Vegetable Picking

I feel very blessed to have met Maya...  not only is she great fun, a fabulous cook and excellent company - but her mum is the most amazing gardener, with an incredible plot full of beautiful organic produce!  This weekend Maya invited Rob and me round to her parents' house with a couple of her other friends to pick some of the vegetables that were ripening.  Her parents were actually away, and I was a little worried that they'd come back to find the garden pillaged of all the veg - but when I saw the fabulous (huge!) plot, I could see why they were happy to let people harvest a little...  Maya's mum clearly loves gardening and delights in growing all the produce that the wonderful Brunei climate allows.

Gorgeous orchids.

Rambutan on the trees and vegetable beds everywhere.

Maya introduced us to lots of exciting new plants - in this picture I'm sniffing some garlicky-scented leaves.  Other plants were more familar, and Maya soon had us snipping away with the secateurs:

Lovely fat ears of sweetcorn.

And my favourite - pumpkins (or squash - we couldn't quite decide on which they were!)

Moving round to the OTHER vegetable garden (I said it was huge!) we then found long beans (still teeny!), Australian spinach and ginseng.  There were also aubergines too, but not yet quite ripe for the picking.

 Oh yes, and chillies - LOTS of chillies!  We picked the red ones (birdseye?) and a few of the fiendishly hot orange Scotch Bonnets.

Not edible, but beautiful - Papyrus from Egypt.  I took a stalk to show my class as we've been studying Ancient Egypt!

After a sweaty hour or so in the garden, we all went inside for tea.  In true Maya form it wasn't just a cup of tea of course, but beautiful purple sweet potato pie and delicious dark chocolate and caramelised orange tarts - drool!

Maya has more photos of the day on her blog here, along with a recipe for a ginseng-leaf salad.  I made something similar last night... but that's for the next blog-post!  We're having such fun using our haul of veg.

 We started simply, stir-frying the spinach with garlic and oyster sauce as a side-dish, but have plenty more excitements on the way this week...

Thanks Maya!

Chocolate Potato Chips

A couple of weeks ago I discovered a newly opened shop here in Brunei, Royce' Chocolates.  (No, I have no idea what that apostophe is for either...).  Of course I had to pop and and have a browse and was so amused by the following product that I took a photo on my phone and immediately uploaded it to Facebook:

I pondered whether this was a good idea or not and received many many comments on the photo, veering from 'Try them, they look interesting' to 'Yeuk, they sound horrible' and just 'no no no'!

Well, amongst the Facebook comments was one from Maya who told me that she had several boxes of these from Hari Raya so would bring me one to try!  We were meeting that week for a sushi lunch, and sure enough, Maya very kindly brought along a box of milk chocolate ones for me (they also come in white chocolate and caramel flavours!).

We opened them almost as soon as I got home with them...  and they really are crisps/potato chips (depending on where you come from!) covered in chocolate!

And the verdict?  This was the plate about 30 seconds later:

Despite the bizarreness of the concept, they were actually extremely nice, and fiendishly addictive!  I'm a great fan of the combination of sweet and salty (salted caramel?  Yes please!) and these contained a hint of salty tang which married beautifully with the milk chocolate (which, by the way, was delicious - yes, I know, Asian chocolate that tastes nice?  It does exist!).  I'll be honest, the potato-ness of them is just a little odd, potato isn't usually found in sweet products, but we managed to get over that pretty quickly.

I think I may just have to purchase some of these at some point...  after all, there are 2 other flavours to try!

Bill's Everyday Asian

Bill's Everyday Asian is Australian chef Bill Granger's ninth book, but the first one of his books that I've ever bought.  I'd heard good things about him, that his recipes were light and fresh, that he wrote in a personable and chatty way... and yes, that he was easy on the eye too! Living in South-East Asia as I do, I love to cook and eat Asian food, but sometimes feel that I'm not doing enough of it.  I worry that I'm not taking full advantage of the local ingredients so easily accessible here.  So when a friend recommended this book, I felt it was one that I needed to purchase to provide me with some inspiration that I felt was lacking.

And my verdict?  I'm glad I did!  I've had the book for a couple of weeks now and it's a real pleasure to read.  It's beautifully laid-out with plenty of mouth-watering pictures.  I spent the first week simply browsing through it, filling the pages with post-it notes to indicate my must-try recipes, and in the last week or so I've made no less than 4 meals from it.

The first dish was cooked for pudding on the last night of my parents' visit to Brunei - Banana Batter Cake.  We don't often made desserts any more (it's just not the climate for ribsticking hot puds) but Bill described this as an Asian take on Sticky-Toffee Pudding so I knew I'd have to try it. 

