Mie Ayam

Growing up in Jakarta held a lot of great memories for me and in particular..numerous food addiction memories. Let's talk about their street food..in every street, any corner, on the street, and yes..under bridges..food stalls are EVERYWHERE. You will never go hungry, or get bored.. Jakarta is notorious for its 2-hour long traffic when the commute (traffic-free) is probably just 20 minutes..Oh yes, this is the lifestyle we have been so in tuned with. It's not all food stalls, but anything from the paper, magazines, viagra, cigarettes by the stick, wooden sculptures, drinks..you name it..they got it.

So you're probably wondering.. I mean, there's an endless supply of food stalls everywhere..you can't possibly try every one? No you can't and there's always this fear at the back of your mind whether any of this stuff is "safe..or clean" to devour. I mean..I'm still here! But then again, my friend T (a tired and full of complaints white man) would say how I, an Indo probably grew up in the village woods and thus exposed to harsh chemicals, pollution, unsanitary conditions, food that isn't organic or "clean" and yes sure..growing up in a third world country isn't always pretty but..fortunately I grew up in a nicer, and safer area with village woods as my playground and guards mending the corners of my home. If anything..I'm glad to have a stomach impervious to anything..except for really really hot chillies which my tongue and tolerance can't hold.

Anyway..before I get too carried away with my past let's get back on track with this title post. Mie Ayam. Mie- Noodles spelled in bahasa, and Ayam- chicken. So technically its Chicken Noodles..chicken and noodles.. Anywhoo..that's the breakdown of mie ayam. It's one of indo's best ever creations..so simple, so good, gosh..it's addictive, I can't stop raving about it..it's just indescribable with one bite. It consists of egg noodles, poached chicken cooked in their secret sauce, boiled choy sum, and bakso (meatballs), and a side of soup. However simple it may be..its always the simplest things that are the hardest to re-create. I'm talking about Bakmi Gaja Mada..yes..for those who know what I'm talking about..good or what!? We always ate it for breakfast, every weekend my siblings and I would crowd around the table with mie ayam and all its condiments, tahu bakso (tofu stuffed meatball) bakso (meatball) , mie ayam jamur (chicken noodles with mushroom) soup, chilli padi (birds eye chillies), and kecap manis...ooh.

It's been a little over a year since I last had mie ayam coiled around my chopsticks and so I had..Haad to make this. And so my adventure began with gathering all necessary ingredients. Wanton noodles..or (Hong Kong style noodles), a whole chicken, chicken bones, scallions, kecap manis, asian shallots (bawang merah), garlic, and jeruk nipis (indonesian lime..a cross between a calamansi and a kaffir lime) I used normal limes since they didn't have it.

The process of making this isn't too difficult, just lengthy and there's a bit of prep work that needs to be done. First you have to harvest extra fat off the chicken, and extra skin (like if you get a whole chicken with the neck then harvest the neck skin) we need this to make chicken oil, which is a key flavorant to many indo dishes. Just drop the chicken fat and skin into a small saucepan and pour in like 2 tbs of water, put it on really low heat and the fat will render slowly and the water will evaporate leaving you with chicken cracklins and clear chicken fat. Secondly, peel lots of garlic and asian shallots, keep them separate, you want to make garlic oil, shallot oil, and fried crispy shallots. With the garlic, all you have to do is mince it and put it in a small pot, pour in about 1-1/2 cups of canola oil and place it on low-med heat..it will slowly heat up and sizzle the garlic, and be sure to watch it..you don't want it to burn.. when it's done you'll get crispy minced garlic and garlic oil! (you can store them together) Now, the shallot oil is a little different..first you have to slice the shallots paper thin..(about 20 shallots), once they're all sliced, fill a small pot with 2-2/12 cups of oil..make sure the oil is about 325 F, we want to fry the shallots till its golden brown and crisp, and the oil leftover is your shallot oil..keep them separately.

