There comes a time in the journey of home cook that you begin a search for your own ingredients. My food adventures has brought me to connect with many like-minded home cooks and it seems many home cooks actually make their own rice wine. Don’t be distracted by the censored image above. It is there for a purpose.
So it seems it takes about a month to complete the entire fermentation process and the rule of thumb for newbies is to start small. Don’t grab any old recipe and dive straight into a micro brewery business in your toilet. Start off with personal consumption as it is the golden rule.
If it works then you can continue to make for your friends if you like.
There are some taboos though. It seems if you are going to make this rice wine, you must not utter any noise or sound. If you do, the wine will ferment badly and you would have to throw the entire batch out and start all over again.
So I thought I would try. And see if it is that easy as they say.
Let’s try it. If it works, and after a month of fermentation, you will find a nice bottle of rice wine. Since I am Hakka, it will be Hakka Rice Wine.
Recipe
Ingredients
2 kg Glutinous Rice
1 portion of 红 something something (bah.. I forgot the name.. The aunty that shared her recipe didn’t know what it was either and neither did I know what she was saying..)
2 pieces of 酒饼 (apparently you can get it at the Chinese medicinal shop.. Incidentally you can also get the portion of 红 something something from the same medicinal shop.. Just ask the herb concoctionist.)
1 bottle of 白酒 (this is something like a guarantee to make the magic work..)
Method
1. Steam the glutinous rice until cook. Or you can cook it in the rice cooker. But dont forget it is 2 whopping kilograms of glutinous rice.
2. Once steamed or cooked. Spread it out on a large round plate to cool down completely. Make sure it is completely cool.
3. While that is being done, ground the 红 something something into fine powder and then mix it into the glutinous rice. Then crush the 2 pieces of 酒饼 and scatter it into the glutinous rice. Give it a good mix.
4. Put the glutinous rice mix into a container, glass is best. Corning ware has a nice glass casserole dish with cover that you could use.
5. Pour in the 白酒 and close the lid. Some people say no need the 白酒, but who knows until you try making two batches one with and one without.
6. Once you are done, wrap up the container in aluminium foil and label it so that you know when to open it up again. All the best!
This is an improvement to my previous recipe Chicken in Rice Wine. That recipe is great but this is much better. I discovered that by adding more sesame oil and also hua tiao jiu together with the hakka rice wine, the results were a sweet caramelized chicken.
I like to cook this with chicken wings as they have the gelatinous fats that would be so delicious once you pressure steam and fry the chicken in a clay-pot.
Make sure you add just the right amounts of ginger and if possible fry them until they become brown and almost burnt. When the dish is done, your clay-pot might be a light charred due to the sugars in the hakka rice wine caramelising, some of the chicken parts are burnt slightly due to the heat, but that is fine. A delicious chicken dish with steamed rice or best with porridge or congee.
Recipe
Ingredients
4 Chicken Wings with Drunplets (separate the drumlets from the wings and also the wing tips)
Lots of Ginger *maybe 8-9 cm of one inch thickness* (sliced thinly)
1/4 cup of Hakka Rice Wine
1/4 cup of Shao Xing Hua Tiao Jiu White Pepper
2 tbsp of Light Soy Sauce
1 tbsp of Dark Soy Sauce
2 tbsp Olive Oil
4 tbsp Sesame Oil
Method
1. Marinate the chicken parts with light soy sauce and white pepper. Allow the meat to marinate at least for 5-10 minutes.
2. Sliced the ginger thinly, and then heat the olive oil and sesame oil in a clay-pot over low fire. Then fry the ginger strips until brown and crispy.
3. Add marinated chicken meat into the clay-pot for cooking. Over medium fire continue to cook until chicken pieces turn whitish in colour. Add dark soy sauce and continue cooking over medium fire. Finally add the Hakka Rice Wine and Hua Tiao Jiu and allow the chicken to simmer and cook over a slow fire. Remember to close the lid. Once cooked serve with steam rice.
If you have tasted Singapore Chilli Crab and like it, you will most probably love crab bee hoon like you love your mother-in-law. Okay, maybe not a good example, but think of crab bee hoon as a softer option compared to the spicy version.
