia. The freshness of Malaysian hawker food never ceases to amaze us. Great flavours, textures and substance!

An all time favourite of ours are their satay skewers.

It was our love of these delicious sticks that lead us to doing the same at home recently.



We made the decision to have beef, chicken and prawn skewers. It wasn't a hard choice as we were having all our favourites. It's so simple too. This time though, we decided to make our own satay sauces. Yes sauces. We chose a traditional peanut satay first. We simply crushed plenty of unsalted peanuts - Mlady was an expert at this - added some smooth peanut butter, a bit of oil (but you can just as easily use water) and some chilli sauce - Linghams in this case. Once it was all mixed together we had our sauce. We deliberately kept it thick and chunky, but its easy to adjust this but crushing the nuts more and adding more liquids to make it smoother and thinner.

We also decided to make a second "Aussie" variation of the satay sauce. We crushed Macadamia nuts and cashews this time, added some smooth peanut butter agian, as well as oil and Linghams Chilli Sauce. Mlady preferred the peanut version while Sir opted for the MacCash satay as it was a bit different.





















Then it was just a case of threading each of the meats onto skewer and cooking them. If you're BBQ'ing or using a griller then it's best to soak the wooden skewers in water first to stop them burning. We "cheated" and pan fried them all. We used a high heat to cook them quickly and keep them moist. We served the sauces in bowls at the side so people could add as much or as little as they wanted. It's so easy to make a big batch - we made heaps - and feed the masses a quick tasty meal or starter.

MALAYSIAN LAKSA - MALAYSIAN HOME COOKING

Malaysian Laksa - Malaysian Home Cooking

If you like a dish with a bit of a kick, whether its simply a mild kick or a major kick, then whipping up a batch of Malaysian Laksa at home is well worth it.

This has to be one of the absolute easiest dishes to throw together.

In case you're not sure what this is, laksa is basically a hearty noodle and meat or vegetable curry soup. The good news is it tastes great and it's super easy to make.

We were speeding the process up a lot this time by using a packet laksa paste. It was literally a few bucks a great investment. We then mixed the laksa paste into a large pot of water and added a tin of coconut cream.

We'd grabbed some nice seafood for our laksa - scallops, prawns, Atlantic salmon and Alaskan King crab. The next simple and very quick step was to use another pan and cook it - lightly. It's just as easy, and cheaper, to use chicken or even just veggies.





















We added some uncooked vermicelli noodles to the pot with the soup mix. They softened quickly and we then added our lovely seafood mix, some bean sprouts, cut tops of some broccolini, a large handful of snow peas and a pile of cubed tofu.

Finally it was just a case of serving it all. We used tongs to grab noodles, seafood and veggies and pile them into our bowls. We then ladled plenty of rich spicy soup on top till it was all swimming. The finale was devouring it. The whole process had only take around 10 to 15 minutes and we had an extremely delicious meal. Would we do this again - hell yeah!

Sir and Mlady's Malaysian Home Cooking was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

TUMERIC CHICKEN AND CURRY CHICKEN - MALAYSIAN HOME COOKING

Tumeric Chicken and Curry Chicken
Malaysian Home Cooking

We do love to cook at home and of course our Malaysian creations and experiments have been a really big part of this in recent times.

This time we decided to cook two different chicken dishes for our group to try for dinner.

The two selections were tumeric chicken and Malaysian curry chicken.

The prep was easy. We used chicken breast for both but thigh fillets would have worked just as well.

We sliced half the chicken - around 500gms - into strips - and cubed the other half - into 1cm cubes roughly.

Mlady had found a great tumeric chicken recipe she was keen for us to try. It met all the criteria we had set - a small number of ingredients and a simple preparation process. Tick and tick to both boxes next to our criteria.

We were using the sliced chicken for the tumeric dish. We marinated the chicken in 2 teaspoons of tumeric powder and 4 teaspoons of oyster sauce for just 10 minutes.

At the same time we diced and seared a white onion in a dash of oil then mixed in the chicken.

We added a bit of sweet chilli sauce for kick, a handful of sliced green beans and a pinch of both salt and sugar. It cooked quickly on a medium to high heat and it was ready in a flash!

At the same time we were also preparing dish number two - the Malaysian curry chicken. In many ways this dish was even easier than the first one.

We simply seared the chicken cubes until sealed, added the curry mix and then lowered the heat.

We then let this cook for a few minutes then added coconut cream and some mixed vegetables to the steaming pan. Voila - dish complete.

We served it all with some packets of steamed rice. It was all so easy, quick and most importantly - tasty.

Sir and Mlady's Malaysian Home Cooking was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

MALAYSIAN SLIDERS

Malaysian Sliders

Ever met a slider you didn't like? Well we're a bit the same too. We love them.

