We had a splendid dinner last evening, if I may say so myself. ;) My guests were good eaters. Initially, I was afraid that there was too much food. My pot of rice was all gone mostly devoured by 3 rice eaters, namely princess, hubby and uncle J. Those invited to dinner last evening were mum, Uncle J, & his wife Aunt N, from Canada. They live and work there but come home to spend a couple of months visiting family and friends during winter. They usually spend both Christmas and Chinese New Year here before heading back to the biting cold.
My preparation started in the morning with marinading the chicken, fish, and the minced pork for the sui kow (shrimp dumpling, somewhat like a wanton). In the dumpling there was minced pork, water chestnuts, prawns and spring onion seasoned with light soya sauce, pepper, sesame oil and cornflour).
The stock, which took few hours to boil, included chicken bones, soya beans, ikan bilis (dried anchovies), ginger & garlic, plus corn.
We had udon and live prawns.
There were crabsticks, tofu, hee keow (some sort of a fish paste thing), sausages, and pork balls.
Next we had Foo Chow fishballs, and some sort of dumpling which tasted like siew mai (very nice). These, together with the hee keow, were courtesy of mum who bought them from the very famous Foo Chow noodle shop in Beach Road. She said there was a snaking queue when she got them the day before. People were buying by the hundreds (of dollars).
Here are the fish, chicken and sui kow (with help from hubby to fold them while I prepared other stuff. Don't you think he did a good job? He is publicity-shy and banned me from using the shot of him in the kitchen doing them. He he. I thought he did great but he was a perfectionist and kept finding fault with them.
Some pakchoy and baby corn (for princess).
Spinach, one of my favourite veggies and great for steamboat. I love veggies soft but my girl loves them crunchy. :) So I tend to go for the leaves and she likes the stalks. Weird as most people I know usually eat leaves and leave stalks. But we make a great combination. ;)
My favourite chilli for steamboat, available only once a year for sale during the CNY period. This is from the famous mini steamboat stall in the Parkway Parade basement food court.
To round off the meal, we had some really sweet mandarin oranges (these are small & seedless),
and cream puffs which I had made in the afternoon.
We ended the evening playing games on the xbox 360, with princess entertaining them all while she did Uno, Viva Pinata, and Feeding Frenzy (which she got each n every guest to take a turn). Auntie N had great fun on it and Uncle J was commenting, 'now who's the kid here?'. Haha. It was a truly 'enjoyable dinner', quoting Uncle J. Come CNY, they are going to take her out for a day, so yippee, mummy can sleep! ;)
Foo Chow Fishball Noodles
33/35 Sultan Gate
Kampong Glam
Conservation Area
Parkway Mini Steamboat
80 Marine Parade Road
#B1-118 Parkway Parade
Tel: 63482070
It's very bright and clean and there was a large variety of food to pick from. First you choose the stock you want, and next you get to choose two special items from the menu. However, I thought it was really silly as those same items could be found on the conveyor belt. We had an early dinner thus the restaurant was empty. You usually need to make a reservation.
I chose the beef and sliced fish. Both were very good and fresh.
My own pot.
The highly recommended sesame sauce to dip the food in.