Cooked in a milky buttery broth and served with bee hoon or white noodles, this masterpiece dish is very easy to cook. I say again, anyone can cook this dish. It’s a walk in the park. Add a little tang-orh vegetables and it is a perfect meal.
We usually go to this place at Ang Mo Kio named Melben for our craving for crab bee hoon, but honestly, they have become quite pricey and sometimes the journey there and the long waiting time just makes the whole experience much to be desired.
So I decided that I would make my own crab bee hoon but make it more fabulous with what my wife and I love to eat. Udon noodles instead of the bee hoon. LOL. In fact, I think it tasted better with Udon.
Recipe
Ingredients
2 “live” Mud Crabs (about 800 grams)
2 packets of Udon Noodles
20 thin slices of Ginger
1 tray of Fresh Clam Meat (NTUC got sell)
1 box Mini Toufu Puffs
60 grams of Unsalted Butter
Half a cup of Evaporated Milk
A pinch of Sea Salt (I use the Maldon Brand of Sea Salt Flakes)
2 tbsp Shao Xing Hua Tiao Jiu
2 tbsp Hakka Rice Wine
1 tsp Castor Sugar
1 tbsp Fish Sauce
Method
1. Boil 1 and a half kettle of water. (1 kettle is about 1.7 litres) Once the water is boiled, pour into a large pot. Turn on fire to a slow boil and add the clam meat and 10 slices of ginger. Boil for about 30 minutes. Then discard the clams and ginger.
2. In another pot, fry the rest of the ginger slices in butter and then add the mini Toufu puffs (sliced diagonally) and continue cooking. Once the Toufu has softened. Add them into the main pot.
3. Turn the heat up to medium. Add evaporated milk. Add that pinch of salt, the fish sauce, hua tiao jiu, hakka rice wine and sugar. Continue to stir. Do a taste test to make sure the it is not too salty, but creamy.
4. Kill the crabs. Using a cleaver, chop right down the belly of the crab. Then remove the pincers and then the body parts. Reserve the eggs (if any) and wash the crabs. After the crabs are cleaned, using the back of the cleaver, break the shells.
5. Once crabs are ready, throw them into the broth. Cook until the colour changes to a hue of red. Add the Udon noodles (or white noodles) and cook for a few minutes. After that serve hot.
6. Prepare and wash the tang-orh vegetables. This is to be dipped into the broth and eaten immediately.
I realized through much trial and error that the best fish for frying in a combination of dark soy sauce and rice wine is none other than the Golden Pomfret.
The skin of the golden pomfret it seems is rather elastic and hard to tear for some reason, much like the skin of the shark. Of course the shark’s skin is probably tougher. So because of this elasticity, the fish after frying still looks really presentable. Unlike the black pomfret or some other variety of fish. In fact the taste of the golden pomfret fried is delicious.
All you need is a little corn starch and it fries to a nice golden brown. Very nice. The interesting thing about the Hakka rice wine is that once it is added into the hot oil, it bubbles and kind of caramelises the oil into a sauce.
It is also the only fish that we would eat until it is left an unrecognizable carcass of bones. Steaming doesn’t cut it. Frying is better.
Recipe
Ingredients
1 medium Golden Pomfret
3 inches of Ginger (julienned) Olive Oilfor frying Corn Starch for coating the fish
2 tbsp Dark Soy Sauce
3 tbsp Hakka Rice Wine
Method
1. Heat oil in wok, then fry the ginger strips under low fire until crispy and slightly brown. Reserve the ginger aside.
2. Coat the pomfret with corn starch, just enough to cover the surface of the fish. Heat some more oil, sufficient for the size of the fish and when the oil is heated, fry the pomfret 5 minutes on each side under low fire.
3. Add the rice wine, and then the dark soy sauce and allow the sauce to bubble until the sauce goes into the fish. Once the fish is sufficiently doused in the sauce, serve with the ginger as garnishing.