The thought of combining Malaysian spices and flavours with some sliders seemed like a perfect match.

It was also extremely easy!

We decided to make four varieties - two with chicken and two with beef.

We bought some good quality chicken mince and combined some egg and a bit of flour. We then split the chicken into two parts and put some Yeo's Malaysian Curry sauce into one bowl and added some corn kernels. In the other chicken bowl we added some Karamel Masakan Cooking Caramel and finally a handful of green peas.

Then for the beef. Again we separated the meat into two parts. In the first we added Linghams Chilli Sauce and again some corn kernels. In the second batch we added Yeo's Rendang Sauce.

The next step was to cook the patties - again an easy exercise as they were small. Normally we'd BBQ them but this time the frypan was cranked out. We also dipped them in flour before cooking.

And this is what the finished products looked like. We ended up with eight delicious sliders, four of each,

We set them out on some platters and garnished them each in their own special way. They almost looked too pretty to eat - but we couldn't resist for long and dug in. They were great.

Sir and Mlady's Malaysian Desserts was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

MALAYSIAN DESSERTS

Malaysian Desserts

Our journey through Malaysian food, both in restaurants and at home, brought us to the inevitable place of dessert. We wanted to try to put a Malaysian flavour to some more local sweets for some of our friends. The challenge was - what?

After some soul searching we decided upon pandan.

Pandan is a type of plant very common across Asia and it is used frequently in Malaysian desserts and drinks. The green leaves are ground into a paste that is both sweet and fragrant.

We started with a pandan cake - not that unique as pandan is often used for this. It's a delicate matter making though as the cake is extremely light and can easily collapse.

We simply used a recipe from the Internet - and fortunately it worked!

We also decided to use some of the cake mix for some pandan cupcakes. Was this successful - they were. We do think it works slightly better though in a larger cake but they were just as tasty.

For the larger cake we decided to ice it with pandan icing as well - to keep the theme going. 

We had plenty of pandan cake. Trifle seemed like a good use for some of it.

Pandan Trifle - a first for us - but so easy. We simply mixed chunks of our green cake with scoops of jelly, dollops of whipped cream, fresh strawberries and for added texture some marshmallows.

We dressed the dish with some crumbled Flake for effect - and some added chocolatey taste.

We did buy some extra treats as well. In our journeys we discovered several Malaysian jelly pods and puddings. They were inexpensive and so we grabbed them. The mango flavour was by far the most popular.

Sir and Mlady's Malaysian Desserts was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

SEAFOOD WITH MALAYSIAN DIPPING SAUCES

Seafood with Malaysian Dipping Sauces

It's summer and that means it's the time of year to eat as much seafood as possible - well at least that's our objective! We love fresh or cooked seafood choices and this time we were trying it all with Malaysian sauces - as many as we could find (within reason).

We wanted to mix things up a bit too with our Malaysian seafood meal so we started with a Malaysian curried scallop salad. It was super easy, we simply lightly cooked some juicy scallops in the pan (don't overdo them - remember they keep cooking a bit more after they're removed from the pan) in some Yeo's Malaysian Curry Sauce. We then added it to some baby spinach and mixed a dressing from the curry with some good vinegar and a good splash of extra virgin olive oil. It was great.


Next up was some chilli baby squid. Baby squid is such a tasty treat to nibble on and chilli goes so well. All we did here was to again lightly pan fry these little suckers and add some Lingham's Chilli Sauce - so easy, so tasty and so popular.

Eating seafood on it's own is always nice, but we usually like having some tasty sauces to use for dipping.

On this occasion we were using Malaysian sauces to add some spicy zing.

We ended up with a good range of Yeo sauces too - with some of the Yeo's Malaysian Curry Sauce warmed, some Yeo's Sweet Chilli Sauce,some Yeo's Satay Sauce (which is beautifully thick and rich) and some Yeo's Chilli Sauce with Garlic.

We also blended some Yeo's Sweet Chilli  Sauce with some fresh lime juice. This mix makes a great dip for seafood but it also works brilliantly as a marinade too for either seafood or chicken.

We ended up having quite a feast with some fresh king prawns, our Malaysian curry scallop salad, our chilli baby squid and a whole platter of crisp goodies like soft shell crab, seafood spring rolls, prawn money bags, seafood triangles and fish bites. Throw in a few fresh salads and a baguette and it's a pretty decent meal!

Sir and Mlady's seafood with Malaysian dipping sauces was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

MALAYSIAN HOME COOKING - ROTI

Malaysian Home Cooking - Roti

If you like roti as much as we do - and it's hard to imagine anyone liking roti as much as us - then you may have also wondered if it's easy or hard to make.

The truth is - it's not that hard.

We gave it a go and managed - and they turned out pretty good too.



