Corn Fritters

Inspired by the best thing that I ever ate crunchy edition on the Food Network, I found the recipe for the E&O Trading Company Corn Fritter recipe online and substituted out the celery for coriander and gave the recipe a go. They turned out pretty and tasty but not as crunchy as I expected so some tweaking needs to be done with the egg and flour ratio.

Serve the corn fritters with sweet thai chili sauce for some sweet heat. However, the next time I give this recipe a go, I’m going to amp up the flavour a little more with shredded kaffir lime leaves and chopped fresh red chilies!

Corn Fritters Recipe (E and O inspired)
Makes about 30

Ingredients:
4 ears of corn
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
4 spring onions, chopped
Handful of coriander, chopped
½ teaspoon of ground cumin
Salt
Pepper
½ cup of flour
4 eggs, beaten
Peanut oil

Method:
1.    To shuck corn, place the flat stem of corn on the cutting board the knife down the length of the ear using a sawing motion.
2.    In a large mixing bowl mix corn, garlic, spring onions, coriander and cumin and mix well. Season to taste with salt and pepper and then add flour and beaten eggs and mix well.
3.    Heat peanut oil in a heavy bottom or cast iron pan then place large tablespoons of the batter in the pan and leave for a couple of minutes to brown lightly. Flip and cook the other side for a further 2 minutes or until lightly browned. Lift out, drain on kitchen paper and season with salt if necessary. (Optional: Serve with thai sweet chilli sauce) and eat immediately.

RyuGin (..in HK)

I recently ate at the new outpost of RyuGin and it is now ranked as my best meal this year. Chef Seiji Yamamoto the culinary mind behind Ryugin is well respected amongst the culinary professions for his techniques and molecular gastronomy and also well loved in the foodie circle. When he first open Ryugin in Toyko, the theme of the restaurant is " TO PURSUE POSSIBILITY OF THE JAPANESE CUISINE". He has embraced adidas’ campaign slogan impossible is nothing and made it his own as possible is everything.
Whilst he his cuisine is very modern and his techniques are a mix of both traditional and molecular at its core his cuisine is still very Japanese, from its kaiseki form and choice of ingredients.

Dinner here is very straightforward – one kaiseki menu guided by the seasons and below is the spring menu that we tasted. The menu changes from season to season, we were hoping to taste an ankimo dish but that’s in season in the winter and for those of you who love eel, summer is the season to go.   

Spring Gastronomy Menu
Deep fried Uni from Hokkaiso wrapped in seaweed, junsai in lightly acidic broth
Foie gas flavoured with Porto and wasanbon sugar served with fresh figs
and sesame cream sauce
Steamed abalone, lotus mochi and yuba simmered together with a
sauce flavoured with mitsuba
Ichiban dashi soup with tender shrimp dumpling
Assortment of sashimi – lobster with crab roe and apple vinegar jelly;
shiro ebi with egg yolk and caviar; bonito with mitsuba
Charcoal grilled alfonsino covered with roasted rice
Sukiyaki Kuroge wagyu beef sirloin with white asparagus,
morel mushroons and onsen tamago
Rice simmered in sakura tea with deep fried sakura shrimp from surugawan bay
-196°C candy strawberry and 99°C strawberry jam
Trilogy of Japanese tea deserts presented in three different images – roasted tea crème brulee;
caramel ice cream; matcha wagashi mochi
Matcha

Pictorially

Deep fried Uni from Hokkaiso wrapped in seaweed, Junsai in lightly acidic broth

Foie gas flavoured with Porto and wasanbon sugar served with fresh figs and sesame cream sauce

Steamed abalone, lotus mochi and yuba simmered together with a sauce flavoured with mitsuba

Ichiban dashi soup with tender shrimp dumpling

Assortment of sashimi – lobster with crab roe and apple vinegar jelly; shiro ebi with egg yolk and caviar; bonito with mitsuba

Charcoal grilled alfonsino covered with roasted rice

Sukiyaki Kuroge wagyu beef sirloin with white asparagus, morel mushroons and onsen tamago

Rice simmered in sakura tea with deep fried sakura shrimp from surugawan bay

-196°C candy strawberry and 99°C strawberry jam

Trilogy of Japanese tea deserts presented in three different images – roasted tea crème brulee; caramel ice cream; matcha wagashi mochi

Matcha

One favourite item around the table was the foie gras with figs and sesame cream sauce. The foreign ingredient, foie gras, is married with the Japanese elements of sesame cream sauce and together it was one of those really dishes with layers of textures and flavours, very good.

The other favourite at the table was the sukiyaki. Although the white asparagus was in season it seemed rather misplaced in the dish but other than that, the richness from the yolk from the onsen tamago and the fatty beef was not this was this was bite after bite of savory comforting goodness.

One of my favourites was the steamed abalone, lotus mochi and yuba. The main elements – the abalone was soft and tender and the lotus mochi had toasted rice that added a little more flavour and and crunch were delicious and earthly smoky mitsuba sauce.

The RyuGin specialty dessert I’m convinced is thrown in to every menu for diner entertainment. The -196°C is a paper thin sugar shell in the shape of a strawberry filled with nitrogen-frozen strawberry ice cream. We were invited to crack the delicate strawberry open and after which they spoon over the 99°C strawberry jam. Good tasty fun.

The plates at RyuGin find beauty in the complexity in its simplicity. Chef Yamamoto is innovate but at the same time is very distinctively Japanese. My meal here was excellent. The ingredients are of an extremely high quality and I really appreciated about his culinary strokes were not only fine techniques but also the restraint that he had exercised that keeping everything in balance.

RyuGin
101/F, International Commerce Centre,
1 Austin Road, West Kowloon, HK
Tel: +852 2302 0222

Artichoke - Moorish Singapore Boy

One of my go-to brunch places in recent times is Artichoke.

At Artichoke, the menu is Moorish and the chef, Bjorn Shen, is a local boy (yes!). The mainstay on the brunch menu and what I am always inclined to order is the lamb shakshuka – a delicious mix up of tomato, braised lamb shanks, onions and runny eggs. And just to push it over the edge it is topped yoghurt cheese for some tang and sprinkling of dukka. But if you aren’t too big on that and insist on your good old egg goodness brunch, there are egg choices but at least embrace their take on it and have it with the haloumi.

 

So brunch is good. In my dinner visit, I’ve also found other good things. Their dips – carrot and hummus were outstanding. Their maple glazed bacon chop, a dish that is hard to say no to, was fantastic the first time I had it at brunch but only good the next time I had it at dinner where it was served with some obligatory green peas to calm the conscience. And if lamb is your thing, with some pre-planning they can arrange and promise a “lambgasam” – which I personally haven’t tried. As a contrast to that, oddly, one of the standouts memories of the food I had there was a salad - the forgotten grain salad consisting of quinoa, bulgar, wild rice, currents and various nuts and seeds, refreshing and delicious. Never underestimate the important of sides.

I go back to Artichoke because food is honest, brassy and maybe a little brash. Other than the food, my other reason is his support of the use of local produce and the fact that he is our very own “local produce”.

Artichoke
161 Middle Road, Sculpture Square
Singapore 188978
Tel: 6336 6949