Bye Bye, Tiger; Hello, Rabbit

Happy Chinese New Year

恭喜发财 万事如意
龙马精神 青春永驻

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Red Hot Char Siu Pork Ribs

Red is the colour of Chinese New Year. From red packets to red clothes and red underwear, the vibrant colour is the symbol of good luck and prosperity. So let's make a red dish for the festive season – char siu!

Long before manmade food colours became de rigueur, char siu was already red, as were peking duck and lup cheong. All these red dishes shared a common ingredient: red yeast wine dregs (红糟), the residue from red glutinous rice wine. Which is red because the yeast used to ferment the wine is red.

The red yeast is made by wrapping rice in a mat and burying it in red soil, pressed down with rocks. The fermentation, which takes three to four years, turns the rice completely red.

After the red yeast has been successfully cultivated, it can be transplanted. This is done by mixing the yeast with cooked rice, which is then sealed and left to ferment for about 20 hours. (Thank goodness it doesn't take another three to four years!) Next, the rice is spread out for 10 plus hours, followed by rinsing four to six times, then finally air dried.

Once upon a time in China, only wealthy folks made red yeast rice, because the poor ate all the rice they had, I guess. And it was a closely guarded secret passed to only the male heirs of the family. (Yup, heard that one before.)

If you want to make char siu red without artificial food colours, you don't have to bury a pile of rice in the ground for three to four years. Just grab a jar of red yeast wine dregs from the supermarket, then wow everyone with naturally red, succulent ribs hot from the oven. Which should be eaten whilst wearing red, outside and in, to maximize the good luck.

Check these out:

Noodles with Red Red Yeast Wine Dregs (红糟面线)	Steamed Crabs	Chicken with Red Yeast Wine Dregs (红糟鸡)	Prawns with Red Fermented Beancurd

Roasted Chickpeas – Guilt-Free Nibble

One day, I'll get round to making Love Letters for Chinese New Year. And I'll put little slips of paper with cryptic messages in the Love Letters – like Fortune Cookies – so that they do their name more justice. That'll be a hell of a lot of fun, won't it? And a hell of a lot of work!

Roasting chickpeas is more my kind of thing. All I have to do is open a few cans and whack the whole lot of beans in a hot oven . . . . Ok, I'm lying. There're a few very complex steps. I have to swish the chickpeas around in water, dry 'em, toss 'em with oil and, when they're baked and golden brown, sprinkle some salt and five-spice powder. All of which add up to 9.78 seconds, the world record for running 100 metres . . . . Ok, I'm lying again. It actually takes 15.20 seconds – the chickpeas, not the 100 metres.

Crisp, crunchy and savory, roasted chickpeas are just right for nibbling on come CNY. After the sweet stuff like Pineapple Tarts, Love Letters and Cashew Nut Cookies, something salty helps refresh the palette. And the great thing about chickpeas is, they have tonnes of protein and iron but not much fat. Who says munchies have to be unhealthy? Roasted Chickpeas are a guilt free nibble, for CNY or any time of the year. Munch away, as much as you like!

Check these out:

Zhenjiang Pork Ribs	Orange Glazed Pork Ribs	Crispy Pork Ribs with Dried Tangerine Peel	Teriyaki Pork RIbs

ROASTED CHICKPEAS (Recipe for ½ cup rounded) 1 can chickpeas (aka garbanzo beans) 1 tbsp vegetable oil ¼ tsp five-spice powder ¾ tsp salt Preheat oven to 220°C. Line baking tray with aluminium foil. Drain, wash and dry chickpeas. Toss with vegetable oil. Transfer to baking tray in a single layer. Bake till golden brown, about 30 minutes, rotating tray midway. Mix with salt and five-spice powder. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary. Serve when cool. Or store in airtight containers.

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How to Make Pineapple Tarts

How do my pineapple tarts look? Not too shabby for a virgin attempt? I think the rustic style is quite charming. It says 'homemade' in a way that sleek and smooth tarts made with cookie cutters don't. Each and every one is unique; there're no two alike. That's the hallmark of something handmade and artisanal, which is so rare nowadays. Not that I could make two alike even if my life depended on it.

'Let me out! Let me out!'

Do you hear some noise? That's the ignoramus who says my tarts don't look professional. I've locked him up in the dungeon, and thrown away the key.

Appearance aside, these fruits of hard labour taste pretty darn good, if only the labourer says so! The filling is fresh and fruity, and the pastry crumbles and falls apart in the mouth. Please note that flour can't melt, in the mouth or anywhere else. So 'melt-in-the-mouth' pineapple tarts are technically impossible.

Making the filling takes about half an hour: 10 minutes to wash and chop the pineapples, then 20-25 minutes to stir the jam on the stove till it's thick. Inbetween, the slow cooker takes over for about four hours, unsupervised. 30 minutes or so for a pot of homemade pineapple filling – that's worth the effort, isn't it?

For the shortcrust pastry, I use a French recipe from Paule Caillat. If there's anything the French know, it's pastry. Her recipe uses only 60 g of butter (and a bit of oil) to every 100 g of flour. In the world of pastries, that's pretty low-fat. Some other recipes call for 100 g of butter, plus egg yolks and sometimes cheese. Despite having less butter, the French recipe makes pineapple tarts that are as crumbly as those that have eggs or more butter. There's more about Paule Caillat's recipe here and here.

