Late Posts: South Africa & Malaysia

We have been cooking plenty but not writing these last couple of weeks. We've had two Around the World dinners since our last post. The first was on April 10. In honor of South Africa hosting this summer's World Cup soccer tournament, we made a South African dinner. We made two courses, a main and a dessert. The main course is a popular South African street vendor food, bunny chow. It is curry served inside a bread bowl. The bread serves as the container and the utensil and is supposed to have originated as a way to serve workers who couldn't afford their own spoons or bowls. We chose to fill our bread with a simple chickpea and tomato curry that I make frequently and which is a family favorite. For dessert, we made Malva pudding. The recipe came from Recipezaar, one of my favorite go to spots for recipes. The recipes for Malva pudding is here. I agree with the review declaring this "the most fab pud ever!"

Last Wed, we made a dinner from Malaysia, in order to see what Dad (aka Steve) would eat on his business trip to Penang, Malaysia. We made Malaysian rojak, a salad made of pineapple, cucumber, bean sprouts, and crushed peanuts. The dressing is usually very spicy but I left out the chilis and just used honey, vinegar, and a little olive oil. Steve and I added red chili paste to our salad. M isn't a fan of bean sprouts but still enjoyed the rojak. I also made Char kway teow, a Malaysian Chinese dish which is kind of like fried rice, except with rice noodles instead of rice. I don't have a good link to the recipe, as I mixed several recipes together. I've always had a hard time making fried rice at home and the char kway teow had a similar problem; it didn't seem as "fried" as it sounded like it should have been. But it was still tasty. I look forward to hearing about the char kway teow that Steve is trying in Malaysia and having it for myself at a local Malaysian restaurant (Peninsula Malaysia) to see how close I got it. M saw a Mango and Tofu stir fry on Peninsula's menu and is eager to try that one!