BBQ Buns (Cha Siu Pau )叉燒包

I suppose those who love dim sum would agree Cha Siu Pau is one of the signature buns served among dim sum dishes. It is also a must order item whenever a family with kids visits a dim sum restaurant.

On 8th August, in commemoration of my late mother-in-law 3 years passing anniversary, we had prepared a hefty lunch featuring her favourite dishes.  I made these buns and Auntie Lan helped to make fried noodles, and Kiam Chai Boey (Stew Salted vegetables). All these recipes are available in my blog, just click on them.

Initially, I was thinking of making own Cha Siu but when I went marketing that morning, the main ingredient, pork loin, had been sold out.  Since in Malaysia ready-cooked Cha Siu was easily available, I decided to go for an easy way out instead. J However, if you wish to attempt making your own Cha Siu (BBQ pork), the simple version recipe is available here.

If you happen to have roast pork for dinner, you can use the left over for its filling too.

BBQ Cockles 烧烤蚶/蛤蜊

BBQ Seafood Part 2 – Cockles

 25th October Sunday
After the episode one with mussels, the following day, we had another round of sun, sea and beach with climax on cockle-picking! However, this time we ventured a bit further by driving 45 minutes north from Auckland to Okoromai Bay at Shakespear Regional Park.

We did plan for cockle-picking as part of itinerary of the day but we were also prepared to be empty handed and just spend our day picnic at the beach. But to our surprise we ended up with stomach and bucket full of cockles. I have never seen so many live cockles in my life before not to mention to be able to harvest so many of them. J

But to get to them, we had to wait for low tide that was when the highlight began! When the sea waters subside, we had to trudge in icky mud all the way and it was quite a distance out from the beach. The further we went the larger the cockles would be. But, everyone is only allowed to pick up to maximum 50 cockles and we had 4 families with headcounts of 16 persons, so do your calculation and guess how many we picked for that day J

At first, we planned to bring the cockles back to brine for a day to allow the cockles to spit out the sand before we can consume them. But, when I saw others just wash them using tap water and barbecue on the spot. I was curious and checked out with one of the picnickers and they even offered me to taste the BBQ cockle and it was so fresh and no sandy taste at all.

So, when we saw one of the parks wood-burning BBQ was vacant, we quickly occupied it. We were lucky that there was still fire in, which saved us a great hassle to start a fire again. We continued our barbeque by adding dried tree twigs and branches collected from the ground. Later only we realized we had violated the rules that we were not allowed to use any dried branches and twigs in the park for the BBQ:-P

Nevertheless, I must say these were the best cockles I ever tasted, they were so fresh with its own salty flavor, of course it would be even better if we had brought lemons and squeeze on them, yum, yum, yum! Thank god neither of us have suffered any shellfish poisoning which we were so worried about after consuming that many of cockles.

So, here to share our BBQ highlight.

Cockle picking

BBQ cockles

 

Wood burning BBQ Cockles

 

Cooked Cockles



Delicious fresh cockles

Even though we had tried hard to consume as many cockles as we could on the spot, we still had a bag full to bring back. So, what to do with all these cockles?

BBQ Hot plate Mussels with Onions and Garlic 烧烤洋葱蒜末青口

BBQ Seafood Part 1 –Mussels

I'm feeling so worn out today after having two consecutives BBQ outings over a weekend. I was really thankful we were blessed with superb sunny spells for us to enjoy sun, sea and beach outings. It has been long overdue since we had miserable wet winter for months. This winter was exceptionally wet we suffered really bad winter flu. In fact I still have not fully recovered from coughing. I'm really looking forward for the warm weather to come.

Last Friday, hubby told me the weather forecast for the weekend was going to be sunny for the entire Labour day long weekend implying we should plan some outings. Well, in Kiwi culture nobody stays home when the sun is out J.

24^th October Saturday morning, Hubby came to me and suggested an impromptu afternoon tea at nearby park Little Shoal Bay, 10 minutes away from our house. After making a few phone calls we had another two families to join us. When I asked what to prepare? Hubby said "I misses mussels and mussels are on sales at $1.99 per kg, so why not BBQ mussels for afternoon tea?"

Frankly, only in NZ, we can enjoy mussels the way like this, back home in Malaysia these will be delicacy and only be available in fancy buffet meals.

