Spatula, Spoon and Saturday

I really should sleep more.

The thing with risotto is that you can take it pretty much whatever direction you want. Again, you can just toss in any leftover vegetables or stew and cheese into it and it will be wonderful. I often make a lot of risotto rice up to the stage before you flavour it (I think it’s called risotto bianco i.e. just plain ‘white’ risotto) so the next time you can whip up risotto within 10 minutes. Efficiency plus eh? There’s really no other way other than that though. You just need to stand in front of the risotto and give it love and undivided attention (otherwise it just won’t be good).

So we start by making us some stock. Sure, you can make your own stock from scratch, but I’m lazy and time poor. I use about a heap tablespoon of vegeta gourmet stock powder and a litre of water. If I have some dried porcini mushrooms, I would throw that in but tragically enough, I don’t. I think my blog is be called ‘this is what I make if I’m too lazy to go grocery shopping properly’. So put some stock to simmer. Admittedly, the stock is very important because it will flavour your whole risotto, so if you don’t have nice stock, you’re not going to have a nice risotto. Fortunately enough, this vegeta stock thing is quite good and I’m relatively happy with it. Sometimes, I throw bits of whatever ingredients I’m using for the risotto into the stock (such as pumpkin) and that makes it slightly nicer.

So for four portions of risotto bianco, I used a chopped large-ish brown onion, two celery sticks, also chopped and two cloves of garlic. They go into a warmed tablespoon of olive oil and a teaspoon of butter on low heat for about 5 minutes until they’re lovely and translucent. Turn the heat up slightly. In go four handfuls of arborio rice. You need about a handful for each person. So if they’re bigger, they’ll need a bigger handful obviously. Such a great method of measuring. Keep turning the rice around until they’re nicely coated in the oil and very hot. They will become a bit transculent. This is when you add a bit of white wine to it. Which unsurprisingly I don’t have. But are you really surprised? So we have a pot of hot simmering stock and the rice frying up nicely. Add a ladle of stock, it should sizzle and the rice will start to absorb the stock. Keep stirring the rice around until all the stock has evaporated and/or absorbed into the rice and then add another ladel of hot stock.

Repeat this for about 5-10 more minutes. By now the rice should be slightly creamy but still undercooked. If you’re making additional risotto portion for later days, remove the excess now. It will keep in the fridge for a few days. Keep adding stock and stir the remaining risotto for another 5-10 minutes. The rice should be cooked but have firm bite too it.

For one person, I used one portobello mushroom, three swiss brown mushrooms and four button mushrooms, cut into thick slices. Some morels are really good but I couldn’t find them. But try to get an interesting mix of mushrooms to make this dish great. On a separate frying pan on high heat, you want to brown the mushrooms with a bit of olive oil. Either use a big wok (which I did) or do this in batches. You don’t want to overcrowd the pan being you want the mushrooms to brown nicely. Toss the mushrooms around over high heat until they are nicely coloured. Add the mushrooms to the risotto with a few sprigs of thyme leaves. Grate in the zest of about half a lemon and a tiny squeeze of lemon juice. Don’t overdo the lemon juice though, you only want a tiny bit of fresh lemony taste. Toss the risotto around and taste. The stock should be salty enough, if not, season with some salt and some freshly ground pepper.

Serve with grated parmesan cheese. Chopped fresh parsley would have been be nice but I didn’t have any

This is a recent invention. Well, not really an invention per se. More like a neat replication. I went to this Korean restaurant somewhere east coast of Singapore. The food was thoroughly average (compared to the nice meat you could get for Korean barbecue I’m used to in Melbourne) and I thought was well overpriced. However, the highlight of the meal was the complimentary iced cinnamon tea they served at the end of the meal. It was beautiful! I think I had like three cups because I liked it so much.

So we start with a litre of filtered water. I really hate the taste of tap water so I actually made my Mum bring over a Brita filter jug from home which gets rid of all the nasty chlorine, metalic and what-have-you tastes that linger in the tap water. I rinse two cinnamon quills to get rid of any dirt that maybe on it and add it to the boiling water. Let this boil for about fifteen minutes. Towards to end, rinse two tablespoon of pine nuts (again to get rid of any dirt and what-have-yous) and add it to the tea. I generally add two tablespoons of white castor sugar and two tablespoons of molass sugar to taste but you can leave it unsweetened and add sugar when you drink it like any other tea.

That’s it. You can drink it hot or chill it to make iced cinnamon tea (which is very fabulous). I once added quartered apples in for that slight tang and that also worked really well although the cinnamon pretty much overpowers any apple scent there was in tea leaving only very subtle fruity tang in the tea. It was nice but without is just as lovely. I also really like biting into the pine nuts which seems to take on the very sweet cinnamony nutty taste. Perfect.

I LOVE spaghetti. Other pasta don’t do it as much. There’s something about spaghetti. It’s strandy, it’s round, it’s nostalgic. Just like it. Sure I like penne and fettucine and farfalle as much as the next girl but for all the dried pasta I like spaghetti the most. Maybe that’s why it’s popular.

One of the most important ingredients for meat sauce that is the most overlooked, I think, is a nice smoky bacon. And definitely fresh herbs. Sure you can have dried herbs any day of the week but when you add a bit of fresh herbs to it, everything just becomes more special.

