[Video] How to cut spring onions for food garnishing

Screenshot (not the actual video): How to cut spring onions for food garnishing

Here is a video tutorial on how to cut spring onions for food garnishing. This is a request from reader Jonie (sorry it took me soooo long to make it happen) who asked in my steamed tofu with minced meat recipe, how I made the spring onions curly wily. I have made a short video showing how it is done, along with 3 other basic techniques for cutting spring onions, i.e, finely chopped, flower-shaped & slanted. Please pardon my noob knife skills and hope these simple tips will come in handy for you in the kitchen. Thanks to B for shooting & editing the video. Look out for more cooking videos with full cooking video recipes coming soon.

Video: How to cut spring onions (YouTube link)

Previous Cooking Preparation Video:
- How to cut a flower pattern on a mushroom
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Stir-fried Chayote with Pork 佛手瓜炒肉丝

Stir-fried Chayote with Pork 佛手瓜炒肉丝

I remember when I first ate chayote (at a vegetable rice/菜饭 stall), I mistaken it for cucumber and I wonder how they manage to stir fry it until so crunchy and sweet. It was only after a while that I found out that I had eaten chayote and not cucumber (though they are in related food family). So now, whenever anyone asks me what chayote tastes like, I always described it as an enhanced version of cucumber – inherently sweet without that “tap water” taste of cucumber (maybe it’s just me), and also nicely crunchy after stir frying.  I like the natural taste of chayote so much that in this recipe, I don’t use strong tasting sauces such as dark soy or oyster sauce. I like to cook this when I’m busy since there is vegetable and meat in one dish (2 in 1). If you are a fan of chayote, check out my other local recipe of stir-fried chayote with tang hoon (vermicelli).

Mapo Tofu (麻婆豆腐)

Simmered Tofu in Spicy Bean Sauce

Mapo tofu (doufu) is a tofu and meat dish cooked in a spicy chilli bean sauce.  It is a popular dish in Sichuan (Szechuan) cuisine. Growing up, I really love this dish and I was delighted whenever my family ordered it. The dish packs a fiery savoury punch and we always needed more rice than usual to enjoy all of the spicy sauce. The sauce has a numbing and lip-stinging effect depending on how much Sichuan pepper is added, though the home cooked version is usually toned down. I never imagined that cooking this dish at home can be so cheap and easy. I have cooked this dish so often that I can now make it in under 15 minutes from preparation to end – definitely a good recipe to fall back on for busy days. If you like a localised version of Mapo Tofu without the dou ban jiang (豆瓣酱) and Sichuan pepper, do check out my simmered tofu with minced pork recipe. 

Fish Cake Omelette

This is an unbelievably fast and easy recipe. I have a few fish cakes 鱼饼 in the fridge which I intend to pan-fry and eat with porridge for lunch. Then I remembered my mum used to whip my this simple dish to go with plain porridge during our school days. So I rang her up and asked her how she made it, and she gave me the instructions in under one minute – there are really so few ingredients and steps. Ten minutes later, this omelette was cooked. Fish cakes and fried eggs are nice on their own, but when paired together, they are heavenly. My mum explained that minimal ingredients is needed since the fish cakes are already salty and flavourful on their own.

Easy Baked Mackerel

– just olive oil, salt, pepper and bake

Some time back, I saw maameemoomoo’s grilled saba with teriyaki sauce recipe, and I fell in love with it. Her grilled fish not only looked so deliciously beautiful, I also like the fact that they were oven-baked instead of grilled or pan-fried on the stove, saving lots of effort. My version, ever the lazy one, involves seasoning the fish with basic salt and pepper. This is a quick way to sneak in one more side dish to the dinner table effortlessly.

Steamed Chicken Herbal Soup

Steamed Herbal Chicken Soup

This is a lazy recipe for chicken soup cooked via steaming instead of the usual simmering method. I just came back from holiday and caught a cold, so I was not really in the mood for cooking anything fancy. I was just yearning to drink some nourishing home-made chicken soup but since there is no one to cook it for me, I use this short cut and equally good method to get rich herbal chicken soup. For convenience, I used a packet of pre-packed Chinese herbs for stewing chicken soup (in this case I used half a packet for half a chicken). Since less water is used, the soup is concentrated and rich. If you like steamed chicken dishes, don’t forget to check out my other recipes: steamed chicken in D.O.M & steamed chicken with salted fish and fungus

Bitter Gourd with Egg Stir Fry (苦瓜炒蛋)

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Stir-fried Bitter Gourd with egg (苦瓜炒蛋)

Note: This is an old recipe which is re-written and updated with new photos.

