Vanilla Ice Cream

Homemade ice cream... is a lot of fun (usually).. and does seem to taste a lot better than the frozen stuff from your local deli. This recipe from David Lebovitz is definitely one of the better ones I've tried out. The resulting ice cream is rich in vanilla and very creamy. Just try to forget you have to use 2 cups of pure cream ... :)

Vanilla Ice Cream
recipe adapted from David Lebovitz's Book ~ The Perfect Scoop

• 1 cup full cream milk
• A pinch of salt
• 3/4 cups sugar
• 1 vanilla bean (split lengthwise into two, seeds scraped out)
• 6 egg yolks
• 2 cups pure cream (separated into 2x 1 cups)
• 3/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract

--- Ice for an 'ice bath'

1. Warm the milk, salt, and sugar in a saucepan. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape the seeds out with the tip of a paring knife and set aside. Add the bean pod to the milk. Continue to simmer on the lowest heat setting.


2. In a separate mixing bowl, pour 1 cup of the pure cream and add the vanilla bean seeds into the cream. Whisk the cream a couple of times to break up the seeds and place into an ice bath, then set aside.


3. Once the sugar has melted, add in the remaining 1 cup of pure cream, continue to stir to combine the cream and milk. Then cover and remove from heat and let it sit at room temperature for about 30 mins.


4. Stir together the egg yolks in a bowl and gradually add some of the warmed milk, stirring constantly as you pour. Pour the warmed yolks and milk mixture back into the saucepan.


5. Cooking over a low heat, stir constantly and scraping the bottom with a heat-resistant spatula until the custard thickens enough to coat the spatula. Strain the custard into the pure cream with vanilla seeds that was set aside previously in the ice bath.


6. Rinse the vanilla bean and put it back into the custard and cream to continue steeping.


7. Add vanilla extract, and keep on stirring the mixture over the ice bath until it has cooled.


8. Once the mixture has cooled completely, cover with glad wrap and place into the refrigerator. David Lebovitz recommends to leave this as long as possible (ie. overnight). I usually leave it until I'm ready for it to be placed into the ice cream maker. (ie. when I feel like wanting to eat ice cream).


9. When it has chilled thoroughly, remove the vanilla bean and freeze the mixture in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturers instructions.

Makes about 1 litre of ice cream.

Thai Red Curry

I'm not a big fan of using pre-made pastes or sauces. Firstly, because of the presence of preservatives and additional colourings usually found in these pre-made sauces. Secondly, because of the amount of MSG present.

MSG = Monosodium Glutamate => very dry mouth => red skin rash => :((((

Making Thai red curry from scratch isn't actually that time consuming. The paste base can actually be done beforehand and kept in the fridge in an airtight container for up to two weeks, or in the freezer for up to 3 months. The red curry paste can be paired with beef, chicken, most seafoods and vegetables. You can use a pestle mortar to make the paste, but I take it as a sign for me to put my Magimix food processor to good use.

Red Curry Base Spice Paste:

• 5 dried red chillies
• 5 cloves garlic
• 5 shallots (Try to get the small redish\purple coloured shallots)
• 1 thumbsize piece galangal (thinly sliced)
• 1 stalk lemongrass (use the bottom 10cm, inner white part - smashed, then thinly sliced)
• zest of 1 lime (grated)
• 3 Coriander stalks (bottom ~5cm of stalks)
• 1 tablespoon coriander seed
• 1 teaspoon cardamon seeds (seeds removed from husks)
• 1 teaspoon cumin seed
• 1 teaspoon white peppercorns (black peppercorns can be substituted)
• 1 teaspoon Shrimp paste (Thai version preferred)

Over a hot pan, lightly toss and toast together the coriander seeds, cardamon, cumin and peppercorns until the aroma is released. This step also helps to bring out the flavours in the spices.

Pour all the ingredients into the food processor and pulse until everything has broken down and blended together. This should make enough base paste for about 5-6 serves. With about 2 tablespoons used per red curry. When using the spice paste, just fry in equal amount of peanut oil to release the flavour.

It does look like a lot of difference spices and ingredients are being used. But once you are able to source all the ingredients, the cooking part is actually quite easy. Thai curry is different to cooking other curries, where you don't actually need to simmer the curry over a long period of time (atleast I don't find that I need to).

I still like to add more fresh lemongrass, shallots and galangal to the curry on top of the spice paste. I also find that with my red curry, I usually end up with a curry that has a lot more vegetables present than meat. I also tend to like eating the vegetables more as it tends to absorb the flavours of the spice and curry sauce better.

