Potato Rice

My grandma's one-pot meal recipes were not created by design. They were spontaneously decided based on the ingredients available at the particular moment. Some of those recipes were probably handed down by the earlier generations of our ancestor. The good thing is that those recipes were perpectuated. I am glad to have inherited those recipes to share with my next generation. My children disliked those one-pot meal in the early stages. But now they are accustomed to them and loved to eat them. I cook one-pot meal for lunch practically three to four times a week. I also packed the one-pot meal for the children to school and for myself to office. They said it is nice and "easy" to eat. This is because the lunch break in school is very short. Only twenty five minutes break.


My wife and I continue to improvise other one-pot meals. One of my wife's creation is the potato rice. The method of cooking is the same as the other one-pot rice.



Recipe for the Potato Rice.



Ingredients:-


400 - 500 gms of Potato cut into small cubes

350 gms of Onion, sliced them

200 gms of meat (Chicken or pork) cut into cubes

6 cloves of garlic, sliced them

3 pieces of shallots, sliced them

50 gms of ginger, cut into thin stripes.

2 teaspoon of Oyster sauce

1 teaspoon of sesame oil.

1 teaspoon of light soy sauce.

Half teaspoon of salt.

2 tablespoon of cooking oil.

3 cups of rice

3 cups of water.

Sprinkes of white pepper powder


Firstly, heat up the wok. Pour in two table spoon of cooking oil to fry the ginger, shallot and garlic until they turn golden brown and emitting strong aroma. Add in the meat and the potato and stir fry until the meal is cooked. Finally, add the oyster sauce, sesame oil and the salt and fry further for about thirty seconds. Sprinkle some white pepper powder onto the potato. Turn off the fire and transfer the whole lot into the rice cooker with the rice and water added in.

The cooking time is about 30 minutes. The potato rice will be ready for eating. If you prefer more pepperish taste, sprinkle more white pepper powder on to the potato rice.

After some time, my children complained that the potato rice was dry. My wife improvised the recipe further, by cooking the potato and the rice separately.

Instead of transferring all the fried ingredients into the rice cooker, she transfer the stuff into a pot. Water is then added into the pot until it covers all the potatoes and simmer for about fifteen minutes, or maybe longer, depending on the quality of the potato. Taste the potato before switching off the fire. The potato must be soft. The rice is cooked separately as normal plain rice.

The cooked potato is then mix with the rice for eating. And here, you have a plate of moist, aromatic potato rice that I really enjoyed eating. So are my children.

Give yourselves a try. You would not regret this.

Kai Choy (Mustard Cabbage) Rice.

Kai Choy(Mustard Cabbage) is not a popular vegetable due to its bitter taste and fibrous texture. This is typically used by the Chinese to cook with the left over meats after the Chinese New Year re-union feast.

During my growing up years, I ate lots of Kai Choy. My grandparents do not grow or buy Kai Choy. They got them free of charge from the wholesaler by baskets. Whenever there was over supply of Kai Choy in the market, the wholesaler would asked my grandparents to help to get rid of them.

We would have consecutive days of meals with Kai Choy. We would have Kai Choy fried with Ikan Bilis (Anchorvies), garlic and shallot, Salted Kai Choy (home-made salted vegetable = harm choy) and Kai Choy rice.

Occasionally, I like to eat Kai Choy rice. Nowadays, it is not easy to find Kai Choy in the market. Only during the Chinese New Year season, this vegetable is available in abundant in the market.

If you wish to buy Kai Choy rice, I know of only one restaurant that sell this, that is "Sek Mie Choy" in Salak South town.

Kai Choy rice is an economical and easy to cook one-pot meal. Traditionally, this Kai Choy rice has no meat, but I have modified the recipe by adding either cubes of chicken meat or or pork.

The Recipe for Kai Choy Rice (for five persons)

300 gms of Kai Choy, cut into small pieces

one teaspoon of dried shrimps ( small size shrimp)

200 gms of chicken meat(optional)

three pieces of dried Shitake Mushromm cut into small slices

two teaspoons of white pepper powder.

one table spoon of cooking oil

three pieces of shallot (medium size)

five cloves of garlic

one and a half teaspoon of salt

two teaspoons of sesame oil,

two teaspoons of soy sauce.

three cup of rice, washed and drained

three cup of water.

First, fry the sliced shallot and chopped garlic in a wok with one tablespoon of cooking oil until they turn golden brown and emiting strong aroma. Then, add in the chicken meat, mushroom and dried shrimps and stir fry until the meat is cooked. Then, transfer them into the rice cooker with all the rest of the ingredients dumped in.

Cooking time is about 30 minutes and the yummy pepperish Kai Choy rice is ready for eating.

If you like more spicy stuff, sprinkle more white pepper powder and add sambal to the rice. It has that Ooooomph... factor and drive you for more helpings.

Believe it or not. I can eat up to three Chinese rice bowls of Kai Choy rice at a time. Big "Farn Thung" uuh..

Pumpkin Rice - An "Accidental" Crop

Pumpkin was grown behind the kitchen as an "Accidental" crop. My grandparents did not grow pumpkin for commercial reason. Occassionally, they bought pumpkin for cooking and threw the seeds behind the kitchen.

The pumpkin grew among the weeds and creeped up to 30 feet away from the seed. The lucky rats and the jungle fowls had the first harvest. That was the indication that the pumpkin were ripe for harvest. As an "accidental" crop that did not required much effort, the harvest wasn't bountiful. Each creeper bore four to five pumpkin fruits only. And the size of the pumpkin depends on the soil condition and rainfall, ranging from one kilogram to four kilogram.

The picture is one of the local variety of pumpkin available at the market.


The golden colour one on the right is an American variety. This is usually available locally during the Chinese New Year festive season as an ornament, as well as an offering.




During the harvest season, we ate lots of pumpkin. We ate steamed pumpkin, pumpkin fried with dried shrimps and pumpkin rice.

The pumpkin has rich nutritional values, based on research done in USA. It contains Zinc 1 mg, Selenium .50 mg,Vitamin C 12 mg, Niacin 1 mg, Folate 21 mcg, Vitamin A 2650 IU, Vitamin E 3 mg, Protein 2 grams, Carbohydrate 12 grams, Dietary Fiber 3 grams, Calcium 37 mg, Iron 1.4 mg, Magnesium 22 mg and Potassium 564 mg



Pumpkin rice is one of the easiest to cook one-pot meal.

Ingredients for pumpkin rice (for five persons)

500 gms of pumpkin, with skin peeled off and cut into 1 cm by 1 cm cube

one table spoon of dried shrimps.

two table spoons of soy sauce.

one tea spoon of salt.

three cups of rice

three cups of water.

200 gms of chicken meat cut into small strips (optional)


Put all the ingredients into the rice cooker and cook for approximately half an hour.

The sweety yummy pumpkin rice is now ready to eat. Sprinkle some white pepper onto the rice to enhance the flavour.