It was one of those self-saucing puddings that seem vaguely sinister when you are preparing it, as the batter is topped with lots of brown sugar and then a cup of water.  It looks as though it will never work, but when it emerges from the oven it has created an amazing caramel sauce.

The pudding is almost clafoutis-like in texture, a dense batter but topped with sliced bananas instead of cherries.  Bill recommends serving it with coconut milk, but we took the easy option and used vanilla ice-cream. 

It was delicious, and I'll definitely be making it again.  Apparently it serves 4, but they must be 4 very greedy people as we got at least 6 portions out of it.

My next meal was made - no cooking involved - as I was feeling the need for a detox.  This may or may not have been related to the Banana Batter Pudding!  The Vietnamese Chicken Salad with Carrot and Mint had immediately struck me as one of the most appealing recipes in the book.  I love Vietnamese food, even more than Thai food I think.  This was almost like a coleslaw, made as it was from sliced chinese leaves, beansprouts and carrot, but pepped up with a zingy Vietnamese dressing of fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, chili, ginger and garlic.  Extra crunch was added with toasted peanuts, and some protein courtesy of shredded chicken breast.  Another important addition is fresh herbs - mint and basil leaves.

This was a mild faff to prepare as it involved lots of chopping, plus the carrot had to be 'pickled' for 20 minutes, but I will definitely be making this again, it was gorgeous.  It wasn't difficult, just a little time-consuming.  Next time I'd be tempted to make a larger amount as it makes a great lunch-dish the following day.

Another salady dish followed later in the week - Chargrilled Chicken Salad with Pineapple and Basil.  I had bought a whole chicken for the previous dish and just used the breasts, so for this dish I used the legs, thighs and wings.  Bill suggests using thigh fillets, but mine seemed the easier option given what I had.  The meat was marinated in fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, oil and turmeric. Bill said to leave it for 15 minutes, but I left mine for 48 hours!  Instead of grilling it as he did with the thigh fillets, I roasted the meat which gave a great crispiness to the skin, and left a fabulous sticky residue in the pan, rich with the flavours of the marinade.

The meat was served  on top of a basil salad garnished with fresh pineapple wedges, and with a chunky cashew nut relish on the side.

Again, this was fresh and zingy, and felt very virtuous!  The pineapple didn't really do it for me I have to say, perhaps because my pineapple wasn't perfectly ripe?  But the chicken was beautiful, tender and very flavoursome.

I'd make it again, but perhaps play with the salad combination a little.  The basil was a great addition.

My final dish was an attempt to use up half a pumpkin that had been languishing in the fridge for several days, so I tried Bill's Butternut Squash with a Sesame Glaze.  This involved boiling the squash/pumpkin in a small amount of water, soy sauce and brown sugar until the squash was tender and the liquid evaporated to a sticky sweet-salty glaze.  It was then sprinkled with toasted sesame seeds.  This was super-easy and tasty, but far too sweet for our liking.  I'd do it again, but with about 1/4 of the sugar in the recipe.  It didn't look beautiful (so no photo!), rather a brown sludge actually as the pumpkin doesn't hold its shape well, but it was a simple supper served with plain rice and some stir-fried, soy-sauce-doused pak choi.

I still have plenty more post-it notes throughout this book, so I know I'll be cooking from it a lot more in the future.

A Weekend of Meeting Important People!

Over 3 weeks after Ramadan ended, and the celebratory month of Hari Raya Aidilfitri continues - these Bruneians sure know how to party!  Last year we had only just arrived in Brunei when Hari Raya was upon us, so we went to relatively few Open Houses, but this year we know lots more people and have therefore had lots more invites to various Open House parties.  It's such a nice tradition.

This weekend we had 2 particularly important ones... 

On Friday night we went to an Open House at the Officers' Mess on Bolkiah Camp.  This was hosted by the female officers who 'live in' at the mess.  It was spectacularly decorated with thousands of fairy lights, and the food was superb - stalls outside serving lamb, satay, kebabs, murtabak, etc, and a selection of curries and sweets inside.  Of course everyone was excited about the special guest, the Sultan himself, who attended with one of his sons.  Here they are, chatting with the hostesses:

After they had done this, the Sultan was invited to sign the guest-book for the evening...  which just happened to be right next to where I was standing!

After this he stood up and started doing the rounds of the room, shaking hands and chatting with the other guests.  He came straight up to the group that I was standing with...  it's amazing how tongue-tied one can suddenly become when the Sultan of Brunei is shaking your hand!!  Thankfully my friends picked up the conversation so I didn't feel too daft.  Now this all happened rather fast, and Rob had wandered off to chat to someone else, so of course he missed the opportunity to take a photo of me and His Majesty.  I was quite cross as I'm always the one who takes photos of other people with the Sultan and no one ever gets a shot of ME (case in point, here's one of Rob on Friday night:)

So just as the Sultan was finishing greeting people, I thrust my camera at Rob and rejoined the hand-shaking line... 

