三味蒸蛋 3-Flavoured Steam Egg

Steam egg is an egg dish usually categorized as a soup dish.  

The basic ingredient are : eggs and water, seasoned with a bit of salt.  A wide variation of steam egg can be derived by adding different additional ingredients to it, 三味蒸蛋 3-flavoured steam egg is one of many variation of it.

First, hard-boil a salted egg.  Cut into small pieces.

Century egg need not to be cooked.  Cut it into small pieces too.

Then, beat 2 egg with 400ml of water, in a big bowl, preferable metal or ceramic made.  Too much water may prolonged cooking time, and the egg turns out watery.

Put in the chopped salted egg, and century egg.  Add in a bit of salt to taste.

Steam for about 30 minutes, until the egg hardened into a tofu-like substance.  

Century Egg 之 松花纹

皮蛋, supposedly ‘leathered egg’, yet named as ‘century egg’ by the Westerners.  During the Ming Dynasty, it was known as 混沌子, which is beyond translation, even for Google translate.

Century egg also known as pine-patterned egg, a more accurate-translation from alternative Mandarin name 松花蛋. 

Some century egg have patterns on the surface of the yolk, which resemblance pine branches.  The pattern is believed to be crystal salts of amino-acids.

Century eggs are coated with a mixture of quicklime (calcium hydroxide 石灰), soda ash (sodium carbonate 碱面) and salt (sodium chloride盐).  Quicklime reacted with soda ash, and forms sodium hydroxides.... Sodium hydroxides then seep through the egg shell and reacted with the amino acids in the yolk, forming amino-acid salts.  It’s the crystallization of the amino-acid salts that form the pattern on the yolk surface.     

MILO + Egg

Yes, you are right.  Its an egg in MILO !  An hardboiled egg, to be exact.

This is my own ongrizinal recipe.  

There are other MILO+egg combination, one that I know is crack open a fresh egg into a cup wih MILO powder, pour in boiling water and stir, the egg will be cooked and appeared to be fine shreds of yellowish-white colloid suspended in chocolate-coloured MILO.  A few slurps and its finish !  No chewing required.     

My version is simple : an hardboiled egg in MILO.   Using a spoon, cut he egg  into bite-size ; or scoop the egg out and bite it off the spoon.   I used to have it for supper or breakfast, when there's no much options.  If after finish the egg, and still not satisfied ... and theres still MILO left, can always add in few crackers ...

You may ask : How does it taste like ?  

Hard to imagine ?  Why not try it yourself tonight ?  

Bon appetit !

MILO

MILO^® is a beverage of cocoa, is a product by Nestlé, developed by Thomas Mayne, launched at the Sydnes Royal Easter Show, in 1934.   MILO^® first production plant located in Smithtown, near Kempsey on the on the North Coast of New South Wales.

The name MILO^®  was derived from a mythical Greek athlete Milo of Crotona ( 6^th century BC ).

MILO^®  consists of mixture of chocolate and malt powder.  The malt extract is rich in energy in the form of different types of carbohydrate : glucose, maltose, oligosaccharide, and polysaccharide.  Often fortified with vitamins and minerals  : B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B12, Biotin, C, Ca, Mg, Fe, P ,  thus it is not surprise MILO^® ‘s TV commercial jingles sings “minum MILO^®  anda jadi sihat dan kuat”.  

MILO^®  is very popular in Malaysia, where the brand is synonymous with chocolate flavored drinks. 

It has 90% market share in Malaysia, and Malaysian were said to be the world’s largest consumers of MILO^® .  Other similar beverages : Ovaltine^® , Horlick^® and Vi-Co^®, find it very hard to capture Malaysians taste.

The largest  MILO^®  factory in the world locates at Chembong, Negeri Sembilan.   

MILO^®  was first introduced as a nutrient supplement 1950s.  It is closely associated with sports and often labeled as sport drinks.  It was MILO^®  that coined the slogan ‘Malaysia Boleh!’. 

In Peru, during the 1970s, MILO^®  can labels displayed Peruvian towns, crops, fauna and floral.  After 1980s, the advertising fit to sports images.

