Char Siu Pork

I love Chinese and funnily enough one of the things I miss from good old Blighty is good Chinese food as Chinese food here in Spain is somewhat lacking in taste or in quality although it is cheap!One of my favourite dishes is Char Siu Pork, a dish which so far has proved impossible to find here (the Spanish don´t know what they are missing!!!)so when I came across the following recipe on fellow blogger Debs´s blog The Spanish Wok, I thought I´d give it a try.

Oh Boy,am I glad I tried it!Deb´s recipe is simple and easy to follow and the result is tasty, succulent pork oozing with  flavours such as five spice and hoisin sauce, really reminiscent of your local Chinese takeaway back in the UK!! I teamed the Char Sui pork with Annabel Karmel´s Vegetarian Nasi Goreng and this is a winning dish that everyone can enjoy,even my daughter loved it!!This will be a regular dish in our house from now on!

Aubergines in Chinese Style-Sauce

I always find it difficult to find new vegetarian recipes and usually end up cooking the same recipes over and over but when I tried this, I discovered that it was a keeper. It´s based on a recipe in my Cocinar con Wok book by Anne Wilson, which I´ve adapted, mainly as I can´t get some of the ingredients and although it would probably taste more authentic with those ingredients, I think you can still end up with a tasty Chinese style dish without them!

Ingredients (for 2 people)

1 large(ish) aubergine, chopped into small squares of 2cm
1 tbsp of peanut/groundnut oil (if you haven´t buy this, you could just use vegetable or olive oil)
3 spring(green) onions, sliced
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
about 1 inch of ginger, peeled and diced
60 ml of vegetable stock (I used 1 vegetable Bisto cube made up with water)
30ml white wine (use rice wine if available)
20 ml white wine vinegar (use rice vinegar if available)
1/2 tbsp tomato puree
5g sugar (white or brown)
20ml soy sauce
1/4 tsp chilli flakes/powder
1/2 tsp cornflour

Method
1. Heat oil in frying pan or wok and when hot, fry spring onions, ginger and garlic.
2.Add aubergine and fry till tender or golden.
3. Add wine, vinegar, sugar, tomato paste, vegetable stock, soy sauce and chilli flakes and cook for a minute.
4. Mix cornflour with 1 teaspoon of water to make a paste and add to pan.
5. Heat till it starts to boil then lower the heat and cook for a further 2 to 3 minutes till sauce has thickened. Add more water if necessary.
6. Serve with boiled rice.

Shan: Possibly the best Asian restaurant in Ciudad Real or even in Spain!

I love Asian food and have been to quite a few Chinese/Asian restaurants in Spain, particularly in Ciudad Real.However, I have often found Chinese/Asian restaurants to be quite disappointing in Spain as they tend to be seen as a cheap alternative for eating out and the quality and choice of dishes can be very limited compared to in the UK. I tend to find Chinese or Asian food in Spain has been adapted significantly for the Spanish palettes or that many dishes are simply not on Chinese restaurant menus here and I find it less authentic.

Until I discovered, Shan Cocina Asiática restaurant that is! Shan restaurant can be found in the city centre on Avda de la Mancha 5 in Ciudad Real. It is a spacious restaurant, very clean and nicely-decorated. It is an Asian restaurant, as opposed to a Chinese restaurant, which means that as well as the usual typical Chinese dishes, it also does some dishes from other Asian cuisines, such as sushi, Thai red curry, Vietnamese spring rolls etc.

All the food is of good quality, flavourful and authentic tasting. Our favourites include the restaurants speciality dish of chicken or beef in Thai red curry, beef in Tien-Ban sauce, ham knuckle or hock Shan-style (with a lovely tasting sauce made from five-spice I think...it reminds me a little of crispy duck too),Wok-style rice noodles (with a lovely spicy Thai-style sauce). We went last night for dinner and ordered some of our favourite dishes, the Vietnamese spring rolls as a starter, fried and bursting with mince pork, carrots, cabbage, Chinese mushrooms, agar-agar, served on a lettuce leaf with a sweet-sour sauce. Then, we had the Thai Wok-style rice noodles to follow and tried a new dish, Sizzling Duck of the house. The Sizzling Duck consisted of a lovely tender and juicy duck breast cooked to perfection, with crispy skin in a brown sauce and onions, served on a sizzling hotplate. Absolutely delicious!Even my husband, who is not that keen on duck, thoroughly enjoyed this dish. We have never had a bad meal or dish at this restaurant.

I´d reccomend fried ice-cream for dessert if you fancy something sweet. The restaurant usually throws in free prawn crackers and an after-dinner chupito (shot). Service is very good, the waiters/waitresses are very friendly and the food is very prompt. It is also very reasonably priced with dishes costing between 4.45 euros to the speciality dishes and duck ,which although slightly more expensive are still very reasonable, from 8.25 -10.95 euros. If you prefer to eat at home, you can also choose to get a takeaway or order it over the phone and have it delivered to your door!

My only concern is that this wonderful restaurant is often empty, which I cannot understand as it is definitely the best Chinese/Asian restaurant I have eaten at in Ciudad Real and maybe even in Spain! Do people just not know about it or is it too authentic tasting for Spanish palettes?I really would find it a great shame if this restaurant were to close.

Prawn Toasts

Just wanted to wish you all a Happy New Year and all the best for 2010! I made these prawn toasts for a buffet style meal (at least I thought it was)for New Year´s Eve as it´s something I´ve been wanting to try for awhile now.Also, it´s one of the only things I eat which contains prawns as I am not keen on fish or seafood.

Prawn Toasts (Makes 12)

137g prawns, desfrosted (or you could use fresh)

1/2 spring onion, finely chopped (white part only)

10g water chestnuts

1/2 beaten egg

1 tbsp cold water

3 slices of bread (I used bread with no crusts, if it has crusts cut them off)

enough oil for frying (I used olive oil)

1/4 cup of sesame seeds

Method

1. Blitz the spring onion and water chestnuts in a food processor.

2. Add the prawns, egg and water and again blitz in the food processer till you end up with a paste.

3.Spread the bread with prawn paste and cut into 4 triangles and dip into sesame seeds.

4. Fry in abundant hot oil with the sesame seed side facing up until it is golden and crispy and you have an easy,quick Chinese starter or party snack!

Honey chicken drumsticks

Spring finally appears to be here, the daffodils and other flowers are blooming and the trees are blossoming. Everything looks beautiful especially the magnolia trees-there are some photos below . The weather is a little crazy though....it was snowing a couple of days ago!



I´ve been pretty busy these past few weeks which is why I haven´t been blogging too much although I have been trying out lots of recipes from other blogs and trying to come up with some of my own creations...so keep an eye out! Meanwhile, I thought I´d share this recipe for Honey chicken drumsticks from BBC Food with you as it´s really easy to follow, tastes really good , almost tastes like it´s from a restaurant and is also fairly economical and at the same time healthy. I used the breadcrumbs as didn´t have any sesame seeds and I also left out the chives but apart from that followed the recipe to the letter. I didn´t make the Waldorf salad as me and my boyfriend aren´t too keen on celery and as I had other leftover salad ingredients, I threw together a salad comprising of lettuce, cucumber, pear, goats cheese and walnuts with a little ready-made bottled ranch dressing to accompany the drumsticks, which made for a healthy,light but delicious meal!