Fragrant Eggplant/New Blog Site!

Fragrant Eggplant

Today is the OFFICIAL RELAUNCH of my website and blog at Fast, Fun, Fresh Cook Like a Wok Star|Wok Star Eleanor Hoh eleanorhoh.com and launch of rasamalaysia.com Bee Yinn Low’s new cookbook. Bee is giving away 5 signed copies, so hop over for that! I will be doing a Giveaway in probably a week so check back at my new site!

Congratulations to Bee who’s worked tirelessly over the year to produce her first cookbook, Easy Chinese Recipes! It must be so rewarding for her to know that all the hard work from her hugely successful blog has resulted in this gorgeous first cookbook.

I pre-ordered this cookbook and already have mine and it’s just as gorgeous as her site! We are also both Virgos and our birthdays are coming up soon, so lots to celebrate.

Bee’s book is beautifully presented and executed. Dishes, photography and styling are outstanding, she did it all herself! It shows dedication to her craft. I like that she has made popular Chinese dishes so accessible for anyone to make at home. Her approach to cooking is simple and attention to detail is meticulous.
I was very honored to be asked to write “Seasoning a Cast Iron Wok” and hope her fans will like it.

As a cooking teacher myself, I find her recipes wonderfully easy to follow and I don’t even use recipes! I was lucky enough to be a tester for her Fragrant Eggplant dish, I must say it turned out just as she taught us. I know her fans will enjoy this cookbook as much as I do, so run out and get it or head over to her blog and see if you can’t win a signed copy!

FISH FRAGRANT EGGPLANT

from Bee Yinn Low’s Easy Chinese Recipes: Family Favorites from Dim Sum to Kung Pao

I followed Bee’s recipe to the tee and must say she does a fantastic job with this recipe with exception to a few ingredients I had to substitute. I’m not very good at following recipes, (as my readers know, I have a NO-recipe technique and encourage everyone to Cook Like a Wok Star) so I was pleasantly surprised how easy this dish was to make from start to finish. And boy, it was so delicious. I love eggplant and now I understand how the restaurants get these so tender and juicy. I’m excited to see everyone’s post of Bee’s recipes.

Serves 4 as part of a multicourse meal

8 oz. Chinese eggplant
Oil for deep frying
1 tblsp oil
2 cloves garlic
one thumb sized fresh ginger, minced
1/2 green chili, cut into small pieces (I substituted with green because there weren’t any red chilies.)
1 handful chopped scallion

Sauce:
1 1/2 tblsp hot bean sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1/4 tsp dark soy sauce
1 tblsp Chinese black vinegar
1/2 tsp. sugar
2 tblsp water
sprinkle of cornstarch

1. Mix all the ingredients in the sauce in a small bowl. Set aside.

2. Cut the eggplant and soak pieces immediately in cold water. Add some salt to prevent the eggplant from turning brown. Pat dry with paper towels before deep frying.

3. Heat enough oil in the dip of my wok for deep frying. The way I test whether it’s hot enough is to use a wood chopstick and put in the middle of the oil. If there are bubbles, your oil is hot enough. Gently lower the eggplant into the oil and deep fry for 10 seconds. Remove them with a slotted spoon or strainer draining the excess oil by laying the eggplant on a dish with paper towels. Discard or reserve the oil for another recipe.

4. Heat 1 tblsp. of oil in my wok over hight heat. Add garlic and ginger and stir fry till light brown. Add the green or red chilies and then stir in the Sauce. As soon as the Sauce thickens, add in the eggplant and scallions. Stir continuously until the eggplant is well coated with the Sauce. Dish out and serve immediately. Instead of steamed rice, I served with brown rice and a simple stir fried shrimp dish. They complemented each other perfectly.

HOH WOK CLUB - INDOMANIA, July 12

HOH WOK CLUB - INDOMANIA July 12, 2010

My first HOH WOK CLUB gathering in 2010 after a few year's hiatus was at Indomania for an intimate sit-down Rijsttafel, Monday July 12. It was a huge success, so much so we are having a second one for those who couldn't get in. Hope to see you then, details below.

We had a very interesting group with entertainment attorneys, numerous wine enthusiasts, the South Florida Foodies
(I am honored to be a member of, it is by invitation only, not sure you can even see their Facebook page if you're not a member), a judge, NPR, PR, travel writer, even a VIP, Jon Secada who came with a group of 9. We received wonderful feedback the next day to say how much everyone enjoyed it. Food is only a part of it, the company is what makes sharing the food so much more delightful.

Indomania owners: Isabel flanked by parents, Pieter an Chef Ineke

Rijsttafel is a 'rice table' with lots of delectable dishes, full menu below. Chef Ineke created a special 12-dish Rijsttafel to give guests a little taste of Indonesia, see menu below.

Growing up in Hong Kong, I remember my mom's Malaysian dishes which are very similar to those from Indonesia, so I am thrilled to find this charming restaurant in a low key part of Miami Beach.

After many visits to Miami, Chef Ineke and husband Pieter from Holland were finally able to realize their dream and open their own restaurant. They designed their restaurant as if it was their own dining room: small and cozy with intriguing Indonesian photographs on the walls and batik tablecloths.

