Episode 3: Catfish Kiev
Russian catfish, admittedly, does not sound all too appetizing, but all you pesca-curious cats have to trust Suki Suki on this. Once you try a bite of this deliciously juicy yet firm fresh fusion feast, you simply must have the recipe!
Ingredients:
2 Fillets of Catfish (US farmed and eco-friendly please)
1 Egg
1/2 Cup of margarine
1/2 Cup of basil
2 Cloves of garlic
1 Cup of bread crumbs
Set the oven at 400 F. If you don’t have bread crumbs readily available, this is also a good opportunity to make use of the heat and toast some bread. Finely chop the garlic and basil, and mix them into the margarine or butter-substitute of your choosing (or butter for those of you who don’t have to worry about cankles).
Lay the fillets of catfish on a flat surface and spread the basil-garlic-margarine mixture evenly on each. Tightly roll the fillets into a log, completely encapsulating the margarine. Use toothpicks to keep the structure steady (much like how Lucille Ball kept her face up).
Beat the egg with some water (less than a teaspoon should do) and place it in a bowl large enough to dip the catfish logs into. Place the bread crumbs in a separate bowl.
Heat about a half an inch of vegetable oil in a saute pan over medium heat.
Roll each catfish log in the bread crumbs to cover completely, then dip into the egg mixture, and then once more roll the log in the bread crumbs. Saute the fillets, sealed-side down, and cook until golden brown on each side. Don’t overdo it - this is just to keep the logs nice and tan.
Bake the catfish logs in the 400 degree oven for between 15 - 17 minutes.
It may take some practice and some getting used to, but Suki Suki knows this is one piece of USSR pussy(fish) that even Katya would enjoy.
Hugs, rainbows and all that shit,
-Suki Suki
Episode 2: Rambutan Cobbler
This sweet recipe, much like Suki Suki, is a paradox of exception and easiness. A bastion of fast taste, some would even say.
The fruit and fruit lovers among you will pleased to discover that to prepare a tasty cobbler-style cake takes less than two hours. Most of that time is spent waiting, which can be aptly applied on the street corner during these dark hours of our economy.
Preparation time: 50 minutes
Ingredients:
1 stick of butter
1 tsp. nutmeg
1-3/4 cups flour
3 cups of fruit
1 cups sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1-1/3 cups milk
2 Tbs sugar
Traditionally, the recipe calls for peaches, but Suki Suki is no traditional girl, as you may well know. We will instead use Rambutan, succulent and juicy red balls which appropriately translates as “hairy” from the Bahasa Indonesia.
There are many different ways to peel a Rambutan. You can take a knife and cut out an edge, peel the fruit as you would an orange, or alternatively take it in your mouth, indent your teeth in the red hairy skin, and peel the sack off. The last being Suki Suki’s preferred method. Just watch out for the hard pit.
Or, for the hurried among you, you can get them peeled and pitted already in ready to eat cans in most traditional Asian market, next to the Lychee.
Cut the Rambutan into halves, then into quarters. The skin should slide off easily. Pull out the pit – parts of it rinds will not come off, but don’t worry. It will be all fine once baked.
Set the oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Butter the sides of your baking dish well. Place the rest of the stick of butter in the dish, and put it into the oven to melt while you mix the other ingredients.
Unfortunately for Suki Suki, she doesn’t own a hand mixer. Hand whisking a cake batter works out fine, but it turned out to be a tough job even for her nimble and dexterous wrists.
Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and milk until the batter is thin. Pour the batter over the melted butter, but don’t mix the two! It’s important that the batter layer on top of the butter. Pour the rambutan, or your choice of fruit, over the batter. Season the top with spices and extra sugar.
Set the dish in the oven and bake for 45 mins – 1 hour. The cobbler is ready when it turns a nice shade of golden brown.
Serves about ten guests, or one Becca d’Bus
Until next time, sweet cheeks.
Episode 1: Gado Gado
Welcome to my kitchen, you dirty dirty reader!
To start things off, I thought I would appease the vegetarians amongst you with a delicious slice of meat-celibacy called Gado Gado: a blanched Indonesian salad topped with a zesty peanut sauce.
Ingredients:
3 Potatoes
2 Coyote Squash
1 Head of Lettuce
3 oz Long Beans
1 Cucumber
1 Packet of Tofu cut in triangles
2 Hard Boiled eggs
3 oz Bean Sprouts
1 packet of emping or kerupuk
First and foremost, let’s cut up those vegetables. If you can’t find long beans, go for string beans - you Asiaphobes might enjoy that variety better anyway. Cut the long beans at a reasonable length, potatoes and cucumbers sliced in coins, not too thick and not too thin, and the potato squash, once pitted, into corners.
Hard-boil the eggs. Boil the potatoes and squash together until crunchy yet tender, around 13 - 15 minutes, then set aside to cool. Blanche the green beans and cucumber for 5 minutes. Blanche the bean sprouts for just 1 minute, or less. Blanching is a fancy term that means giving ingredients an ice bath after placing them in boiling water, named after Rue McClanahan’s favorite pastime.
It’s getting hot! Or is that just my early onset menopause? Anyway, once all of your ingredients have cooled down (give those potatoes and squash a dousing of cold water to help), toss them gently and place on a bed of cut lettuce. You know how Suki Suki likes her tossed salads.
Fry the tofu triangles. If you’re lucky enough to find rice crackers (no, not the Ben Kingsley or Mark-Paul Gosselaar Hapa Actor type) fry them up and place on top.
In a separate saucepan, mix the following ingredients together for the bumbu.
Bumbu:
5 oz Peanut butter
2 tablespoons of vinegar or lemon juice
1 tablespoon of brown sugar
1 teaspoon of salt
2 tablespoons of pepper, blended
2 tablespoons of kecap
1 cup of water.
A nice trick is to melt the peanut butter in the saucepan on low until it becomes seductively creamy, then add water and the rest of the ingredients.
The finished product. Dericious, no? Well don’t take my word for it, let’s ask web designer extraordinaire Han Yu. What do you think, Han?
“Mrf mrf.”
Oh the muffled sounds of ecstasy.
Until next time!