The Recipe is dead easy too - 2 cups of bread making flour, 1 cup of cold water and a pinch of salt - yes three ingredients plus some melted butter for later on. Just put the flour and salt in a bowl, make a well in the middle and slowly add the cold water. Mix it together then put it all on a floured board and knead it for at least ten minutes.

Roll it out and cut it into eight pieces - we made a double batch so thats why we had sixteen pieces. Wrap each piece in plastic for later. 

Then roll out one piece on a floured board until its quite thin, smear a little melted butter all over it and roll the piece up. Then twist it into a snail shape and flatten it with the roller again. Repeat this process. Heat and lightly oil pan and cook on medium heat turning once it lightly browns on one side. Tear the cooked piece apart - basically shred it to get the layers showing - and serve while hot. The verdict - they tasted really good and were pretty quick and easy to make. Were they as good as restaurant roti - no - but they were still pretty good and the mix makes plenty of them too.

Alternatively, you can just buy some frozen pre-made roti from most Asian supermarkets. We tried two varieties. Just put them, still frozen, into a lightly oiled pan. it's much faster than making them but a lot less fun. What do they taste like - pretty good actually - a bit closer to restaurant roti.

Would we do it again - absolutely. Our roti was fun to make and great to eat!

Sir and Mlady's Malaysian Home Cooking of Roti was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

 

MALAYSIAN PIES - HOME COOKING

Malaysian Pies - Home Cooking

Eating lots of Malaysian meals lately has given us a new appreciation of the versatility of this lovely, rich and fragrant food. As a meal there's always plenty to choose from, whether it's a light meal you're after or a full and hearty dish.

We decided to mix two concepts together and see how it worked - Malaysian food and Aussie pies.


The idea was pretty simple, put Malaysian fillings into fresh home made pies. The next challenge was what fillings to actually use.

As beef rendang is always a favourite of ours, it became our first choice. Also, beef in a pie seemed pretty logical in Australia anyway.

We used a good Malaysian rendang paste we bought from the markets for only a few dollars, Tean's Gourmet Malaysian Traditional Tumisan Rendang Dry Curry Paste for Meat.

We cooked it in a pan and thickened it before adding the meat, rump steak cut into small pieces. The meat cooked and softened as the rich rendang sauce thickened even more and caramelised around the beef. We then set the mix aside to use later as filling for our pies.

Next choice was Malaysian satay chicken. We looked at a number of recipes but in the end we improvised and made our own sauce from scratch. We simply crushed and blended unsalted peanuts with some oil, garlic, Jeeny's Tamarind Puree and Jeeny's Palm Sugar. Normally the chicken is basted in rempah first - a spicy paste - but we simply added the spice to the peanut sauce with some Lingham's Chilli Sauce. Once the chicken was seared in the pan we just added the sauce, thickened it and set it all aside for later.

We've had curried scallop pies several times in Tasmania, it's a  native delicacy there that people travel to try. We did. We decided to make our own Malaysian version, with Tasmanian scallops lightly seared then mixed with a traditional Malaysian curry sauce. Of course it needed thickening which was easy - and we then again set aside the mix for our pie. Finally we added some extra chicken to some extra curry sauce to use for curry chicken pies later on as well.

So we now had our four pie fillings - beef rendang, Malaysian satay chicken, Malaysian curry scallops and Malaysian curry chicken. They were all thickened varying amounts and ready to be used.  The next and final step was the easiest, we just cut out our pie bases and tops from sheets of ready made puff pastry, put the bases in our pie maker, added fillings and a lid and cooked them It's such an easy way to eat leftovers - everything seems to taste great encased in pastry!

Our Malaysian Aussie Pies turned out great. The rendang was spicy, very spicy in fact, but just what we wanted. The Malaysian peanut satay pies were rich and tangy but quite mild. The Malaysian curry scallop pies were lovely - packed with many more scallops than you normally get in these pies. The Malaysian curry chicken was also tasty - but still quite mild. Sir and Mlady's Malaysian Pie experiment was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

REKORDERLIG CHRISTMAS MUFFINS - HOME COOKING

Rekorderlig Christmas Muffins - Home Cooking

The good folks at Exposure PR asked us if we'd be interested in trying our hand at using the new Rekorderlig Pomegranate Cider to make something to eat that was Christmas influenced. We thought - why not. So we put our thinking caps on and decided on Rekorderlig Pomegranate Cider Christmas Fruit Muffins - not just because it was the longest title we could find!

One of the reasons was that muffins are just so quick and easy to make - they can often be in the oven within 5 minutes of starting! This time we simply soaked some mixed fruit for several hours in the Rekorderlig Pomegranate Cider then used the fruit, and cider, in our standard muffin mix. We then decided to enhance it all a bit by reducing some more cider on the stove - basically boiling it down - and adding some raw sugar to sweeten it a bit more and thicken it too.


