This easy Panang Curry recipe is very delicious and takes less than 20 minutes to make. It guarantees an authentic Thai restaurant-quality dish if you use homemade curry paste. Serve the curry with steamed rice and you’ll have a complete meal.

Serve 3-4

• 1 tablespoon   cooking oil
• 1/3 cup             Panang Paste (click here or refer to below for homemade curry paste)
• 1 cup                   coconut milk
• 500g                    boneless chicken breast or chick thigh, cut into bite-size strips
• 2 tablespoons   fish sauce
• 3 tablespoons   palm sugar
• 5-6                      Thai bird chili (optional)
• 5-6                      green beans, cut into small pieces (optional)
• 4-6 Kaffir lime or lime leaves, sliced into strands, or zest of two limes. Save a bit extra for garnishing
• Salt to taste

Method

1. Heat up a heavy-bottomed pot, add into 1 tablespoon of cooking oil over high heat for about 2 minutes then place the 1/3 of the Panang Curry Paste. Cook for a few minutes until aromatic. Pour into 1 cup coconut milk and bring it to a boil.
2. Turn to medium heat. Add into the 500g chicken, mix well and cook until chickens are almost done. Add into fish sauce, palm sugar, Thai red bird chili and green beans. Cook until the chickens are well cooked. This takes no more than 15 minutes. Turn off the heat. Taste it and add salt as needed.

Panang Curry Paste

Makes 1 cup

• 2 teaspoons sea salt
• 12 cloves, garlic, peeled
• 2 tablespoons, cilantro stems
• 20-30 dried red chili depending on your tolerance level of spiciness, softened in warm water
• 2 teaspoons, white peppercorns, dry-roasted
• 1 big thumb of galangal
• 2 stalks lemongrass, white parts only香茅, roughly cut
• 2 shallots, peeled小红葱头
• 2 teaspoons, kaffir/lime leaves or lime zest
• 2 teaspoons of Thai shrimp paste, or use 2 tablespoons of red miso
• 7 to 8 tablespoons of unsalted peanuts, dry-roasted
• 1/3 – 1/2 cup, water

Method

1. Place all the ingredients into a food processor, blender or chopper. Add 1/3 to ½ cup of water to help the machine running. Blender till the mixture becomes paste. The paste does not have to be very smooth. Transfer to a jar with a tight-fitting lid and refrigerate until ready to use.

These beautiful cookies are traditionally served to guests on the Chinese New Year. But they can certainly be a great healthy snack choice for children as well as wonderful sweet treats for adults all year around. It is so easy to make. So just grab a bag of walnuts, along with other the ingredients already in your pantry, and head into the kitchen!

Makes 15 pieces

Recipe adapted from Mykitchen101en

• 150g all purpose flour中筋面粉
• 1 teaspoon   baking powder
• ⅛ tsp table salt

Ingredients (B):

• 60g walnut
• 40g salted butter, softened (room temperature)
• 30g cooking oil
• 100g white sugar白糖
• 1 large size egg, about 50g-60g. You will ONLY use 40g beaten egg. Save the other 10g beaten egg for egg wash (brush unbaked cookies)

Method

• Combine 150g all purpose flour, 1¼ tsp of baking powder and ⅛ tsp fine salt, sift the flour mixture twice to incorporate and distribute the salt and baking powder evenly. Place walnuts in a plastic bag and use a rolling pin to crush them into small bits. Pan roast the walnut bits with a dry pan over medium heat. Stir constantly with a spatula until fragrant or lightly brown. This recipe uses small amount of walnut, it should take about 2-3 minutes of toasting, set aside to cool.

Add walnut to a food processor/dry mill, mix with some flour mixture, about the same amount of flour from instruction 1. Adding flour will help keep the nut dry so that it can be ground finely without turning to paste. Combine walnuts with the flour mixture, press any lumps with a spatula to break them up, mix until well blended. Or if you prefer a coarse texture of the cookies, you can just skip the the food processor/dry mill step by pounding the walnuts into coarsely ground walnuts as indicated in the step 1.

Place 40g softened salted butter in a deep mixing bowl. Turn your electric beater into the slowest mode and beat the butter. Gradually add the 100g sugar and keep beating. Then add 30g cooking oil and 40g eggs. Keeping beating and mixing. The mixture will become fluffy and light. The whole process takes about 2-3 minutes.

Mix in dry ingredients, fold with a spatula until dough forms. Wrap the cookie dough with cling wrap and rest for 15 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 170℃/340F°.

