Red Hock Chew Wine Residue (Distiller's Grain, by product of Distillation process) 红糟

I am a Chinese, with ancestors from Hock Chew of Hokkien province of China, but born in Singapore. Since young, I very much like the cuisine my mum would cooked up using something what we call 红糟, (Chinese Hanyu Pinyin Hong2 Zao1), translate to English... well... no actually word but a description.

It is actually a distillation by product made from fermenting Chinese glutinous rice, Red Yeast Rice (红麴) and white yeast (the thing you put into the grains to make wine). The result would be wine and also the residue. We, The Hock Chew, uses the residue for many cuisines, one of which is 红糟鸡, chicken cooked in red yeast rice residue.

Here comes the most exciting part, to me :P

The ingredients

1. 5 whole chicken leg - cut into manageable pieces for eating
2. 10 sun dried mushroom - soak over night with warm water. Squeeze dry and remove stem
3. 4 thick sliced of ginger the size of a thumb.
4. 4 peeled garlic clove - crush or flatten it
5. 5 tbsp of Hock Chew red yeast rice residue
6. 5 tbsp of Chinese wine (I use 花雕酒)
7. 2 tsp of Sesame oil
8. 1 tbsp of sugar
9. 1 tbsp of chicken essence powder
10. Salt and light soya sauce to taste

To add some notes. Red yeast rice residue can be a very tricky ingredient for cooking. It is obtained by fermenting process, where the temperature and weather condition and age affects the taste, the amount and the quality. The product maybe a bit too sweet, too sour or bitter at times. The one I had was made by mom about 1 and a half year ago (maybe I will try to post the process of making it) and it is a little sweet. Most of the time, it is a bit sour and bitter (is that what you normally expect from wine? I am not a wine connoisseur, so I couldn't tell you. My taste is from the memories of eating my mom's creation)

The sugar, salt and light soya sauce listed here is what I use to balance the taste. You should find something that is a little sweet and slightly salted and slightly sour. In the end, it is really up to you. My dad and god-father would pour in almost 2 cups of the wine (花雕酒), well.... guys like it that way I guess...

Process:

1. Heat up your wok and about 4 tbsp of oil. When the oil is hot enough, throw in the 4 piece of ginger.

sautéed the ginger until it turn golden brown and dry.

2. Throw in the garlic, sautéed until aromatic.

3. Pour in the red yeast rice residue, stir-fry the mixture for a few seconds. Do not over fried this as it burns very easily.

4. Throw in the chicken, mix it well so that all the pieces are covered by the mixture.

5. Put in the mushroom. I put it in early as I want it to suck up all the good flavours.

6. At this point, you can put in the chicken powder, sugar, light soya sauce and salt. Taste it after every condiment you put in and see if the taste is suitable for you. Do this over medium fire.

7. If you want more gravy, you can put in some of the water from soaking the mushroom. Doing so, you will have to add in more of the condiments to balance the taste.

8. Simmer over low to medium heat for about 15 minutes.

9. End result. Put in the Chinese wine just before you bowl it. If you don't like too much of the alcohol taste, simmer it further for a minute or so.

The variation I cook this time round is more of a dry-gravy type. If you want the soupy style, just add chicken stock (be careful of the saltiness in commercial ready-pack chicken stock).

Other variations of the dish is using pork belly and bamboo shoots. If so, pork belly must be stir-fry before adding the red yeast rice residue. Mom ever cook duck version before, it's just nicer! Do note that duck version will be more oily as duck contains more fats. Remove it if you must.

Bon appétit!

All about cooking Oil (Well, not all, but what we should be concern about)

There are many people who show me face in awe and fear, when I say I use Olive oil to do my stir-fry and sautéed, namely the Chinese cooking method. Some even express concern that I use Coconut oil.

Generally, Coconut oil is being demonise by a lot of Singaporeans while they still savour the delicious Nasi Lemak, where the rice are cooked in Coconut milk. Maybe it is time they should goggle the word "cooking oil" and try to find out about what is good and what is bad. I google it and found a very good table, which shows the different properties of different cooking oil.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2003/10/15/cooking-oil.aspx

Table: Difference of Cooking Oil Properties. Source Mercola.com (Linked above)

The above table shows that Olive Oil is high in Mono-unsaturated and low in Saturated fats. While Coconut oil is on the other end of the scale.

Image from http://coconutoil.com/

When I do deep-frying (some things are still nice when deep fried, no devils about that) I would rather use a healthy saturated cooking oil, as the burning point are high and good properties are releases. I used palm or coconut oil, which both are recommended for deep-frying. This is a very good article about Coconut oil.