Bitter gourd is a healthy vegetable and it is known to reduce “heatiness” – a really much-needed attribute for tropical dwellers like me who is living in hot and humid Singapore. Bitter gourd is very much an acquired taste for me because when I was a kid, I did not dare to eat it at all, but now I have since grew to love it. This is a classic local home-cooked Chinese dish where fermented black beans and eggs are used to stir fry with the bitter gourd slices.

Stir-fried Chayote With Vermicelli

My family loves chayote. We love how it stays crunchy after stir-frying so we like to call it crunchy cucumber. Besides stir-frying with pork, this is another new family favourite recipe added to the family dinner menu. Black fungus and carrots are added for both colour and nutrition, while my favourite vermicelli – the mung bean noodles (tang hoon) are added to soak up the sweet chicken and dried shrimps stock used to simmer the dish. If you like some meat, you can also add marinated pork or leftover roast pork for a complete meal. I like the fact that both chayote and carrots keep extremely well in the fridge, while the rest of the ingredients are dried (dried shrimps, black fungus and tang hoon), so I can cook this anytime my kitchen fresh food stock is getting low. That’s the reason why I always sneak in a chayote in my supermarket trolley nowadays.

Lemon Chicken 柠檬鸡

I love lemon chicken and I am glad I learnt to make it. It is definitely much easier than it looks, for the sauce can be prepared in the matter of minutes. The bright yellow hue totally liven things up on the dinner table. I like the home-cooked version because the chicken is more tender and chunky, and I can tweak the sauce to my liking. You can serve it with plain white rice or rice cooked with chicken-stock. Deep fry the chicken just before serving so that it is hot and crispy.

Claypot Chicken with Bitter Gourd (苦瓜焖鸡)

Claypot Chicken with Bitter Gourd

Where food pairings go, I think chicken and bitter gourd is like a marriage made in heaven. I believe that those who do not like bitter gourd may find it more acceptable when cooked in this way. In this recipe, the chicken and bitter gourd are simmered in a claypot with tau cheo (soya beans paste) and fermented black beans. This is total comfort food to me. Claypot is excellent for braises and stews like this because not only does it add flavour to the food, it also conduct the heat evenly throughout the casserole and you can serve the dish right away in the claypot. I cooked this pot in advance and heat it up for dinner. If you do not have a claypot, you can still cook this dish using a wok or pot.

The Crazy Basil Peach Black Pepper Parmigiano-Reggiano Cobbler that Captured My Heart

This unusual basil, peach, black pepper, Parmesan cobbler recipe started out as an innocent experiment making individual-sized cobblers, but somehow spun out of control into weird and wonderful new directions.
I was thinking about a cheese Danish, so I grated some Parmigiano-Reggiano into the batter. I was thinking about Gougères, so I added some freshly ground black pepper as well. I was thinking about a peach and basil sorbet I had one time, and decided that some of the sweet aromatic herb seemed perfectly appropriate.

Getting Overexpose by Hungry Nation

When my friends at Hungry Nation were over here filming my “Fresh Five” secret ingredients, they also forced me, under threat of severe physical injury, to do an interview called a “Meet & Eat.” I spend most of my free time thinking of ways to avoid going on camera, so I’m really never comfortable (or very good) doing these things, but since they did such a great job on the production, and took the time to put this together for me, I feel the least I can do is show it off here. I’ve also included the full Mahi Mahi Ceviche video below. Enjoy!


Mahi Mahi Ceviche (click here for original post with ingredients)
Posted byChef Johnat2:36 PM

Coming Soon: Fried Stuffed Squash Blossoms

Ewen Grantsaid...

Squash flowers (courgette flowers in Scotland) are extremely underrated. They don't seem to have a massive flavor but the texture they provide is brilliant. For example I usually have them stirred through a squash (courgette) risotto.

September 19, 2011 1:10 AM

Next Up: Breakfast Sausage Patties

Anonymoussaid...

John, forgive my density, but where is the recipe!? I want sausage! I see the pic and saw the video on Facebook, but . . .

Mike

September 21, 2011 12:51 PM

My Mayo Method Steak Sauce Formula – Looks Like Math, Tastes Like Magic

Anonymoussaid...