In India, MILO^®  fails to compete with other beverages, thus ceased its production.

In Australia, the home country of MILO^®  , a new version called MILO^®  B-Smart was released in 2008, which is of finer texture and has added vitamin B and iodine.

In Brazil, production of MILO^®  was discontinued, but other Nestle brands, Nescau and Nesquik still continues.

Sold as powder in its signature green tin,  MILO^®  is also available as a premixed beverage in TetraPak, and 3in1 packages. 

MILO^®  can be served hot, lukewarm (MILO^® suam) or chilled (MILO^® 冰), with milk, or Nescafe instant coffee powder (Neslo).

Other MILO^®  derived products are : chocolate bar, cereal, yoghurt, ice cream etc

More information about MILO^®  can be retrieved from http://www.milo.com.my  and http://www.milo.com.au

MILO + Cracker

MILO + cream cracker is a mash up, instant, snack of my all time favourite.  It is convenience, easy to prepare, fast, economic and most important of all, fill my empty stomach !    I can have it between meals, midnight supper, for breakfast, lazy-to-cook-day, … while watching tv, reading… etc

Akin to American counterpart of cookie-milk, I believe this combination of snack is a specialty of S.E.Asian Chinese. 

It is a cup of MILO, and a few crackers.  Crackers are soaked momentary in hot MILO – not too long so that the crackers still have its crunchy bite – then scoop out with a table spoon.   It may look messy and distasteful for some, as the crackers looks somewhat awful when if softened.

I remember spreading sweetened milk or kaya on the cracker before soaking them into the MILO.   Hmmm....too sweet even for myself. 

Thinking of it, the cracker can be replaced with any type of cookies… be it butter cookie, Oreo, etc.  Just soak it, scoop it !

A more ‘civilized’  way is to dip-only the crackers in the MILO, and lift it up and bite it.    But, if the MILO is half full, then it might be inconvenience to dip the cracker.   A gentleman way it is, but not so effective, I think.  ( 歹势吃自己 / segan makan, perut lapar ! )

竹蔗凉水 SugarCane Herbal Tea

竹蔗 ( literally means bamboo cane.  竹 = bamboo, 蔗 = sugarcane ) is a kind of sugarcane, dark purple in colour, at 1-2cm diameter, it is skinnier than the normal sugarcane ( Saccharum officinarum ). It is also less juicy, and less sweet.  Very much favoured by the Chinese community as the main ingredient of infamous sugarcane herbal tea.

I supposed bamboo cane should be Saccharum sinense, but can’t be 100% sure.  It is also known as Chinese cane.

Fresh Chinese bamboo can be bought in most Asian fresh market.  Dried ones find their ways to hypermarkets and sundry stores pre=packed.

before cleaning ......                                                                 after cleaning ......

If you have fresh Chinese cane, it is vital to clean it off any debris, dirt, buds and dried leaves.  Scratch it, scrub it, rub it, wash it.  Then, cut it into about 10cm long ( for them to able to fit into my pot, of course ), chopped them into 2 - 4 vertically.

Simmer them in a huge pot of water with big chunk of chopped carrot, till the water turns yellowish and smells of sweet sugarcane aroma.  Ironically, add in a bit of sugar to sweetened it up.  Serve hot or chilled.  Discard off the sugarcane lol .

Minus all the hassle of cleaning and chopping, one can always head to any grocery stores or hypermarkets to have pre-packed dried Chinese cane.  Those dried packs are mostly produce of China, often have other herbs added to it : arrowroot, carrot, and Imperatae root.

丝瓜炒虾球 Stir-fried Luffa with Prawn

First, heat oil over medium flame, stir-fry in sliced ginger.

Add in minced garlic as well. 

Then, add in minced meat and skinned prawns. 

When the meat and prawns are half cooked, add in the luffa.

Stir-fry a bit…  Add in some ShaoXing wine ( 绍兴酒 ).

Simmer for a while till the luffa is softened.  Add in bit of water when necessary.

Lastly, a pinch of salt and some oyster sauce ( 蚝油 )to taste.