Fried Salted Fish in Tamarind Sauce (Ikan Masin Masak Branda)

When my mom was around, she used to cook this salted fish dish which I loved very much. Sometimes, when she can't find the firm and meatier salted fish, she would used other types of firm meat salted fish. I don't fancy soft meat salted fish like gelama that much for this dish :-) In the Penang island, this style of cooking is known as Masak Branda or sometimes, it's written as Masak Belanda but in Malacca it's known as Goreng Asam. I suspected the name of the dish may be influenced by Indonesian Peranakans from Medan in North Sumatera which is very close to Penang island. During the heyday of Spice Trail and colonisations, Indonesia was influenced by Dutch (in my country, the locals still call Netherlands as Holland) or Belanda in Malay language (derived from Portuguese ~ 'Holanda').

I also discovered this versatile sauce or gravy for this dish easily adapted for fried eggs, meat, seafood and vegetables as well. My favourite vegetable for this tamarind gravy is aubergine (eggplant or brinjal), which I will post the soonest.

If you read or knew Peranakan culture in Southeast Asia, a Nyonya was trained not just the cooking skills but also able to adapt their recipes accordingly to seasonal ingredients. I hope Peranakan culture and cuisine stays in years to come as younger generations of this minority group found the tradition is no longer practical in today's world. As the older generations faded away, it's easy to dine Nyonya cuisine in restaurants but I can assured you, the best Nyonya cuisine comes from the home and from the heart. It's truly an authentic amalgam of Malaysian cultures. If you ever invited to a Peranakan Nyonya home for meal, DON'T decline it! No second thoughts! ;-)

Fried Salted Fish in Tamarind Sauce (Ikan Masin Masak Branda)

Serves 4-6

150 g Dried Salted Fish Meat (preferably firm and white fish meat like Red Snapper, Threadfin or Cod)

2 nos Fresh Red Chillies ~ sliced diagonally

6 nos Red Shallots (Asian Red Shallots) ~ sliced thinly

5 cloves Garlic ~ sliced thinly

20 g Ginger ~ cleaned, removed outer skin & julliened

300 ml Tamarind Juice ( or 35 g Tamarind Puree + 250 ml water)

20 g Raw Cane Sugar or to taste (or Granulated Sugar)

1 g - 2 g Grounded White Pepper or to taste (about 1/2 tsp full)

Cooking Oil

Garnish (optional):

Some chopped Fresh Coriander, Spring Onions, Crispy fried shallots or Ginger

Method:

1. Removed any dried scales and hard fish bones hidden within the salted fish meat. Sliced the dried salted fish meat of your choice about 0.5 cm thick pieces. Soak them in water for few minutes. Remove and pat the pieces dry with kitchen paper. Set aside.

2. Heat some cooking oil in a pan enough to fry the salted fish meat ( I used about 125 ml cooking oil for the amount of salted fish I used). When the oil is hot, fry the salted fish pieces until crispy but be careful not to burn them. Remove them quickly into some kitchen paper to absorb the access oil. Arrange the salted fish into a serving plate.

3. Remove some of the oil and leave about 50 ml in the pan. Stir-fry the sliced chillies, red shallots, garlic and ginger until fragrant.

4. Add in the Tamarind juice and let the gravy boils for few minutes.

5. Add in sugar and grounded white pepper to taste and continue to let the gravy boils until it thickens to your preference.

6. Pour the thickened gravy over the fried salted fish pieces in the serving plate. Serve with hot steamed rice or rice congee with other condiments.

Note:

If you can't find Tamarind Purée (with seeds and impurities remove), use the usual Tamarind pulp with seeds. You may need more amount than the Tamarind Purée. I usually average it 1 teaspoon full of Tamarind Purée to 1 Tablespoon full of Tamarind Pulp. In Malaysia's Peranakan or Nyonya cuisine, each household has their own taste preferences. It's difficult to give exact measurement as most recipes literally handed down through the female generations. For this recipe, I like it more sour with lots of ginger and garlic. For chilli fans, you can replace fresh chillies with dried chillies instead :-)

If you can't find firm whole salted fish meat fillets like Spanish Mackerel, Red Snapper, Threadfin, you can use those small salted fish that had been sliced and dried in halves in Thai supermarkets or major Asian shops.