Chef Ineke's 12-dish Rijsttafel Menu:

Snacks with drinks
Kropok: shrimp crackers

Shrimp wontons with sweet, chili dip

Emping with peanut sauce

Appetizer:
Gado Gado, salad with tofu, french beans, egg, beansprouts
and cabbage with a peanut/coconut dressing

Sateh Ayam, skewer with grilled chicken

Beef Semor: braised beef in a sweet soy sauce

Ayam bumbu Bali: Balinese spiced chicken
Babi Medan: slow cooked porc with ginger, lime leaves and lemon grass
Atjar Tjampoer: sweet and sour pickled vegetables

Sayur Lodeh: mixed vegetables in a coconut broth

Gulay Telor: curried eggs

Toasted coconut and peanuts (sprinkle on everything)
Noodles

Nasi Kuning: yellow rice steamed with lemon grass and galanga
-- --

Rudjak: Indonesian fruit salad
Black rice pudding with coconut milk

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Is this how it looks when foodies go out to eat? 5 cameras snapping:

Jen's food shots were great, mine were a bit dark.
Take a look at our Facebook pages for more photos.

Indomania hosted a fantastic dinner party on Miami River Wall and got videotaped by Fox Style File TV!

NEXT EVENT: Indomania, August 16

Wok Curry Beef

Wok Curry Beef - combining my 2 heritages

My mom is from S'pore and 

dad is Hakka but born in Malacca

Join me to celebrate Asian Pacific American Heritage month and cook up a simple Wok Curry Beef!

Thanks to New Asian Cuisine, a beautiful site that promotes the best in Asian culture and cuisine, who invited me to do a guest post. Do subscribe to their weekly newsletter, their site has good resources as well as delightful dishes from all over Asia.  For my full "recipe", visit New Asian Cuisine - Wok Curry Beef

My step-by-step photos and TIPS to make a quick, weeknight dish taste Asian after the jump:

Las Olas Wine and Food Festival

Wok Star Eleanor Hoh at the Las Olas Wine and Food Festival last Saturday, May 2. The festival was a fundraiser to benefit American Lung Association. It was the first year the Festival had a Culinary Pavilion, so I was honored to be invited to participate in this worthy cause. Thanks to all the staff at American Lung Association who helped coordinate with me, not forgetting my friend, Linda who took all these photos and of course, many thanks to prolific writer, Sara Liss, editor of Urbandaddy who included us in their weekend mention plus her own blog, Allpurposedark. Oh, thanks for a lovely bottle of wine from Bonterra Vineyards as a gift for my participation.

Here's a summary of the Festival for those who didn't make it...

The Culinary Pavilion had all Viking appliances and cookware. But, being a Wok Star, I had my own Wok Star Kit and portable butane gas stove to show folks how easy and convenient it is to set a gas stove on an electric glass flat or coil cooktop which many of us have in South Florida. I wrote quite a lot about this topic under a Note about Heat Source because wok cooking requires HIGH HEAT which can only be achieved with a gas stove.


Gary Cuica is the Director of the Coconut Grove Art Festival, Culinary Pavilion and was instrumental in helping the Las Olas Wine and Food Festival's Culinary Pavilion in their first endeavor, great job. Gary is also a graduate from Johnson & Wales but his day job is a financial consultant with Wachovia Securities!

Gary and I first met when I was sponsored to give a presentation pairing with Tiger Beer at the Anheuser-Busch VIP event during Superbowl in Miami. Subsequently, he's invited me to present at the Coconut Grove Art Festival 3 years running, always so much fun but a real pleasure and honor since it's attended by 40,000 visitors annually.

I am preparing Pineapple Stir Fried Rice using the Del Monte Gold Extra Sweet pineapple. Folks are constantly surprised to see pineapple in this dish but in Asia, it's quite popular. The cubes give sweetness to the dish without adding sugar and the juice makes the dish moist and fluffy. Del Monte features my video on fruits.com which also has tips for other fruits and vegetables. You can submit your review and rate me there. I gave away San-J tamari (Japanese version of soy sauce) samples with a free recipe postcard for the Pineapple Stir Fried Rice and they were a big hit. San-J is my favorite tamari because of it's rich depth, I've used it for 18 years and LOVE IT! They give me a lovely 5 oz. bottle to include in my Wok Star Kit, people really like all the goodies that come in their kit, like opening prezzies at Christmas.

Hayli, a Johnson & Wales student, has been assisting me in my Wok Star classes and volunteered that day to help chefs in the Culinary Pavilion together with Carla, another assistant who will be helping me as well (thanks Hayli and Carla). The wonderful thing about having these students is that they have food and service experience so makes my events go smoothly. Since Asian cooking is not covered a lot at the school, they are eager to learn and love what I do.

Even though there were forks, I insisted they try using chopsticks, as someone said,"slows them down", ha, ha.

My buddy, Chef Hugh of Irie Spice specializes in Caribbean cuisine. We met at the Coconut Grove Art Festival and bump into each other frequently at cooking events around town. He made a delicious plantain soup and added enough rum in there to get me tipsy. I cannot really "drink" alcohol, just a little wine / beer and only when I am eating, not on an empty tummy, otherwise I'll be like a 'flashing beacon'. Sorry, I diverse.

Chef Hugh has a lovely personality and actually studied to be an architect! I know a lot of chefs who wore other hats prior to their current hat. For myself, I taught computers and helped Wang launch products worldwide when I lived in UK for 17 years. What I did with computers (simplify a complicated topic, I am now doing with wok cooking (showing a simple approach.) My bio details more "hats" I've worn.