Rob redeemed himself - Success!!  I'm laughing because the Sultan shook my hand then looked at me and said "You again!" - and then did exactly the same to the girl next to me who had also lined up for a second hand-shake!  We told him he had a good memory, and he laughed.  I don't think I've ever had the opportunity to meet one of the British Royal Family face-to-face, but the Royals are much more accessible here in Brunei.  It's a much much smaller country of course, but they are very 'visible', often seen driving around (complete with hoards of motorcycle outriders), and attending public events.

On Saturday we attended another Open House that I was no less excited about - Maya's!  I first met my fellow Brunei food-blogger Maya a couple of weeks ago when she invited me to an Open House at her parents', but this was at her own house.  I was so pleased that Rob could meet Maya, and of course for us both to meet her lovely family (so welcoming!), and of course we were very excited to see her famous new RED kitchen - fabulous, lah?   (NB, 'lah' is the Bruneian equivalent of the Canadian 'eh'!  I'm such a cultural chameleon...!)

Oops, we appear to have adopted our signature 'kawai' pose again!

The food was - need I say it? - fantastic.  Maya's mother-in-law had cooked the savoury dishes which included Soto (a local chicken noodle broth with lots of condiments) and satay.

Rob helping himself to the Soto.

 The desserts were Maya's creations - strawberry-topped chocolate cupcake, mini cheesecakes and tiramisu.  *Yum*

Another sociable and food-filled Brunei weekend!

A Busy Few Weeks

Oops, 19 days since I last wrote on this blog!  I've been chivvied along reminded by Maya that I need to re-enter the 'blog-cave' again, so here I am.

So, what have I been doing in the last 2 and a bit weeks...?

1)  Working.  New class, new Principal, new role (Year Leader), lots of work.  The children are delightful, and just beginning to get into their new classroom routines.  Me too.  But I know that a good start to the year is invaluable so I don't mind spending time on this.

2)  Cleaning.  Because when you're temporarily without an Amah, if you don't clean the kitchen you get ants!  Who knew?!

3) Taking photos of babies.  Our 1-month-old neighbour for a start (and wow, babies are tricky to take photos of - they keep MOVING - hence the sleeping shot!):

But also this baby kingfisher we found in our street last week:

Poor little thing, we think its mother had been killed.  It was looking very lost, and sat here for ages (which at least allowed me to take a photo).

4)  Meeting the local wildlife.  I continue to be delighted and amazed by the wildlife here in Brunei (OK, not the ants.  I could do without wildlife in my kitchen).  This little fellow was lurking outside our door at the weekend:

5)  Pinning.  Have you found Pinterest yet?  It's a website where you can create virtual pinboards of all your favourite things.  Check it out - although be warned, it's totally addictive!

6)  Reading.  I've become mildly obsessed with the Mitford sisters, the eccentric aristocratic family who became notorious in their lifetimes for political reasons, but whose memories live on through their prolific writings - autobiographies, novels and letters.  They're a truly fascinating bunch.  I've been engrossed in this excellent biography, and felt quite miserable when I finally finished it...  so immediately went onto Amazon and ordered a book of letters between Nancy Mitford and Evelyn Waugh - My next Mitford-fix!

7)  Cooking.  This weekend we had a pretty typical Brunei-shopping experience - carefully planning some meals and then discovering that crucial ingredients were nowhere to be found in the shops!  I had decided to make a chilli-con-carne, but there was no mince and no tins of kidney beans.  Correction, there was mince, but it was so fatty as to be almost white (ick!) and there were kidney beans, but they were in syrup (another ick!).  So I ended up making a chilli with diced steak and tins of lima beans instead.  I'm nothing if not adaptable!

I'm looking forward to a bowl of this for supper tonight (with chips and some grated cheddar - naughty but nice!) and then we'll fill the freezer with portions of it.  Over the last couple of weeks we've almost emptied the freezer of the 'ready meals' that we make andkeep for busy weeks, so it's satisfying to restock it.

This isn't actually the recipe I used (I don't usually use a recipe for chilli), but a friend posted it on our forum recently and I have been meaning to give it a try, if only for the name!

Cowboy Chilli

olive oil
1 large onion, diced
1 or 2 red chilies, finely diced
salt
4 cloves garlic, finely diced
2 lb (1 kg) ground beef
6 strips (300 g) bacon, diced
1 x 14 oz (400 g) can of kidney beans, black beans or pinto beans
1 cup (250 ml) barbecue sauce
2 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 teaspoons cayenne pepper (optional if you don’t want it too spicy)
2 teaspoons chili powder
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 x 12 oz (350 ml) beer
grated cheddar cheese, sour cream, diced scallions, tortilla chips, etc., to serve

Heat a splash of olive oil in a large pot over a medium-high heat. Add the onion, chilies and a pinch of salt (to stop the onions from browning) and cook for 10 minutes, or until the onions have softened. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute more. Add the ground beef and bacon and cook until it’s nearly cooked through and browned, stirring occasionally.

