Beauty Food : SP2

In one of my previous post, I mentioned this book about food combination for health which I refer to frequently. It features food ranging from vegetables, meat, seafood, fruits, etc. Besides mentioning the benefits of each type of food, it also states the effects of combining food that will or will not benefit our health, which is what I like about this book. After all, anyhow cook doesn't mean haphazard cooking, you know.

This book is in Mandarin, the title translated is "Achieving good health by eating the right food".  In fact, NTUC is selling the 2nd edition of this book currently. I'll try to share some of the knowledge I learned from this book here.  Since it's a Chinese book, I'll have to put my translation skills or rather, my hubby's, to the test.

For a start, I tried stir frying pumpkin and steamed prawns.  I love the sunny colour of these dishes which whet my appetite.

The book suggests that eating pumpkin and prawns together can help to beautify our skin and reduce fatigue. The vitamin C in pumpkin combines with the protein of prawns to improve formation of collagen, and it helps prevent freckles as well as reduce fatigue.

So go ahead - try SP2 (short for Sunny Prawn and Pumpkin), it's a cheaper and tastier alternative to SK2. Satisfaction guaranteed!      

Homemade Ginger Tea

Lately, I’ve fallen in love with ginger tea. Especially when honey is added to it. So yummy !

I discovered that actually ginger tea offers a multitude of benefits to our health. “Ginger tea has been used for thousands of years as an herbal remedy to treat a wide range of health concerns from nausea and colds to indigestion and joint pain. It is also purported to help boost the immune system and promote cardiovascular health.” http://www.learn-about-tea.com/ginger-tea.html .

A Chinese website that I chanced upon also sited very good health benefits of drinking ginger tea, whether it is mixed with honey, red or black sugar. Ginger tea with red sugar is said to be very good for women. If it is drank a week or so before a woman’s menstruation, it helps to ease possible cramps. The mixture of honey and ginger provides instant relief to a person suffering from cough, cold, sore throat, and runny nose. Apparently both ginger and honey contain natural anti-biotics. Each time when I feel an onset of sore throat or runny nose coming, this drink come to my rescue and it really works !

What I like most about this tea is because it is really easy to brew. Required ingredients are simply ginger, boiling water and honey. Usually I would manually minced the ginger, and put it into a stainless steel strainer.

Pour boiling water, cover it and simmer for about 10 to 15 mins.

After that, remove the strainer, let it cool down by another 30 mins or so before adding honey to taste.

I use raw honey here which gives a natural taste. The reason to cool down the drink before adding honey is to ensure that the high temperature of the drink do not spoil the honey nutrients.  I've also learnt that the correct way to make ginger tea is not to boil the ginger in a pot, but to simmer in a cup of boiling water. This way it will prevent the goodness of ginger from being damaged.

Just yesterday, I read that there are actually few types of ginger with each type giving different health effects to our body.  Wow, didn't know that.  Anyway, I hope to share it here after I find out more.

Nuts 'bout Walnuts?

Not exactly crazy about it but I loved eating walnut muffins or cakes when I was young, especially so if the pastry happened to be sweet, the presence of walnut would help to neutralize it to my taste. I basically dislike things that are either too sweet or too saltish. Fortunately hubby isn't too particular and can live with my preferences when it comes to food.

I bought a soya drink maker some months back and had been using it mainly to make soya milk. Since it also has functions for making peanut and sesame paste, I decided to try making walnut paste.

It is actually quite easy: simply soak the walnut for 2 hours, and soak some uncooked rice grains for 30 mins, boil some water with rock sugar, put all in the machine, and let it do the work. However, the walnut did not seem so well blended after the first round, so I got the machine to go one more round, before it turns out like this: 

 

I liked the texture. What about hubby? He's all smiles after tasting it.

The Wok is Willing...

... but the chef is weak. That's what was in my mind during the days when I was not blogging. Being employed and having to prepare meals each day is no simple task, though hubby helps out in the cleaning and washing up after meals (which I appreciated very much). I guess too much of western food may not be a good thing, such as pork chop...

and chicken drumstick sauteed in mushroom sauce...

