Monday, January 16, 2012

Cooking: Tangy Chinese Spare Ribs [糖醋排骨]

Finally after multi-levels of procrastination, I decided to try cooking the pork ribs that had been on my "to try" list for months now.

I like tangy spare-ribs [糖醋排骨]and been meaning to make them for ages now. One of the reason it took so long was because I was hoping to find a small bottle of Black vinegar as required ingredient but all I could locate was the big bottles. Why do I want a huge bottle of sauce for something I cook time to time?


Came today, I completely forgotten that I had forgotten to get the Black Glutinous vinegar  and neither do I have plain flour at home but I was already half way into the job. So I decided to fuck the black vinegar and proceed ahead with just the Zhejiang Red Vinegar.

Sauce Ingredients:
1. Zhejiang Vinegar (浙江醋)- 2 tablespoon
2. Black Glutinous Vinegar (烏醋)- 2 tablespoon (required! It gives the dish the nice rounded sweet taste like 排骨王)
3. 2 teaspoon heaps of white sugar, or use cubes of icing sugar (冰糖)(personally I prefer the latter)
4. Tomato sauce - 1.5- 2 tablespoon (i just gauge when I cook)
5. Dash of cornflour - 1/2 - 1 teaspoon for those precision cookers.
6. Dark soysauce - 1 tablespoon
7.  Plum sauce (梅漿)- 1 teaspoon

Marinade A:
1. Sugar - 1/2 tablespoon
2. Lemon Juice - 1 teaspoon
3. Salt - 1/2 teaspoon
4. water - 1 tablespoon (I kinda omit this because the ribs were already wet after rinsing)

Marinade B:
1. Plain Flour (面粉)- 1 tablespoon
2. Potato (太白粉)or Corn flour - 1 tablespoon
3. water - 1 tablespoon ( to combine the flour)

Cooking steps
1. Marinate the ribs prior to cooking. First marinate the ribs with Marinade A for at least an hour. Stick it in the fridge.

2. Combine the marinated ribs with Marinade B and set aside for at least 30mins.

3. Heat (peanut/coconut) oil over medium flame and deep fry the marinated ribs.
Remove ribs when it is golden brown. Cook longer if ur ribs are very cold or very thick. Hard to burn ribs if u are watching it as u deep fry. Note, do not over heat the oil too much at the start or u will burnt the meat rather than cook it through.

4. While your fried ribs are draining oil on the side, use a different pot, put in a tablespoon of the used oil and then pour in the Sauce mix into the pot and stir over low flame. This is the time you get to adjust the taste. If you think its too sour, add more (2-3) icing cubes (or sugar). Dont overdo it. moderate bit by bit. Do not make it too sweet as the flavor will change again when combined with the ribs. Note: Do not stir over heat too long or you will lose the vinegar aroma.

5. Add a little corn flour if the sauce is still too watery but not too thick else its hard to coat the ribs later. (optional step)

6. Reheat the pot of frying oil and do a quick refry 10-15seconds before serving. (optional if the time lag between sauce preparation and serving is not long)

7. Pour the sauce over the ribs and mix well. Let the fried layer of the ribs soaked in the flavor of the sauce before serving (that's about a min or two. The taste will differ slightly when ribs are very hot and when cooled)

PS: I didnt have plain flour so I had only used the corn flour. This wont affect the taste but will affect the layer of batter on your ribs.





Sunday, January 15, 2012

A polite way of getting people to move out...

Was shopping at Times Square yesterday. Not the best move since Causeway bay is often the most crowded on weekend.

We were on the 9th topmost floor heading down to the ground floor. When the elevator reached the ground floor, all those non-Hong Kong people crowding at the door didnt budge. There was a HK chap stuck in the middle who obviously was pressed for time and looked fustrated. Seeing that those blur mainlanders still standing there unmoving, he did an announcement in cantonese "到了,各位!(We have arrived everyone.)" That got everyone moving in a flash and frenzy as if they were activated by a single command.

I started to laugh when he did the loud polite announcement...coz from his tone, it sounded perfectly as
"We have arrived, you fucklings."

Travel Log: Santorini, OIA Sunset views. Part 3


As I mentioned, it was rainy week the time we were in Santorini. One of the nights we were in OIA, it was pissing down thunderstorm, so much so that the streets were transformed to mini streams and made walking impossible.


The little gal and doggie was such a endearing sight. She was waiting for her mummy and decided to make herself comfortable patting another owner's doggie. Kids, sometimes u adore them and sometimes makes u wanna strangle them This moment, she was sweet like an angel.


Love the "fork and spoon" depiction. A true definition of cooked food.

The rain never let up....
 It was wet and gloomy but luckily for me, I spotted this yummy looking basement dessert store and had the most delightful choc cake in there with a very chatty waiter. I cannot rem where he was from but I rem him telling me he loves rain because he grew up in a desert like area.

ahhhh...the lovely Mascarpone choc cake




When cold and hungry, everything looked really tempting...

The sunset was beautiful. I could not stop clicking on my shutter. We were there for about 15mins and it was amazing to see the beautiful rays flirting with us as the clouds come and go. All the photos are taken with my good old canon S95 and the colours are "as are", non photoshop. I think my camera did a fantastic job in capturing the brillance...

8-10 Oct 2010, Santorini, Oia





Gorgeous orangey glow




Red, orange blue and white...lovely combination


When one waits patiently long enough, one will be rewarded with richness of nature's gold.

Admiring the fleeting rays bursting through the mutilayers of clouds. 








People sat there quietly, enthralled by nature's simple beauty.
What wondrous marvelous view that binded every stranger together in awe and delight.












After early dinner, we realised the rain had stopped and the sunset was out. We ran as fast as our legs could carry us to the windmill spot but only caught a glimpse of the sunset before we could whip our cameras out in time.

Roofttop view




The famous Oia Windmill backdrop scene









A full moon night, in the spitting rain

A serene chilly night