Two Asian Kitchens by Adam Liaw

I wasn't into Masterchef from the 1st season and never got suck into the 2nd either. Did watch a bit on the 3rd while having dinner for the past few weeks but can't say I enjoying it or not. Too much drama, too much crying. Let's just says it's a ok dinner table program for the moment.
I got very curious after all the fuss on twitter when Adam Liaw's 1st cookbook was out available on the shelves. I hadn't add any new addition cookbook onto my collection for quite a while and was keen to go thru the recipes in this cookbook. When I finally managed to find 1 in Big W, I bought it. It was the cheapest I can find at Doncaster Westfield. Plus we do love Singapore/Malaysia/Japan style food. Majority of our meals are Asian cuisine so do see myself using the recipes more than the rest of the cookbooks I owned. Maybe? Or just another excuses???

The 1st dish I tried was Fire Chicken (bul dak).


I did change the recipe slightly as my pantry didn't have some of the ingredients and I could find any nashi pear and was too late to try pop into a Oriental supermarket to get some nashi pear. I also tone down the spiciness just in case. The amount stated in the recipe seem to be too much for both of us to handle.

Differences in my version of Fire Chicken

1. I had some chicken drumstick in the freezer so decided to use them instead of whole chicken. Too lazy to chop the whole chicken up into pieces.
2. Ran out of sake (no idea how did that happen as I'm always well stocked). Never bought korean rice wine before so I substitute with japanese rice wine which I found in the pantry. What's the different? Honestly totally clueless.
3. I used korean corn syrup instead of honey/rice malt syrup/mul yut (korean malt syrup). Assuming this is a korean style dish can't go wrong substituting ingredients with korean stuff right?
4. To ensure the dish is not going to be too spicy, instead of using 3 tbsp of chilli powder, I used 2. Skipped the red birds eye chillies.
5. I do know korean like to use nashi pear for sweetness when marinating meat. I'm guessing nashi pear acts the same in this recipe. Since I can't find any, I replaced it with onion. Adam told me on twitter that apple should do the job as well. Why didn't that occur to me?? hmmmm.

This recipe is a keeper for me. Both of us enjoyed the dish. Reducing the amount of chilli into this dish was a smart call because this dish was still a bit too spicy to have it on it's own. But great having it with white rice.

2nd dish I tried was Seafood Char Kway Teow.


This time round, I sticked to the recipe especially on the sauce. Did use my own version of chicken stock. Stir-frying this dish using a cast iron wok brings so much wok-hei flavour to the dish. With my homemade chilli paste, it taste even better than some of the others sold in restaurant. 

3rd dish I tried was Beef Rendang.


This dish was my contribution for the Adam Liaw Cookbook Feast which was orgainsed together with a few friends. Each of us was to pick a dish from the cookbook, prepared it and eat it together. Great idea especially able to test out a few recipes in 1 sitting.

Additional dishes we had for the night:

1. Black Hokkien Noodles
2. Nasi Lemak
3. Green Tea and Pea Corquettes.
4. Mango Pudding
5. Pearl Pudding
6. Nine Layer Cake (Kuih Lapis)

I'm not going to include the above mention dishes as I'm not the one who prepared it. Not sure did they stick to the recipe or not.

I did try to stick to the recipe on this dish as well. Might had added a bit too much turmeric for the base paste. As there's a few friends who can't take spicy food at all, I decreased the number of red birds-eye chillies from 6 to 4.

The beef was so soft and melts in the mouth after the long duration of cooking. It smells fantastic guessing because of coconut but it wasn't as flavoursome. Something was missing but I can't pinpoint what it was.

The 4th dish I tried till present was Black Belly.


I was suprised how simple and easy this dish was. Very nice caramelisation on the pork which I like.Mr. loved it too.

The 5th dish I tried was Gong Bao Chicken which I can't find a picture off!!! ARGH!!!
As usual, I decreased the amount of dried chillies but I will increase the amount of sichuan peppercorn next time I cook this dish. I prefered to have cashew nuts in my Gong Bao Chicken so I replace peanuts with cashew nuts. But as for the sauce, it was much taster than off the shelves bottles ones.

Just remembered, I also did the Chilli and Garlic Oil which I didn't take any picture. It was spicy and serving it together with my egg noddles.

I did make full use of this cookbook right?