I have been searching for a good spinach dip recipe that is easy and simple, and with the ingredients easily found in my usual fridge stock. I finally found this recipe, which I improvised a little. Kids love this, and they can finish 1 cup in just one sitting. 1 small bunch of spinach (from Jusco, RM1.20 per bunch) can make 2 cups. So, effectively 1 kid ate 1/4 bunch of the spinach, considered a success for those who hate veggie.

INGREDIENTS
1 bunch of spinach
1 tbsp butter or margarine
1 tbsp flour
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 teaspoon onion salt
1/4 tsp lemon juice
1/8 tsp pepper

METHOD
1. Wash spinach, drain and finely chop the spinach
2. Steam the spinach until cooked (will shrink too)
3. Melt butter/margarine in a pan, add flour and stir for a minute.
4. Add in the cooked spinach and other ingredients.
5. Stir to mix well, chilled and serve with taco or tortilla chips (or even celery for a healthier change!)

This is a healthy way of eating spinach. No oil. The miso paste also adds more nutrients. Sesame adds fragrant too! My kids who don’t like vegetables love this dish. I learnt it from one of the health book I bought recently.

INGREDIENT
1 pack of spinach
2 tbsp white sesame
1 tbsp miso paste
1 tbsp Thai chilli sauce (甜辣酱)

METHOD
1. Steam or boil spinach (whole) in work till soft.
2. Drain the spinach, keep some water for the gravy.
3. Cut the spinach into about 2″ length and arrange on plate.
4. Dry-fry white sesame till slightly yellow and fragrant. Crush the sesame slightly.
5. Mix sesame with miso paste and chili sauce. Pour onto the spinach and serve immediately.

Hubby doesn’t like it if I use ready-to-eat tomato pasta sauce, like Prego. Kids love macaroni in tomato sauce, occassionally they also ask for angel hair in tomato sauce as well. I have experimented a few times and found this recipe quite tasty. My kids love it!

INGREDIENTS
10-12 red tomatoes
1 tbsp dried basil
1 tbsp oregano
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1 onion, chopped
3-4 pips of garlic, finely chopped

METHOD
1. Boil a pot of water, scald the tomatoes for a few seconds. Wash in cold water. Then, the skins can be removed easily.
2. Heat some oil in wok, stir fry chopped onion until translucent. Add in garlic and sugar and stir fry a while.
3. Add whole tomatoes, basil, oregano, pepper and salt. Simmer in wok, covered, for about 30 min until tomatoes softened.
4. Mash the tomatoes with spatula.

This gives you the very basic tomato pasta sauce. Can serve hot immediately with cooked macaroni or spaghetti/angel-hair. I like to cook a lot, and keep them frozen for future usage. If frozen, can keep for a few months (but I usually use within 1-2 weeks).

When used on pasta, can add in other ingredients like meat balls, sausage, etc.

The tomatoes can be roasted instead of boiled, which gives more aroma, but I dislike that because it means more consumption of electric. LOL!

The other day when I boiled the Chinese Burdock (Cobo) soup, I used only half of the very large radish. Trying to clear my fridge, I took out whatever ingredients left from previous cooking and made this pot of soup. This can be made vegan if you omit the dried mussels – it tastes equally good (I added because I wanted to eat it!).

Ingredients
1 corn cut into 3 segments
1 medium radish or half a large one, cut into large pieces
1 tomato wedged
2 stalks of celery, cut into chunks
1/2 carrot, cut to chunks
1 pc (150gm) pumpkin sliced
6-8 dried mussels, washed and soaked (can be obmitted to turn this into vegetarian soup)

Method
1. Bring 1.5L water to the boil.
2. Put in all ingredients and bring to the boil again.
3. Turn to low heat and boil for 2 hours.

If you like, you may add some salt to taste, but my family prefers it this way without seasonings. The soup is very tasty with natural sweetness. Again, Isabel gobbled up the corn!

My 2 children, each like different veg. Isabel loves broccoli, and Ian loves spinach. But both of them love these veg for the same reason – they believe these veg can help them to grow tall!

I just want to let them get used to a variety of vegetables, so I have been trying to push for asparagus lately.

This asparagus is similar to the previous stir fry asparagus, with very small differences.

In this one, I used stuffed taopok (豆腐干) instead of the fuchuk. I also used a different seasoning –> nutritional yeast flake.

Nutritional yeast flake is very tasty and yes ‘nutritional’! It is often used as cheese substitute in vegan dishes. I once tried it but didn’t really like the fake cheese. Still prefer the real cheese. LOL!

Anyhow, the use of nutritional yeast here, to substitute salt or other seasoning is surprisingly good. My mom came for dinner and she specifically mentioned this asparagus very tasty.