With all that prep work done.. we're just halfway there! Trust me..it'll be worth it! Fill up a large pot of water and place it on the stove..(off heat) Fabricate the chicken meat off the bones and place the bones into the cold water..now turn on the heat and bring it to a boil then down to a simmer. Cut all of your chicken meat into small pieces, like 1 inch and half inch pieces..like a very rough dice/mince. Poach the chicken meat into the simmering pot for a good 10-12 minutes. After poaching..shock the chicken pieces in ice cold water and drain. Heat up a saute pan, add a little bit of chicken oil, garlic oil, and shallot oil, once sizzling, throw in the chicken and add in kecap manis, a little bit of the garlic, touch of oyster sauce, fish sauce, sugar, and white pepper. Cook it for about 5 minutes, till the chicken pieces have soaked up all the goodness. Once that's done, its time for the noodles!! It's finally coming to an end!! Bring a pot of water with a pinch of salt to a boil. Drop in the noodles and cook till al dente (to the bite). While waiting for the noodles to cook, assemble your bowl..a tsp of chicken, garlic, and shallot oil, a splash of fish sauce, a pinch of sugar, a dash of white pepper, and a squirt of lime juice. Drain your noodles and throw it into the bowl, mix the noodles thoroughly and top it with the chicken meat, garnish it with a half a lime, and crispy shallots. DONE!

Since I had a lot of the chicken meat leftover from the day before, I made mie ayam jamur as well.. All I did was add straw mushrooms and splashed some mushroom soy in the mix. Equally as good!

So if you're ever in Jakarta..head over to a Bakmi GM.. you'll be hooked instantly! And if you never have the chance I do recommend going to Killiney Road (singapore) and trying the Sarawak Kolo Mee ..it is sooo good too!

Nutella-Cointreau Smore Cupcakes

There's nothing like the rich addictive taste of nutella. Sometimes I just want to slather nutella on everything I devour...(like french fries).. it's really not so bad...sweet..salty.. crunchy..nutty..potatoey..mmm. Alright..I'm not offended if I haven't influenced or converted you yet, but if you ever have the opportunity give it a try.

This cupcake recipe came about after making nutella custard for my nutella ice cream. My friend M had a spiffy kitchen aid ice cream maker collecting dust in the corner so I thought why don't we put it to good use. I began to heat the cream and sugar to a boil, added a little vanilla in there too. In a separate bowl I had 4 egg yolks lightly beaten. I took the hot boiling cream mixture and began pouring in a thin steady stream while whisking into the egg yolks..(this process is called tempering)..if you just dump it into the eggs.. well..unless you like scrambled eggs swimming in sugary cream then there you go..but if you don't then don't forget to temper! Pour in about 1/4 of the cream whisking constantly, then pour the eggy mixture back into the pot of cream, bring it back on the heat and stir until it coats the back of a spoon. At this stage I scooped out about 2 extra-large dollops of nutella..it slowly melted and infused into the cream resulting in a creamy, chocolatey mixture..mm. After all the nutella was incorporated evenly, I took it off the heat and allowed it to cool. Meanwhile I already had my ice cream container freezing frozen solid in the freezer. I set the machine up, plugged it in, placed the container on and poured my nutella custared straight in. After that, cover it and press the magic button and begin to watch it churn away.

Since the container can only take so much.. I had a lot leftover and didn't want any of it to go to waste. And since we were on a cupcake bend that was the only thing I could think of making this with! I added 4 heaping tablespoons of flour, melted chocolate/chocolate chips, and maybe another handful of sugar and eyed the batter for cupcake consistency. I baked them at 350 F for 23 minutes.








They came out amazing. Extremely tender inside and the perfect balance of nutty chocolateyness. And even after 3 days they were still moist and tender. It's really the custard bit that allowed the cupcake to stay moist. I'll probably recreate this again with other ingredients and see how it'll turn out. Anyway, a cupcake isn't a cupcake if it isn't dressed up with a delightful frosting. Since I had a bunch of egg whites leftover I decided to make a marshmallow frosting. I heated up the egg whites with sugar in the kitchen aid mixer bowl..Over a bain marie I whisked the whites until it became frothy, white, and about 160 F. I didn't use a thermometer for this, but I just eyed it. After All the sugar is dissolved, quickly attach it to the stand mixer with a whisk attachment and let it whisk at med-high speed for 3 minutes or until it becomes triple the size, glossy and thick. With no piping bag in hand, I took a ziploc bag, filled it with the marshmallow mixture, snipped a corner and began piping the cupcakes. I caramelized the topping with a butane lighter. Or you could put it under the broiler for a minute or so..but watch it carefully, they will burn almost immediately.

Be my Schmalentine: Cupcake Overload

It's that time of year again the time where people get all mushy and literally everything is in gradient shades of red. Window shopping can be an eye sore with only one continuous shape..a heart. I don't have a huge problem with valentines..its cute..for some people..for me, i'm just happy if I get something chocolatey.