My wife’s friend used to bring delicious glutinous rice made by her mother and everytime her mum made it, we would get to taste some. It was the most delicious glutinous rice dish ever and I swore to myself quietly that one day I too would try to make the most delicious glutinous rice dish.
And that day is today. The inspiration to cook delicious glutinous rice struck me this morning on the way to work and I knew that I cannot escape not making it.
So here, this is my first attempt at making delicious glutinous rice. I know it will be delicious. I tried it. And true enough, it is delicious.
Recipe
Ingredients
400 grams Glutinous Rice (soaked and drained)
60 grams Dried Shrimps (also soaked and drained but in hot water)
6 pcs Dried Shitake Mushrooms (soaked in hot water, then sliced thinly)
4 pcs Garlic (minced)
4 tsp Light Soy Sauce
2 tsp Dark Soy Sauce
2 tsp Oyster Sauce
2 tsp Hakka Rice Wine
Half bowl of Water White Pepper Sesame Seed Oil (drizzle) Olive Oil
Optional
Meat from 1 Chicken Thigh or;
100 grams of Pork Belly
Method
1. Heat olive oil in pan, then when oil is sufficiently heated, fry garlic, mushrooms and dried shrimp until fragrant (add chicken or pork belly if you like). After that’s done, throw in the drained glutinous rice. Some say the longer you soak, the better it is. I soaked maybe 10-15 minutes, you can soak overnight if you like.
2. Fry the glutinous rice over medium heat for a while and combine ingredients. Then add the pre-mixed sauces (which you would have already mixed in a separate bowl) into the frying pan and give it a good stir fry until all the ingredients are covered with the sauce. Continue frying for another 5-8 minutes. Once sufficiently fried, drizzle a thin layer of sesame seed oil over the rice. Powder the white pepper over and give it a good mix.
3. Next scoop the rice into a large bowl or round metal pan. Flatten it nicely. Wet the rice with water, I pour about half a bowl of water into mine. After that, steam the glutinous rice over high heat for about 45 minutes. The rice should be softened by then, if not, add more water and continue to steam at high heat. Do a taste test and if the rice is too dry, wet the rice with a little more water. The end result should be soft fluffy, sticky delicious glutinous rice.
My wife and I love this zi char place (read: small eatery) located along Purvis Street next to the famous Chin Chin Eating House (which we also like). But we love the claypot fish head there (that is the shop next to Chin Chin) and would make a weekly pilgrimage on Sundays after church.
Each time we had it, we would almost swear by it and stare at each other with glee written all over our faces. That claypot fish head was by far one of the best that we have ever had. The boss was this heavily jowled, grumpy-faced Chinese uncle that didn’t look happy all the time. I think I have never seen him happy before. And his shop looked run down and almost falling apart. But, they served gold in a claypot and as far as we are concerned, nothing else mattered. Most of the times, we would lick the pot clean save for a few bones.
That all changed one Sunday when we went back and realised to our dismay that they had mysteriously shut the business down. No word, no goodbye message. Nothing. It felt like the end of the world. Honestly, we felt betrayed and hurt. How could they do that to us, their loyal customers. Never mind the fact that each time we went there we ordered only their clay pot fish head, we really felt connected when we were there. These days we have become like wandering spirits in search of that elusive clay pot fish head shop, but alas, our efforts have all come to a nought. Needless to say, the rest of the clay pot fish head places that we have come across so far all seem to fall short of that place. Worse still, we totally never got their name nor name card. Something that we regret much till today.
So what’s so special about their clay pot fish head? Firstly, it is not too salty and has little or no MSG (many sick gourmands), I don’t get that dry throaty feeling after eating, which was a clear indication of how much MSG went into the cooking. The thirstier I got, the more MSG went into the cooking, and that irks me to the core. If you are a good cook, you can do the dish without MSG. What’s wrong with salt? The sauce was a thick, not watery mixture of all things wonderful. The fish head was as fresh as the morning dew on periwinkle petals.
