Category: Uncategorized

Creamy Smoked Salmon Pasta (Lite)

Contrary to what the name suggests, the creaminess from this dish doesn’t come from the cream, but from the thickening (“manticatura”) of fish oils, starch, and liquids. Sure there’s cream, but not a lot is needed. Perfect for a guilt-free, Saturday lunch, with side salads and scotch eggs. 

Makes 3

Time: 🕰🕰
Effort: 💪

Ingredients:

240g pasta (80g per person)
3 large garlic cloves
Several slices of frozen smoked salmon (there’s no need to use the fresh, expensive kind for cooking!)
Splash of white wine
50ml cooking cream
200ml milk
Salt
10g unsalted butter
Olive oil
Coriander or parsley
Lemon juice

Method:

1. Defrost smoked salmon in room temperature
2. Finely mince garlic cloves
3. Bring pot of salted water to the boil
4. Put pasta into the water – linguine is a classic choice
5. In a large pan, heat oil and garlic until garlic starts to bubble
6. Reduce heat to lowest to cook for further 2 minutes, until garlic softens and looses its spiciness
7. Add a splash of pinot grigio for a fundamental acidity to the dish
8. Add cream and salmon and bring to a light simmer
9. Add 3 ladles of pasta cooking water and continue to simmer
10. Once pasta is almost done – still a bit raw In the centre – transfer to the frying pan
11. Add half the milk, the butter, and mix rigorously
12. Cover and simmer on medium heat for 3 minutes until milk is absorbed
13. Uncover; add more pasta water and the remainder of the milk
14. Continue to simmer and flip the pasta on medium heat until sauce has thickened and the pasta is well coated
15. Check seasoning and add more salt is needed
16. Serve “family-style” on the table, with chopped coriander or parsley as garnish
17. Place lemon wedges on table for guests to highlight their dish with a squeeze of lemon juice, to their own liking — the lemon elevates the dish to a whole new level

“Unwanted” Soup with Truffle Oil

This is a special soup made mostly with unwanted and discarded ingredients. You won’t find a much better cream soup than this. We were super inspired by a book called Bread is Gold by Massimo Bottura and friends, which sits next to our TV.

Makes 3

Time: 🕰🕰
Effort: 💪💪

Ingredients:

1 leftover romanesco stalk, or 2 broccoli stalks
Discarded onion peels
Discarded celery fibres/peels/ends
Discarded carrot peels/heads/ends
Leftover cheese rinds (comté, parmiggiano)
2 garlic cloves
1 spring onion
Water
80ml cooking cream
10g butter
Truffle oil

Method:

1. Up to a week before, boil discarded onion, celery and carrot bits in around 500ml of water for 30 minutes, then store in fridge until the day: this is your “garbage” stock
2. On the day, chop up romanesco/broccoli stalk(s), garlic, and spring onion
3. Add spring onions and garlic to a pot and sweat in butter until softened, around 5 minutes
4. Add romanesco/broccoli stalks and stir to coat
5. Add stock from step 1 and enough water to not risk the pot drying out
6. Bring to boil and simmer until stalks are soften enough to blend – around 30 minutes
7. Remove soup from flame and blend with handheld blender until smooth, adding water bit by bit where necessary until the liquid is able to circulate, but still rather thick
8. Add half of the cream and blend further until frothy
9. Return to the flame; add cheese rinds and simmer until flavours from the rinds are released, around 20 minutes
10. Stir in the remaining cream and bring to temperature
11. Rigorously check seasoning and adjust with salt until just right – this is a heavy soup which can carry quite a bit of salt without tasting overboard
12. Fish out the rinds (optional)
13: Divide soup into bowls
14. Finish with a swirl of truffle oil

Pineapple Fried Rice with mixed seafood

Taiwanese pineapples were on sale yesterday at USelect – only HKD19 each. We changed our plans and made this for a quick lunch instead of wonton noodle soup 🙂 This is super simple to make, but you do need a good wok.

Makes 2

Time: 🕰
Effort: 💪

Ingredients:

1/2 fresh pineapple
Rice for 2 people
2 spring onions
2 eggs
2 handfuls frozen seafood mix
1 teaspoon turmeric
Splash of fish sauce
Chili powder

Method:

1. Boil rice with a little less water than you normally would
2. Rinse pineapple and cut in half
3. Using a short knife, cut around the edges until the knife reaches halfway down the sides
4. Using a spoon, finish the cuts and scoop out the entire section of the meat
5. Reserve the centre pith for dessert (it’s too tough to be included in this dish)
6. Chop up the remaining flesh; set aside
7. Roughly chop up spring onion whites, and finely chop up the spring onion greens
8. Beat two eggs
9. Fry seafood mixture in a small pan until cooked; reserve liquid for broth or pasta
10. Heat wok to very hot
11. Add 3 tablespoon of oil to wok
12. Fry spring onion whites for 10 seconds; remove from wok
13. Add egg to the oil and wait a few seconds before stirring
14. Once half-cooked, add in the rice and stir-fry rigorously until eggs and rice are evenly mixed
15. Spread out the rice on the wok to continue toasting
16. Add a pinch of salt and fish sauce; stir-fry a few seconds
17. Return spring onion whites to the wok, along with all other ingredients
18. Mix well and serve in pineapple shell

Korean Pancakes with Seafood

We don’t know the first thing about Korean cooking, but this was pretty good! We added a sprinkle of baking powder, which made it slightly fluffy. Totally optional.

