A common question people ask is how long can leftovers be kept for. Well, as I go along I’ll pass on my personal experience on this, with a couple of caveats.

Recent dishes I have refrigerated and eaten are;

Frozen

Pork Vindaloo (from 2 weeks ago, still have 2 portions frozen)

Malaysian Beef Curry (from 4 weeks ago)

Braised Pork Shoulder (last week)

Refrigerated

Spare Ribs and Watercress Soup (eaten on the third day)

I re-heated all by microwaving. 

In all cases, keeping quality was fine. I did very slightly overdo the microwaving for the pork vindaloo, so there were some dry spots on the meat.

For the soup, the flavours matured somewhat, which was very nice. But with mature flavours, saltiness does become more apparent, so if you will refrigerate anything, go easy on the salt. That said, we do use very little salt at home and we are thus pretty sensitive to salty tastes.

Now the food safety part.

Caveats

1) I observe strict hygiene, so I wash my hands very often during food prep and cooking, and take care to avoid cross-contamination, ie knives, boards, plates etc used for raw foods do not come in contact with cooked food. Contaminated food is unsafe to keep.

2) Leftovers are promptly put into clean covered containers and as soon as cool enough, usually in 1 - 2 hours max, are put in the fridge or freezer as appropriate. They never ever sit out for longer than 4 hours (this is a very common limit on exposure at room temperature, unless you are an Eskimo at the North Pole), and if I forget to refrigerate and find them out the next morning, I discard without even sniffing the food.

All dishes mentioned are on my website - just go into the recipe page, enter the recipe name in the Search Box on the upper right corner and hit enter or click search. Easy as that.

Be economical, and be safe! 

Well, I finally got around to grilling the great cuts of pork that I bought a while back.

As promised, you can see the photograph in the latest article, Cooking Methods and Cuts - Beef, Pork, Lamb, Chicken.

Now, I can think of Moo Ping and other great uses for it.

You like salt in your food, she doesn’t. You like real spice in the dish (not the toned down versions touristy joints are noted for), she cannot take that.

Well, if you are doing the cooking and your joy is in seeing her enjoy the food, doing it your way just takes all the joy out of it. So, knowing how to work in compromises is the key here. I’m still learning, to be honest.

Serve It On The Side

If something can be served on the side, then that is an easy one. Salt obviously can be added at the table, though some will argue that it is not quite the same as adding it at a precise point in preparation or cooking.

Ah, perfection – where would we be if we could not slip your grasp? In a quiet and lonely place I would suppose, eating the perfect food we cook that only we like.

Hold the lime! Yes, she does not care much for lime or vinegar either. No problem, slices of lime can be passed on the side.

Temper It.

And the spice? Cloves and cinnamon can’t be passed on the side, they have to go into the dish at the appropriate time, and that is not a nod to perfection, just reality. But, chilled slices of cucumber and tomato on the side will temper the spice and heat of any dish.

In South-East Asian cooking, especially the one-dish meals, cucumber and tomato slices are very commonly included. Think chicken rice or fried rice for example, or mamak fried noodles. No, the chef was not lazy or unimaginative. There is usually chilli on the side, if not in the dish, and these vegetables help when your tongue is burning - from the chillies that you mistakenly or otherwise, tucked into with gusto.

Reduce It or Mask It

Some people dislike gamey tastes, as in oxtail, lamb shanks and duck. If cooking oxtail soup, an initial boiling and discarding of the water helps.

Lamb shanks lose their gamey taste with an appropriate choice of spices in the masala. Herbs can have the same effect.

But be warned, if you are taking the ’spice route’, that freezing leftovers moderates the spice effect, and the dish will be gamey when re-heated. This one I found out the hard way - she loved the original, could hardly eat the re-heated dish.

It’s all about recognizing that tastes and tolerances differ, and finding a way to accommodate everyone that you cook for.

It can’t be done successfully all the time, but to me it is worth a try. And that is why, with cooking, as with the rest of life, we live and learn.