I read about Burdock somewhere, that it is a ‘heath’ food for Chinese, used to remove toxins from body as well as to prevent cancer. I finally saw it in Tesco, and apparently it is widely sold in the market. I just didn’t pay any attention to it before.

I used it, together with some coriander, pumpkin and carrots, and made this soup. This is a vegan recipe. For more savory or ‘meaty’ result, you may add in chicken or beef chunks.

INGREDIENTS
1/2 stalk burdock (roughly 250g)
4 stalks coriander
600g pumpkin
1 large carrots (or 2 medium)
1 tbsp QiZi (杞子)
4 red dates

METHOD
1. Wash burdock, peel and cut into chunks.
2. wash and drain coriander.
3. Remove pumpkin skin and pith. Cut into chunks.
4. Peel carrot and cut into chunks.
5. Rinse red dates and core. Rinse QiZi.
6. Boil 1.5L water. Put in all ingredients. Boil over high heat for 30 min. Reduce to low heat and continue cooking for 1 hour. Season with salt and serve.

Similar to frying the broccoli, frying asparagus is also very simple. I read that roasting can bring up the aroma even better, and I might try next time.

Anyhow, here is my stir fry asparagus. Children don’t really like this dish because it is harder to chew compared to soft veggie like spinach.

Ingredients
1 bunch of asparagus
4-5 pcs of fuchuk/beancurd
1 tsp of finely chopped garlic

Method
1. Wash asparagus and bend them into approx 2″ sections.
2. If asparagus is big, you might need to peel off the hard outer skins near the root, or would be too rough to chew.
3. Cut fuchuk into halves.
4. Heat oil in wok. Add garlic and stir fry till fragrant.
5. Add in the remaining ingredients. Stir fry for a while.
6. Add in 1 cup of water and simmer with cover for a few minutes.
7. Remove the cover, add in seasoning and fry a few times before serving.

One seasoning that I like for vegetarian dish is the Vegetarian G Powder (素G粉). It is made of soy bean, and tastes better than ajinomoto. Using this makes dishes tastes better than salt!!

Whenever I boil soup using lotus roots, I normally don’t eat it and it is really a waste. I found this cold dish recipe, fully utilizing the ingredients in soup.

When I made this Lotus Root and Mushrooms Soup, when the soup was ready, I removed the cooked lotus root and made it into this delicious cold dish:

My mom came for dinner that night and she was surprised by the aroma and tastiness of the cold dish (she never liked lotus root and turning it into a dish is something that she hates).

Ingredients
About 500g cooked lotus roots from soup
2 slices ginger
1 tbsp fish sauce
3 tbsp vinegar (I prefer apple cider vinegar)
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp sesame oil

Method
1. Slice ginger into shreds, set aside.
2. Cut lotus roots into thin slices. Rinse in cold boiled water and drain.
3. Mix all ingredients together. Serve.

Note: It would be nicer if you can add in 2 red chillies, diced. I don’t do that because my 2 little children can’t take it.

:p I think everyone know how to fry broccoli, so this post is like… err… stating the obvious! But then, I still remember when I first fried broccoli many years ago, I really didn’t know how to handle it! :p

This dish is actually ‘vegetarian’ broccoli. Usually people use prawns or beef/pork fillets to add sweetness, but because I don’t eat these, I added other stuff instead.

Ingredients
1 broccoli
1/2 carrot
1/2 can of button mushrooms
4-5 pcs of fried fuchuk (beancurd)
1 cup of water

Method
1. Wash and cut broccoli into bite sizes.
2. Remove carrot’s skin and slice it.
3. Wash and rinse mushrooms, slice it.
4. Tear fuchuk into halves.
5. Heat oil in wok. Add all ingredients when wok is hot enough.
6. Stir fry for a while. Add in 1 cup of water. Cover wok and simmer for a few minutes.
7. Uncover, stir fry a few times and serve hot.

This is a very easy and cheap, but very refreshing and delicious dish. I like to choose this from mixed-rice-stalls. My friends and I liked to order this when we traveled to China too! You just won’t go wrong with this one.

Recipe
Ingredients
2 medium size tomato
3 eggs
1 pip of garlic
1 tbsp oil for frying
Salt and pepper to taste

Method
1. Remove tomato skin if you don’t like it. Dice the tomatoes.
2. Crush and finely chop garlic.
3. Crush eggs in a bowl, lightly beat, add salt and pepper.
4. Heat oil in wok, saute garlic till fragrant.
5. Add in tomato, stir fry till tomato is soft.
6. Pour in the eggs, keep stir frying till the egg mixture is dry, fragrant and slightly brown.
7. Serve warm.