Air Fried Chicken 65 - Dried version

I've not heard of Chicken 65 until I moved to Melbourne. Probably I did not dine enough in Indian restaurants when I was in Malaysia hence a little behind on their offerings. I fell in love with it on my first try at this little Malaysian Indian restaurant named Indian Delight and has been ordering it each time i dine there. I went to try others too but some are just way too spicy!

The other day I bought 1.2 kg of chicken wings and was wondering what can I cook with them? So, I went through all the saved recipes from FB and found a sharing by this lady in Malaysia and decided to try as she made it look so easy. Just add everything and marinate overnight! However, she deep fried her chicken and that was the last thing I want to do. And my good friend, Black Knight the air fryer came to my rescue! No used oil to discard and minimal mess in the kitchen... I tweaked the recipe a bit to suit our taste buds (need to be kids friendly so its less spicy) and to suit air frying method.

Ingredients

• 1.2kg          Chicken wings
• 2 tbsp         Garlic & ginger paste
• 1.5 tbsp      Coriander powder
• 1 tsp           Turmeric powder
• 2 tbsp         Chili powder (put more if you want more spicy
• ¾ tsp          Salt
• ¼ tsp          White pepper
• 4 tbsp         Greek yogurt/plain yogurt
• 2 sprigs      Curry leaf (chopped)
• 6 tbsp         Corn flour
• 3 tbsp         Rice flour

Methods

1. Clean the chicken wings and pat dry with kitchen towels. Cut into 2 sections.
2. Mix ginger garlic paste, coriander powder, turmeric powder, chili powder, salt and white pepper in a bowl. Pour the mixture into chicken together with yogurt and mix till well combined. Cover and leave it to marinate for 4 hours or over night for best results.
3. Prepare corn flour and rice flour on a dinner plate and mix them well. Sprinkle the chopped curry leaf over and mix the chicken before coating the chicken with the flour and place into the basket of the air fryer. If you are deep frying, you halved the flour and mix into the chicken.
4. Before you air fry, brush or spray some oil over the coated chicken wings.
5. Air fry at 180C for 15 to 18 minutes and turn mid way. Remember to brush with oil after you flipped over as the flour will not cook properly without oil. Please adjust your air frying timing as sizes of the chicken may required more or less frying time.
6. Drain on wire rack (if you put on kitchen towel to absorb the excess oil it will turn the crispiness of the skin soggy).
7. Squeeze some lime juice over the chicken prior to serving.

Braised Lemonade Pork Belly

As most of us are locked down at home, there's only so much we can do. Eat, sleep and repeat. It is bad for our health really! To de-stress, I will normally cook or bake else I'll turn into couch potato! Luckily I'm not into any TVB or K-drama...

One night, a friend was following this live cooking show on FB and asked me to check it out. It was Maria Cordero, a popular HK celebrity cooking live from her kitchen. The dish she cooked that night was this rather easy to follow pork belly dish using 7-Up. Pretty interesting and best part is, it is so easy as she literally just dump everything in and boil! No mess and no oily kitchen!

Kids love it knowing they get some soft drinks in their food! Yes, it uses 7-Up or any lemonade to tenderize the meat. It has a sweet savoury taste and kind of appetizing. As I do not have the required fresh chili, I substitute with some dried chilies which worked out better as I get a little kick of spiciness in the gravy. Kids practically flooded their rice with the gravy!

Ingredients

1 kg         Pork belly (cut into big cubes about 1.5")
4 pcs       Shallot (cut into big slices)
2 pcs       Garlic (cut into big slices)
1 - 2         Bay leaf
1 pc         Cinnamon stick
2 pcs        Star anise
1 pc          Fresh chilie (use 2 dried chilies if you prefer a tinge of spiciness)
350 ml      Lemonade (7-Up/Sprite)
2 tbsp       Dark soy sauce (dark caramel)
2 tbsp       Light soy sauce
1 pc          Rock sugar (can omit if you prefer less sweet)
1 tbsp       Vinegar (or rice vinegar)
1 tsp         Salt
½tsp         Black pepper

Methods

1. Place all the dry ingredients into a deep pot (best if you have a cast iron casserole pot).
2. Rinse the pork with some water added with 2tbsp of vinegar to get rid of smell.
3. Drain and arrange pork cubes on top of dry ingredients.
4. Pour in the lemonade. Add a bit more if you prefer to have more gravy.
5. Put in the sauces, rock sugar, vinegar and seasoning. 
6. Switch on medium fire and let it come to a boil. Stir every few minutes.
7. Cover and let it simmer for 45 minutes on small fire till pork pieces are tender.

Orange Burnt Basque Cheesecake

I've cut down on cheesecakes ever since I was diagnosed with lactose intolerance over 20 years ago. I used to love American cheesecakes and Japanese cheesecakes but have to stop consuming when these cheeses got me a troubled tummy during my uni days. It got better over time but I'll still eat with caution.

Last year, the Basque Burnt Cheesecake was all the range as it went viral in many FB baking and cooking groups. It was definitely one of the easiest cheesecake or cake to bake! Just add all the ingredients and in to the oven and after 40 mins you'll have a lovely cake. I've been baking this cheesecake for so many times I've lost count! My kids simply love it and since its so easy... why not?

I've tried infusing it with lemon once and it turned out lovely. Probably the acidity of the lemon juice helps to eliminate or reduced the greasiness of the cheese and you don't feel bloated after eating. I have some really sour oranges which no one wants to eat so I decided to try using them to bake this burnt cheesecake and surprisingly the aroma from the oranges was fantastic. Kids really enjoyed it and the cake was gone in a flash.

Ingredients

250gm  Cream Cheese
75gm    Castor Sugar
3           Eggs
250ml   Whipping Cream

3tbsp    Freshly squeezed orange juice
20gm    Plain Flour

1tsp      Orange zest

Whipped Cream

100ml    Whipping cream

25gm     Castor sugar

Methods

1. Line a 6" round baking pan with non stick baking paper.
2. Pre-heat oven to 200C. You may want to check your oven as some may need to set to 220C.
3. Cut the cream cheese into big cubes and beat with a mixer for 1 minute to break them up. Add in the sugar and beat till pale and creamy for a few minutes
4. Add in eggs one at a time.
5. Sift in flour and beat slightly in the mixer.
6. Using a sieve, filter the batter into the prepared pan. Press down the trapped flour in the sieve.
7. Mix in the orange zest.
8. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes using fan-forced function.
9. Bake a further 10 minutes using top/top and bottom heat to get the burnt effect.
10. Cool on wire rack for 10-15 minutes and remove from pan and continue to cool on wire rack.
11. Chill in the fridge for a few hours before decorate with whipped cream.
12. To make the whipped cream, pour the whipping cream in a mixing bowl and whip for 1 minute and slowly pour in castor sugar and whip till stiff peak.Spread onto chilled cake and decorate with preferred fruits or macaroons.