Makes 2 pancakes (pajeon)

Time: 🕰🕰 （exclude the 1 week pickling)
Effort: 💪

Ingredients:

1/2 teacup flour
1.5x amount in ice-cold water
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder (optional)
3 handfuls frozen seafood mix from USelect-Tesco
Greens of 6 spring onions
6 teaspoon Vegetable oil

For dipping sauce:
1/2 onion
6 tablespoon Japanese soy sauce
4 tablespoon water
3 tablespoon vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar

Method:

1. Chop onions into sizes of large marbles
2. Transfer to an air-tight container
3. Add with rest of dipping sauce ingredients and leave in fridge for one week
4. On the day, mix flour, water, sugar, and baking powder (optional) to form the batter
5. Sautée frozen seafood until cooked; pour out and reserve the cooking juices for broth or pasta
6. Get a non-stick frying pan very hot
7. Add half the oil; swirl to coat evenly
8. Arrange green onions, followed by seafood, in the oil
9. Pour batter over the ingredients in a thin and even layer
10. Once edges are coloured, check to see if bottom is golden brown; if yes, transfer onto a plate
11. Cover with another plate, flip, and add back to the pan to cook on the other side with the remaining oil
12. Once both sides golden and edges are crisp, remove from oil
13. Cut into squares and serve

Rib-Eye Steak, Fries, Béarnaise Sauce

Map of the world

Inspired to make this dish after watching a Masterchef Canada episode and coming across an excellent piece of organic-fed, free range steak. Timing is important for all three components — teamwork essential!

Serves 3

Time: 🕰🕰
Effort: 💪💪💪

Ingredients:

For the steak:
1 rib-eye steak (around 200-250g per person)
Thyme
2 garlic cloves
Canola or corn oil
Salt and pepper

For the fries:
3 large potatoes, unpeeled
Canola or corn oil
Salt

For the Béarnaise sauce:
2 small shallots
Splash of lemon juice
Splash of white wine
2 egg yolks
1 teaspoon water
Salt and pepper
Tarragon (fresh or dried)
30g unsalted butter

Method:

1. Bring steak to room temperature between layers of kitchen towel
2. Cut potatoes into desired shape and thickness
3. Heat a neutral-flavoured oil, such as corn or canola oil, until a piece of potato placed in the oil will start having small bubbles, followed by more active bubbles; around 150’c
4. Blanch potatoes in this oil until slightly soft in the centre – test with fork
5. Remove and set aside
6. Finely chop shallots and soften in a pot over gentle flame with a squeeze of lemon juice and a splash of white wine, until liquid is almost completely gone
7. Spoon the shallot reduction into a mixing bowl
8. Add two egg yolks, water, black pepper, and tarragon
9. Whisk over a water bath (bain marie) until you see glimpses of the bottom of your bowl, around 3 minutes
10. Remove from bain marie
11. Heat butter on very low heat, until three layers form: foamy milk solids floating on top, middle layer of golden fat, and heavier milk solids on the bottom
12. Skim away top layer and pour out middle layer, leaving the bottom layer: this is your clarified butter
13. Add a few drops of clarified butter to your whisked yolks (sabayon) and whisk
14. Once the butter is able to be suspended in the yolks, add a few more drops and whisk
15. Once you’re confident the oils are suspending successfully, add the remaining clarified butter in a thin stream
16. Check seasoning
17. Add additional lemon juice to bring to desired consistency; keep warm over the bain marie, flame off
18. Heat small frying pan until smoking hot
19. Add vegetable oil and cook steak to your liking; tip: if using, add garlic and thyme only after the first flip, otherwise it might cook too long and burn, imparting an unpleasant bitter flavour
20. Let steak rest for roughly the same time you cooked it
21. While steak is resting, reheat the frying oil until considerably hotter than the first time — test with a piece of potato, which should bubble actively; around 190’c
22. Return potatoes to the oil for the second frying, until golden — this time to crisp the outside
23. Drain fries on kitchen towel and set aside
24. The steak should be rested by now
25. To plate, gently pull steak apart, with the help of a serrated knife, into distinguishable portions: the fat cap, the spinalis, the longissimus, and the longissimus Costa rum (if you’re lucky!)
26. Serve steak with fries, Béarnaise sauce, and coleslaw on the side

Homemade Coleslaw

Crisp and easy to make. The trick is to combine the vegetables with the dressing just before serving for extra crunch.

Serves 4

Time: 🕰
Effort: 💪

Ingredients:

1/4 head of cabbage
1/2 carrot
Small section of celery, around 2 inches
2 tablespoon mayonnaise
2 teaspoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
Sprinkle of paprika for colour
Salt and pepper

Method:

1. Slice cabbage into thin shreds
2. Peel carrot and grate using the largest hole on the grater
3. Peel and chop celery very finely
4. Combine celery with the remainder of ingredients to form the dressing
5. Taste and adjust with salt and pepper, and add more lemon juice if desired
6. Mix only before serving: take the required amount of cabbage and carrots for the meal, and spoon in enough dressing to coat evenly
7. Reserve the rest in fridge separately — this keeps the vegetables crisp and fresh
8. Serve with sloppy joes, burgers, or any other deli-themed meal