So, we had grilled mussels on BBQ hotplate for adult

Mussels with Onions and Garlic     

onions sausages for kids J

BBQ HOTPLATE MUSSELS WITH ONION AND GARLIC INGREDIENTS: 2kg Mussels 2 cloves of finely chopped garlic 1 sliced Onions 2 Lemons for juice 1 roll of aluminium foil Chopped Chili (optional) White Wine/Cooking wine METHODS: Scrub and de-beard mussels. (I spent more than 30 minutes to scrub and wash 2 kg of mussels) Heat BBQ hot plate. (The park provides a free button pressed BBQ hotplate J) Make a few rectangles aluminium foil and place 8-10 mussels on each. Spread chopped garlic, slices of onions, chili and drizzle some white wine or cooking wine and wrapped the foil. Place the foils on the hot BBQ plate for 5-8 minutes or until the foils puff up. Open the foils to check if mussels are open, squeeze in lemon and serve.   烧烤洋葱蒜末青口 材料2公斤青口 2瓣蒜头切碎 1粒洋葱切片 2粒柠檬 （挤汁） 1卷铝箔 辣椒（可选） 白葡萄酒/料酒 方法： 清洗青口和去胡子。 （我花了30多分钟，洗擦2公斤的青口） 热烧烧烤炉。 （公园提供了一个免费的按钮烧烤炉具） 用铝箔做成方包裹，每个放进8-10 粒青口。 撒上切片洋葱，切碎的蒜头辣椒，和一些白葡萄酒或料酒。 烧烤5-8分钟，或直至铝箔膨胀。 打开铝箔，检查是否青口已打开表示熟了就可挤柠檬汁调味。

BBQ Pork (蜜汁叉烧)

Other than Roasted Pork Belly (烧肉) which I had covered in my August posting， BBQ Pork (叉烧) also known as Char Siu in Cantonese is another famous Hong Kong style BBQ dish that many like to eat.

At one of our regular lunch sharing gathering with my computing class cooking members, Doris from Hong Kong has taught us the easiest way to make Char Siu which taste like what you can expect in HK BBQ restaurants.

Well, it might not be 100% homemade as we skipped the tedious steps of making Char Siu sauce by using ready-made sauce instead but it produced the same drool-worthy BBQ pork that one hardly resist!
Interested to know more, scroll down and get the recipe, happy trying!.

BBQ Pork (蜜汁叉烧)

Ingredients：

• 500g Pork Scotch Fillets
• 5 -6 big Tbsp Lee Kum Kee Char Siu Sauce
• Honey (for glazing)

Method:

1. Wash meat and pat dry with paper towel and cut pork fillets into strips
2. Marinate evenly with Lee Kum Kee Char Siu Sauce. Initially, the sauce is quite sticky and gluey to spread over fillets. Once being left in the fridge for a while it will get diluted.
3. Marinate for at least 2 hours, best leave overnight to allow the flavors to seep in (I stored them in covered container and left overnight in fridge).
4. Pre-heat oven at 230 degree C.(Mine is not fan oven)
5. Place marinated fillets on baking tray with aluminum foil on the bottom for easier cleaning. Keep marinade aside for basting.
6. Bake for 10 minutes; flipping fillets over basting with marinade and bake at lower heat at 200 degree C for another 20 minutes..
7. For better juicy effect, repeat the flipping and basting at least 2 times.
8. Take out and glaze with honey and change oven mode to grill 180 degree C, return to higher rack to grill for another 5 to 10 minutes or until it is charred but not burnt.
9. Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes. Transfer to a cutting board and slice into thin pieces.
10. You can serve this with rice or wanton noodle or even use as filling for char siu bau (pork bun)

成份：

• 500克猪柳片（梅头肉）
  
• 6大汤匙李锦记叉烧酱
• 蜂蜜（上色）

方法

1。洗净切成猪柳片，用李锦记叉烧酱均匀的腌猪肉。最初，酱是很粘。一旦被留在冰箱一段时间它就会稀释。

2。腌至少2个小时，最好腌过夜，让味道渗入（我存放在有盖容器中，并留在冰箱过夜）
3。烤箱预热至230摄氏度（我的是不是风扇烤箱).
4。将腌好的猪柳放置在底部有铝箔的烘烤盘上。保留腌汁来淋猪柳。
5。焗10分钟后; 用夹把叉烧反转淋一点腌汁，焗炉转200度焗20分钟。过程中时不时翻面如果太乾淋一点腌汁。
6。取出再将蜂蜜涂在肉上上色，放回较高层烤箱里改为180摄氏度烧烤5到10分钟或直到它被有烧焦的买相为止。
7。从烤箱取出放凉了几分钟把多余的蜜汁滴一滴，切成薄片。
8。你可以配白饭或云吞面条。