Chinese New Year Three Wise Monkeys

Chinese New Year is coming very soon. One important celebration for Chinese New Year is the reunion dinner held on New Year's Eve. It's getting more and more common for people to eat out in order to save the hassle of cooking. It's also not easy to come up with a variety of dishes. Are you also racking your head on what to cook? For today, I'll be sharing two easy recipes for you to add to your reunion dinner feast.


Before I move on to the dishes, I also have a Chinese New Year food art to share. Since 2016 is the year of the monkey, I made the 3 wise monkeys, who embody the principle "see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil".


The two dishes I'm sharing today are Oyster Sauce Baked Chicken and Scallop and Asparagus in XO sauce. I'm using Lee Kum Kee Oyster sauce and soy sauce for the chicken and Lee Kum Kee XO sauce for the asparagus.


They are both easy and fast to whip up, thanks to the help of Lee Kum Kee's oyster sauce, soy sauce and XO sauce. These 3 Lee Kum Kee's sauces are a staple in my kitchen and I'm sure it is in many of yours too. All three products are available in all leading supermarkets with limited-time Chinese New Year promotions.


Before I share the recipes, I would like to share about a food photo contest where Lee Kum Kee will be giving away weekly prizes and cash angpow. To enter:

1. Snap a photo related to the theme of "Reunion" with any Lee Kum Kee product;
2. Write a caption for the photo;
3. Hashtag #LKKReunionSG
4. Upload through Instagram or LKK webstite - http://lkksauce.com/reunion/
5. And you stand a chance to win these prizes! Good Luck!

OYSTER SAUCE BAKED CHICKEN



Ingredients:

10 medium sized chicken wings/drumlets
3 tbsp Lee Kum Kee Oyster sauce
1 tbsp Lee Kum Kee soy sauce
1 tbsp Shaoxing Huatiao wine
dash of five spice powder
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp sesame seeds

Method:

1. Marinade chicken with oyster sauce, soy sauce, wine, five spice powder and sesame oil. Cover with cling wrap and leave in fridge for at least 2 hours or overnight.
2. Remove chicken from marinade, place them on a baking tray, lined with baking paper. Reserve the marinade for use later.
3. Bake in the oven at 200C for around 20 minutes. In between baking, flip wings and baste them with reserve marinade. They are ready when both sides are nicely browned.
4. Sprinkle sesame seeds before serving.

SCALLOPS ASPARAGUS IN XO SAUCE



Ingredients:

1 clove garlic, minced
3 slices old ginger
10 fresh scallops
1 pack of asparagus, skin removed and sliced
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp cornflour
2 tbsp XO sauce
2 tbsp water
dash of pepper

Method:

1. Marinate scallops with sesame oil, salt and cornflour for 15 minutes.
2. Heat wok on high heat, add in a little oil. Add in minced garlic and sliced ginger and fry till fragrant.
3. Add in XO sauce and asparagus, fry for a minute and add in 2 tbsp of water.
4. Add in scallops and fry for another 4 minutes or until scallops are cooked. 

Animal Palz Pocket Sandwich

LT had a class party on his last day of school last week. It also marks the end of his kindergarten, as he will be moving on to primary school next year. It was a potluck party and the kids were asked to bring along food to share.


I decided to pack mini bentos for LT and his friends. I woke up early that day to get these ready.


Thanks to my Animal Palz, it was a breeze making these cute pocket sandwiches.


I added in some fried chicken for the kids too. LT insisted everyone gets a panda pocket sandwich, as it's his favourite in the set.


I had quite a lot of leftover bread after making the pocket sandwiches, so I made breadcrumbs with them. I am sharing the recipe at the end of this post.

I often get questions asking me what I do with leftover bento food cut outs, I actually wrote a post 2 years back on what I do with them. You can check out the post HERE. I will try to update that post with more recipes for leftover bread in future.


I made a pork cutlet using my homemade breadcrumbs last week. :)

HOMEMADE BREADCRUMBS

Ingredients:
Slices of stale bread, bread trimmings and/or bread crusts.

