Mee Siam

My younger girl has not been coming home for her meals lately. She is a volunteer, helping out in the Youth Olympics. That's why lately, I've been resorting to cooking simple fare for myself and my husband.

Today, I felt like eating mee siam.

I love mee siam, in fact anything that's bee hoon! The danger of my cooking bee hoon is that I don't have limits eating it. Today is one such day! BURP!!

Forty-two years ago, I met a charming Indonesian lady in her late thirties . She was one of my guy friends' aunt. I learned a lot of baking and cooking from her. She was very knowledgeable in the art of cooking and baking including cake decorating with buttercream, royal icing and even gum paste. You could say she was my 'Guru' or 'Sifu' then.

I learnt to cook many Indonesian dishes. The mee siam is one of them. Hers is a wet version with gravy but I did a dry one instead and tweaked it a little.

What I Used:

A

500g bee hoon (vermicelli)(I used the thick ones meant for laksa)

1/2 cup shelled prawns (I omitted this and used sliced fish cake)

B (to be ground)

2 teaspoons belachan

3 cloves garlic

10 dried chillies, soaked to soften

12 small onions

C

50g dried prawns/hae bee/udang kering, soaked and ground

1 and 1/2 tablespoons preserved soya bean paste/tau cheo

2 big onions, sliced

2 handfuls of bean sprouts/tau gay

1 tomato, sliced

Oil

1 tablespoon assam, soaked in 300g water and strained

sugar to taste (I used 2 tablespoon gula melaka syrup)

D (save some for garnishing)

3 pieces tau kwa, fried and cubed

2 eggs, beaten and made into omelette, cut into strips

a bunch of chives, cut into 3-cm lengths

limes

fried shallots

What I Did:

1. Heat oil and fry ground ingredients.

2. Add sliced onions, dried prawns and bean paste and fry for a while.

3. Add fish cake and bee hoon and stir well to mix and then add assam water and simmer to cook.

4. Add bean sprouts, tomato, 1/2 tau kwa, omelette and chives and gula melaka. Stir well and fry for a couple of minutes. Do not overcook bean sprouts or it will be soft and limp. No salt is required as the dried prawns and bean paste are salty enough.

5. Serve, garnish with remaining tau kwa, omelette, chives and fried shallots. Squeeze juice of one lime over mee siam. Yum!

I forgot to buy limes when I went to the market this morning. I had to make do with lemons which I happened to have in the fridge.