Fast forward many unhappy claypot fish head meals later, we stumbled across this gem tucked away like an enclave, wedged in the middle of OG (read: OG stands for Ocean Garments Shopping Mall) at Albert Complex. Located on the second floor of OG, was this place known as 一口未, and they served really delicious clay pot fish head. I snapped a cannot-make-it photo with my cannot-make-it handphone camera below for all to drool. Trust me, it was drool worthy. They used Song Fish (which I don’t really like) but the sauce was exactly like that shop that we used to eat from.
Looks Shiok right?
However, being the perfectionist home-cook that I am, I wanted to make my own clay pot fish head. All these years of wandering around, finding for that perfect clay pot fish head, has somewhat taken its toll on our discriminating palate, and in a sense our taste buds may have been already damaged by the over MSGed meals that we have had.
So here is the result of much tinkering, my very own adapted clay pot fish head recipe. Tweaked to my liking and more importantly, my wife endorses it. She say 90% like the shop at Purvis with a score of 8 out of 10. I hear already chin happy. My version looks more swee than the picture above, and got more liao. Are you ready? Read on.
Updated 16 February 2015
My friend suggested that I do it again and post with photos, and actually I did do it again, and this time around I found that it tastes even better with Red Garoupa Fish Head! So no more Red Snapper for me, but you can still continue to use if you like. I used a Neoflam Kiesel Claypot for this because I think it cooked better than the traditional claypot. So maybe you may want to check that out.
* please note that I have included amazon affiliate links to the products I use, so check them out if you wish to support me, and if I can get these items from NTUC Supermarket, I would just indicate.
Recipe
Ingredients
800 grams Red Garoupa Fish Head (Split down the middle into two halves) {I buy my fish head from Blk 628 Market at Ang Mo Kio St 61, no regrets! Only $12) 1/2 tbsp Light Soy Sauce 1/2 tbsp Shao Xing Hua Tiao Jiu 1/2 tbsp Ginger Juice 1/2 tsp White Pepper Powder 3 tbsp Hakka Rice Wine 1 Egg (beaten) 3 tbsp Cornstarch Olive Oil (for deep frying, you may use Vegetable Oil if you like a cheaper alternative) 1 packet Bean Curd Puff (mini tau pok, cut into diagonals) 1 small Yam (sliced thinly) $3 worth of Roasted Pork Belly 1 inch Ginger (peeled and sliced thinly) 1 medium Yellow Onion (peeled and sliced thinly) 4-5 dried Shitake Mushrooms (soaked, sliced thinly as well) 1 small can Button Mushrooms (cut into halves) 2 tubes Red Chillies (seeds removed, roughly sliced) 3-4 cups of Chicken Stock 1 tbsp Oyster Sauce 1 tbsp Sesame Seed Oil 3 stalks of Spring Onions (sliced into 2 inch lengths) 2 clusters of Baby Romaine Lettuce (sliced into half)
Method
1. Marinate the Red Snapper in a ziplock bag with the soy sauce, shao xing hua tiao jiu, white pepper and ginger juice for about 10 minutes (if you have more time, you can marinate longer). 2. Mixed 2 tbsp cornstarch and 2 tbsp of water and an egg and mix it into a thick creamy batter. 3. Mixed 2 tbsp cornstarch and 2 tbsp water and set aside. 4. Heat olive oil over high heat and when it is about ready, dip the red snapper pieces into the batter, and deep fry for about 5-8 minutes. Tip: the more oil you use, the less likely the fish will burn. After frying both sides to a crispy brownish colour, set aside. 5. In another pot (this is where the clay pot magically appears and takes its place), add some oil, and fry the sliced ginger and onions. Fry them until they are softened and fragrant. Add chillies, two types of mushrooms, yam slices, mini tau pok and roasted pork belly, and continue frying. You may turn the heat up high for this part. 6. Add the chicken stock (I bought the packet type of chicken stock, although if you’re hardworking, you can also prepare it from scratch), sesame seed oil, hakka rice wine and oyster sauce. 7. Ensure that the ingredients are cooked fairly well, especially the yam and the tau pok. Then add the fried fish head pieces (whole, no need to cut small) back into the clay pot and simmer over low heat for about 8-10 minutes, constantly stirring to ensure evenness in cooking. 8. Last part, add the spring onions and mini romaine lettuce on top and if need be, add the cornstarch water to thicken the sauce a little. You may also pour the remainder of the egg batter into the pot and give it a good stir. Serve immediately with steamed rice.