As for Olive oil, there are quite a few different grade where each can be used in different situation. Ever heard people around telling you not to use Olive oil for cooking? Yes they are right! But what they should actually be more precise is, do not use those Olive oil with "Extra Virgin" or "Virgin" labeled on them, for cooking. Generally, they are not good when heated up. They'll lose all the antioxidant properties and may release chemicals which increase free-radicals, that harms your body. Generally, those Virgin ladies... I mean Extra virgin or virgin Olive oil should be reserved for food uncooked or serve cold, A.K.A. Salad, or even some sashimi. (wondering anyone pour oil into their raw seafood?)

For cooking, I use only light Olive oil. These wonderful are the last last press (A.K.A. they are squeeze until the very end and what is remain). These should be the one that you can safely used for stir-fry, sauteed etc etc, the Chinese style cooking which I did a lot. Just for your information, I will never buy Olive oil that does not label properly whether they are virgin or not (pun intended ;P ) Example, I came across some that say "Pure Olive Oil". Maybe they want to stress the word pure as some people think some brand are not pure or mixed? You never know.

So there are at least 3 bottle of oil in my house, Light Olive, The Virgin and Da Coconut (I change to palm occasionally, one should never stick to one always, as in food only hor, don't quote that in other places like Relationship etc. etc.. Same good food everyday will turn bad one day, and makes Sam a boring person)

Some people ever asked me, is Sesame oil save for cooking? I am sure if you google, you would find out the answer. Generally, Sesame oil loses it's good properties if heated up badly. I generally dash it on my food after i turn off the fire. Even if i did use it in cooking, it would be the very last item i drop in, before I turn my gas off. I know I know, there are some great dish done by famous chef that stir-fry their beef in sesame oil, it gives great flavour and it's delish, no doubt about it.

Everybody is on smart phone today (at least those I know), why don't we spend some time to find out what we put into our mouth?

The Singapore Seafood Guide

Some time ago, I run into a booth at Tampines Interchange where WWF (Not World Wrestling Foundation, it is World Wide Fund for Nature), a guy gave me a little pamphlets on Singapore Seafood Guide which talks about what seafood is recommended and what is avoidable as there are questions on sustainability on the sea wild life. They also invite me to make a donation, which I did now on a half-yearly basis.

I kind of find it useful. With all the hypes on no Shark's Fin, I think we should also consider further on the type of seafood that we should take care not to make the species of sea wildlife depleted, just like sharks and those endangered species.

The pamphlet is available online from WWF website HERE. Just look for "The Singapore Seafood Guide. This guide tells you what is best for consumption without a threat, what is best consume less and what best to avoid.

Screen Capture of the Web page. Go to Website

We should all do our part, else there would be a day when a child would ask you, "What is Shark?".

My Hokkien/Hock Chew Style "Giam Ben" (Hokkien, translated to Salty Rice, Flavour Rice)

Mom used to cook this very often when she runs out of idea on what's for Lunch/dinner/supper etc etc. I kind of like this as, to me, it is simply delicious and simple.

Ingredients:
4 Chicken Drum stick
1 Mustard Vegetable 芥菜(Taiwanese would call it 常年菜)
5 Dry mushroom sliced to strip (after soaking in water for 2 hours, squeezed dry)
1 Handful of dried Shrimp (soak in water for 1 hour)
2 cup of rice (washed, soak in mushroom water)
Some minced Garlic
Oyster sauce
Dark soya sauce
Chicken Stock 1 cup

1. Start fire, heated wok with cold oil. Add minced garlic and fried till golden.

2. Add dried shrimp and fried till aroma releases.

3. Add mushroom, stir fry till aroma releases.

4. Add chicken, stir fry till surface shrink a bit. 

Then add a spatule of oyster sauce and mix well.

5. Add mustard vegetable (don't cut it too small). Mixed well.

6. Add 1 cup of chicken stock, 1/2 cup of water. 

Pour in the mushroom water soaked rice. 

Stir well for about 5 minutes. 

Then add a spoon of dark soya sauce. 

Note that this is to add colour, not saltiness, so choose those that is not so salty one.

7. Throw in 2 spoon of deep fried onion and stir well. Then pour the mixture into a steam pan.

8. Steam the mixture for about 30-45 minutes to an hour. 

Try the rice to see if you like the softness every 15 minutes 

so you don't over cook the rice an make it too soft for your liking.

9. I use a round cover, so that steam will cool and roll down the side and not fall into the mixture. 

That would make your mixture too wet. 

I cover with a very wet cloth to condense the steam underneath the cover.

10. End result. Serve with chilly and more deep fried onions and pepper. 

(Chilli is easily make, just grind Garlic, Ginger and Chilly Padi in this proportion, 

1-1-1.5 bowl, add soya sauce to taste. Add lime or lemon to add flavour)

There are a few variations which mom ever cook before.

1. Change chicken to pork belly
2. Change Mustard Vegetable to Cabbage (高丽菜）