What's cooking?

Since my mom is away, and I am the earliest to come home from work so automatically I'm the one who's doing all the cooking. By the time my sisters come home from work, dinner will be laid on the table. The rule of thumb, whoever does the cooking, somebody else will have to wash the pots and dishes. No arguments! Honestly, we used to fight a lot about who's turn to do the washing until dad comes up with the brilliant solution. Thus when my mum cooks, she's got the immunization for washing. Brilliant eh?

My first time experiment: Kung Po Squid


The ingredients:

1. Squid (8 small ones)
   
2. Red Chillies (2)
3. Onion (1)
4. Ginger (1)
5. Curry Leaves
6. Dried Chillies (6)
7. Spring onion

Sauce:

1. Oyster Sauce (1 table spoon)
2. Black Soya Sauce (1 table spoon)
3. Sesame oil (1 teaspoon)
   

Method:

1. To clean the squid: Firstly, pull the head & tentacles from the body cavity. Pull out the pointy cartilage & insides or ligaments. Pull off the skin and cut the tentacles from the head just below the eyes. Now cut into small pieces and wash well.
2. Bring a pot of water to boil and soak the squids into the boiling water and dish up after a few seconds.
3. Heat a table spoon of oil in the pan and fry ingredients 2-7. Then put in the squids and add the sauce.
4. After a few good stirs and the sauce is mixed well into the ingredients, dish up and serve.

I must say that the end result is very satisfying. I've never know that I have such flair in cooking (*choke*) must be due to the red chillies that got stuck in my throat. Anyways, this is a very easy recipe that I wanted to share. The only tedious task is cleaning the squid as it might get messy as the squid ink leaks.

Once again, I was put into a position of cooking again on as it would be a quiet day at work on Tuesday, I decided to cook my 2 colleagues spaghetti for lunch. Thus on Monday night, I cooked the spaghetti sauce and Yiling boiled the spaghetti to al dente. I'm quite a fussy person on choosing the right pasta as most of the brands in the market are not up to my expectation. Don't be fooled by cheap prices or promotions. The rule is cheap is never good. I love Rummo Lenta Lavorazione because the pasta cooks to al dente and no matter how bad you are at controlling the cooking time, the pasta will not get soggy like your over-cooked instant noodles.

The downside is that the brand is not available on the shelves. I brought in the brand while I was with my ex-company and when I left, they decide not to sell pasta and instead cleared it off at warehouse sales. At market value, it should be RM5.50 a packet compared to the usual RM2.99 or RM1.99 pasta brands. Now at warehouse sales, it's 7 packs for RM10! No doubt I grabbed the good offer and my chef has been buying the whole carton! The next best brand you can get is actually DeCecco and it's available at Cold Storage.

And so I cooked the spaghetti bolognese with pork because my assistant doesn't eat beef. Then my colleague added the sotong and fishballs to the pasta sauce! Haha..it was our first time eating it like this! Kinda weird but it's okay.

After that we had a good drink of Swartland Winery Sparkling Grape Juice. Nope, I'm not having alcohol in the factory. It's just sparkling juice! A very good sparkling juice that deserved its place at the MAS Golden Lounge. Normal sparkling juices cost around RM6-10 but this bottle is 4 times the price. Hehe... I know what you'll be saying next - I've got expensive taste. Guilty as proven.

Good food, good time, ah the good life....
(if only I don't need to work).