a rustic carrot onion omelette

an easy carrot and onion omelette.

I know, I know. This is but a mere vegetable omelette. And so simple, you probably don't even need the recipe. Still, this homely dish, with its effortlessly natural mix of sweet and savoury, never fails to put a smile on my face. My mum tends to serve this carrot onion omelette with rice or congee for lunch or dinner, but you can easily adopt it as a breakfast omelette as well. Back home in Malaysia, I always reach for my share of this omelette eagerly when mum puts it on the family dining table, so today I'm sharing it with you.

carrot onion omelette

1 small carrot
1 small onion
4 large eggs
1/4 teaspoon salt
oil, for frying
soy sauce and pepper, to taste

- Julienne carrot and onion, or just slice them into similarly sized strips.
- Lightly whisk the eggs and salt in a bowl with a fork.
- Continue along the following steps, either using all the mixture to make one big omelette, or dividing into batches to make 2 - 4 smaller omelettes.
- In a frying pan, sauté carrot and onion in a little oil for 3 - 5 minutes over medium heat.
- Spread the carrot and onion pieces evenly across the pan.
- Pour the egg mixture over the carrots and onions, swirl to coat the pan more evenly.
- Fry for 2 or 3 minutes until set, then flip over and continue to cook for 1 minute.
- Serve carrot onion omelette with soy sauce and pepper on the table, so that everyone can help themselves and season to their liking!

carrots and onions lend a sweet, savoury deliciousness to this omelette.

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crispy rice cake + chinese sausage canapes

hot dog inspired mini sandwiches, made with pan-fried eggy crispy rice cakes and steamed lap cheong.

Hot dogs! That's the theme for January's International Incident Party, hosted, as always, by the lovely Jeroxie. It's been quite the messy situation organising myself for this month's party, and I had a few hiccups along the way - but I got something done. It's certainly not the traditional hot dog - more a hot-dog-inspired canapé or pintxo re-interpreted with a strong Chinese twist. I present to you my eggy crispy rice sandwiches with lap cheong!

If you're not familiar with lap cheong, it is a sweet chinese sausage, usually made of pork, and as is typical of Asian goodies, does not seem to have an official or universal English spelling. On my packet, for example, it is spelt "lup chong". Either way, have a look at my photographs and if you see something that looks like those in your local Asian grocery, you should be on the right track. I do recommend that you try these sweet, savoury, fatty bundles of deliciousness: they are fantastic in dishes such as congee and fried rice.

a packet of lap cheong, plus a Lebanese cucumber I forgot to use.

cross section shots of the sweet chinese sausage usually labelled as lap cheong or lup chong.

Since lap cheong goes so well with fried rice, I decided to make eggy, crispy rice cakes to use as mini sandwiches. The concept of these, in some ways, is quite similar to my flourless potato pancake-omelettes, except instead of potatoes, rice is used here, and instead of keeping them soft and fluffy, I pan-fried them till crispy on the outside.

The first thing I did was steam some rice, together with chopped up Chinese chives, red chilli, ginger, salt and pepper. I also steamed the lap cheong. I then mixed the cooked rice with egg. Finally, I assembled the mini sandwiches, which is basically just putting the crispy rice omelette-cakes together with the steamed lap cheong. I had planned to add cucumber for a cool, refreshing contrast, but I forgot. It still turned out well.

chinese chives, red chilli and ginger.

the mixture of steamed rice and egg.

hot dog inspired canapés: crispy rice cakes with lap cheong

From memory, this made about a dozen little canapés.

2/3 cup cooked rice with seasonings of your choice and to your taste (I used chopped Chinese chives, red chilli and ginger, salt and white pepper)
1 large egg
1 medium lap cheong, steamed whole for 10 minutes, then sliced
cucumber slices (my forgotten ingredient!)
oil, for frying

- Lightly beat the egg, then add the seasoned cooked rice and mix well.
- Heat up a little oil in the frying pan and spoon the mixture into the hot pan, frying it like you would an omelette or pancake. Press the mixture down to help it fry faster and hold its shape, and cook on both sides until crispy on the outside.
- Remove the crispy egg-rice omelette-pancake from the pan, and cut into little squares.
- Place the lap cheong onto one crispy rice cake, and top it with another crispy rice cake. Secure with toothpicks. If you want a higher ratio of lap cheong joy, do it open-sandwich-style and omit the crispy rice cake on top. Remember to steam an extra lap cheong in that case!
- If you do use cucumber, you can incorporate them into the mini sandwiches, or serve them on the side.
- Serve immediately, while they are still warm and crispy.

appetizing bite-sized finger food: part sandwich, part pintxo, part canapé.

the hot dog buffet is on!