Add the remaining ingredients and stir to combine. Bring to a simmer, then lower the heat to keep at a gentle simmer. Cook for 30 minutes to 1 hour – the longer you cook it, the more the flavors will develop – adding more beer or water if the chili starts to look too dry. Serve the chili warm with toppings of your choice.

Meeting Maya

I've mentioned my blog-friend Maya before - she's the one who invented that divine Red  Dragonfruit Ice-Cream.  I can't quite remember how I stumbled upon her blog, but I was immediately captivated by her creativity in the kitchen, her intelligent and witty writing and her luscious photographs... and then I discovered that she actually lives in Brunei!  It's a small place so this was really exciting, and I hoped that one day we might meet.

Well, we just have!

I e.mailed Maya yesterday asking her a couple of foodie questions (where she bought her flower-shaped Polvoron moulds, and where I could purchase Black Sesame Powder in Brunei) and she e.mailed straight back with the answers, and inviting me to a Hari Raya Open House! 

The Open House was actually at her parents' beautiful house on Jalan Muara.  There were hundreds of people there (including a couple that I knew from school - I told you Brunei was a small country!) and there was lots and lots of excellent food. 

Everything was delicious - even the Beef Lung dish...  I'll try most things once, and I'd even eat that again.  There was also Soto, a lovely chicken noodle soup, plus some very tasty homemade biscuits for dessert

Everyone is always so friendly at these events and I chatted to Maya of course, but also some of her lovely friends and family.  One of her relations is the Bruneian Ambassador to Belgium, and he had been to school in Salisbury, my home town.  Small country, small world!

Anyway, Maya was of course a delight, just as fun and friendly as I had known she would be.  We asked her lovely daughter to take a couple of photographs of us together.  "Do a friendly pose!" she said:

And then we just got a bit silly!

Thank you Maya for the invitation - I know we'll meet again soon!

Mango Bread and Butter Pudding

We recently discovered that we have 2 mango trees in our garden!  Now this might seem as though we've been rather unobservant - we've lived here for a year after all - but to be fair to us, it's very hard to actually spot any mangoes on them.  We only noticed when we saw a that the trees were full of monkeys, and small green fruits were raining down into our garden.  On closer inspection we saw that they were unripe mangoes... with lots of monkey teethmarks in them!

However, as soon as we had noted what a mango tree looks like we began seeing them everywhere!  A quick cycle-ride around the Camp just picking up windfalls (plus a few that we managed to pick that weren't too high up) yielded a bowl full of fruit which has been slowly ripening in our kitchen for over a week.

A couple of days ago we got to the point where we really needed to use those which were softening fast.  Coincidentally I had just found 4 slices of sweet sliced bread in our freezer which had clearly been there for most of the year that we have been here, so I devised a recipe that could solve both problems in one delicious stroke.

No, your eyes are not deceiving you, the bread really was a near-luminous yellow colour!  Much of the bread you can buy here is quite sweet (hence my own breadmaking habit) but it's perfect for puddings.

Mango Bread and Butter Pudding

Ingredients

4 slices of bread, buttered liberally on both sides
Flesh of 1 large mango, chopped
1 3/4 cups of milk
1/3 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence

Cut the slices of bread in half diagonally and lay into a buttered dish, overlapping slightly.  Place slivers of mango flesh in between and around them, also tipping in any juice.

In a bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, sugar and vanilla.  If your mango is not terribly sweet then you may wish to increase the sugar to 1/2 a cup, but my mango was intoxicatingly, pungently sweet - on the verge of unpleasantness really - so I didn't feel that much sugar was necessary.

Pour the egg mixture over the bread and mango and leave it to soak in for at least an hour.  I left mine in the fridge for several hours until I was ready to cook it.

About an hour before you want to eat the pudding, place the dish into a large baking tray and fill the tray with boiling water (this is called a bain marie).  Carefully place the whole lot into a preheated oven - 160 degrees C.

Bake for 45 mins - 1 hour.  The pudding is ready when the custard is set to a gentle wobble and the edges of the bread are browned and ever so slightly crisp.

I like my B&B Pudding to be very custardy, but if you don't then just reduce the egg mixture to 2 eggs and 1 1/4 cups of milk.

I also sprinkled a little cinnamon on top of the pudding before I cooked it, but I also thought about using some slivered almonds.  I think it's a very adaptable pud.