Baked Cheese Rice....with chicken and sausages...

Canned cream of chicken soup....hmm delicious....

Baked cheese rice.......
My son#1 loves anything with cheese.... and he ask me to cook for him baked cheese rice today.
The ingredients I used are :-

2 cups cooked rice
50 g sliced chicken breast
2 nos chicken sausage -sliced
2 slices chicken ham- cubed
1 tbsp butter
1/2 can of chicken or mushroom soup
1/4 cup milk
slices of cheddar cheese or grated cheddar cheese.
1 tsp of chopped garlic


First I saute the garlic in butter til fragrant in a pan. Then I add in chicken breast(season with some salt and pepper)to the garlic. Fry for a minute and add in the cubed chicken ham together with the sausages to fry til cook. Leave aside...



Meanwhile arrange cooked rice on a heat-proof dish ( brushed with some melted butter). spread the chicken mixture on top of rice or can be mix into the rice.

Mixture of rice with chicken, sausages and ham.........

Then combine milk and cream of chicken soup in a sauce pan. Bring to boil on medium on medium heat. Stir constantly and then add in grated cheddar cheese ( you can use sliced cheddar cheese if available). The amount of cheese used is up to your choice. I use about 50 g. Cook til cheese melts . Then pour mixture over top of rice. Spread some sliced cheese on top. Cover with foil and baked at 190 degree Celcius for about 30 - 35 minutes.

Cream of chicken soup + milk+ cheese.........

Steamboat galore....

Wonder how the name steamboat got its name??I think it must be the rounded metal bowl that looks like a boat where we put in our food to cook and the steam coming out from the bowl ... ? waiting to be corrected...In the olden days steamboat uses charcoal to heat up the bowl.I do not have a picture of the original steamboat using charcoal...will try to post it next time when I got the pic. This steamboat has a chimney-like tube in the middle of the bowl where you put in the burning charcoal . There is a hole at the bottom of the steamboat for.. the ashes to filter through and to fan air into the chimney to light up the fire...what a hassle..Steamboat of the present day uses gas and electricity. Even the rice cooker can be use as steamboat if you do not have one at home.

Steamboat are quite easy to prepare if you have all the ingredients. In fact you can put anything into the steamboat. to cook. The only thing a steamboat needs is to cook up some good stock beforehand. Nowadays there are many variety of stocks you can get from many steamboat restaurant...tomyam,...herbal....fish stock....and so on.....Here in Malaysia we use to have many varieties of beancurd call towfu,, fish slices , fishball, squids and squid balls, sea cucumber,,, oyster, crabsticks, cuttlefish, quail eggs, chicken meat, beef slices, vegetables, noodles and so on..to be put into the prepared stock to cook. A lovely chicken stock cook from bones with some onions,celery and carrots is just as good . You can prepare some sauces like soya sauce with chilli or sambal for dipping with the cooked food. I like to have steamboat for gatherings. It is more fun or 'lau 'juak besides you can prepare more variety of food to be finish up..

Shepherd's Pie....for ...dinner.

chopped tomatoes....

Bayleaf...

Uncooked shepherd's pie...

simmering beef sauce ...

mash potatoes..

golden brown shepherd's pie...

I have been cracking my head of what to cook for tonight's dinner for my boys today. Have not done any shopping for days and still very tired after attending Uncle Keng Tee's funeral service. for 2 days... not enough sleep...So decided to dig into the fridge to see anything I can cook up. I found a packet of mince beef, some very ripe tomatoes.. left over pasta sauce... potatoes...and that give me an idea... I am going to make shepherd's pie! I have not make this dish which is my son#1's favourite for quite sometime already.

Do you know that shepherd's pie is a poor englishman dish?? Long long ago.. shepherds( one who looks after sheeps and take them to eat grass) are very poor and so they will use left overs and cook it with with some sauces using tomatoes and some spices and then mash some potatoes to cover on top and then bake it....I think that is how shepherd's pie got its name..ha..ha.. Now for the method:-

I first make the mash potatoes by peeling 3 big potatoes and put it in a pot of water to boil til soft.(Add a pinch of salt to the water).When soften drain away the water. Add a big knob of butter,about 2 tbsp to the hot potatoes and mash it with a fork or potato masher.Add some milk to get the right consistency (about 5 to 6 tbsp). The sprinkled some pepper and salt and mashed til very smooth. Leave that aside.... For the beef sauce fillings:-

I used 1/2 packet mince beef about 200gm. I chop up a big onion, 3 big tomatoes, and some finely grated carrots ( my boys doesn't like vege... so I have to grate and chop it finely and sometimes I blend it together with some cauliflower if I have it to hide the vege in the sauces!!) my tricks to get them to eat vege..!! Saute the chopped onions in a tbsp of oil til soft....then throw in mince beef to cook til brown...then add in the chop carrots , some pasta sauce or tomato paste if you do not have pasta sauce ( I will sometimes use campell tomato soup if I have it in my larder. It taste really delicious!). Throw in also the chopped fresh tomatoes. ..add a leaf of bayleaf .... simmer it til the beef is tender. ...about 15-20 mins.... add water if a bit dry...then I add in 1/2 tsp of Marmite instead of salt to season...If the sauce is watery , thicken it with a tsp of cornflour mix with a tbsp of cold water.

Put the stew into a heatproof dish and spread out thinly... then add in the mash potatoes on top of stew and spread out with a spoon...use a fork to make some pattern( see pic above) .I then sprinkled some parmesan cheese on top......... ready for oven...pre-heat to 200 degrees C ...and bake for 30mins til golden brown.... I have a nice ...shepherd's pie..ready to be gobble up in seconds!!!

Konnyaku Jelly

The weather has been very hot recently. So I decided to make some jelly to cool down. The above picture is the peach flavoured Konnyaku jelly with canned longan which I made yesterday. Konnyaku is a type of Japanese jellied paste which is made from a vegetable starch extracted from a tuberous root called devil's tongue.(wonder why it is called that??) It is chewy in texture unlike the normal jelly made from seaweed. You can get it in many flavours with sugar added or without sugar or flavouring (which is not so convenient) in most hypermarket. This jelly is good for us because it has a high calcium content. To make the jelly more attractive I use the jelly mould specially for konnyaku as in the above picture. I like to eat my konnyaku with evaporated milk or low-fat milk...hmmm....delicious...

Coca-cola ..........Chicken............

the ingredients......................................

Coca-cola chicken ............................................

This is the chicken I cook for lunch today using coke. It is easy to cook and taste good too. I marinate some chicken pieces(drumsticks )( I added some chicken wings because I run out of drumsticks) with 2 tbsp dark soya sauce. Then I fry it with 3 tbsp of oil til golden brown. Then I add in 3 slices of ginger and 3 crushed whole garlic to fry for a while til fragrant. Then sprinkle 2 tbsp of brown sugar on chicken to caralamize it. After that pour in about 150ml of coke and simmer on low heat til coke reduced,adding more coke(another 150ml) til chicken is cooked.(about 30-45min). Once chicken is cooked let the sauce reduce down to a thick syrupy consistency and serve with rice.