American Southern-Style Fried Chicken Bites

 炸鸡

This fried chicken recipe is different from my other fried chicken recipes (here, here, here, here and here) as it soaks the chicken in buttermilk brine which helps to tenderise the chicken, and the chicken is cooked sous vide before deep frying. Follow this recipe to get fried chicken that is quite similar to KFC fried chicken or Shake Shack chicken bites. 

Ingredients:

500g chicken breast 

Buttermilk brine/marinade: 125ml buttermilk (or 125ml milk with 1/2 tsp white vinegar), 1 tsp salt, 1/2 egg

Herb-seasoned flour: 120g plain flour, 40g corn flour, 1 tsp black pepper, 3/4 tsp paprika, 3/4 tsp onion powder, 1 tsp garlic powder, 1/4 tsp ginger powder, 1/2 tsp dried herbs (thyme and/or oregana), 1 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp celery salt

2 tbsp plain flour (plus more, if needed)

Method:

1. Prepare buttermilk brine by mixing buttermilk with salt and egg. If you do not have buttermilk, pour milk in a large bowl, add white vinegar to it, give a quick stir and let it sit for 10 minutes until it starts to coagulate/curdle a little. After that, mix in salt and egg. 

2. Use a sharp tip of the knife to poke the chicken breasts lightly to help the meat absorb the marinade, then cut into bite size.

3. Submerge the chicken into the buttermilk brine (in a vacuum bag) for at least 3 hour or overnight (in fridge - remove chicken from fridge one hour before cooking).

4. On day of cooking, sous vide the chicken breasts first. Heat a pot of water to 70 degree celcius. Submerge the vacuum bag with chicken pieces into the water for 45 minutes. After 45minutes, remove the chicken pieces from the vacuum bag and put them in a sieve for the excess marinade to drip off (into a bowl)

5. When ready to fry the chicken, prepare the herb-seasoned flour. Add 4 to 5 tablespoon of marinade into the herb-seasoned flour and use a whisk to mix until you get lots of lumpy flour bits. These lumpy flour bits will turn into crunchy crust after frying.

6. Lightly coat each piece of chicken with plain flour and shake off excess flour. Then dip the chicken into the marinade and dredge the chicken through the herb-seasoned flour. Squeeze the chicken piece using your palm so that the flour will adhere to the chicken. Repeat for remaining chicken pieces. Rest the breaded chicken pieces on a tray for 10 to 15 minutes (to allow the flour to adhere properly to the chicken). 

7. Fry the chicken pieces in batches until golden brown, flipping it half way through frying. Transfer the chicken to wire rack to drain excess oil. Repeat until all chicken pieces have been fried. 

Enjoy the chicken bites whilst warm and crispy!

Salt grilled salmon head

 烤鲑鱼头

Yes, you can have a decent Japanese meal at home. Buy a  salmon fish head from the market (they are cheap - I got one head for S$5!), grill it and serve with Japanese rice, miso soup and chawanmushi (steamed egg).

Ingredients

1 salmon head

1/2 teaspoon salt

Method

1. Ask the fishmonger to cut the head into two and remove gills. 

2. Wash and clean the fish heads and dab dry. Make sure scales on the fish head are removed.

3. Line a baking pan with aluminium foil. Put the fish head, cut side facing up, and sprinkle half of the salt.

4. Grill the salmon at 250 degree celcius for 8 to 10 minutes. 

5. Take the salmon from the oven, flip the salmon over and sprinkle the remaining half of the salt. Return the salmon to the oven and grill until the salmon head is a bit charred, around 15minutes.

6. Take salmon out from the oven and serve hot.

Claypot Chicken Rice

沙锅鸡饭

This is a simple one pot meal which you can cook at home. 

Ingredients (serves 4 pax)

3 chicken drumsticks (deboned), cut into bite size (750g before debone) 

1 Chinese sausage (optional) , thinly sliced diagonally

2 rice cooker cup rice

2 rice cooker cup water (360ml)

a few pieces of salted fish

Marinade for chicken:

1 tablespoon soy sauce

1 tablespoon corn flour

1 tablespoon rice wine (I use Hua Diao brand)

2 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon sesame oil

1 teaspoon dark soy sauce

Method

1. Prepare the marinade.

2. Heat 1 teaspoon cooking oil in wok and fry the salted fish over low heat till golden brown and fragrant. Cut into small pieces and mix into the marinade. Replace salted fish with 1 teaspoon of soy sauce if you do not have salted fish. 

3. Mix the marinade into the chicken, set aside for at least half an hour.

4. Wash the rice, drain and put it in the claypot (ceramic pot will work too). Add water and start cooking over medium-small fire for 10 minutes.

