Lettuce Wraps

In my country, the last part of the chicken we eat are the chicken breasts.  When we have any grilled chicken, we always have a problem with what to do with those meaty parts.  While I had some in the fridge, my mind was lost of what to do with it: Chicken tortilla soup, chicken macaroni salad, chicken sandwiches....Anyway, this idea came up and it was a hit! Get ready to have your hands dirty!

Ingredients:

Big leaves from iceberg lettuce
Any cooked meat, I used grilled chicken
Sliced bellpepper
Sliced onions
Shredded carrots
Cooked rice vermicelli noodles
Hoisin sauce or plum sauce



Assembly:

In a flat big serving plate, arrange all the ingredients and in the middle, a small bowl for the sauce.
Start filling the lettuce leaves as you please. Roll and eat!

Taco Filling

Taco Filling

No, no I did not use a Taco Spice Mix. I googled and found out that the main ingredients of a Spice mix are Oregano (which is always around in our kitchen) and Cumin. In this recipe I used almost 4 tablespoons of oregano and perhaps some 3 tablespoons of cumin. But of course its all up to you.

Ingredients:

500g ground beef
3 cloves garlic
2 shallots or 1 onion
4 small chilies
pimenton picante 
cumin
oregano
salt
oil
150 ml broth

Direction:
1. Heat a bit oil in pan. Fry and break the beef until it runs dry or if you have not so much time, take the liquid away. Remove from the pan.
2. Blend the garlic, onion and chilies with a bit of oil. Then saute adding a bit more oil if needed. Place back the beef and saute until well incorporated.
3. Add the broth and all other spices.  Let simmer and keep adjusting the tast.

Pork in Garlic-Chili Sauce

The chili-garlic sauce I used here is from the bottle, Heinz to be exact. Afterwards, I blended my own with 70% small red chili, 30 % garlic, bit of vinegar, salt and sugar. It is sitting in the ref and have used it for the rice vermicelli and gave marvelous spicy taste.

Ingredients:

1 fillet of pork, sliced into longish bite size pieces

1 bell pepper, sliced lengthwise

1 cup sliced fresh mushrooms

half an onion

some minced garlic

brown sugar to taste

2 teaspoon chili garlic 

oil

Directions:

1. Saute pork in oil until soft.

2. Add garlic and onion. Then all other veggies.

3. Finish it off by adding sugar and the sauce.

4. Serve with jasmine rice.

Rice Vermicelli with Spring Onions and Carrots

 

I always marveled the vermicelli noodles done by Miggy Chang whenever we had a pot luck lunch.  And she has told me not only once how she cooks it.  However, I think only today did I master it the way I wanted it to taste.

Ingredients for 2:

3 cups cooked and drained vermicelli noodles (Marks and Spencer)

half a carrot, cut into julienne strips

3 stalks spring onions

bulb of ginger, cut into julienne strips

garlic, julienne strips

half teaspoon chili/garlic mix 

sesame oil

fish sauce

ground peanuts (optional)

Saute in oil the garlic and ginger. Add carrots until limp, then spring onion. Make a well in the veggies and place the homemade chili/garlic mix and add more sesame oil. Wait some seconds to fry that then mix. Add fish sauce. Then place the noodles and stir fry until done. Sprinkle with peanuts and/or serve with peanut sauce.

Pad Thai

Pad Thai

I got so lucky to get to know a Thai lady in Suva.  Her name is Noi. She had beautiful tall Thai basil in her garden.  It was her who taught me her own version of Pad Thai, in which I still use until now.  There are the basic ingredients of oil, garlic, oyster sauce, fish sauce, sugar, and some tamarind sauce or vinegar to give it a kick, flat noodles, egg, beansprouts, spring onions and ground peanuts.  With the pics above, I just used what I have at home. Left picture: zucchini, baby spinach, ground and whole peanuts and salted eggs and since I ran out of oyster sauce, I just did not add it.  Right picture:  ground beef, boiled potatoes, coriander

The important thing is to have a lot of sauce to coat everything and you can stretch that by using oil. 

oil

garlic

oyster sauce

fish sauce

sugar 

tamarind sauce or vinegar

egg

flat noodles

beansprouts

ground peanuts

chili (optional)

Soak the noodles in warm water until soft.  In a pan put on high heat and fry garlic in oil.  Then add all the sauces and chili.  Then the egg. Put the meat at this time if you are using some, then the veggies although the beansprouts should come last. Add noodles.  This is when it can get tricky because it must be cooked but since the fire is so high, it gets quickly dry therefore do a lot of sauce already at the beginning.  Add a bit water if noodles are not done.  If too much water, the noodles will be soggy.  Then put a cup of beansprouts.  Garnish with ground peanuts, spring onions or coriander and serve with nam pla (lemon juice, fish sauce, chili). Serve immediately!

I think serving Pad Thai should be from the kitchen to the table food but when I froze some leftover, I get a compliment from my husband that they are still very good.  Well, perhaps I am the one who is demanding!

Bärlauchsuppe

Bärlauchsuppe

Bärlauchsuppe

200g potatoes, cut in small pcs
Half onion
Butter
1 liter water
Bouillon
150g bärlauch

Melt butter. Add onions and cook til transparent. Add potatoes and fry for few minutes. Add water and bouillon and cook til potatoes are tender. Add bärlauch and cook till leaved are done. Puree. Serve soup with croutons.