Spaghetti MeatBalls

Yum yum, couldn't help it when i saw these meatballs on the shelve. I had this a couple of times in Glasgow, most of the time for dinner at someone else's place. The meatballs taste like the ones you get in IKEA but feels softer in texture. (Think its because the meatballs in IKEA are fried so it gives it that firmer crustier texture. The generic tomato sauce from Sainsbury tasted alright too, much better than Morrison's house brand.

Ingredients
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Garlic
1 onion
Sainsbury onion and garlic sauce
Swedish meatballs 1 packet
Spaghetti 200g
Cherry tomatos (as much as you like)
Parsley
Table spoon of tomato pesto
Dried Basil

Fry the onions and garlic in oil. Next give the meatballs a good stir fry. Next the tomatos to evaporate some of the moisture in them and to give that skin a nice scalded surface. Spaghetti is next followed by the sauce and pesto. I used Burtoni pasta, more expensive than house brands but taste much better. Wait for the buy 1 get 1 free sales and stock up like 10 packets lol. I boiled it 1min below the recommended time because I knew i will be frying it later, so the waiting time actually steams up the pasta. Chop parsley gives it a nice aroma. I really like parsley.

There's enough food for 4 small eaters or 2 big fat eaters or 1 glutton like me... opps.

Herbal Chicken Night.

Its herbal chicken night again. This time with 2 chickens! I like Giant pots.

Quite cheap and feels cheaper when placed next to a 800g chicken which cost 3 pounds. hmm.. I wonder why?

Busy week ahead. Posts might come in a little slower.

Gregg's For Lunch

Hi all, back from my short hiatus. Since I worked from home on monday, I managed to finally escape the dreadfood hospital food. (still trying to take some pictures for ya all).

Let me introduce you to Greggs. There is nothing unfamilliar about this with the locals but for people outside of UK this is one of the most common lunch options.

Actually, the first time I came to Glasgow I had a Gregg's egg sandwich for lunch and I think dad had a beef sandwich or somesort. All of these on top of the little red bus whilst touring the city. To be honest, I was not so impressed then.

Having been here for 5 years, you know if you can fight it u adapt to it. This has become one of my favourite lunch options because its relatively cheap. Its healthy (minus the excess mayo they put sometimes) and its quite tasty too.

Here's a link on wiki if you want to learn more about it -->>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greggs

Ok here's a red thai chicken bloomer (1.79 pounds) . Quite authentic thai flavour. reminds me of a creamy red thai curry but in this case "ang-moh-fied" with mayo crisp salad in between 2 slices of brown bread. There's 2 options of bread: brown and white but i like the brown one better cos there s more fibre and taste more complex. The crust is a little dry but once u get past that its fine. There are other flavours like chicken and mango, new orleans chicken and tuna crunch. Apparently, they have revamped the packaging and taste recently.

Well.. the sandwich wasn't enough so I had to add on something. Ah ha this is one of those less healthy stuff you get in Greggs. its really carb and fat loaded and only had one piece of chicken in it a wee tiny piece. Introducing..... Chicken bake... In simple terms. puff pastry with cream of chicken . POlar chicken puffs beats this hands down feat down everything down anytime.


Anyone up for Gregg's?

Teriyaki Chicken Drums

Yum yum. Chicken drumsticks are one of those meats that I enjoy eating. So fun to eat and so delicious as well. Aa and C went "pa tohing" so I ended up eating on my own ... haha its ok that means more for me.

Ingredients
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6 Chicken drums
Kikomann Teriyaki Marinate
Sesame seed oil
Sugar
Garlic mince

Just mix all the above items together and let it marinate for an hour or overnight if you can afford the time. Basically, just pour enough teriyaki marinate to coat them through once. drizzle the oil over the chicken. Sugar gives it a nice caramalised flavour. garlic provides a nice fragrance and burnt touch. rotate them so that the marinate is evenly distributed. bake in the oven for 25 mins at 180 degrees celcius.

*I ended up eating all six myself haha. it was good... Burp!

Dinner with the flatmates and WY!!

Er.. This is a mince beef rendang pancake with sweetcorn. Aa was totally wide eye when he saw this. For a moment, he thought I had gone bonkers but I reassured him that mine dish will definately be safer than some of his "unique" past creations. Anyhoo, I used this Asian gourmet rendang paste and mixed it with some mince beef and sprinkled some tumeric over it. Give it a good fry and then add some sweet corn. It tasted ok lor... a bit bland and lacking in the rendang flavour. It was edible but I don't think I will be making it anytime soon. Just one of those bad cooking days lol.

Luckily, Aa had something to supplement the meal. And guess what TOFU again . This time it was mapo tofu though but without mince pork but in its place, some prawns. Hmm. This was the spicy sourish version. I think i prefer the savour version much better.

WY joined us for dinner and he contributed a dish of fried broccoli with fish cake and mushroom. I think he likes fishcakes with veges, seems to order it quite often when he's eating at chinese restaurants.

