recent food photos

Pork groeung

Today Soeun flavoured pork with a mix of spices called groeng, its usually used in stir fry. We usually use a mortar and pestle, but we don't have one here. Lemongrass, garlic, lime leaf, turmeric/lmit, galangal/romgdang

He put the lime leaf, sliced tumeric and galangal in some foil and put it over a flame, then into the little blender thingy. Still working out how to use it, the stuff didn't get as ground up as he would have liked.

Next in was chopped garlic and lemongrass.
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Then he added some salt, sugar, knorr etc and the pork to sit in it for awhile. Then fried it and ate with rice! Yum!

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Herbs

The saw herb plant we got from my parents (they got it from some Cambodians who live in Australia). I carried it back on the plane in May.

Chicken and ginger stirfy

I normally think of ginger as being used to flavour things, but in this Khmer stir fry its more of a veggie that you munch on. Also, I prefer pure meat, soft easy to eat, but Soeun prefers the way Khmer normally make it. I think they just chop the whole chicken up - bones and all.

pizza snacks

Made these today! Kind of like the savoury version of cinnamon twists.

dough
300grams flour (2 cups), plus extra for dusting
1/2 tsp salt
1 sachet dried yeast (2 tsp)
200ml warm water
1tbsp oil, plus extra for greasing

filling
100g smoked ham
100ml tomato sauce
85 g grated cheese
1/2-1 tsp dried oregano

(i might making some with pesto and olives too, instead of sauce and ham)

1.flour and salt, stir in yeast, make a well add water and oil and mix to a soft dough

2 turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 10 min of until smooth and elastic, then put into a lightly oiled bowl. cover and leave to rise in a warm place for 1 hour, or until doubled in size. meanwhile , line a large baking tray with non stick baking paper

3 knead the dough lightly then roll out thinly on a floured surface to make a rectangle

4 chop the ham. spread the tomato sauce over the dough, sprinkle with ham, cheese and herbs

5 roll up tighlty like a swiss roll and cut into 16 slices. place the pieces of dough on the baking tray. cover and leave to rise for 30 min. meanwhile preheat the oven to 230/450

6 bake in centre of oven for 8-10 min or until will risen and golden brown, serve warm or leave to cool on rack

freezable for up to 2 months

can use wholemeal flour , they suggest 50-85 g of whole and the rest plain

Cinnamon Twists (saturday august 20)

I was feeling like I wanted to cook something with flour yeast and cinnamon, this recipe was on the back of the dry yeast box.

2 sachets dry yeast (14g)
4 cups plain flour
1tsp salt
1/4 cup sugar
300ml sour cream, warmed
1/4 cup warm milk
2 tablespoons melted butter (40ml)
an egg (lightly beaten it says- oops i didn't do that)

filling
2tablespoons melted butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1tsp cinnamon

(also they give ingredients for icing but i didn't make icing)


1.mix dry ingredients , add sour cream, milk, butter and egg, mix well to form soft dough. knead for 10 min until smooth and elastic.


2.Place dough in a greased bowl. Cover, leave leave in a warm place to double in volume (approx 50 min). I put it in/over a sink of hot water

3.Knock down dough (punch in middle first)then knead for 1 min.

4. divide dough into 2 equal portions . roll each portion to a rectangle 30cmX30cm (sounds more like a square to me?) Combine all filling ingredients and mix well. spread filling over each portion.

5.Fold dough in half lengthwise. Slice into 12 X 2.5cm slices. twist each end in opposite directions. place on greased baking trays. Leave in warm place to double in size (approx 30 min)- I put one tray over the sink again , and the other in front of heater. I don't think they doubled in size, but they ended up turning out ok as far i as i could tell

6. bake at 180 c for 25 min. Cool on wire rack

(if you want to do the icing you beat 1 tbs butter and 1 cup of icing sugar until light and fluffy then beat in 1 tbs milk, some drops of vanilla , when cool ice and sprinkle with cinnamon )

I might make them smaller next time and use more fillings

our house got a freezer!

Met people from the province I lived in in China! I've met stacks of Chinese people in Aust, but these are the first ones from that province.

minced pork

mix garlic, soy, sugar, salt, ginger, chives etc with mince pork and steam, or you could stir fry
nice with stir fried green leafy veg and rice
i got this idea from a singaporean in cambodia, so not sure what nationality food it is

chocolate choc chip biscuits

125 g butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup castor sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla e
an egg
1 1/2 cup SR flour
1/3 cup cocoa
3/4 cup choc chips

1,mix butter and sugars
2, add vanilla and egg
3, add flour and cocoa
4, choc chips

bake at 160 for 10-15 min

i'm really missing cooking. atm we live in a college so we get fed most meals, excpet holidays (college/school and public), and Sunday nights. also we share a kitchen, 6 of us altogether with only 1 freezer! plus there is not much kitchen stuff, but i don't really know what is there yet and what isn't , i only find out as i need to use it, which isnt very often
and when i do cook i end up throwing out the rest of the bottle of olives, or the two servves of left overs, as we don't need to eat here much and we don't have much freezer space, so i'm not very inpsired to cook, exp as KS and I don' t have much food we like in common, so i'm mostl cooking for one(without being able to freeze left overs)

but today i did some pototoes in the oven, some bits of chicken in oil (coated in egg, flour and yummy stuff), with some nice raw veg (red caps, beans, carrots)
KS had some, as well as rice and kimchi

part of getting settled in places for me is having a place i can feel comfy cooking in, it was great at our last place to buy mixing bowls, measuring cups etc etc, and know they were mine and i could make my food, i don't have that here