Just last night I made a similar sauce: mayo-fresh lemon juice-lemon zest-salt-pepper and..honey, delicious my kids loved it with their chicken and home made creamed spinach!
Thanks chef John for inspiring so many people with your great videos. Every morning I click on the newspaper sites and then on to your site, it's in my toolbar :-)
Dorothea

September 23, 2011 9:22 AM

Next Up: Burrata with Fig Brulee

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Spatchcock Chicken Tease

Sarahsaid...

I once cooked spatchcock for a Christmas in July dinner (I live in Australia so it makes sense to be roasting in winter). My husband was horrified that spatchcocks are little baby chickens who haven't grown up yet. This didn't stop him from eating it though!

September 28, 2011 9:54 PM

Spatchcocked Spatchcock

“Spatchcock” refers to the method of cutting open a whole chicken, so that it sits flat in a pan, or on a grill. However, it wasn’t always the highly amusing verb it is today. 

Originally, it was a highly amusing noun used to describe a small, young chicken. Since these tender birds were usually butterflied to cook faster and more evenly over the coals, “spatchcock” became the culinary term for this technique. So, if you use a small, young chicken like I did, then you’re actually spatchcocking a spatchcock, which is about the most entertaining answer ever to the question, “What are you doing for dinner?”
Above and beyond how fun it is to use in casual conversation, the technique really does work beautifully for grilling a whole chicken. Once you remove the backbone, and set free the sternum from its covering of cartilage, you'll have a bird that will cook quicker and more evenly. It also looks pretty damn cool.
If you don’t own a sturdy pair of kitchen shears, then I hope this video inspires you to go out and get this must-have piece of equipment. They make this technique incredibly fast and easy, and you can also use them to completely section a whole chicken into serving pieces, as we showed in this video demo.
Anyway, I hope you pick up some spatchcock soon, and give this whole spatchcocking thing a try. I’ll be showing a recipe I did using this technique in a future video, so stay tuned for that, and as always, enjoy!

Posted byChef Johnat12:00 PM

Next Up: A Spicy Cornell-Educated Calabrian Spatchcock

Chris K.said...

Hahaha! Very nice, Chef!

I'm making pumpkin soup this afternoon... inside a pumpkin. We've been getting heirloom varieties from our CSA farmer, and one can only make so much bread and pies.

October 1, 2011 3:26 PM

Grilled Calabrian Chicken – A Deliciously Stubborn Hen

blogagogsaid...

It looks tasty. Also, it looks like that spatchcocked chicken needs to run to the bathroom.

:)

October 2, 2011 7:31 PM

Slow Cooker Tips for Dummies

I'm going to be posting a recipe for slow cooker beef pot roast tomorrow, and in anticipation I was checking out a few related videos on YouTube. I've always assumed the people who write those "For Dummies" books must be really smart, but based on this, I may have to reconsider.
It's been a long while since I posted a video just to poke fun at it, but I couldn't resist. Just for fun, see how many strange, disturbing, wrong, and/or crazy things you see and hear in this offering from Dummies.com (btw, the glass cutting board doesn't count). Enjoy!
Posted byChef Johnat12:09 AM

Classic Slow Cooker Beef Pot Roast – What's Next? A Jell-o Mold?

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"Stump a Chef" with Average Betty

One reason I don’t interview celebrity chefs is because I feel so sorry for them. I can’t imagine having to answer those same inane questions, over and over. And that’s from the real food journalists; imagine how brutal us bloggers’ questions are.
However, there is one interviewer that does things a little differently; my buddy, Average Betty. Here she is at the Los Angeles Times and Food & Wine “The Taste,” breaking the modern record for most chefs stumped in 5 minutes or less. You can see her full post on the event here. Enjoy!
Posted byChef Johnat7:30 PM

Next Up: Root Vegetable Gratin

Chris K.said...

The word "gratin" derives from the French verb gratter, "to scrape." It refers to the bread crumbs and cheese scraps used as a topping in this casserole.

I see potatoes, turnips, parsnip, and perhaps celeraic? Some leek and fennel would not be amiss either...

I am hoping for lots of stinky cheese, cream and butter.

October 6, 2011 2:43 PM

Root Vegetable Gratin – Notes from the Underground

Dr Droopsaid...