Hubby seemed to succumbed to a kinda western food withdrawal syndrome (he is after all still very chinese in heart), and so I reverted back to simple soup-based dishes such as mushroom soup with lean pork, dried bean curd and carrot. 

But alas the weather and exposure to air-borned virus in packed public transportation did my hubby in and he was finally down with flu this week. So I had to prepare my meals even more carefully so as not to aggravate his conditions, such as this lightly stir-fried leeks with wolfberries in miso paste gravy...

... and the sliced fish with bitter gourd and tomato in vermicelli soup.

Fortunately hubby recovered well enough with a little tender loving care from his personal chef, and decided to accompany me for a Saturday outing today. And that certainly brightened my day!

Mangolicious Cod

Hubby's favourite fish is cod. I happened to have one juicy cod steak in the freezer. Hubby loves mango too. I'm looking at one now lying on the kitchen top. Now the question is: are they compatible? Well, you never know unless you try, right?

So, I fired up my computer and search for a mango sauce recipe. Found one here. But I decided to substitute vinegar with leftover lemon slices I had in my fridge. That's just me, always finding ways to clear the clutter in my kitchen just to make sure nothing expires and everything stays fresh. The result? Mmmm... mangolicious!

Cod is much easier. I marinated it with dashi shoyu, salt, some ginger slices (my own concoction; not bad for an anyhow attempt), and then baked it in my new Tefal hot convection oven (yes, you heard it right! hubby finally bought me a personal oven to experiment with new dishes... yeah!).

Added some vermicelli (bee hoon) and a couple of blanched broccoli, and what have you got? A wholesome and delicious dinner meal, of course!

Hubby's rather pleased with the way the cod was baked to near perfection, and the mango sauce certainly enhanced the overall taste. I'm sure he's looking forward to more such dishes, baked or roasted by the new member of the kitchen.

Hubby and Chocolate

Seems like hubby has taken a greater liking for chocolate ever since he married me, maybe because I almost always orders hot chocolate whenever we frequent Starbucks or Coffee Beans. He has such a love for good food sometimes he'll include them in our casual conversations...

Tonight as he came in from the front door from work, I extended my arms to welcome him, wanting to take his backpack while he removed his shoes. Instead he misinterpreted my gesture and gave me a hug. Nice. "Wah, how come your backpack so heavy? Got gold bars, is it?" I joked. He walked past me and with a nonchalant voice, remarked, "The probability of finding chocolate bars inside my backpack is higher than gold bars..."

Later, over at the dinner table, I read an article to him from a recent copy of The Eagles' VantagePoint magazine on how a man's theology about women may have either good or bad repercussions on his relationships with the women around him, in particular his wife. He listened thoughtfully, and then asked me, "Do you think I'm chauvinistic?" I replied instantly with a grin, "No, you're not!" He heaved a sigh of relief, and then muttered, "I guess I'm more of a chocolanistic guy..." I broke into laughters.

.

Ps: Are there any good chocolate recipes that my readers can recommend me to pamper my hubby with?

NDP 2010

Today is Singapore's 45th birthday, but we're not going to the National Day Parade (NDP) because we did not have the tickets. Staying home on a holiday wasn't a bad idea anyway.

Hubby wanted to eat Yong Tou Fu so I went to the West Coast market to do some marketing and bought

the ingredients to make this lunch for him.  As I did not have time to pre-soak the soya beans, I simply make the broth using ikan bilis, yellow onions, garlic and ginger and it turned out to be superb!   

                                     

After lunch I went to NTUC to buy a tub of Kings raspberry ice-cream (hubby's favourite brand and flavour) as I suddenly remembered one of my colleague gave me a pack of chocolate flakes which her daughter brought all the way back from London.  It was a nice cool dessert perfect for warm weather.

For dinner, I decided on something simple but nuitritious: Tomato and Loofah soup with black fungus and sliced lean pork. This soup not only strengthens your digestive system, it also reduces heatiness and counters constipation. Suitable especially during hot weather, or when you eat too much heaty stuff or stays up late at night. Took only 10 minutes to prepare.  Maybe I didn't add enough tomatoes and meat, the soup was not so tasty.....  Anyway,  try it!

Here's the link to the recipe.