Last night I cooked my usual Pork Vindaloo, but thought I’d give it a bit of a tweak for a change.

Nothing dramatic, just cut back on the dried chillies from 20 to 12, and added 1 heaped teaspoon of Garam Masala.

It turned out quite nicely, mellower due to the reduction of the chillies and with a deeper flavour due to the addition of the Garam Masala.

 It will be interesting to see how it freezes (I froze 4 portions), as typically the chilli heat diminishes in the freezer and a richer flavour develops.

Time will tell.

I wrote in my post of 16th June, 2008 that freezing the cloud ear fungus (mushrooms) seemed to give them a slightly powdery texture.I since cooked a larger batch, and as noted, prepared more gravy so that the mushrooms could be submerged in gravy when frozen.

This has done the trick - texture was normal, so obviously any deterioration was due to freezer damage from exposure, albeit in an airtight container.

Cooking with Cloud Ear Fungus

It’s hard to get bored with food if you always tweak the recipes you use. I do that, even with my own creations. If the result is great, I’ll share it as an update, which is what I am doing today.

In May, I posted an article and recipe for Fusion Duck Curry. At the time I was eating the curry, I made a note that I would like to try it with the addition of curry leaves and garam masala.

Well, some time has passed and I was asked if I would cook the dish again. As I did that, I saw my note to try the variation. So I added 3 sprigs of curry leaves at the same time as the sliced onions, and ½ teaspoon garam masala together with the other spice powders. I also reduced the water to 1 cup, and reduced the heat to get the barest of simmers. Cooking time was the same.

It worked wonderfully, with a thicker, more flavourful gravy. Try it, you will not be disappointed I assure you.

Of all the fish that I buy and cook, the most versatile for me is mackerel steak. It has great texture, reasonable taste and it freezes well, qualities that give me a range of choices for when and how I will cook it.

A mackerel steak will go well in many Asian curries. I have for example used it in fish-head curry; no cheeks, but a lot more flesh than an actual fish-head. In Malay cuisine, it is good deep-fried then sautéed in a spicy sambal paste. And it goes well in Indian curries.

Thirty years ago when I was in Kuala Lumpur, there was an Indian restaurant in Brickfields that did a roaring trade in deep-fried fish at lunchtime. Essentially, it had a spice rub applied, then was deep fried and served piping hot. If you use mackerel steak for this, it makes sense to have it sliced thinner.

Mackerel steak takes well to western style preparations, though here of course I would want thicker slices. Any dish that calls for firm-fleshed fish will be pretty OK with mackerel. And for simple weeknight meals, a basic western preparation of mackerel steak is hard to beat for simplicity and goodness.

This is an example of a broiled mackerel steak that I do. Originally inspired by a Mark Bittman recipe, I have since added minced garlic and minced chilli to the mustard. In moderation, I might add, but enough to give a little extra dimension to the taste. Total time to broil was 17 minutes. Seven minutes on the first side, turn and dress with mustard mixture, then broil for another 7 minutes. Top with the chopped honey tomatoes and broil for another 3 minutes. The rack is placed 13 cm / 5 in. from the element, and I do not put it closer to finish as that is not necessary.

This is one main course that takes less time to cook than the potatoes. In this instance, as the main has plenty of flavour, I paired it with a simple Italian style potato salad. Boil the potatoes skin on, peel and slice, allow to cool, then sprinkle with minced garlic and parsley. Drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil and you’re all set.

With a green salad on the side, it makes a good meal.

Want more on mackerel steaks? See Article and Recipe

As a kid, whilst Ceylonese Banana Leaf Cuisine was a treat, prawn or shrimp curries were not on my list of favourites. When it came to prawn curry, we had a choice of ‘wet’ prawn curry, ie a prawn / shrimp curry with gravy, generally with smaller prawns, or a ‘dry’ prawn curry, ie. stir-fried prawns, generally larger ones. The larger ones would be salt-water prawns, as Tiger Prawns were unknown back then.As we bought the curries from restaurants, the prawns were usually cooked shell-on to save time, hence my dislike of them; I was never one to eat the heads, so the shell was just a needless nuisance at that time.