This is a recipe that makes me for about 6-8 serves and the sauce freezes really well. I usually just freeze the sauce as soon as it cools and when I want to use it I defrost it by leaving it in the fridge for a few hours. It is generally safe to refreeze something you’ve defrosted in the fridge but I don’t recommend doing it this more than twice. I try to use one batch of meat sauce within a couple of weeks. I’m not too sure it will be safe for longer than that.

Anyway, finely chop a brown onion, two sticks of celery, four cloves of garlic and two strips of streaky smoked bacon (I find that good bacon is so flavourful you don’t need much). Put a frying pan on medium-high heat for a minute or so and toss in the chopped bacon and watch it sizzle (this bit is always fun). After the bacon is nicely browned and the fat rendered, turn the heat down and add the chopped onion and celery. You should allow the onion and celery to sweat over low heat for at least five minutes. You shouldn’t really need to add extra oil.

While the soffritto is cooking, in a separate frying pan and over high heat, cook your mince in batches. Generally if you are using a non-stick frying pan, you don’t really need to add oil here either as the mince usually have a bit of fat it in anyway. You don’t want to overcrowd the pan with minced meat so it ends up steaming in its own juice. You want even high heat so the mince browns. I did 200 grams of mince in two batches. Add the cooked mince to the soffrito and add garlic and about one tablespoon full of fresh thyme leaves. I use thyme today but oregano, basil, sage or rosemary are always good too. One or a combination of fresh herbs really brings out the flavour.

Once you’ve added the meat and herbs, turn the heat up slightly and add a bottle of your favourite pasta sauce. I use Leggo’s Stir Through – Char grilled Vegetables. You can easily use a can of Italian tomatoes here. I use jarred pasta sauce because I really like this one. Good jarred pasta sauce is a bit of a rarity, I have to say. I generally don’t like them. But I am much impressed by the Leggo’s Stir Through range. If you can’t get them where you live either use your favourite pasta sauce (if you have one) or put in a can of tomatoes now. I then add two tablespoon of tomato paste and a bit of water. Bring the sauce to boil and then turn to the heat down to simmer for about 10 minutes.

A note: if you use canned tomatoes instead of ready made pasta sauce, you’ll have to simmer it for much longer to get that good stewy taste. I recommend leaving it to simmer for about 20 minutes longer (half an hour total). You will also have to season the sauce with a bit of salt and pepper. I would also add a little glug of extra virgin olive oil for flavour as well. I would also add a bit of red wine with the meat and soffrito and cook out the alcohol before adding the canned tomatoes (sorry to be going back a step here).

While the sauce is simmering, cook your spaghetti according to the packet instructions less two minutes. This way your spaghetti is slightly undercooked. Drain the pasta but leave a little bit of the cooking water. Add about a ladlefull of meat sauce per person to a saucepan and add the pasta. Toss together to combine over medium heat for a minute. If you find it to be slightly too wet still, just let it rest for a few minutes before serving.

Grate some nice parmesan cheese over the pasa and serve with green salad and a glass of red. Voila!

I have discovered something awesome in Singapore and that is stuffed fish balls. I have no idea how they are made commercially. I’ve seen a TV show making it. Basically it seems like they mince some fish meat with seasonings and just make them into balls. Like meatballs really. But fish. And more finely minced and different texture. One day, I had this noodle soup thing for lunch at a foodcourt near work and it had these balls in them but what is special is that it has minced chicken bits in the middle which were tasty. So I went hunting for them at the supermarket and accidentally bought the right things – which is rare considering I can’t read Chinese. Score one for me.

So fishball and cabbage soup is what we have.

Bring some chicken stock to boil (I made this by dissolving a Knorr chicken stock cube in a litre of water. If you can get a hold of nice chicken stock cubes, this soup is so simple. Making your own chicken stock can be a pain if you’re hungry because it takes time). Add some chopped shittake mushrooms (if you’re using dried shittake mushrooms, rinse them under water to wash out any dirt and soak them in hot water for a few minutes and then chop. Don’t throw out the soaking water, add it to the soup) and some cabbage leaves and the fishballs. Simmer for about 5 minutes.

That’s it! Seriously. Dinner in ten minutes. Score two for the lazy girl. Full sized images here.

Why is porridge in Singapore made from rice and is not a breakfast dish? I totally don’t get it.

Okay, so this is a really good breakfast (and I’m a huge believer in good solid breakfast). Bring a cup of water to boil and add half a cup of oatmeals (I think they’re those instant rolled oats but I have to say I don’t know the difference between instant oats and non-instant oats, suffice to say the oat in question takes about 2 minutes to cook). Keep stirring while it boils because a cup of water is not really enough liquid for it. Once the liquid has almost all been absorbed (this should take about a minute or so), add a chopped banana, two tablespoons of molass sugar (okay, so it’s not brown sugar but the name just sounds better) quarter of a cup of cold milk and a pinch of ground cinnamon. Stir and leave to simmer for one more minute.

Umm. That’s about it. Served topped with a bit more milk or a dollop of cream and sprinkle with a bit more sugar, if you like. It’s so yummy.