4. After 10 minutes, turn off heat, open lid and add the marinated chicken pieces including all the marinating liquid. Do not stir the rice. Place the sausage on the chicken, if using. Cover and cook over small heat for another 15 minutes. 

5. After 15 minutes, fluff up the rice and serve hot. If you like darker rice, add 1 tablespoon of cooked oil and 1 tablespoon of dark soy sauce into the rice and mix in. Serve hot with vegetables!

Homemade Yogurt

酸奶

Yogurt is an effective way to get probiotic bacteria on a daily basis, and improve our gut microbial health. All you need is fresh milk and some starter yogurt (from store bought  yogurt).  

Ingredients

500ml fresh milk 

3 heap tablespoons plain and unflavoured Greek yogurt (starter)

Method

1. Put the milk in a pot (covered) and heat over medium heat until it is just below boiling point (small bubbles form around the edges).

2. Remove the pot from heat and let it sit until you can dip your finger into the milk for 5 seconds without burning your finger. If you need to use the pot for something else, transfer the milk to a wide mouth stainless steel container/thermos flask (which can retain heat) where you will be storing the yogurt.

3. Transfer 100-200ml of milk to a small bowl and add the yogurt starter. Stir until smooth and transfer this back to the pot/container/thermos flask with warm milk. Stir to mix in, cover the pot/container/thermos flask with lid and keep it warm by wrapping it with a towel. 

4. Let the yogurt sit for 4 hours (Singapore weather). It should set by then, if not leave it (wrapped) for another hour. Note that the yogurt will be tangier the longer it sits. 

5. Store the yogurt pot/container/thermos flask in the fridge. 

Note that even though you used Greek yogurt as a starter, your homemade yogurt is not considered as "Greek" yogurt unless you strain it to remove the whey. I find that straining is not necessary as whey is nutritious and I can still get thick/creamy yogurt by increasing the amount of starter.

Homemade Chinese Five Spice Powder

五香粉

So easy to make if you have these 5 spices in your kitchen.

Ingredients

1 tablespoon fennel seeds

1/2 tsp cloves

1 tablespoon szechuan peppercorn

4 star anise

2cm cinnamon stick

Method

1. Break the spices into small pieces and toast them over low heat in wok until fragrant. Set aside to cool down.

2. Put the spices in a blender and blend until powder form. Transfer the five spice powder into container.

3. Put a tablespoon of rice grains into blender and blend to clean the residual powder and  remove the smell of five spice from the blender container.

Sourdough Crackers

天然酵母葱饼

Revived my sourdough starter that was kept in the fridge for more than a year. Fed the starter with equal amounts of water and flour every 24 hours until it doubled in size on consequent days. Luckily, the starter was strong and it slowly sprung back to life. It became bubbly and tripled in size after 5 hours on the third day. In the feeding process, I collected a lot of sourdough discards, and a good way to use them up was to make crackers. So glad I found below recipe from King Arthur Baking. 

These crackers have a slight tangy taste due to the use of sourdough starter. But they are still very tasty!

Ingredients

227g sourdough discard (cold, straight from fridge)

113g Plain flour 

1/2 tsp sea salt flakes

2 tbsp dried herbs (oregano, thyme or basil)

57g butter (melted and warm)

Half portion

113.5g sourdough discard

56.5g plain flour

1/4 tsp 

1 tbsp dried herbs (I replaced with 12g fresh scallions/spring onions from my garden)

28.5g butter (melted and warm)

Method

1. Sieve flour into mixing bowl. Mix in the salt. 

2. Add butter and use the dough scrapper to quickly mix into the flour. Butter will coat the flour with fat which makes for a more tender cracker.

3. Add the starter and mix in using your fingers/dough scrapper. Then add the scallions and continue to mix until the dough almost comes together. If necessary, cover and refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes for easier rolling.

4. Divide the dough into two pieces (for easier handling) while it is in the mixing bowl. 

5. Preheat oven to 170 degree celcius.

6. Take one piece of dough from the mixing bowl and cover the other piece with a cloth/cling wrap (to prevent drying) and place on benchtop/rolling mat (lightly floured with rice vinegar). Lightly dust the top of the dough with rice flour and shape the dough into a rectangular slab. Roll the dough to about 2 to 3cm thick and cut the dough into desired shapes. Prick each cut dough with the tines of a fork (to prevent the dough from puffing up). Transfer the cut dough into a baking tray (lined with parchment paper) and bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until the crackers are lightly browned. Note: to save some effort and time, the shaping/rolling/cutting can be done on a parchment paper. Then the dough and parchment paper transferred wholesale to the baking pan for baking. No need to separate the cut dough at all as the crackers will separate themselves as they bake.

7. Remove the crackers from oven and transfer to wire rack to cool. Once cooled, store in air tight container.