Well... not a good day for food... but its ok rite. Still got food to eat... lol.. Tomorrow will be a better day.

Spaghetti Bolognaise Aa Style

This was Aa's version of spag bolognaise. Basically like mine a tomato meat sauce plus his touch of "what ever i can find in the fridge i'll put in". You can probably see from the pic there's corgettes not cucumber, tomato, celery, olives and red onions. Ppl cook for me of course I will say nice rite but it was nice la and I finished it all up except for the olives. Yikes.

Dinner with the flatmates

Hey hey the curry didn't burn this time round because I learnt my mistake. Added more coconut milk this time round before I went off to surf. I used one of the asian gourmet spices but felt that there wasn't enough paste after frying it and decided to spoon in 3 dallops of sambal chilli. The end results was suprisingly shiokingly hot but pleasant. Will have to stock up more of that potent sambal chilli the next time I go back home.

Aa made a special XO sauce fried with tofu and egg. Quite nice leh. Must be the combination of XO sauce and fried red onions that provided a sweet savoury glaze to the onions.

Overall, a satisfying meal with white rice and good company.

CrabShakk

So good was this restaurant that apparently you need to make a reservation 2 months ahead before getting a reservation. That however did not stop us from getting a table one fine saturday afternoon. It wasn't a planned outing at all. Somewhat impromptu when we were passing by the place and I mutter to Aa, "hey there's no one in crab shakk". "Really!" Aa.. The next thing I know he had already made a detour and was ready to park the car and called C to meet up with us.

Its almost impossible to spot this restaurant on Argyle street with its greyish dull exterior that spells more "I am a paint stall rather than HEY FRESH CRABS INSIDE COME GET ME" but trust me as you open the doors, you will be spell bounded by the clean wood and steel finishes that will instantly remind you that you are walking into an expensive restaurant.

My expectations were high and I so much wanted to try every single bit of crustacean on the menu. Unfortunately, I knew that was impossible and we opted to share a few dishes amongst the 3 of us.

We had 2 soups. The one in the foreground is the crabshakk bisque. Pretty much a crustacean bisque that was in every essence full of a smokey shellfish flavour and embedded with a handsome portion of crab meat. I found it abit too overwhelming at times and if it could be diluted down by 15%, the magic would been better. The seafood chowder on the other hand hit every single tastebud in me. Do not be fooled by the plain appearance in the picture because beneath that milky cream, you will find muscles, fish and crab meat. It was probably the best seafood chowder I have had in Glasgow.

Fried food is always nice. This dish is an example of how presentation and portioning can allow you to sell food at 10 times the price you normall pay at street hawkers. There's nothing complex about this dish. Whitebait, salted heavily and deep fried. So good and tasty you wish the portion was doubled but before you jump on to say please give me another plate, I would like to remind you that this starter cost 7 quid.. !!!!!!!! ( I can almost hear my mum screaming wah you know how many kilos of ikan kunning I can buy . hahaha)

Moving on... we have crab cakes. Yup how can you not have something crabby in crabshakk. These little patties are about an inch in diameter. I can reassure you i tasted only meat and none of that starchy stuff that you find in frozen crab cakes. These were alittle disspointing as they were over deep fried and tasted really dry.

Lastly, a plate of vongole pasta to share. Simple, clean and tasty. If only there were more clams hee ;)

Well... I can't say I will come back here anytime soon mainly because its just too expensive to do so and it dosen't feel you up. Food is good and certainly one of the best place for scottish seafood. Definately want to come back someday to try the scallops and brown crab . Going to have to save some $$ first....

CrabShakk
---------------------------
1114 Argyle Street
Finnieston
Glasgow G3 8TD
0141 334 6127

Vegetables are so expensive!!!!

All these vegetables cost 2.75 pounds. How is that possible man!!!!. .. Honestly, if veggies are going to be so expensive how do you expect people to maintain 5 portions of fruits/vegetables a day. I really should have bought them from cheapo iceland or tesco and not from "atas" roots and fruits..

My mistake... then again they tasted really good . especially the tomatos.. (P.S: I don like to eat raw/semi cooked tomatos but these were great)

Blackbean Sauce Chicken

My first cooked meal since coming back. The luxury of a cooking mum is unavailable at the moment so I'll have to make do with my own hands. Afterall, why did God give us hands ? (yes picking our nose is one use lol)

So... I rummaged through the sauce bag and found this packet which mum threw in. Looks simple and tasty enough to use.

Threw the rice into the cooker, chop the ingredients and within half an hour, a nice meal.

Ingredients
------------------------
1x Lee Kum Kee sauce packet
sesame seed oil
sugar
1 packet chicken (6 drums inside approx 600g)
spring onions
Onions

Deboned the chicken and chop into pieces. Fry the onions in oil, throw in the chicken give it a good bath. Smear the sauce all over the meat and drizzle some sesame seed oil over if u like and maybe add a pince of sugar. Serve with spring onions.