Recipes & Cooking
I am lucky that I live in Orange County because I can pretty much get all the ingredients I want at the many ethnic food stores here. Whenever I want to cook Chinese, there is 99 Ranch Market. When I am in the mood for Japanese food, I go to Mitsuwa or Marukai. And when I need ingredients for Malaysian,…
A few weeks ago, when my friend Eat A Duck I Must came to shoot my cookbook promo video for me, I made her a killer pot of Penang Assam laksa. After she left, all the remaining spices had been sitting in my fridge in a dark corner—lemongrass, bird’s eye chilies, galangal, and lime juice. Last week, my market was…
Born and raised in Penang, I am all about sun and warmth. I absolutely dread cold weather and the mere presence of sun lights me up like a glowing stick. I am inherently happier and more cheerful when the sun is out. This month has been mostly cold and wet—lots of rain, cloudy, and yucky. I feel moody when the…
There is an “inner celebrity chef” in me. I always daydream about my “celebrity chef” moments–giving speeches about my cooking and recipes to applauding fans; authoring a series of Rasa “fill-in-the-country-name” cookbooks (starting with Rasa Malaysia, of course); hosting glitzy food schmooze fests attended only by the crème de la crème; looking-and-cooking pretty in the highest rating lifestyle and food…
I told you about clearing out my fridge in my last post, so this is the second installment where I used the leftover lemongrass, shallots, and chicken breasts as the main ingredients. I found this Vietnamese lemongrass chicken recipe on a recent copy of Food & Wine magazine–an article about Vietnamese recipes. I believe this is not the most authentic…
What happens when I try too hard to be out-of-the-box creative in food presentation? You get–without sounding cruel and insensitive–a sea of drowning, struggling, and limping fresh water prawns crying out loud for “HELP!” such as this. Sad, very sad. (Mind you, I am not proud of this shot, but to amuse you, I thought I would share my sin…