We used this thick sauce to pour on top of the warm muffins - and added dollops of double cream. They turned out great and were very quick and easy to make.

The Recipe: 1 3/4 Cups of self-raising flour, 3 tablespoons of brown sugar, 1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder, 1 egg, 100mls milk, dash of oil. Despite what other recipes say, just lightly beat the egg first then mix everything else in - including the fruit. Add enough of the Rekorderlig Cider that the fruit was soaking in last to still keep the mixture thick. Scoop into a greased muffin pan and cook at about 200'c for around 25 minutes. The Sauce: boil 200mls of Rekorderlig Cider till reduced and thicken by adding raw sugar and mixing vigorously. Preparation time 5 minutes. Ready in 30 minutes.

MALAY/AUSSIE BBQ - HOME COOKING

Malay/Aussie BBQ

We BBQ regularly - a lot in fact. Often we use whatever meats we have available and experiment with various home made sauces and marinades.

On this occasion we decided to create a Malaysian/Aussie BBQ fusion by using traditional home made Malaysian sauces with our meat and seafood.



We marinated our rump steak in rendang. It was surprisingly easy to do - we simply googled the recipe and it only took around 15 minutes to mix everything together into a thick paste. We then smeared a generous quantity onto both sides of the meat a few hours before cooking.

We marinated our green prawns in a tasty mix simply by following the recipe on the back of the Jeeny's Roasted Belachan Shrimp Paste. All we needed was a mortar and pestle. We stirred the final mixture through the prawns a few hours before cooking and covered them and left it all in the fridge till cooking time. 

Our simplest dish of the night was the satay chicken.

We've done this so often and it's so easy.

Simply mix some good satay sauce (we used Happy BBQ Satay Sauce) into some chicken breast that's been chopped into decent sized chunks. Cover and leave in the fridge for a few hours before cooking.

The finished product was great. The Malaysian sauces and flavours went extremely well with the BBQ meats - adding colour and spice to everything - but not in an overpowering way. It was a nice twist to a typical Aussie BBQ.

Sir and Mlady's Malay/Aussie BBQ was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.

MALAY-ITALIAN HOME COOKING - SYDNEY

Malay-Italian Home Meal
Sydney

Despite the fact that we eat out a huge number of nights each week we still like to cook at home! Sometimes we like to take our time and make everything from scratch while at other times we like a quick meal. This was super quick. While particular foods from certain countries are always appealing we do like to mix and match as well. This night we were trying a fusion of Malaysian and Italian - but a fast version.

The big question for us was - what to fuse with what? We decided to keep the base as Italian and fuse this with Malaysian spices and condiments. Do you call this Malay-Italian or Italaysian? Not really sure but it turned out to be quick and quite tasty too!

Our first dish, our starter, was bruschetta. First we grilled some garlic infused sourdough as the bread base. Then we chopped up some Roma tomatoes and some Spanish onion.

Finally we mixed it all with a quite spicy Lingham's Chilli Sauce. It certainly added some kick and combined well with the tomato and onion. Normally we'd add some fresh basil as well but sadly we didn't have any on this occasion.



















So many people have told us that they use Lebanese bread to make a quick pizza. We've tried it quite a few times and they are a simple fast way to make a crispy based pizza. This version had a spicy twist.

Instead of tomato paste on the base we spread a generous amount o0f Happy BBQ Satay Sauce on it. Then some mozzarella and finally plenty of chicken breast and a few shallots for colour and flavour. It's a very quick very simple way to make a tasty pizza!

Our second pizza was another easy one.

We started with the same base of Lebanese bread but this time we topped it with Yeo's Sambal Oeleck giving it a nice kick.

Again some tender chicken breast and shallots on top completed it.

So simple and ready in 5 minutes!

So after bruschetta and two pizzas it's obvious what to have next - pasta! We grabbed some ready made tri-colour pasta. As we already had some chicken breast we simply  it with some Yeo's Sambal Oeleck, some Jeeny's Tamarind Puree, a dash of Lingham's Chilli Sauce and some Jeeny's Palm Sugar to slightly reduce the sourness. Once cooked together we added a sprinkle of Doree Fried Garlic on top and we had our sweet and sour chicken pasta. A bit less tamarind puree and a bit more palm sugar makes it a bit sweeter.

Even though we sometimes eat out every day of the week, we do like to cook at home and enjoy experimenting with flavour combinations to create something different. We do like Italian but often infuse it with other flavours to add a kick. Don't be shy to experiment - you may discover your new favourite dish!

Sir and Mlady's Malay-Italian home cooking was supported by the Malaysian Kitchen Programme.