Murdered Hotdogs

I remember eating and making this snack ever since I was a little kid. Making it my own by adding a few more ingredients, I've also discovered that aside from as an afternoon merienda, it also goes great with a bottle of cold beer.

Murdered Hotdogs
(Serves 1-2)

Ingredients
2-3 hotdogs sliced into small pieces (either all meat or red; doesn't matter)
regular ketchup
1 medium to large onion
hot chili/chili powder/hot sauce/red chili flakes (the more the spicier)
cooking oil
parmesan cheese (optional)

Directions
1) Heat the oil in a pan, and then saute onion and hotdog pieces.
2) Add some chili, keep frying
3) After around 2-3 minutes, add ketchup (about half a cup --more if you're big on ketchup) and chili
4) Mix together in pan til ketchup begins to simmer.
5) Sprinkle with a bit of parmesan and serve! :D

Tom Yum!

Here is how to make Tom Yum soup.
Ingredients:
-Shrimp and/or squid
-Green chili (sliced on one side about thrice. The more slices and chili, the spicier)
-Tom Yum paste* (30g to every 500g of water)
-Tomatoes cut so that it kinda looks like potato wedges (sorry I don't know what that cut is called haha)
-Pechay/Leafy vegetable
-Fresh or powdered coriander
-Bunch of lemongrass
-Onion leaves (cut)
-Onions, garlic, a little ginger (all chopped)
-Salt and pepper

Directions:
1) De-shell and de-vein shrimp. Don't throw shells just yet. For squid, just slice ala-calamares
2) In a heated pot, saute the garlic and onions with 1/4 amnt of water (total amnt of water depends on how much soup you want.. just keep in mind the tomyum paste to water ratio). Add the shrimp heads in soon after.
3) When shrimp heads begin to change in color, add another 1/4 of water along with the ginger. Boil for a few minutes. Then take out the shrimp heads (which by then should be very orange already)
4) Add the remaining 1/2 of the water into the pot with the tom yum paste, shrimp, squid, tomatoes chili, and vegetables
5) Mix in the coriander and onion leaves as the water is boiling, put in a dash of salt and pepper to taste.
6) Soup is ready when the shrimps have turned pink and and squid has become firm. Put in the bunch of lemon grass when you are about to turn off the fire.
7) Wait for it too cool a little bit and then serve! :)

*Tom Yum paste
You can purchase tom yum paste in most Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Singaporean, Thai etc groceries. If not, what I do sometimes is I just mix tamarind powder (sinigang mix is fine too), curry mix, and patis (fish sauce) in a 1:1:1 ratio. I also add more coriander --this time fresh than when I use the tom yum paste.

Singapore and Philly cheese corned beef

So I just got back from my Singapore trip last January 2. It was awesome over there! The shopping, the sights, the nightlife, and of course, the food. On the left I've made a collage of some of the dishes I tried over there. My favorite is the Cereal Prawns which is the biggest one in the collage. It's fried prawns and cereal that is very crispy and slightly sweet. It's so good that even the shells can be eaten! I tried the dish over at Hawkers near Esplanade and of all the food I have tried in my stay there, that is the most unforgettable one! In a good way! We ate it with pineapple rice, another tasty treat, grilled stingray, and Tom Yum soup. The last two had quite the spices, so I wouldn't recommend it for those who mind sweating a bit and getting their tongue a little burned. I would gladly come back though. :D I have yet to try cooking it myself, but watch out for that. I will try some day soon.

Some other goodies really worth mentioning are the buffet breakfast over at the Singapore Zoo which made me forget that we went there for the animals and not the food haha, the spicy Mcwings over at Mcdonalds which was so juicy and slightly spicy, the swedish meatballs at IKEA which surprisingly went great with the sweetness of the linden(sp?) berries, the Sing ice cream sandwich sold in the streets which was great, especially because it didn't melt as fast as I expected, and the "BBQ Shabu Shabu" in Pasar Oleh Oleh, Bintan, Indonesia. Well I included it with the Sing food already because Bintan is very Singaporean; the currency used to pay for stuff there is even SGD. Tiger Beer, the Singaporean counterpart of my country, Philippine's "San Miguel/RedHorse" is lighter than I thought it would be. It's good though.. 'swabe'. It reminds me a little of Cerveza Negra, but lighter. Bintang Beer of Indonesia is quite like Cerveza too, but it feels very watery and thin. San Miguel Strong Ice and Red Horse are still on top for me. :)

For more info on these dishes, check out my flickr account over at http://flickr.com/photos/kamums

Meanwhile, let me go on with the recipe I will share with you today. Wanting to make a philly cheese steak sandwich since before I left for Singapore, I decided to finally make one when I got back. Unfortunately, we still did not have any good tenderloin/sirloin or any beef cuts for that matter so I settled with what I found in the pantry --corned beef.

PHILLY CHEESE CORNED BEEF
Ingredients
1 small can purefoods corned beef
1 red onion
1-2 cloves garlic
cheeze whiz
2 slices bread
olive oil

1. Heat a little olive oil in pan
2. Sautee chopped onion and garlic
3. Put on high heat, and then add corned beef
4. Keep on pan until corned beef is dry and begins to crisp
5. On one slice of bread, put the corned beef. Make sure to include the little burnt pieces stuck to the pan --those are the crunchiest, yummiest corned beef parts
6. On the other slice, spread on a rich amount of cheeze whiz
7. Put slices together, grill in sandwich griller or toast. :)