Loh Mai Kai

I suddenly have a craving for Singapore's Loh Mai Kai. Haha... When I told my SG friends I'm going to try making it, they are quite surprised as normally you can find this everywhere in SG!

I adapted the recipe from Lily Wai. Hers is more like the Malaysian version, and I wanted to make the SG version, which is white in colour, instead of black. Also, in terms of ingredients, it is normally just chicken. I added mushrooms and chinese sausages to mine.

Ingredients

Glutinous Rice (250g)

2 Chicken thighs

1/2 Chinese sausage

3 Mushrooms, soaked and cut into thin slices

Marinate (for chicken thighs):

Light soy sauce

Pepper

Oyster sauce

Ginger juice

Sugar

Sesame oil

Chinese wine

Stock:

2 cups water or chicken stock (I combined some water leftover from soaking the mushrooms too)

Light soy sauce

Pepper

Sugar

Salt

2 Tbsp oil

Sesame oil

Steps:

1. Soak washed glutinous rice for 2 to 3 hours.

2. Drain and steam for 30 mins.

3. Marinade chicken for at least an hour.

4. I then proceed to fry the chinese sausages, mushrooms and chicken. However, I realised that I should have just steam them for 10 mins. The meat will be softer and more tender. If we fry the ingredients, the chicken will be more dry.

5. Arrange the chicken, mushrooms and sausages into bowls.

6. Scoop the glutinous rice over them.

7. Cover the rice with the stock (just level will do).

8. Steam for another 30 mins.

Prima Taste - Hainanese Chicken Rice

This is another of Prima Taste's pastes. I like it as they have 3 different sauces - black soya sauce, ginger sauce and chilli sauce. However, the chilli sauce is not as nice as the one you can find commonly in hawker centers. Every Singaporean must have at least one favourite chicken rice stall. For me it's either Boon Tong Kee or the one at Queenstown Hawker Center. How about you?

This is my first attempt at chopping up a chicken... Not too bad for first attempt right? :)

This is the rice. Prima Taste has special fragrant oil for you to cook the rice. It is not too bad...

I find the soup a bit too oily and bland. But come to think of it, most of the chicken rice soup is quite bland.

These are the 3 different sauces... Looks nice right? :)

Fried Rice

Fried Rice with Char Siew

Fried Rice with Chicken

Cooking fried rice is both easy and difficult. Easy, because it is just one dish, you do not have to think of other dishes to go with it. Difficult, because it is very tedious work to cook it. You have to slice all the ingredients to tiny pieces, then you have to fry each of the ingredients separately first, before combining them together.

The most important thing is the rice has to be quite dry. You can put the rice uncovered in the refrigerator for at least 5 hours, or cook it with less water. If the rice is wet, it will become “mashed” fried rice, you can’t see the rice 一粒粒. To prevent the rice from sticking to the wok, we need to heat up the oil and “spread” it around the wok.

I have not figured out which is the correct way to “coat” the rice with egg:

• Pour the egg into the wok first and quickly put in the rice and stir so that all the grains are covered with egg OR
• Pour the rice first and then pour the egg over the rice and stir

Please let me know if you know which way is correct or if there are other ways! :)


Ingredients

Oil, Rice
Garlic (chopped)
Chicken thigh / char siew
Chinese Dried Mushroom
Dried Chinese sausages (La Cheong)
Prawns
Frozen Vegetables (Peas, Corns and Carrots)
Egg (Shredded and also some for “coating” the rice)

Steps:

1. If using chicken thighs, remove the skin and rub with salt. Then, blanched it in hot water and marinate with soy sauce, cornflour, sesame oil, Chinese cooking wine for at least 30 mins.

2. Soak the Chinese mushrooms in hot water to soften, then remove the stem and cut the rest of the mushrooms into cubes.

3. To make the prawns more crunchy, first remove the shells and veins, then rub it with salt and cornflour to try and remove their skins. Then, put under running water for 10 mins.

4. Soak the sausages in hot water and then remove the outer skin and cut them into cubes.

5. For 2 cups of rice, normally I will use 4 eggs. Beat the eggs and pour half to make the omelette. Then, shred them.

6. Fry each of the ingredients separately with oil, adding some garlic when frying the prawns and chicken.

7. Oil the wok again and pour in the rest of the eggs, then the rice.

8. Stir well to evenly distribute the eggs.

9. When the rice is golden, pour in the other ingredients and continue stirring to mix the ingredients. Add seasonings - salt and pepper to taste.