This year I got a reese's peanut butter cup "valentine edition"..I was later surprised with a strikingly red doggy plush toy the morning of. I'm happy to receive but I've always been happier to give. This year M and I decided on surprising our friends with tooth-aching gifts in form of cupcakes..with extra finger-licking frosting.

The obvious was the red velvet.. it being all red and valentiney.. the second was a plain chocolate with nutella frosting and the third was a double chocolate with extra chocolatey chocolate frosting.

don't you just love sprinkleees?

fluffy and light

a little extra chocolate shavings won't hurt

Hope everyone had a fantastic Valentines day!

save the cupcake tops for whoopie pies!

My Kind of Eggs Ben: Homemade Hollandaise and Sweet Cream Biscuits

Waking up in Boston's Chinatown can be a little noisy.. even when i'm on the 21st floor. This morning I was awaken by loud drumming, and the crackle and pop of continuous firecrackers. I watched from above as the lion dancers were ushered in, kicking their heels to wallow up the cabbage and gleefully receiving their hong baos (red packets). My stomach began to grumble after about 15 minutes, I soon realized that I had plastered my face on the glass and left a less than glamourous mark. I quickly searched for any liquid spray cleaner and ended up with some 402 lysol..fearing in the back of my mind that my OCD best friend would catch sight of it..she didn't.. she's always up 2 hours after me anyway.

Anyway..I was still hungry after that minor setback..and there could only be one thing on my mind... eggs. I knew we had everything we needed for a simple breakfast..after all..we had raided whole foods about 3 times this week alone and ended up with 5 trays of eggs, about 10lbs of butter, and of course chocolate milk. But we didn't end up with any form of bread.. or english muffin to be exact.. And it wasn't like I was going to eat my eggs benedict without the muffin!? So plan B came into play.. Biscuits.. They are soo super easy to make and if you cook regularly I assure you that you have all the ingredients at hand.

I made the biscuits first, flour sugar, salt, baking powder, and heavy cream. Mix together, roll it out, cut, and bake! Tender, fluffy, and really..not what you expect from such a short ingredient list. But seriously..these are awesome biscuits!

With the biscuits done, I went on with the egg part of the picture. I brought a medium saucepan with water to a slight simmer and splashed in white vinegar. Dropped the eggs one at a time and let it sat there for 4 minutes. While waiting for the eggs to poach, I decided to make my hollandaise. It isn't difficult to make..just a lot of arm work whisking..oh and also the challenge of multi tasking...cut a stick of butter and melt it in the microwave for about 30 seconds..take it out and let it sit so the milk solids will drop to the bottom and you can skim off the top..(all you want is the clear golden liquid or clarified butter)..bring a saucepan to a simmer (this is for your bain marie..for the hollandaise) in another small saucrepan reduce red wine vinegar and black pepper together..about 3/4 reduced. Strain and pour it into a metal bowl. Seperate 4 egg yolks in with the vinegar and bring it over to the simmering water. Begin whisking, make sure the water isn't boiling rapidly..you dont want your yolks to curdle.. Whisk until the yolks become pale and slightly thick..still whisking, ladle in the clarified butter in a slow and steady stream..the mixture should begin to thicken and double in size after all the butter has been mixed in. Take off the heat and season with salt and a drop of lemon juice, and a dash of cayenne pepper.

During my whisking fiasco, I managed to drain my poached eggs on a paper towel and kept them warm on the stovetop. To assemble my plate, I took a biscuit and halved it. I placed a poached egg on each half, sprinkled some salt and pepper and ladened it with the warm hollandaise, I sprinkled a little more cayenne on top for some kick.

If only I had smoked salmon or gammon ham on me....next time perhaps..

warm, tender, and fluffy biscuits..oh yes

way better than store bought english muffins

there isn't really anything like

watching a poached egg ooze out its

golden yolkyness ..MMMm

Snowy Wonderland: Our dogs in Paradise

Bright blue skies, acres upon acres of century old woods, the clucking and quacking of free-ranging poultry, and the boisterous roar of the one and only...Big Red (the plow truck). Welcome to Tyngsborough, Mass. This is my getaway from the bright lights and rowdy streets of NYC. My friend T grew up in this quaint little town rich with history and only minutes away from New Hampshire.

I decided to bring my dog Dolce along, knowing how much he loved frolicking in the snow..I knew this would be his heaven.

macgyver (left), d (right): "don't even think about it"

Big Red

Angus Macgyver

doesn't he look like those gnomes from the

gnomeo and juliet movie?

dolce hopped through the snow like a bunny

i guess there was something in there?

"wheeeee"