Air fryer pork ribs

We had this takeaway pork ribs from Pura Brasa last week to celebrate our wedding anniversary at home ( thanks to Phase 2 HA restrictions!!) 

I wanted to try to prepare a homemade version as Y loves her meats (her latest addition to her nickname list is "Miss meaty"). I didn't want to have to burn a big hole in my pocket to feed her carnivorous cravings. 

So I got this lovely slab of pork ribs from the wet market at Chinatown. This hit the weighing scale at close to 900+ grams (approx 2 pounds?), and costs $23/kg. 

The uncle at the stall suggested that I precook the meat before putting it into the oven to roast/BBQ, to avoid drying out the meat. So here it is, in my WMF stainless steel pot on a trivet,ready to be steamed.

I chose steaming rather than boil or parboil, so that the juices and flavour do not leech out into the boiling liquid. Besides, it's already so hot in the kitchen! In total, I steamed it for about 15 mins. It was fully cooked when I poked the meat with a chopstick, as the juices ran clear. 

I then rubbed on some store bought BBQ seasoning sauce and popped it into the air fryer for about 5-7 mins at 170 deg Celsius. I just eye-balled and flipped it over (for more even browning, aesthetics, really, since it was already fully cooked) and cranked up to 200 deg Celsius for a final burst for another 4mins. The BBQ smell was so enchanting and the fats sizzling and popping when I opened the airfryer. 

Here's a pic of the final product. 

Verdict: it looks better than it tastes. 

I think I overcooked it and the exterior bits of meat were super dry and tasted like jerky. Personally, I had the small loose piece of rib, which I cut off from the main slab so that it could fit into the airfryer. It was exposed to the convection heat in the airfryer and tasted dry and tasteless. I later had another rib from the middle section and it was much juicier and softer. 

By not marinating in advance, I set the stage for bland meat. The seasoning was only on the exposed parts of the meat. I can only shudder to imagine the quantity of seasoning used by restaurants to get that smoky, sweet, salty taste we get when dining out. I can only console myself that my version is healthier! 

This is a dish that I will definitely try again, not least because Y asked for more (her exact words were "mummy, can you cook this more often") , but also cos I have a bottle of BBQ seasoning dry rub to use up before SG's humidity ruins it. 

DIY Red Bean Pancake / DouSha GuoBing 豆沙锅饼

Had too much time stuck at home during Singapore's "Circuit Breaker", so I tried making something that I was craving for, but didn't want to buy/order from outside. There aren't too many places that do tasty Chinese red bean pancakes, and if they do, they usually serve it as a large serving meant for 6-8 persons to share as a dessert. 

I had some organic red adzuki beans on hand, but was quite sick of making red bean soup or red bean popsicles. I decided to try using frozen prata to replace the pastry encasing the red bean paste. The paste was easily cooked with the help of my pressure cooker. It did take a while to prepare this dish as I had to thicken the red bean soup to a thick paste, cool and spread it out as an even thin layer. This is a trick I learnt from watching ban jien kueh hawkers. 

Pressure cooking - pork rib carrot soup

I finally got down to buying a pressure cooker after eyeing one for the longest time ever! I was sick of pots of stock or beans or braising peanuts for hours on end over the gas stove, and still NOT getting the desired taste/texture I wanted. To be fair, I did try alternative methods of cooking like slow cooker and thermal cooker, but being the impatient me, I wanted something faster and more energy-efficient, without having the gas or electricity plugged in for hours. 

I was only familiar with the WMF brand as it was the one that my mother owned in her kitchen. I was shopping around the usual larger departmental stores (Metro, Takashimaya, OG, Robinsons) and came across an offer for a non-German/non-European brand. It was still quite costly but I decided to just get a cheaper one to use and experiment with recipes first. 

This is one of my first recipes on my "Pressure Cooker To-Cook list", a huge pot of soup stock for saving and freezing in batches. I wanted a pork and ikan bilis stock (according to the recipe shared by tummytroll), but did not have the exact ingredients on hand. 

My version below included Pork Ribs, carrots, onions, garlic, ikan bilis powder (whizzed in the grinder and scooped into DAISO empty tea pouches). It was sweet and flavourful after 30 minutes of cooking under the "High Pressure" setting. The vegetables were all soft and mushy, and the pork tough, but I didn't mind it as I was after only the stock.... Yay.... I am so happy that I can reduce my dependence on instant dashi granules and chicken stock cubes....