MCO 3.0 Day 75: Smoked duck aglio olio on lockdown Hari Raya Haji holiday

Smoked duck aglio olio is Jaden’s favourite after he tried it at Naughty Babe Dirty Duck and Skinny Dip. Very often, he would order this when we dine there.

Naughty Babe Dirty Duck

When I ran out of idea of what to cook, I always ponder of what Jaden likes. Jaden’s favourite food is my inspiration to try new recipe. I searched for the recipe and watched several YouTube. I usually pick those with similar ingredients as what written on restaurants’ menu. After tried cooking this pasta twice and Jaden gave 👍, I decided to perfect the pasta. I cooked for my brother and cousin too. Afterall, it’s Hari Raya Haji holiday today.

Selamat Hari Raya Aidil Adha to my muslim friends

Ingredients for 2 serving:

• 200g pasta noodles of your choice
• 1 smoked duck breast (about 200-250g, thaw frozen smoked duck thoroughly)
• 30g butter (cut down to 20g if don’t like too oily)
• 6 tbsp olive oil (cut down to 5 tbsp if don’t like too oily)
• 6 cloves garlic, sliced thinly
• 6 shallots, sliced thinly
• 2 tsp dried chilli flakes (reduce to 1 tsp if don’t want too spicy)
• Zest of 1 orange
• 50g sundried tomatoes, sliced thinly
• 1/2 cup coriander leaves, roughly torn, stalks removed (can omit)
• 1 sprig fresh basil
• 1.5 tbsp balsamic vinegar (can omit)
• Salt and pepper to taste

Bought online from Lazada. The delivery charges is more expensive than the meat.

Ristoris dried tomatoes seasoned with spices and aromatic herbs and preserved in sunflower seed oil.

Prepare the pasta

1. Bring a pot of water to boil. Once boiled, sprinkle some salt into the water.
2. Cook the pasta according to instructions on the packaging.

 Prepare the smoked duck

1. Heat some oil in a frying pan, over medium heat.
2. Sear the duck breast, skin down for about 5 minutes, until crisp.
3. Flip over and cook for another 3 to 4 minutes. Remove from heat.
4. Once it is cooled, slice the duck breast thinly, reserving torn or smaller bits of meat to be included into the pasta.

 Prepare the aglio-olio sauce

1. In a pan over medium-high heat, add butter and olive oil. Cook until butter melts.
2. Add in garlic, shallots, chilli and orange zest and cook for about 2 minutes.

3. Add in dried tomatoes, some of the coriander, basil and seasoning. Toss briefly.

4. Add in small chunks of smoked duck breast meat pieces and reduce to low heat.

5. Drain the pasta and add into the aglio-olio sauce.

6. Combine some remainder coriander and balsamic vinegar into the dish.

7. Once all the ingredients combined well, dish out onto serving plates, and arrange sliced smoked duck breast on the side or on top.

8. Garnish with fresh basil and serve warm.

For brother and cousin’s lunch. Jaden said “You gave them so much?”

For Jay and Bryan

Jaden always asked me to cook more so that he could eat over 2 meals. But not today. 350g of Barilla spaghetti was just enough for the 3 of them.

Jaden’s lunch.

I sent this pasta for brother and cousin’s lunch today with ice cream as dessert.

My brother said “Same standard as Naughty Babe Dirty Duck. Thanks SL. Very nice, bryan love it so much. 👍🏻👍🏻”

My cousin “Hi Saw Leng, thanks for the very yummy Duck Aglio Olio ! 👌🏻 I shall keep the recipe”.

When they asked for the recipe, you know it’s a good one.

MCO 3.0 Day 71: I’m getting better in cooking

For almost every meals, Jaden will ask me what’s for lunch, what’s for dinner. When I told him that I would be cooking seabass, he was not excited. I asked him why and he told me pan fried seabass is dry. So, I browsed through internet and watched few YouTube and found this recipe.

Jaden told me it’s nice. Seabass is moist and he loved the tomatoes and baby spinach. The butter gives a buttery, nice taste to the side. So, I’m putting this in my blog now and will cook seabass this way more often.

Ingredients:

• 2 fillets cut of seabass
• 1 packet of baby spinach
• 12 – 14 cherry tomatoes, cut in halves
• 5 tsp lemon zest
• 5 tbsp lemon juice
• 3 cloves garlic, cut into thin slices
• 2 tbsp butter
• ¼ tsp of thyme
• 2 tbsp of olive oil
• Pinch of salt
• Pinch of ground pepper

To cook Seabass:

1. Bring seabass to room temperature, pat dry.
2. Lightly drizzle Olive Oil on seabass, season with Salt, Pepper and Thyme on both sides.
3. Put a non-stick fry pan on medium heat
4. Put a tbsp of Olive Oil, place the skin side of the seabass down first
5. After 2 minutes flip the fish over
6. When the seabass is almost done, add Butter and Lemon Juice directly on the seabass

To cook tomato sides:

1. In a medium size frying pan, on medium heat
2. Add olive oil, tomatoes and garlic, then stir
3. Zest the lemon, then cut it in half for lemon juice
4. When the tomatoes and garlic are soft, add in salt, pepper and a hint of thyme
5. Add 1tbsp. of butter
6. Add lemon zest
7. When butter melts, add spinach then cover
8. When spinach is done and cooked down, remove from heat, stir and recover

To serve:

1. To prep the plate, put the tomatoes and spinach down
2. Place the seabass directly on top of the tomatoes and spinach
3. Drizzle a little bit of juice from the seabass on top

MCO 3.0 Day 57

Trending today on socia media is the screenshot of MySejahtera for AstraZaneca 2nd appointment. This is after Khairy announced that AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine dosing interval shortened to nine weeks from 12 weeks and suddenly, all of us received 2nd vaccination appointment.

For lunch today, I cooked Scallops Aglio Olio.

Scallop is not a cheap seafood. Most people avoid buying it as they dont know how to cook scallop. After watching few YouTube, it is actually quite easy to cook beautifully tender scallops with crust on the outside.

1. Take scallops out from fridge 30 mins before cooking and let it rest to room temperature. Scallops should not be frozen or wet. Pat dry it for it to sear and crust beautifully.
2. Season scallops with salt, ground pepper and pinch of garlic powder. Rub on both sides.
3. Heat up a non-stick pan. Add butter (for flavour) and let it melt. Drop a little of olive oil to help keep the butter from burning.
4. When pan is hot, put in scallop. The sizzling sounds show that oil is hot enough.
5. Pan fry 1.5 minutes on one side of scallop and a minute on the other side. Don’t touch the scallops. Let it develop crust on the outside and beautifully tender inside.

Jaden loved the Scallops Aglio Olio for lunch today and he ate a big plate of pasta.