There have been so many references over the time now I know for sure you have some kind of hip hop fetish :)

October 7, 2011 12:45 AM

A Perfect Time for Pumpkin Pancakes

A friend sent me a nice note recently that his wife had made these pumpkin pancakes for dinner, and that they were thoroughly enjoyed by all. I always appreciate those kinds of messages, especially since they often serve as a reminder for doing seasonally appropriate recipe re-posts.
This was the week pumpkin made its yearly appearance into my life. On restaurant menus, on television, in store windows, on neighbors’ steps, and all over our living room…and dining room…and kitchen…and, well, you get the idea. So, to celebrate the beloved American gourd, I decided to rerun this tasty winter treat. Enjoy!

Click here to read the original post, and to get the ingredient amounts.Posted byChef Johnat11:59 AM

Next Up: Miso Maple Broiled Salmon

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Miso Maple-Glazed Salmon – Canadian Japanese Fusion Cuisine at its Finest

KPeffsaid...

Salmon sounds so good right now. That's the first thing I'm going to cook when it gets cool enough for me to ventilate the house without inviting 85 degree air in.

October 10, 2011 6:24 AM

Country Gravy – Deliciously Dingy and Definitely Diner

Jay M.said...

Be still my heart! How did you know my wish?

I had a country gravy skillet the other day going through Dubois, Wyoming that blew me away (you can find it on a map, just look for the town closest to absolutely nothing at all.)

I've been wanting to recreate it ever since.
Base layer: a pile of sauteed diced potatoes, onions, ham, green pepper, and tomatoes.
Middle layer: a split homemade biscuit smothered in country gravy.
Top layer: coupla eggs, over easy, with a good dose of hot sauce.

I CAN'T WAIT 'TIL THE MORNING!!

October 12, 2011 4:33 AM

Red Velvet Cupcakes and My Big Moment on Just Desserts

I don’t make a lot of cupcakes, but since I’ve always been fascinated by the red velvet cake, I decided to try a version based on this venerable American classic. 

I’ve gotten so many requests for cupcakes and red velvet cakes that I figured I’d kill two food wishes with one video. They came out really well, and as I tasted, I actually caught myself daydreaming about being on Top Chef Just Desserts.
I imagined I’d furiously finished frosting these red velvet cupcakes just as time expired (I think the faux-hawked prima donna with the Jacques Torres tattoo next to me hid the cream cheese to screw me over). I bring them up to the judge’s table, and watch as the lovely Gail Simmons takes a big bite. She swallows, smiles, and then says, “Really not that bad for a food blogger.” Okay, so she’s too classy to ever say that, but still, it would be pretty cool.

Watch Cream Cheese Frosting Being Made and Relax

As promised, here is the cream cheese frosting recipe that co-starred in our red velvet cupcakes video last week. If you’re a regular cake baker, you may be wondering why a video is even necessary for such a simple frosting? I used to think like that.
When I posted the red velvet recipe on YouTube, and teased the fact that I’d show the frosting in a future video, I was instantly met with a huge wave of panicked comments, all having a similar message; something to the effect of, “When the hell is the frosting video being shown? I want it now. I need it now. Give it to me now!”
So, not wanting an angry mob of people waving pitchforks and unfrosted cupcakes in front of my house, I quickly edited the footage and posted it today. This shows that no matter how simple a recipe or technique is, people just feel better and more relaxed about making it, if they can see it being done first.
Anyway, the next time you whip up a carrot cake, or batch of red velvet cupcakes, I hope you give this ultra-simple and delicious frosting recipe a try. Enjoy!

Ingredients for a cake or 12 cupcakes (plus maybe some leftovers):

Halloween Party Food Idea: Cheesy "Severed Fingers"

If you're looking for a mildly disgusting, yet fun and creative Halloween appetizer for an upcoming party, consider these severed fingers made from string cheese. I ran this video a couple years ago, but wanted to repost in case you hadn't seen it before, or just needed a reminder. Don't be scared...click on the link below the photo and check it out! Enjoy!

Next Up: Bacon Ranch Chicken Skewers

always have to say something smart ass? Stop coming to his blog and putting on crap do you not have anything better to do with your life? wow grow up and get a life!

October 19, 2011 5:27 PM

Bacon Ranch Chicken Skewers – Perfect for Tailgating and/or Vampire Staking

Christophersaid...

I had a hard time finding this video. It was ob-skewer.
Thanks John, this one is a must for the next poker game.

October 19, 2011 8:19 PM