Nasi Ayam a.k.a Chicken Rice, A South East Asian Speciality

 There are 4 components to Nasi Ayam. However, it is one of the easiest recipe in this site. The 4 components of Nasi Ayam are :
1) Chicken Soup
2) Chilli Sauce / Curry
3) Chicken Rice
4) Fried Chicken

Now let's go to the recipe to make these components and enjoy the yummy taste of this famous dish in the South East Asia.

 1) Recipe Chicken Soup

Oil - 1 Tbsp
Ginger - 2 or 3 inch sliced thinly
Chicken - 1/2 kg of Medium cuts 
Salt - apinch
Water - enough to keep aside for a soup as well as to cook the rice later. roughly 1 liter should be more than enough.

In a heavy bottom pan, pour the oil and saute the ginger till golden brown. This is to make the stock fragrant. Add the water and let it come to a rolling boil. Add Salt and the chicken and let it cook till tender.
This should take about 15-20 minutes.
Keep aside a bowl of soup and add 2 or 3 soup leaves.
Save the rest for the chicken rice.

2) Chilli Sauce / Curry
 

In a blender, place the following and blend well.

Young Red Bell Pepper Chilli - 10 or 15 deseeded
Tomato - 1 medium
Shallots - 3 or 4 medium
Garlic - 10 or 15
Vinegar - 1 or 2 Tbsp
Salt - a pinch
Sugar - 1 Tsp


This sauce is spice and if the spice is too much to handle, add water t o make it less concentrated as required.
Take 1 bowl and keep aside and keep the remaining in the blend the marinate for the chicken.

3) Chicken Rice

Remember the chicken stock we kept aside earlier?
That will be used to cook the chicken rice.

Basmati Rice - 2 Cups
Chicken Stock - 3 Cups
Salt - as required

Cook in a rice cooker





4) Fried Chicken

In the blender where the chili sauce is reserved earlier, add the following and blend well;

Black Pepper- 3 or 4 Tbsp
Dark Black Soy Sauce - 8 or 10 drops
Light Soy Sauce - a few drops
Chilli Sauce - 1 Tbsp

Marinate the chicken in it and leave for 5 mins.

In a pan, add 2 Tbsp of oil and fry the chicken till golden brown


Now, all the components of your Chicken Rice or Nasi Ayam is ready. Enjoy and if you really did, leave me a comment and let me know how it went :D

Chocolate Custard Eclairs

Most of the shops carry Eclairs that are filled with Creme Pattissiere. The recipe I tried out, recommended a fresh cream filling. However, I was out of heavy cream. Therefore, I decided to use a custard filling instead.
This recipe is from the book Success With Pastry, by Catherine Atkinson. I have used the book version of choux pastry and the chocolate topping. The custard recipe is from my pineapple flan recipe.

Choux Pastry
65grm plain flour
a pinch of salt
50 grm butter, diced
150 ml water
2 eggs slightly beaten (you may not need all of it)

Pre heat oven to 200 deg C
Grease baking sheet with butter and keep aside

Sift the flour and salt
In a heavy bottom pan, heat the butter and water gently till the butter melts. Ensure that you do not bring this to boil before the butter has completely melted.

Increase heat and bring to a rolling boil.
Remove pan from the heat and add the flour to it immediately
Stir vigorously with a wooden spoon or spatula till the flour is fully incorporated into the liquid
Return this to a low heat.
Beat the mixture till it comes off easily from the sides of the pan.

remove from heat and cool for 2-3 mins

Add the beaten eggs slowly, incorporating after each addition, till you get a smooth, shiny paste which is thick enough to hold its shape. You need not use the entire mixture for this.

Transfer this pastry into a piping bag and pipe onto the baking sheet to desired length.
Use a wet knife to cut off ends.

Bake for 25-30 mins until golden brown. The pastry would puff up.
Remove from the oven and make a slit in the middle, allowing the heat to escape.
Bring your oven temperature down to 180 deg C and cook this for a further 5 mins.

Keep aside and cool.

Custard
This custard is best when you make it the day before and keep in the fridge to chill.

500 ml milk
90 grm powdered sugar
90 grm powdered sugar (this is not a repetition)
2 eggs - yolk and white seperated
3 tbsp custard powder
1 tsp vanilla essence 

mix the cornflour in a 3 tbsp milk.
add the egg yolk and mix well.

combine the rest of the milk and 90 grm sugar in a heavy bottom pan.
add the cornflour mixture.
stirring continuously, bring the above to boil.
you should get a smooth consistency and your custard to ready to removed from heat if it coats the back of a spoon nicely.

add vanilla essence and keep aside to cool

Beat the egg whites well till soft peaks form.
Add in the other 90 grms of sugar and mix well.

Add this to the custard mixture and stir well till totally incorporated

Keep this mixture in the refrigerator till required. Will last for a week or so.

Fill this custard in a piping bag and pipe into the eclairs till they are full.

  


Melt chocolate (about 100 grms) with 2 tbsp water in microwave or over the pot of boiling water. Add 20 grms of butter and mix well.

Spoon or pipe the mixture onto the eclairs
You can serve this once done or you can serve this cold.

These needs to be eaten within 24 hrs