My mother-in-law’s recipe (which she shared in a hazy manner) and my after a few times trial and error to get the right consistency and taste. My official food taster (and my greatest critic), my wife, tends to be a little more critical of the dishes that I copy from her mummy. Naturally if it were my mum’s recipe, I would be a little more strict with the taste-test. This time around though, it is her mother’s recipe and I got to respect the taste. Furthermore, it is a dish that she likes. So I got to get the taste right.
But me, being me, I will usually do it the way that I think is the right way to do it and not the way that people tell me is the right way to do it. I am stubborn like that, but really, it is important to develop your own flair in cooking and be yourself. There are many ways to skin a cat and when it comes to cooking, there is no hard and fast rules to it. To me flavour is everything, everything else is secondary.
Of course this maverick way of cooking only applies to cooking per se and not baking. Where baking is concern, proportions are very important. Baking is more of a science and cooking is like fine art. I can taste my way to perfection if I were cooking Coq Au Vin but if I got the proportions wrong with baking, the Tiramisu will be ruined. There are no two ways about it. So respect always goes to bakery chefs first, and then applause to the celebrity chefs and whatever it is that they are cooking.
So, this I think is perfection. Wifey ate the fish, and enjoyed it silently. Needless to say, I am pleased.
Want to know how it is done? Let me assure you, it is not rocket science. In fact the way I do it, anyone can follow – caveat: you can only if you have the freshest ingredients and the magical Hakka Rice Wine.
1. Julienne the ginger into thin strips. Fry in oil until crispy and fragrant. Once ginger strips starts to brown lightly, remove and set aside. Add more oil if needed, and turn the heat down. Pat dry the pomfret and slowly place the fish to fry. You may slowly increase the heat and ensure that the fish is fried till it is crispy.
2. Fry both sides of the fish, turning every so often to prevent it from burning. The skin of the fish is likely to peel off, that is normal. You can only achieve a high level of frying if you have lots of oil in the wok. As for me, I didn’t want to waste oil, so I didn’t use that much. Once the fish is more or less well cooked, you may add the dark soy sauce into the wok and flip the fish a few times so that the sauce gets onto the fish. Then add the magic hakka rice wine and watch the sauce bubble and you know deep in your heart that it is ready for consumption.
3. Once it is ready, garnish the ginger on the fish like in the picture above and you can serve.
I recently discovered this wonderful way of making chicken in rice wine. Hakka Rice Wine to be precise. Somehow when you cook chicken in rice wine and excessive amounts of ginger, over a slow fire, what you usually get is a concoction that literally brings a smile to the face. The rice wine has a sweet sugary taste to it which makes the chicken taste really yummy.
It’s so good that I have decided to bring my six “friends” (drumlets) together for this wonderful confluence of flavours. We already consumed the wings and since then I have been thinking of a nice recipe to send off these guys.
Finally they are ready to go. This is their finest moment.
Recipe
Ingredients
6 Chicken Drumlets *after using the wings in the airfryer*
Lots of Ginger *maybe 8-9 cm of one inch thickness*
Half a bowl of Hakka Rice Wine White Pepper
2 tbsp of Light Soy Sauce
2 tbsp of Dark Soy Sauce
3-4 tbsp Olive Oil
Method
1. Carve the meat off the chicken drumlets for ease of cooking. Marinate the meat and bones with light soy sauce and white pepper. Allow the meat to marinate at least for 5-10 minutes.
2. Julienne the ginger (I usually diced), and then heat the olive oil in a clay-pot over low fire. Then fry the ginger strips until brown and crispy.
3. Add marinate chicken meat (including bones) into the clay-pot for cooking. Over slow fire continue to cook until chicken pieces turn whitish in colour. Add dark soy sauce and continue cooking. Finally add the Hakka Rice Wine and allow the chicken to simmer and cook. Once cooked serve with steam rice.