Red Curry Chicken with Mix Vegetables

• 2 tablespoons peanut oil
• 2 tablespoon red curry paste
• 3 shallots (chopped into quarters)
• 3 whole dried chillies (optional - use less if you prefer a milder curry)
• 1 stalk lemongrass (thinly sliced diagonally)
• 1 thumbsize galangal (thinly sliced)
• 5 kaffir lime leaves (torn in half)
• Mix vegetables - see section below...
• sawtooth coriander (if substituting with chinese coriander add this around the end)
• 500g coconut milk
• 300g chicken thigh meat (skin removed, sliced into strips)
• 3 tablespoons fish sauce
• 1 tablespoon palm sugar
• juice 1 lime (kaffir lime preferred)

Mix vegetables - I usually add in a selection of the following (about a handful each):

• canned longan fruit <-- used to enhance the sweetness in the curry
• Thai green round eggplant (preferred, but purple eggplant can be substituted)
• Okra (a.k.a Ladies fingers)
• canned bamboo shoots
• fresh oyster mushrooms
• zucchini (sliced in chunks)

This list is a guide only, you can use any types of vegetables that you may have available. The veggies in the list are also what I've found to soak up the curry sauce better.

The canned longan fruit is easily sourced from any supermarket. Try to get the non-sweetened syrup version. The sweetness in the longan fruit actually helps soften the hotness of the chilli in the curry.

Method:

1. In a medium-hot wok, add peanut oil then the two tablespoons of the previously prepared red curry spice mix. Fry the spice paste for a couple of seconds, then add in the chopped shallots, dry chilli, lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime leaves.
2. Add in the mixed vegetables & sawtooth coriander. Stirfry the veggies around with the spice paste and the other fresh spices for about a minute. The veggies are added in earlier to try to soften them first, as they do require to be cooked longer than the chicken.
3. Pour in the coconut milk. Stir the contents around, making sure the coconut milk has combined with the spice paste. Bring up the heat until the coconut milk starts to simmer.
4. Add in the chicken strips. Season with fish sauce and the palm sugar. Keep the curry on a slow simmer. Keep stirring the curry around, make sure the chicken pieces has cooked.
5. Squeeze in the juice of one lime.
6. Taste the curry, if its not salty enough, add in more fish sauce. If its not sour enough then add in more lime juice. If its too sour, then add in more palm sugar.
7. Let simmer for a couple more minutes then serve with some steam rice.

Notes:

• If using Okra (Ladies fingers), make sure they have cooked thoroughly.
• Sawtooth coriander is a Thai style herb. Chinese coriander can be used instead. Put these in at the end, if you are using chinese coriander.
  

Steam Scallops with Garlic & Glass Noodles

Glass noodles .. vermicelli noodles or green bean thread noodles is what I've heard these noodles been called before. They can be found in most Asian grocery stores and are really easy to prepare. All you have to do is to soak the dried noodles in some cold water until they soften and turn kinda limp when you try to pick them up with chopsticks. This should take about 8-10 mins.

In my last few posts, I did mention I was trying to get my hands on some fresh scallops still on the shell. Well, it took a trip to the Fish Market in Sydney to be able to source some. And at $1.50 each, they weren't exactly too expensive.

I also tried a different take on the fresh garlic this time. Instead of adding light soy sauce to the garlic in the beginning, I decided to just drizzle the light soy over the scallops after steaming but before the hot oil went on.

Steam Scallops with Garlic & Glass Noodles

• 1/2 dozen fresh scallops on shell (quickly rinse through water to ensure there's no sand)
• 1 packet Glass Noodles (soaked in cold water for about 8-10 mins)
• 6 cloves of garlic (finely chopped)
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• freshly grounded salt
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil

While the noodles are soaking, place the chopped up garlic into a china bowl (or something that is not reactive to hot oil). Add sugar and a couple of grinds of salt to the garlic, and mix it together with a spoon. Heat up the oil in a separate saucepan until its starts to steam. Pour the hot oil onto the garlic mixture. This should immediate cook the garlic. This part is really done to make sure the garlic is cooked, as the time required to be able to steam the scallops is not enough to make sure the garlic is cooked also. And I don't think anyone wants to have a mouthful of raw garlic...

Bring water in a wok to boil to be used as a steamer.

Arrange scallops on a plate to place into the steamer. Drain the glass noodles, then split them between the scallops. Arrange it so the glass noodle covers the raw scallops. Spoon a teaspoon of the garlic on top of the noodles. Once the water has boiled, place the plate of scallops into the wok to steam on medium heat. Turn the heat off after 3 mins, and leave the lid of the wok off. Sprinkle the following toppings onto the scallops (all except for the oil).

Toppings:

• 1 stalk chinese green onion (thinly sliced diagonally)
• 12 coriander leaves (handpicked)
• light soy sauce - enough for drizzling over the scallops
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil

Doing the same as before, heat the oil until you can see steam coming off the saucepan. Carefully drizzle the oil over the green onion slices and coriander leaves. The heat from the oil should immediately cook the greens and release the fragrance from these herbs.

Serve immediately.


Notes:

• I tried omitting the last drizzle of heated oil, but it just doesn't taste the same. After all, Chinese food is supposed to be rather oily.... :)