Cookie dough is about 400g, Divide into 15 portions with 26g each, arrange on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Roll each dough into ball-shaped and flatten slightly, press the cookies dough with your thumb to create a hollow center. Brush with egg wash.

Place the baking try in the middle deck of the oven. Bake at 170℃/340F° for 24 minutes or till they become golden brown.

Cool for about 20-30 minutes on a cooling rack for before enjoying.

Panang, also spelled Phanaeng or phanang, is a type of red Thai curry that is thick, salty and sweet, with a nutty peanut flavor. Loads of fresh, fragrant herbs and spices go into the paste. But don’t be put off by the long list of the ingredients. All of them require little to no preparation and are simply tossed in a food processor or chopper and easily blitzed. If you have trouble in finding Thai shrimp paste, you can use Japanese red miso which guarantees the authentic, rich and complex flavour the paste is meant to have.

Makes 1 cup

• 2 teaspoons sea salt
• 12 cloves, garlic, peeled
• 2 tablespoons, cilantro stems
• 20-30 dried red chili depending on your tolerance level of spiciness, softened in warm water
• 2 teaspoons, white peppercorns, dry-roasted
• 1 big thumb of galangal
• 2 stalks lemongrass, white parts only香茅, roughly cut
• 2 shallots, peeled小红葱头
• 2 teaspoons, kaffir/lime leaves or lime zest
• 2 teaspoons of Thai shrimp paste, or use 2 tablespoons of red miso
• 7 to 8 tablespoons of unsalted peanuts, dry-roasted
• 1/3 – 1/2 cup, water

Method

1. Place all the ingredients into a food processor, blender or chopper. Add 1/3 to ½ cup of water to help the machine running. Blender till the mixture becomes paste. The paste does not have to be very smooth. Transfer to a jar with a tight-fitting lid and refrigerate until ready to use.

 

 

This tomato-based “Chinese Borscht” soup was in fact introduced and adapted by Russian refugees who migrated to Shanghai. Hence the Chinese name: 罗宋汤, which derived from the pronunciation of “Russian Soup”. The “Chinese Borscht” doesn’t include beetroots though, as Shanghai doesn’t have the suitable environment to plant beets.

Serve 4-6

• 300 to 400                      beef chunk or shank (any cuts for stew), cut into cubes
• 2 tablespoons cooking oil
• 1 large yellow onion (about 250g), roughly chopped
• 3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
• 1 medium size carrot, peeled and cut into cubes
• 1 stick of celery, cut into cubes
• 2 to 3 tomatoes (about 300g), roughly chopped
• 3 to 4 tablespoons tomato paste
• 6 cups of unsalted beef stock (Use 3 cups of beef stock + 3 cups of water if you use concentrated beef stock)
• 200g cabbage, roughly chopped
• 1 to 2 bay leaves
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 teaspoon ground black peppercorn
• 1 small russet potato, peeled and cut into 7 to 8 large pieces
• Ground black peppercorn and salt to taste

Method

1. Rinse the beef chunks and pat them very dry (this helps brown the meat.). Cut them into small cubes. Place two tablespoons of cooking oil in a thick-bottomed soup pot over medium heat. Add the beef cubes and saute till they are browned.Add into garlic and yellow onion cubes and cook over medium heat till the onions turns soft.   
2. Add into carrot and celery cubes and cook for a few minutes. Add into chopped tomatoes. Clear a space in the center of the pot, and add 3 to 4 tablespoons of tomato paste, letting it fry lightly. Stir and cook until the tomatoes are slightly dissolved and the oil in the pot turns reddish––a few minutes over medium heat.
3. Now add 6 cups of beef stock (or 3 cups of beef stock + 3 cups of water) and turn up the heat to high. Add into cabbage and bay leaves add 1 teaspoon of salt and 1/3 teaspoon of ground black peppercorn. Cover and bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to simmer for 60 minutes.
   

   
4. After 60 minutes of simmering, peel and cut the potatoes, and add them to the soup. Bring it to boil, then reduce the heat to simmer for 30 more minutes, or until the potatoes are tender. Salt to taste before serving.
5. Soup and stews always taste better the next day, so don’t fret if you have leftovers. Freeze the soup for another meal, and you will be very happy that you did.

Notes:

1. As this is tomato-based soup, the quantity of the tomato paste varies depending on how flavourful of your fresh tomatoes are. If you are luck to find very good quality tomato, you can use less tomato paste.