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

Breastfeeding mothers need a healthy diet and breastfeeding makes many mothers extra thirsty and therefore drinking a lot of fluids help to prevent dehydration.  Fluid intake is associated with breast milk production and green papaya is one of the nutritious fruit that can be used in a soup or in salads. That said, consuming green papaya helps to increase the production of oxytocin which ultimately increases the production of milk. Green papaya snow fungus pork rib soup ~ 青木瓜雪耳猪骨汤 (坐月汤) Ingredients 800 gm green papaya, remove skin and seeds 15 gm snow fungus, soak till it plumps up, snip off the hard ends 450 gm pork ribs 12 seedless red dates 2.1/2 lt water 1/2 tsp crushed pepper corns seasalt to taste Method Peel off the skin from the green papaya, remove the seeds and cut into wedges. Blanch the pork ribs in a pot of boiling water, rinse well. In a pot, bring the water to a boil, add in the red dates, peppercorn and pork ribs.  Let it si...

  This is a very simple and homely dish which I tasted during my recent trip to Beijing.  It was done without onions but I added in some to enhance the taste.  This was well received as it was light and refreshing with the added crunch from the cloud ears and not so oily as the other dishes which we had. Recipe for Stir-fry eggs with cloud ears and onions Ingredients 10 gm cloud ears in its dried state, soaked, stemmed and cut 2 eggs lightly beaten + some salt and pepper 1 onion, sliced Drizzle of light soya sauce Method Lightly beat up the eggs and add in some salt and pepper. Heat up some oil in a wok, stir-fry the onions for a while, dish out. Toss in some cloud ears, stir-fry.  Push the cloud ears aside and pour in the eggs, give it a quick stir and mix with the cloud ears. Toss in the pre-fried onions, add a drizzle of light soya sauce and mix well. Dish out and serve immediately.

I seem to have developed a fond liking for woodear fungus and here's another dish that I cooked recently.  A simple, quick and easy dish with chicken.  I just made a soup and some salad and dinner is ready! Recipe for Braised Chicken with Woodear Fungus Ingredients 600 gm chicken, cut into bite size 10 gm dried woodear fungus, soaked, stemmed and cut into strips 3 pips of garlic, chopped 1 Tbsp oyster sauce 1/4 tsp salt 1/2 tsp sugar 1 tsp light soya sauce 1 tsp dark soya sauce 2 tsp Shiaoxing wine Method Marinate the chicken pieces for half an hour with the above sauces and sugar. Heat up a wok with some oil, throw in the chopped garlic, stir-fry till fragrant. Stir-fry the marinated chicken pieces for a while, then add in the woodear strips. Add in 1 cup water, once it boils, cover the wok and let it simmer on medium fire till chicken is cooked through. Fine tune to desired taste, add in the wine, turn off heat, dish out. Serve immediatel...

T his sweet soup or 'tong sui' of snow fungus, preserved dates, liquorice and ginseng roots  is a saviour these days because of the crazy hot weather.  Not only is this easy to prepare its taste is fabulous too.  A good idea to have a bowl of dessert to cool us down in this sweltering heat and this can be taken both warm or chilled.

This steamed chicken dish is very easy and quick to prepare and minimum effort is needed to get this served on the dining table.  For those who have no inkling of what 'foo yue' is ..... it's fermented beancurd or sometimes people refer to it as Chinese cheese.   It has a pungent aroma and cheesy flavour.  Fermented beancurd comes in two colours, red and white.   The former is  usually cooked with meat while the latter is normally used to flavour vegetable dishes.

This is one simple recipe of  steamed chicken dish which I'm sure many bloggers have blogged before.  Tasty yet easy and quick to prepare, this dish pairs very well with steamy hot white rice.

This cooling and refreshing dessert soup is what we need to cool down our system in this current hot, humid, hazy weather........'Sea coconut with snow fungus sweet soup'.  This 'tong sui' or 'leong sui' is easy to prepare and also tastes fabulous both taken warm or chilled.

This is another chicken dish with preserved bean curd ~ Foo Yue.  A country style chicken dish, simple to prepare which I'm sure most of you would have made this in one way or another.  You can click  here   to view the other chicken post  using foo yue as well.

This is truly an original recipe as I just whipped it up with whatever I have on hand and one of the ingredients is foo chook or beancurd sticks which is my favourite.

Snow Fungus, 'Suet yee' in Cantonese ...... Tremella fuciformis and other names like Silver Tree, ear fungus, white muer, are wobbly fungus commonly found on various types of trees especially in Asian countries and other warmer climates worldwide.  The name is probably derived from its white pale colour and more or less ball shape. There are 2 types of this edible fungus, one is crunchy and the other is jelly-like, a 'poor' man's substitute of Birds Nest!  The superior quality is light yellowish.  It's tasteless, almost transparent, enjoyed for its jelly-like texture in savoury soups or desserts and also for its supposed medicinal benefits. Snow fungus contains iron, vitamin C, calcium, phospherous and the gum like proten in it is especially nourishing to the body.  It's supposed to lower cholesterol, fight inflammation, cure dry cough, may slow the aging process, helps strengthen the respiratory system and help prevent cold.  A word of caution, take it...