Vietnamese Fresh Spring Rolls

Keeping to Vietnamese theme for the week, I made Pork Banh Mi for breakfast and spring rolls for dinner.

Make 10 rolls

Recipe:

• Round rice paper wrappers
• Some fresh mint leaves
• Whatever you will like to eat for my case: 
• 10 Cooked Tiger prawns, peeled and sliced half lengthwise 
• Lettuce, carrots 
• 5 Crab stick
• Some Fresh basil and Cilantro
• Chop peanuts to go with the sauce

Steps:

1. Soften the rice papers using warm water. It will soften very fast just dip and remove
2. Lay rice on large plate and place your choice of fillings and wrap 
3. Then enjoy :)

Avocado egg mayonnaise

What to do with the left over Baguette from making Banh Mi? Avocado egg mayo toast! I made this the next morning :D

Recipe:

• 1 Avocado
• 2 hard boiled eggs
• 1 tbsp spring onion (finely chop)
• 2 tbsp Japanese mayo
• salt to taste

Steps:

Just mix everything together and spread on preferred choice of toasted bread.

Pork Banh Mi

We like Vietnamese food, so I have decided to cook up some at home. Recipe adapted from Sharon Lam 

Recipe:

• 300g shabu shabu type pork
• 2 clovers garlic, minced
• 1 stalk lemongrass, ends finely minced 
• 2 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tbsp minced fresh basil 
• Pepper to taste
• 1 tbsp oil 
• Foot long Baguette
• 1/2 cup cilantro
• 1/2 cucumber, thinly sliced 
• Butter, for the Baguette (optional)
• Prepared pickled radish and carrot
• Chilli (optional)

Pickled Radish and carrot:

• 1 cup julienne daikon radish
• 1/2 julienne carrot
• 1/4 cup vinegar
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• (Mix everything together ad chill for at least 3 hrs)

Steps:

1. Mix meat, lemongrass, basil, garlic, fish sauce and pepper. Marinate for at least 30mins

2. Heat pan with oil and stir-fry the meat till cook

3. Split the Baguette and butter the inside

4. Build the Banh Mi: Cucumber, pork, pickled radish and carrot, chilli and cilantro

Lemon roast chicken

Frozen chicken was on sales last week so decided to make roast whole chicken. It's a small chicken about 500g.

Recipe:

• 1 small chicken
• 3 lemons
• 3 tsp salt
• Black pepper
• 1 tsp dry rosemary 
• Honey to glaze with 
• 2 Tbsp olive oli
• 1 carrot
• 1 yellow onion 

Steps:

1. Wash and dry the chicken then rub chicken with 2 tsp of salt around the surface of the chicken. 

2. Place the chicken into a ziplock bag and add juice of 2 lemons.

3. Put in fridge to marinade for at least 3 hours or overnight.

4. Preheat oven @ 180c (fan mode).

5. Cut up carrot and onion, coat with 1 tbsp of olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Place on the side of the roasting pan.

6. Remove chicken from bag and pat dry with paper towels.

7. Rub olive oil all over the chicken skin.

8. Sprinkle salt and pepper on and inside the chicken. Sprinkle rosemary inside the chicken.

9. Place 1 lemon (cut into wedges) inside cavity of the chicken

10. Roast for 20mins and lower the heat to 150c and roast for another 40mins

11. The last 10mins glaze chicken with honey

12. Remove chicken from oven and let it rest for 15mins 

Note: Keep the drippings from the roasting pan as gravy

I find that roasting a whole chicken takes up too much time. Likely I will cut the chicken and roast it flat the next time. Also I will be more generous with my glaze. 

We didn't finish the chicken for dinner as I decided to keep the chicken breast meat for our breakfast the next morning. So we had roast chicken sandwich the next day :) 

Banana choco and Passion Fruit Muffins

My mom like the Blueberries Muffins so she requested for more muffins. As I don't have any more berries, I made do with whatever I have currently.

2 frozen banana

some frozen passion fruit

some choco chips

I use the same recipe with some small changes:

• 350g flour
• 1 tsp banking soda
• 1 and a half tsp banking power 
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 130 brown sugar
• 100g melted butter
• 1 egg
• 200g yogurt (The yogurt I got is pack in 200ml packages) + 50g water or milk
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Steps:

1. Mix flour, salt, baking power and baking soda together
2. Cut up the bananas into small pieces (I didn't mesh them as I like to taste bigger pieces of the banana)
3. Strain passion fruit to remove the seeds. Keep the seeds as topping.
4. Wisk butter, sugar, vanilla, egg and yogurt. 
5. Mix dry and wet ingredients till almost combined (Over mix will result in tough muffins)
6. Mix half the cake mixture with the banana and choco chips. 
7. Mix the rest of the cake mix with the strain passion fruit.
8. Fill the liners 3/4 full. Top with brown sugar for the banana choco muffins and passion fruit seeds for the passion fruit muffins
9. Bake 160c (fan mode) 20 mins 

The passion fruit muffins smell amazing!!!