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flourless potato pancake-omelettes

flourless potato pancake omelettes

Last Saturday, after buying some very nice down-to-earth sebagos from the market, I found myself home alone and decided to make some simple potato pancakes for one.

organic sebago potatoes

I concocted an easy recipe for flourless potato pancake-omelettes, an inspired cross between latkes (Jewish potato pancakes), and tortilla de patatas (Spanish potato omelette)! Like latkes, it utilizes grated strips of potato, and like tortilla de patatas, it is eggy and flourless.

the flourless potato pancake-omelette mix

flourless potato pancake-omelettes for one

1 medium to large potato (I used a sebago, and it cooked very easily)
1 egg
1 very, very small onion (or substitute with a shallot)
oil or butter, for frying (I used butter!)
Salt, pepper, and yoghurt to taste

- Shred/Grate the potato, with or without the skin, into some cold water, then drain well and lightly squeeze out some of the excess water, keeping a little starchy moisture.
- Finely grate or mince the onion, and add to the grated potatoes.
- Lightly beat an egg with a fork, and add to the grated potato-and-onion mix.
- Season to your liking with salt and pepper, mix well.
- Heat some oil or butter in a pan, and ladle 1 tablespoonful of the mixture for each potato pancake-omelette that you will be frying.
- Fry on one side, pressing the mixture down evenly. When you can flip it over without it looking like it will fall apart, flip it over, and fry on the other side.
- Serve hot/warm, fresh from the pan, with toppings of your choice. I used a slightly sour, slightly sweet organic wildberry yoghurt just because it was all I had, and it turned out to be a beautiful match!

Note: The potato I used was approximately 4 to 5 times the size of the egg I used. The onion was about the size of the egg or slightly smaller.

the love children of latkes and tortilla de patatas get friendly with a dollop of yoghurt.

These flourless potato pancake-omelettes had me charmed at first taste. The softness of the cooked egg and the gentle bite of the grated potatoes complemented each other. The onion weaved some lovely invisible magic to the flavour, along with the salt and pepper. The good quality yoghurt, thick and tangy, brought everything together. This is definitely something I'll be making again, and the next time I do so, I hope to be cooking up a bigger batch and sharing it around with loved ones.

going, going, gone!

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a taste of the forest: chanterelles for breakfast

barn-laid eggs, ficelle and chanterelles

Today is my day off, and I have been lusting after the truffles at The Vegetable Connection for awhile now, so I decided to pay them a visit this morning for some truffle goodness. Unfortunately, when I got there, I was informed that they had all sold out. They did, however, still have some fresh wild chanterelle mushrooms from France, which at a whopping $120/kg don't come cheap, so I bought a modest 50 grams. On the way back, I popped by Babka for a ficelle, which is like a baguette but thinner.

As I had never used chanterelles before, I decided to keep it simple, so I made omelettes.

the finished product

Ingredients:

50g chanterelles, sliced

4 eggs (I used eggs that were 50g each, so 200g total)

1 tablespoon pure cream

knob of butter

ficelle

fresh slices of lemon

salt and pepper to taste

- whisk eggs and cream in a bowl, set aside.

- add butter and chanterelles to a pan, cook till chanterelles are slightly soft but still firm, set aside.
- add more butter to the pan, and start on the omelettes.

- omelette #1: I poured half the egg mixture into the pan, waited till it was nearly done, added half of the chanterelles, and folded.

- omelette #2: I poured the rest of the egg mixture into the pan, and while the mixture was still semi-fluid, I scattered the remaining chanterelles on top. After the chanterelles sank in a little and were secured into the body of the omelette, I flipped it over.

- add salt, pepper and lemon juice to taste

- serve with sliced ficelle

chanterelle omelette #1, resting on a plate

chanterelle omelette #2, perched on a fork

I  loved the chanterelles! They had a gorgeous earthy flavour, and the simplicity of the dish suited them very well. I was happy with both the omelettes, but for me, the first one was much better as the lovely taste of the buttered-up chanterelles was more distinct. And in the end, this luxurious breakfast ended up costing less than, say, if we'd gone for eggs benedict at a cafe - it did take a little more time and effort, but with ingredients this good, I say it's worth it.

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