No-Frills Recipes ... cooking, baking & excerpts on travel

This chicken dish has a unique flavour from the galangal root.  The tender and juicy chicken meat is fried with a mixture of chopped galangal root, young ginger and shallots with soy sauce to taste.   Lengkuas or  Galangal is a tuberous root with a tough skin, slightly pinkish in colour and can be used with skin intact.  If galangal is difficult to find, ginger can be a substitute. Galangal Braised Chicken   ~   藍姜燜雞     Ingredients 300 gm whole chicken leg cut into bite size 50 gm young ginger, chopped 10 gm galangal finely chopped 8 to 10 shallots, finely chopped 1 Tbsp light soy sauce 1/4 tsp salt to season the chicken 2 tsp Shaoxing wine to drizzle Method Wash the chicken, pat dry and season with salt.  Set aside. In a wok saute the shallots, galangal and young ginger with some oil till fragrant. Add in the chicken and shallow fry.  Cover the wok and let it simmer for about 15 mins. Test for doneness and fine tun...

  This dark chocolate chip pound cake is soft and spongy with a tender texture.  As I used 70% cocoa Lindt dark chocolate, the cake is not too sweet and the slight bitterness of the dark chocolate complements well with the sweetness of the cake.  This cake has a combination of butter, oil and buttermilk hence it gives a better crumb and not heavy.  The oil keeps it moist and fluffy.  Enjoy it with a cup of hot coffee or tea. Dark Chocolate Chip Cake  黑巧克力蛋糕 Ingredients 210 gm plain flour 1.1/2 tsp baking powder 55 gm unsalted butter 1/4 cup or 60 ml vegetable oil 130 gm caster sugar 2 'L' eggs 1 tsp vanilla 180 ml buttermilk 100 gm dark chocolate or semi-sweet chocolate buttons 1/4 Tbsp vinegar to make buttermilk Pinch of salt Method Prepare and line a 8.5 x 4.5 inch loaf pan, set aside. Pour milk and vinegar into a measuring cup to get 180 ml buttermilk, give it a stir and keep refrigerated. Sift the plain flour, baking powder and salt, set aside. Bre...