The combination of tangy pineapples and buttery pastry is the king of all Chinese New Year cookies for good reason. What would CNY be without pineapple tarts? These little symbols of prosperity make CNY a special occasion and if they're homemade, that makes CNY even more special . . . . Well, that's if there're some left by the time the rabbit comes a hoppin'. The chances aren't looking good though. Everyone loves the humongous, golf ball size 'tangerines' because there's lots of filling and the pastry is really thin. They're disappearing fast and because everyone knows they're disappearing fast, they're disappearing faster and faster!

Maybe I should make another batch this weekend? Hmm . . . hmm . . . I'll think about it.

Check these out:

Durian with Sticky Rice	Sesame Balls	Snow Fungus & Pear Sweet Soup (银耳雪梨糖水)	Sugared Yam (反沙芋)	Kacang Putih (Frosted Peanuts)

Lucky Orange Glazed Ribs

Mandarin oranges are a symbol of good luck. Come Chinese New Year, many homes are decorated with mandarin orange plants decked out with lucky ornaments. And crawling from house to house collecting ang baos wouldn't be possible without a pair of orange mandarins.

Given mandarin oranges' importance to Chinese traditions, it's a shame these good luck fruits aren't used in any popular CNY recipe. You know, like pineapples are in pineapple tarts.

'旺来', meaning prosperity is arriving, sounds like 'pineapples' in Hokkien. Mandarin oranges' other Chinese name, 大吉, means lots of luck. We should, therefore, eat lots of lucky 大吉 whilst inhaling piles of pineapple tarts in the name of prosperity. With the double dosage, we ensure that the arriving prosperity is the best type that falls out of the sky. If we eat only pineapple tarts, we might be prosperous only by working our ass off. That's not as good as getting undeserved riches, is it?

There're lots of wonderful things to make with oranges, like orange cakes, orange cookies, orange soufflé, duck a l'orange and my favourite, Orange Glazed Pork Ribs. I love anything sweet and sour, so these ribs are right up my alley. All the dish needs is an auspicious name to make it perfect for CNY, so I've renamed it 大吉排骨, or Lucky Ribs. After eating 大吉排骨, I'm sure I'll have lots of good luck in the Year of the Rabbit.
Casino, here I come!

Check these out:

Kou Shui Ji (口水鸡)	Drunken Chicken and Eggs	Zhenjiang Pork Ribs	Drunken Prawns

Curry Leaf Cashews	Sesame Duck	Sweet Glutinous Rice Balls (湯圓)	Fried Spring Rolls

Salted Crispy Chicken – Taiwan's Hot Chook

It's chicken; it's deep fried; and it's got lots of seasoning. How can 盐酥鸡 – Salted Crispy Chicken – not be a winner? It's practically the king of nighttime street food in Taiwan, loved by young and old alike.

Eat your heart out, KFC, in the land of 盐酥鸡. (Hey, it rhymes!)

Using a recipe from the Taiwanese cookery teacher here, the 盐酥鸡 I made yesterday bore the classic hallmark of street food – it made me quite thirsty! Hah, so it really had the feel of night market food! There was quite a lot of salt in the seasoning, as well as sugar and spices which masked the saltiness. 盐酥鸡 isn't something that should be eaten too often, I guess, but it makes a great occasional nibble.

Besides being heavily seasoned, good Salted Crispy Chicken must be, as its name says, crispy. The key to getting the maximum crunch is deep-frying the chicken twice, once to cook it and a second time to crisp it. The first round of deep-frying is quite easy. It's good so long as the chicken is slightly brown, and just cooked or almost cooked. The oil shouldn't be too hot, but hot enough to set the flour so that it doesn't fall off.

Whilst the chicken is waiting for the oil to heat up for round two, excess moisture in the meat rises to the surface. Which then evaporates when the chicken is refried, causing the oil to bubble rapidly. When the bubbling subsides, that means the coating of flour is dry. Ideally, at the same time, the chicken should be just turning a perfect shade of golden brown. If it isn't, that means the oil isn't hot enough, and the flour is full of oil and therefore soggy. Or the chicken may be brown before the bubbling stops because the oil is too hot. That means the flour is full of moisture and therefore soggy.

The conclusion is: a deep-fryer with temperature control would be very handy!



The night markets in Taiwan where 盐酥鸡 is commonly found sometimes have performances. In the same spirit, I'm also offering entertainment with my post, and it's a Hokkien/Taiwanese song, no less. Before you sniff at the idea, thinking Hokkien songs are terribly lowbrow, let me assure you this is a classy performance with a full size orchestra and humongous chorus. In fact, the Taiwanese songstress is so good that she shows Placido Domingo a thing or two. That's right, Placido Domingo singing a Hokkien song, upstaged by a woman from Taiwan (who admittedly had some home advantage):



Check these out:

Pearly Meatballs (珍珠丸子)	Housefly Heads (苍蝇头)	Lion's Heads (清汤狮子头)	Spring Onion Pancakes (葱油饼)	Three-Cup Chicken (三杯鸡)