Enjoy!

Curry Chicken in Kaffir Lime Leaves

Firstly, I wanted to thank Nihal, the Mediterranean Turkish Cook for passing me this wonderful Lemonade Award that really cheered me up after a long bout of wheezings, coughings, sore throats and sleepless nights for the last few weeks! Çok, çok teşekküler, Nihal for this Lemonade Award! Also, what a coincidence that I was cooking another family recipe that I love so much from my mom that shared the same Citrus family as this lemony award!

I'm referring to this frequent cooked Kaffir Lime Curry Chicken in Southeast Asian homes where there were several versions from different countries even available online. This fragrant curry actually doesn't have kaffir lime juice in it but its evergreen fragrant leaves! Kaffir lime itself has very little juice compared to other Limes. Besides as culinary use, it plays very important part in local beliefs. In this recipe, I preferred the curry thicker or 'dry' as the local called it and to maximise the fragrant leaves, I julienned the kaffir lime leaves finely with a very sharp knife more than required and mixed into the curry instead of whole leaves as the norm. Traditionally, my mom would use an Indian terracotta pot to cook this curry but you can use your normal heavy pot. It's only slight difference in taste (though the terracotta gives out better taste.) Here's my version adapted from my mom's... :-D

Curry Chicken with Kaffir Lime Leaves

Serves 4-6 persons

600 g - 800 g Whole Chicken or your favourite Chicken parts (thighs, drumsticks, etc)

To be pounded finely:

8 shallots

1 stalk Lemongrass - use only the white portion

4 pips Garlic

6 dried chillies

5 fresh red chillies

3 cm fresh Tumeric

Thumb-sized Galangal

10 pcs Kaffir Lime leaves

4 pieces Tamarind Slices

2-3 Tbl Cooking Oil

250 ml Fresh Thick Coconut Milk

Some water

Method:

1. Clean the chicken and cut into pieces. I preferred to remove the skin before cooking. If you don't bother, you can leave it on and remove skin later.

2. Smash the galangal with the back of a knife or you can use a pestle and mortar if you have it.

3. Soak dried chillies in warm water for 15 minutes or until soften.

4. Pound the shallots, garlic, fresh chillies, tumeric and dried chillies until fine. You can use a blender if it's more convenient.

5. Wash the Kaffir Lime leaves and cut off the hard middle stems. Roll the leaves up tightly and with a sharp knife, julienne the leaves finely.

6. Heat a deep pan or a wok until hot. Add the cooking oil and the pounded ingredients. Stir until fragrant.

7. Add the cut chicken pieces and stir. Make sure the chicken pieces are thoroughly coated with the spice mixture for about 5 minutes.

8. Add 1/4 cup water, tamarind pieces, galangal and the julienned kaffir lime leaves. Stir until the chicken pieces are well coated with the spices.

9. Pour in the fresh coconut milk. Stir and add salt to taste. Cover the pot or wok and turn the heat to medium, stirring occasionally. Simmer until chicken meat thoroughly cooked.

This curry is great with rice, bread, naan, chapati or even as stuffings for buns, puffs, pies...

Note: I added very little water (sometimes non at all) as the chicken meat and coconut milk already contained some liquid. If you add more water, it would take longer time for the gravy or curry to thicken. Nevertheless, if you like more gravy, you can add more water :-) This curry is best eaten the day after - if you can stand it ... :-P Don't worry about the quantity of kaffir leaves used, it's not going to make the curry bitter. If you want, you can squeeze some Key Lime juices after stop the cooking. Enjoy!