A Laksa is a curry noodle soup found in Malaysia and Indonesia. Typically some of the noodles are rice noodles, others are egg noodles. The following variant is one that I made last week. Traditionally each household would make a laksa paste following their own reciepe. I tend to rely on a commercial brand of laksa paste. I also tend to use soba (buckwheat) noodles.

Serves 4

200g of fresh oily fish eg tuna, salmon, rainbow trout.

100g of frozen raw peeled prawns

100g of frozen scallops with roe

1 can coconut milk

3-5 table spoons of Laksa paste

1 can of mixed asian vegetables:

• bean sprouts
• bamboo shoots
• water chestnuts
• baby corn

Cauliflower

90g soba noodles

(more…)

Stock is an ingredient in soups, risottos, stews and many other dishes. There are also instances where boiling in stock rather than water will add more flavour. This is the first of a series of three posts about stock. Making stock is not very hard, only requires time, and adds more flavour to dishes than comercial stocks. In addition to basic stocks such as vegetable, chicken and fish, there are stocks which belong to specific cusines. Japanese Dashi is a form of fish stock and comes in two grades. Chinese Master Stock is a traditional stock that does not fit neatly into any one category.

(more…)

Why grain length matters

Dishes from all over the world use rice as their key ingredient.  Rice comes in different grain lengths. eg. Jasmine rice is a long grain rice. Different grain lengths are used for different dishs determined by the nature of the grain first and the cultural orgin of the dish second.

(more…)

Food for Thought has moved to http://anitamorris.net/food/ Please update your bookmarks. The redirect will stay live until August 13.

Mulled Wine was a medieval favourite and is still a great drink for a festive occasion. Christmas, last year, was so cold in Melbourne that I served it to my family. It tastes delicious and has less alcohol content than red wine because the alcoholic content is reduced in the cooking process. The spice mix may be adapted to taste. Some people prefer to use enough cloves to turn the mouth numb. I prefer to avoid that.

(more…)

Everyone has foods that they eat everyday. Mine include porridge, sandwiches, and dinner. These foods that you eat everyday are the basis of stocking a kitchen. The ingredients of these foods are the first things you should have on hand. Therefore the first foods and ingredients I keep on hand are quick oats, UHT milk, a loaf of bread, and one serve of a home cooked meal in the freezer. To work out what your basics are make a list of the foods you eat everyday and then list the ingredients of each.
(more…)

Celebrity chefs agree, from Gordon Ramsay to Heston Blumenthal, that the best tasting ingredients come from shopping locally and buying organic produce. Sarah Spock has recently written on the health benefits of buying local organic produce.

To quote one of my friends, “Cooking is an Art, Baking is a Science”. For this reason recipes serve as inspiration to me. A recipe is not a set of rules, it is more guidelines. Recipes is not what cooking is about for me. On the other hand recipes form a large part of conventional food writing, so I will post one occasionally.

Serves 1

Ingredients:

• 50 g of butter
• 1 heaped tsp of crushed garlic
• 1/4 tsp mild curry powder
• 70 ml pure unthickened cream
• 1 can of crab meat
• chopped spring onions to taste
• pinch of grated parmesan
• pasta

(more…)

I am teaching myself how to cook homestyle Japanese food. A typical Japanese meal has soup, a serve of fish or meat, and at least two side dishes. Each of these is served in its own small bowl or plate. There are exceptions to this such as when noodles are being served.

In the past when I have made Japanese food at home it has been yakisoba and teriyaki chicken. This time I attempted a different combination. I was making miso soup, udofu, teriyaki salmon, broccoli rolled in seasame seeds and rice.

(more…)