Ka Poa Pla : Chinese style fish maw soup

                Last Sunday I had my daughters birthday party.  I wanted to make something special so I decided to make this dish.  For this food it is not actually Thai food but it is more like Chinese.  In Thailand we take culture from Chinese and food is one of them.  Chinese people in Thailand believe that soup will help the cycle of blood in your body to have a good circulation and keep you warm in winter.  This dish will be good to eat it when the weather changes from hot to cold. 

For this dish in Thailand we call it Ka Poa Pla meaning stomach of fish soup  (I know that sounds scary right!!!).  Actually they didn’t use the stomach but they used fish maw of fish (it is like the air bag of the fish) and the Ka Poa Pla maker will prepare it for easy storage and eat by taking the fish maw off from the fish then dry by air and deep fried until crunchy and sell it at this point.  So for me I will by the one that is already deep fried for making this soup.

                For the fish maw you can find it in a Chinese grocery or an Asian grocery.  It is a little bit pricy, but it is good for you so you might want to try one.

Ingredients

1 pack 2 oz. fish maw (already deep fried)

2 can of 14 oz. thin sliced bamboo shoot

10 hard boil quail eggs (optional)

 1 3-4 lb whole chicken

6 dry shitake mushrooms

3 cilantro roots

4 tbsp. Light soy sauce

4 tbsp. Oyster sauce

2 tbsp. Black soy sauce

3 tbsp. Sugar

Pepper

1/3 cup. Corn starch + 1/3 cup. water

¼ cup Chinese cooking wine (but If you cannot find it don’t worry about it.)

Cilantro

Cooking instructions

1.       In a large bowl add warm water then soak fish maw and let it sit for 1 hour, drain it out from water set aside

2.       Then wash it with water 2 times squeeze it very well each time.

Note : this process for cleaning fish maw is to take away the fishy smell of it.

3.       Large pot boiling 12 cups of water with chicken and cilantro root, pepper for about 1 hour. Meanwhile rehydrate mushroom by soak in the warm water for about 30 minutes

4.       After 1 hour take the chicken out and shred the chicken and set aside.

5.       In the soup pot add bamboo shoot, soy sauce, oyster sauce, black soy sauce, sugar, Chinese cooking wine when it boils again add the fish maw at last add corn starch mixture into the soup and keep stirring while adding the mixture (the soup will not be lumpy)

6.       When serving add hard boil quail eggs, shredded chicken in the bowl then add the soup and top with pepper, cilantro.

PS: I don't have too many picture because I've been busy with the party and this soup is gone so fast!!! 

Easy egg fried rice : for the side dish

                This is almost like a side dish that a lot of people ask me for the recipe, because sometimes if you don’t know the technique it doesn’t come out like you wanted!  I have 2 techniques for the perfect fried rice, first you have to use rice that is left overnight after it was cooked and it will come out better and another one is that you have to cook egg first before adding the rice into the pan.  All of this I already talked about in the shrimp fried blog, but this time it was just an egg fried rice for the side dish. Here is the recipe.

Ingredients : 1 serving

1 cup of rice

1 egg

1 globe of garlic

1 tbsp. oil

1 ½ tbsp. soy sauce

Cooking instructions

1.       Preheat the pan then add oil and garlic, cook garlic until golden

2.       Add egg stir it like scrambled egg, when the egg is cooked add rice and soy sauce then stir it until mixed well.  Turn the heat off.

3.       Serve as a side dish.

Eggplant Stir fried with Thai Basil

                It was one of my childhood recipes that my dad cooked for us.  Usually my dad did not cook much, but when he cooked he always surprised us and this recipe is one of them.  Because when I was a kid I didn’t really like eggplant much, but my dad made eggplant at another level of tastiness.   

This is a vegetarian recipe.  All of the ingredients are almost like Thai basil stir fried, but you have a little soy bean paste( I have the details on a sauce blog) in it.  This dish tastes salty sweet.  Try it and you might find yourself in love with this dish like me!!!

Ingredients: 1 serving

2 Chinese eggplants or ½ Italian eggplants (cut into bite size)

½ cup basil leave

1 sliced fresh Jalapeño (optional)

2 globes chop garlic

2 tbsp. soy bean paste

1 tbsp. sugar

1 tsp. soy sauce

2 tbsp. water

1 tbsp. vegetable oil.

Cooking instructions

1.       Chop garlic

1.       Heat the pan at medium heat, when it is hot add vegetable oil then fried garlic until golden pull garlic off on the side for garnish later.

2.       Add eggplant, sugar, soy bean paste stir it well then add water and turn the heat down to medium low and cover it about 2-3 minutes or until the eggplant softens then add Jalapeño.

3.       Turn the heat off and add basil leave stir until mixed, then pour into serving plate then put fried garlic on the top and serve with steamed rice.

Pad Prick On : chicken jalapeño Stir fried

                Ok now you will have a question why jalapenos are in Thai food??  Actually this dish in Thailand we use one kind of chili that looks like a banana pepper, but as spicy as a jalapeno and because it is easy for me to find jalapeno anyway that is why I use it instead.  This dish is one of my favorites when I was a kid, because it is not too spicy (for me) but it’s got a little kick to the taste of the dish.  It will be a little spicy, salty and a little sweet but it is very good with rice.  I hope you will like it.

 Ingredients : 1 serving

1 chicken breast cut into bite sizes

½ onion

3  jalapenos

2 tbsp. oyster sauce

1 tsp. soy sauce

1 tsp. fish sauce

1 tsp. sugar

3 tbsp. water

1 globe minced garlic

1 tbsp. oil

Cooking instructions

1.       Add a pinch of sugar and ½ tsp. of soy sauce into chicken and marinate about 5-10 minutes

2.       Meanwhile cut onion into a half-moon and jalapeno into strips.

3.       In the hot pan add oil and garlic, cook garlic until golden brown

4.       Add chicken stir it until cooked then add onion and jalapeno stir it 2 times then add all of the ingredients stir it until mixed well and the jalapeno is cooked.

5.       Turn the heat off and serve with steamed rice.