The Food Canon

This is a simple cheap grain-fed sirloin steak bought from a nearby supermart

Should you try Sous Vide cooking at home?

If you, like me, cook regularly, my answer is most definitely yes.

For those who are new to this rather mysterious-sounding cooking technique, I will give an overview here.

Sous Vide is basically about placing food in a vacuumed pack and then cooking it in a water bath at a precisely controlled constant and gentle temperature. 

This way of cooking is not new. For centuries, Chinese cooks have wrapped glutinous dumplings (rice with mushroom and meat) in lotus leafs to retain moisture, add and mix flavours, and steam it. Malays have long known that one of the best ways to eat fish is to "pangang" it: wrap the fish in a banana leaf and cook it slowly on charcoal fire.

Some think that SV is boiling food. On the contrary, it is about controlling the temperature; this technique hardly needs heat near the boiling point. It is more akin to poaching and slow cooking at low temperatures. Cooks have have long known that slow-cooking produces great results.

This post continues my diary on my experiments with Sous Vide (SV) cooking at home.

A piece of chicken breast does seem easy to cook. It is easy to debone and it looks like it is made for the pan due to the neat shape of the fillet. It cooks faster than thigh meat.

However, many prefer thigh as breast meat can be 'dry'. It can be difficult to get it "just right": tender, moist, flavorful and not over-cooking it. If a piece of chicken can retain its juice, the flavour is better.

Vacuum-packed boneless chicken breast

This is where Sous Vide can help. Vacuum-pack it and put it in a water bath for 25 minutes at 63°C. And like some of my family members will say, it is the best chicken breast they have ever eaten.

Let me get down to the recipe. I will first describe the methods and then lay out a summarised verison of the recipe in table form.

Purchase a good quality chicken boneless breast meat, skin-on. Some at supermarkets or specialty stores like Hubers will vacuum pack for you. Some will even add a few sprigs of fresh thyme if you ask.

Now, you can also vacuum pack it at home with the meat you purchased from the wet market. One advantage of vacuum packing it yourself is that you can add stuffing and other flavours to the meat.   

With Cantonese style soy sauce based sauce

Sis, this is for you

My sister called me up from KL and asked me to post up something on steamed fish.

She was quite excited with my food blog, especially the way Mum's recipes are now easily accessible.

Steaming is probably the easiest way to cook fish and the best way to eat it, especially if it is eaten whole.

This way of doing fish is something normally associated with Chinese cooking. It is a great way of showcasing a good piece of fish in all its glory - head, body, colour and texture. It is a regular dinner feature in many Chinese homes.

In Chinese restaurants, live fish will go from the tank to the steamer and then, the table. Some of them can be very expensive. You may have heard of the rather controversially priced Sultan fish. I have eaten it once before. It is fantastic eaten steamed (and this is the best way to cook this boney and succulent fish) but I wouldn't pay a thousand dollars for it.    

Warning: This article is groaner's territory

This post has been on draft for many months. So, here it is finally.

Reliable sauces are so important. In this day and age, when there are so many competing claims, you need to make good choices. I trust this post is a reliable source for reliable sauces. (I warned you...)

Here is my list:

Loh Mai Kai. 

It has been a long time since I had a good one. It was my childhood favourite. The Siew Pau stall sold this. He will move the stacks of bamboo steamers around to get to the Loh Mai Kai bowls. Then, scooped out of shallow aluminum bowls, it was served on a plastic plate with chili sauce. Memories.

It is nothing like that sold in aluminum foiled dishes in many coffeeshops here, with a cardboard stuck on the top carrying the brand and name of the supplier. Outsourcing. Clearly, convenience has triumphed once again over effort and passion when it comes to cooking.

This is why I am intrigued by stories such as this on Muah Chee scooped by Ieat here. There are some who still believe that food should be done well even if most customers don't care.

I wish I could tell you that what you see above is bought from somewhere here in Singapore. And I am happy to know if you have some "lobang." (tips).

My Mum made fabulous glutinous rice ("Loh Mai Fun") and this was one of her regular contributions to church potluck breakfast gatherings.

She will labor on it in her wok, working on it constantly with her 'wok chan' and adding water occasionally till it iscooked to perfection. It was hard work. She did not like to use the regular steaming methods. Those who have experienced cooking glutinous rice will understand why. She wanted the rice to be fluffy and separated, not in gluey wet blobs or clumpy.

The latter can dislodge your dentures.

It is notoriously difficult to achieve some consistency using regular steaming methods. This is especially so when you are making a large batch. Some parts will end up too soggy/sticky or under-cooked. And what happens most times is that the rice will end up being overcooked as no one likes bits of it which are still hard.