Life> Food

Simple staples

By Pauline D. Loh (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-09-19 09:46

As the humidity drops, it's time to make sure we take in plenty of liquid to make up for the dehydration. One good way is to have a nourishing meal of porridge. Pauline D. Loh taps into her culinary heritage for the recipes.

My mother's father was a typical Fujianese. Although he was worldly-wise and much exposed to the cuisines of Asia, he enjoyed simple food with simple flavors, especially the rustic victuals of his native province. My early childhood years were spent under his watchful eyes, and so it is his favorite dishes I remember now whenever I think of him.

He was an imposing patriarch by my aunts' accounts, but fear was never in my vocabulary as I clambered all over him and dogged his heels like a frisky puppy. I also learned to eat from my grandfather, who had a habit of waking up each night at the stroke of midnight for a meal of porridge and tea.

As the owner of most of the bumboats plying the Singapore River, he had exclusive access to some of the best imports from East and West.

We often had rare delicacies from China such as the best tea from Wuyishan, or fat roe-rich hairy crabs from Shanghai whenever they were in season. We also enjoyed Earl Grey tea when it was still unheard of in supermarkets and real English fruitcake that would start their journey from the UK in autumn to reach Asia in time for Christmas.

He was always ahead of the trends. I was fed on unpolished rice because he heard it was better from a nutrition point of view. He also had our nanny cook it for his equally beloved dogs, who were rotated between home and dock to keep his warehouses safe. Years later, it would become a family joke because I would nurse my bowl of unpolished rice for hours and try to feed it to the dogs whenever no one was looking.

These days, I go out of my way to look for unpolished rice because I know it really is good for me. I still share it with my own dogs, though, but every nutty grain makes me think about my granddad.

Here are his favorite recipes - a simple rice porridge dotted with chunks of golden-yellow sweet potato, a salted radish omelette that we called chai por n'g, a spicy morning glory (kangkong) fried with a chili and dried prawn mixture, and the main attraction, a simmering pot of soy-braised pork that he would never be without.

They are what every village kitchen would serve in the poor coastal regions of Fujian, a hilly province where lofty cliffs made agricultural land scarce. Originally, the sweet potatoes were used to fill out the more expensive rice so the pot of porridge could feed more.

Salted radishes were pantry staples, hunks of which would be stored in dusty urns tucked away in a dark place under the kitchen shelves. Morning glory grew wild, and it was a matter of foraging for enough tender shoots to make up a plate of tasty greens.

The braised pork was a rare treat, meat being scarce. But, a simmering pot went a long way when hard-boiled eggs from the backyard chickens were added, or cheap, dried beancurd puffs were cut up and tossed in. The thick sauce would be ladled by the spoonful onto rice or porridge, and you won't even be needing the meat to polish off one bowl or even two.

These dishes are part of the culinary heritage of a family now spread out from Dublin to Perth to Beijing, and they are all in memory of a man who took the first step out to eke out a living in a strange land so those who came after him could have better opportunities. I hope we made him proud.

Recipe | Dried radish omelette

Ingredients (serves 4):

200 g dried radish (luobo gan)

1 tsp sugar

2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

2 eggs, beaten Dash of salt and pepper Vegetable oil

Method:

1. Wash the dried radish and roughly chop. Keep it chunky if you like the crunch of bigger pieces. Add the teaspoon of sugar and mix well.

2. Heat up a tablespoon of oil in a frying pan and fry the minced garlic until a light golden brown. Add the chopped dried radish and stir fry on high heat. This gets rid of the muskiness of the preserved radish.

3. Season the beaten eggs with salt and pepper and pour the mixture into the frying pan. Allow to slowly cook until eggs are almost set.

4. Flip the omelette in sections and brown on both sides. Plate and garnish.

Food notes:

Dried radish is known as chai por in the Fujian dialect and this simple omelette is a favorite side dish to go with the sweet potato porridge. It has to have lots of the chopped dried radish, slightly sweetened. The combination of savory and sweet really goes with the porridge, so make a generous portion.

Recipe | Sweet potato porridge

Ingredients (serves 2 to 4):

300 g sweet potatoes

50 g rice

3 cups water

Method:

1. Rinse the rice once to get rid of dust and grit. Place into a deep pot.

2. Peel sweet potatoes and cut into 2 cm chunks. Add to rice in the pot.

3. Add the three cups water to the rice and sweet potatoes. Place the pot on a medium fire and bring it to a boil.

4. Lower the heat to a simmer and cook until rice is fully flowered and sweet potatoes are soft.

Food notes:

Cook the porridge according to your preference. Some families like their porridge with visible grains of rice that has barely "blossomed". Others prefer their rice as a soupy gruel. The rice will disintegrate with cooking, so the longer you cook it, the smoother it will become. You can also scoop up the sweet potato chunks when they are cooked so they will not collapse and "melt" into the porridge.

Recipe | Hot and Spicy morning glory

Ingredients (serves 4):

500 g morning glory vegetable (tongxin cai)

2 tbsp dried shrimps

2 red chili, seeded

1 tsp fish sauce Vegetable oil

Method:

1. Wash and drain the dried shrimps, picking off odd bits of shell or grit. Chop up the chili roughly and pound or blend together with the dried shrimps. Set aside the pounded mixture.

2. Wash and dry the morning glory vegetable and pluck off the tender leaves. Break the young stems into sections and discard any tough old stalks.

3. Heat up 2 tbsp vegetable oil in the frying pan and fry the dried shrimp mixture until fragrant.

4. Add the morning glory stems and fry till they turn color and are cooked. Add the leaves and fry for a minute more, tossing to coat the vegetables thoroughly.

5. Check the seasoning and add the fish sauce as needed. Give the vegetables a final toss and plate.

Food notes:

This vegetable is common throughout Southeast Asia, and getting more common in Beijing and Shanghai. It is a very easy vegetable to grow and popular in countries like the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. Most of the time, it is fried with a spicy sambal or used in curries and tamarind-based stews. This recipe is based on a southern Chinese favorite - a spicy dried shrimp stir-fry that can be used with other vegetables like cabbages or even sweet potato leaves.

Recipe | Soy-Braised pork

Ingredients (serves 4-6):

300 g belly pork, cut into chunks

300 g pork shoulder butt, cut into chunks 6-8 eggs, hard boiled and shelled

2 bulbs garlic, broken into cloves, skin on

1 cup dark soy sauce

1/2 cup light soy sauce

2 sticks cinnamon

3-4 pods star anise

1 tsp cloves

50 g sugar/crushed rock sugar

Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. Heat up some oil in the pan and add garlic cloves. Fry till cloves are lightly browned and fragrant.

2. Add sugar and allow to caramelize. Once sugar caramelizes, add pork chunks and toss well to coat. Add all the spices and stir to mix.

3. Allow the pork to sear on all sides, add the soy sauces and enough water to cover the mixture. Bring to a boil.

4. Turn down heat to a simmer and cook for 30-45 minutes until pork is chopstick tender. Add the eggs, simmer another 10 minutes and remove from heat.

5. Serve immediately, or let the stew develop flavors overnight.

Food notes:

This is a stew with everything meat, eggs and a sauce that is delicious dribbled over sweet potato porridge. It was also my grandfather's favorite dish of all time, the old Fujian native that he was. This soy-sauce braised pork was a staple on our dinner table, along with rice or porridge. The daily greens or pot of soup may change, but the clay pot of soy braised pork was always simmering on the kitchen stove.