Quay Po Cooks: kiwi salsa

Showing posts with label kiwi salsa. Show all posts

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Don't mess with granny

While organizing my files in my hard disk last weekend, I came across this video clip called “Granny’s airbag”.

I could not help but laugh out loud watching it again. Not only was the video hilarious, it reminded me of an incident where my Quay Lo hit the car bonnet of a guy’s car when he sped up on him instead of stopping while we were crossing the road. At that moment we were furious but now the drama seemed so funny to me. I showed my Quay Lo the video clip and he too laughed when he saw how fierce that granny was. He thought it was acted out and staged but then even if it was, I still find it plausible. We chatted for a long time about how people could turn into devils the moment they go behind their wheels. We both agreed that drivers in Malaysia are more aggressive compared to many countries. Pedestrians need to be very careful when they cross the road.

We enjoyed our chat so much and did not realised it was past our usual dinner time already. Die!, I forgot to plan for dinner.

When I walked into the kitchen, I saw the bowl of Zespri kiwi fruits sitting on the table. An idea of making kiwi salsa came to to mind. I got dinner ready in less than an hour. This dish was refreshing, delicious and visually appealing. The combination of grilled pancetta wrapped prawns, avocado and kiwi salsa was superb and I love the colors in the dish. There you go, here is the recipe.

Pancetta wrapped prawns with Kiwi salsa and avocado

Sorry for the poor quality of the photos, they were all taken by my iPhone,

no time to set up my camera, it was late and we were both hungry. LOL!

for 1 serving

Ingredients:

3 to 5 prawns, clean, deveined with the tail on

4 or 5 pieces of sliced avocado

½ lemon, juiced

zest from 1 lemon

1 tomato, seeded and chopped

1/2 small red onion chopped

½ sweet red chili, chopped

½ sweet orange chili, chopped

¼ cup chopped cucumber

¼ cup chopped parsley

2 tbs extra virgin olive oil

1 green Zespri kiwi, peeled and diced

1 golden Zespri kiwi, peeled and quartered

¼ cup feta cheese

salt, sugar, ground black pepper to taste

4 - 5 pcs thinly sliced pancetta

Method:

In a medium bowl, combine the lemon zest, lemon juice, chilis, cucumber, onion, parsley and diced green Zespri Kiwi, salt, sugar, ground black pepper and extra virgin oil. Put salsa in the fridge. Season prawn in ¼ tsp sugar. Make sure prawn is dried before being wrapped with pancetta. Spray some butter on the grill pan and grill prawns till pancetta looks crispy, about 2 mins per side. Remove salsa from the fridge and transfer to the serving plate with a slotted spoon. Top salsa with grilled prawns, sliced avocado and quartered golden Zespri kiwi and serve with freshly baked baguette and corn chips.

Note:

Zespri had given me some cute bookmarks and keychains to give away to Malaysians. If you are a Malaysian and you are a follower either on my facebook page, my twitter or here, you may leave a comment to indicate your interest for either the keychain or the bookmark. I will contact you later to get your address. I have 10 keychains and 10 bookmarks and it will be on first come first served basis.

A LITTLE ABOUT THIS QUAY PO

Before I was married to my "Quay Lo" (Guaylo) husband, I did not know how to bake or cook. Subsequently I learned some baking and cooking Western cuisine from him, and providing his food for him launched an interest in cooking in general. Many of my Chinese friends and family told me that "Quay" is the wrong spelling for devil in Cantonese. The right spelling should be "Kwai" or "Guay". Well, somehow I like the spelling "Quay" better although I have to agree that it does not sound very Cantonese. Try asking a Westerner to pronounce "Kwai" and you will probably hear "Quay" haha. Whether is "Quay" or "Kwai" or "Guay, just know the devil woman is me when you see Quay Po Cooks. My hubby said if people pronounce "Quay" as "Key" is even better because I am the key to his heart. LOL!

Only now, have I started to learn the traditional Cantonese cuisine of my Mum. She cooks fabulously and all her specialties are divine. These two interests, my husband's Western food, and my mother's traditional food, prompted me to document them so they will not be lost.

Here, I wish to share my cooking and baking experience with my readers. I also hope to inspire those who do not know how to cook or bake to do so because, trust me, if I can, you can too.

Something I'd like to mention is that I find that many people are rather unwilling to share their recipes. However, for me, I think differently. I think good recipes should be shared thus allowing as many people to enjoy it as possible. Unless those recipes are for doing business, I don't see why we want to keep them all to ourselves. So if you are generous in sharing your recipes, you are welcome to share on my blog. Send the recipes to me and better still with pictures of the final products and I will be very happy to post them them with credits to you of course.

Our cuisine is a deeply embedded part of our culture. When two cultures come together under the same roof the results in the kitchen can sometimes be comedic, sometimes confrontational, but more often it is a journey full of surprises and discovery. There is joy in our food. If we think upon this, it is intuitively obvious. This blog is a journey of joy and sharing, reflecting what the French like to call "joie de vivre" (joy of living). No one could be more different from one another then my husband and my mother. Yet one thing they share in common is knowing intuitively that food, cooking, and sharing can be avenues of joy in life itself. So herein, help yourself, to a little joy and , if you like it, share it with your own family and friends. Joy is something that should be shared.