Method:

1. Cut your bread into thin strips. 
2. Lay them on an oven tray and toast at 130 degrees celsius for around 15 minutes, or till the bread are dry. Do not brown them.
3. Grind them in a blender till fine.
4. When they are completely cool, you can store them in a zip lock bag in the fridge. You can store them in the freezer if you want to keep them longer.

Where to get same or similar item used in today's post:

Curious George Bento

I decorated the burger and wholemeal bread as Curious George for today. It's been a while since I serve them burger and fries for lunch. And they were happy to see fries on the menu. I think they were more excited over the fries than Curious George, lol.

Bento for IT's recess, in the box are nutella bread, grapes (under the bread, separated with a silicon baran), and fries. :)


Bento for LT's recess, same food as above, except he's having strawberry jam sandwich.


Bento for IT, in the box are chicken/cheese burger, fries, salmon, strawberries and golden kiwis.


Bento for LT, same food as above.


I forgot about the eye sparklers in George's eyes, I cheated in the previous four pictures by adding in digitally. This picture is the actual version, lol. :)


Asari clams and tofu in dashi/miso broth for me. Looks very unappetising in the picture, lol. :)

Monkey Bento

It was nice to have an extra day of break, but it was tough getting out of bed this morning, lol. :) I made monkeys for their bentos today, 2 versions, one using rice and the other one using a butter roll.


IT's bento, in the box are onigiri, chicken balls stuffed with cheese, broccoli, strawberries and blueberries.


LT's bento, same food as above. Rice coloured with a drop of dark soya sauce.


IT's recess bento, in the box are ham and cheese butter roll and strawberries.


LT's bento for school, same food as above.


Monkeys monkeying around. :)


A quick box for myself, in the box are curly crisps/shaved ham butter rolls and baby spinach/tomatoes salad, dressed in Japanese soya sauce dressing. Love how the tomatoes brightens up the box so effortlessly. It's such a pity that the boys refused to eat them, maybe I'll try sneaking some in their bentos again this week, though I doubt they will eat any. :P

Sausage Tutorial - Monkey

This is part 2 of my tutorial from yesterday. This tutorial is on how to make the sausage monkeys from this bento.


This time, you need 2 sausages. :) It's the same, you have to look for these short and fat sausages. :)


Cut off one slice, to be used for the monkey's ears.


Using a round cutter, cut out a circle and then cut the circle in half.


Attach on to the other sausage using pasta.


Cut hands out from the remaining sausage.


Assemble the monkey using pasta.


Using a slightly smaller circle cutter, cut out a circle from cheese and cut into half. Then, attach onto the monkey's ears.


Using a toothpick, cut out a heart shaped for the monkey's face. I did not use anything to 'stick' the cheese to the sausage, it'll 'stick' by itself.


Add on the face details from nori and you are done. :)

Hope you found this useful. Our one week break is almost ending, and the boys will be back in School next week. I'll be back with more bentos then. :)

Monkey Bento

It's very hot over here every day, you can feel the sun burning your skin if you are outdoors. When I'm out sending the boys to School, I just feel like hiding in the car or in the malls, where I can have an air-con blowing at me. :) The boys asked for cold soba, which is just perfect for today's weather.

I made a monkey to decorate the bento. IT is born in the year of the monkey. But he hates bananas. lol. :) I did a tutorial on how to make these sausage monkey, click HERE to see.


LT's bento, in the box are cold soba, sausage, salmon, beancurd chicken and golden kiwis. As they have their lunch at home, I kept the dipping sauce in the fridge.


IT's bento, same food as above.


IT's bento for recess, in the box are cold soba, sausage, beancurd chicken and marshmallows. I packed his dipping sauce in a thermos jar.


3 cheeky monkeys. :)


I saw IT taking out his monkey and put it on his palm before he ate his food, so I took a shot of it. :)


Lunch for Mummy, rice with miso pork/cabbage and beancurd chicken.