Today, a spicy stir-fry of prawns (shrimp) has certainly become one of my favourites, though I do remove the shells for cooking. And yes, I am partial to a nice prawn curry with gravy.

The stir-fry that I like is a visual treat with the different colours of the ingredients and the great texture of the dish - yellow from the turmeric, red from the slivers of ground chilli and sliced onions, green from the sliced chillies and curry leaves, black from the pepper and mustard seeds and the golden colour of fried garlic. All these, with a taste and aroma to match.

Full Article and Recipe

One of the undoubted favourites in Thai cuisine, leaving aside touristy stuff, is grilled chicken. It is usually served with som tam (Thai papaya salad) and sticky rice (glutinous rice).

Getting a good recipe is difficult. I have 3 from my collection of Thai cookbooks, and they can be best described as not having any commercial potential. So, I have been experimenting, with a fair degree of success, but still not at the point that I can say “This is it”.

Last night I made another change to my recipe, and instead of grilling the whole chicken, I just roasted it. To be honest, I was lazy to set up the rotisserie and just used the smaller oven. The fan supposedly gives the effect of a rotisserie, but moves the air around the chicken instead of moving the chicken - so the manual claims, doubtless with input from the marketing department.

Anyway, I decided to try the circular heating element in addition to the upper and lower elements, and this time I positioned the roasting tray on the lowest rack level. This positions the chicken so that most of it is directly in front of the fan. Not a good idea. Within 20 minutes it became apparent that spots were going to char long before the chicken would be done. I dropped the temperature from 180°C / 360°F to 160°C / 320°F for 10 minutes and raised the rack 1 level so that only the top third of the fan blew directly at the chicken.

When I was comfortable the chicken would not char, I raised the temperature to the original setting. By then my calculated timing was out of course, and I was flying by the seat of my pants. No matter, at least I had things under control. (For more on the circular element and timings, please see my earlier post under category “roast chicken”).

The chicken was done 10 minutes later than I expected, though I must say that I was deliberately trying to get the breast meat to the point where it just crosses from ‘moist’ to ‘not moist’. You see, Thai grilled chicken is usually served with a dipping sauce that is bottled and sold commercially under various brands, and it is a real treat. So, having the breast meat just ‘not moist’ would I thought go well with the sauce. Of course, leg meat remains moist even so, but that is OK.

We ate it with jasmine rice and raw vegetables, with the dipping sauce of course.

I ate most of it with a knife and fork, but as with all good grilled or roasted chicken, at a certain point you are better off using your fingers, which is what I did. I enjoyed it very much, and pretty much picked the bones clean.

And the crying dogs? Apparently in Thailand when you pick the bones clean and leave no meat for the dogs, some people call it “making the dogs cry”.

I mentioned in the post that I would give an update on how well the dish took to freezing.

Well, I’m pleased to report that it does keep well and taste and texture do not suffer as a result of freezing.

I defrosted only in the microwave, as I am not a huge fan of microwaving vegetables and the like. Then to complete reheating, I put the thawed braised pork and cloud ear fungus into a shallow bowl, which I then put in the electric rice-cooker. The one I have includes a steamer insert, so once the rice is cooked and it switches to keep warm mode, I put in the insert and the bowl. It heats through in about 20 minutes.

If you do not have the steamer insert, you can also put the bowl directly onto the cooked rice. In any case, just be sure that you use oven mitts to handle the bowl when removing, as it gets very hot. 

And if you do not use an electric rice-cooker at all, or if you are reheating a large portion, you can always reheat gently on the stove top.

Only two points are firstly, I wish I had more gravy, it is delicious and more would be nice. Secondly, there was a very slight powdery feel to the mushrooms, which only I noticed, and this is perhaps because there was not enough gravy to submerge the mushrooms in the freezer. Nothing too obvious, as I was the only one who noticed it. And the overall taste was great, just like curries and stews which improve with freezing.

So, all told a good candidate for bulk cooking and freezing.