Everything is fine…

I went and bought some taugeh (bean sprouts) for my Sarawak laksa that day and a couple of days later, my missus took some and fried for our lunch and dinner.

However, she did not finish all of it as she thought perhaps I would want to use it when I cooked some noodles or whatever. No, I did not have any such intention and of course, it bugged me to see what was left in the container staring at me in the face everytime I opened the door of the fridge. In the end, I decided to take it and do something with it.

My girl is not really  a fan of fried taugeh and when my missus fried it that day, it was very nice when we had it for lunch, fresh looking and very crunchy but when it was heated up for dinner, not only had the colour gone off and turned into a shade of grey but the texture was very different too, kind of hard to chew, no longer crunchy. Nonetheless, we did manage to finish all of it even though I can’t say that we enjoyed it a lot.

I remember that not too long ago, we had taugeh in the fridge too and my missus made some kerabu (Malaysian-style salad) with it and it was so very nice. Even my girl loved it! That was why that day, I decided to take what was left of the bean sprouts and make my version of it…

…for our meals.

Unfortunately, I did not know the recipe so I went and googled. What I saw was not very encouraging – there were so many ingredients and so many steps in the making. Just seeing the list alone would put me off making it already.

In the end, I decided to do it my own way. Firstly, I peeled and sliced some shallots, added a few cili padi, sliced and squeezed calamansi lime juice (with a teaspoon of sugar to counter-balance the sourish taste) all over them…

…plus a tablespoon of fish sauce.

Next, I added some hay bee/udang kering (dried prawns)…

…that I had soaked to soften and pounded and after that, the chopped daun sup (Chinese celery) that I bought together with the taugeh for the Sarawak laksa that day too plus a sprinkling of pounded peanuts…

No, I did not follow any recipe – I just reckoned that I could just add anything and everything and it will work out just fine. I did not want to add anything too strong like belacan (dried prawn paste) or cincaluk (fermented shrimps) or air budu (fermented fish sauce) in case my girl would get put off by it. Otherwise, I think those Thai basil leaves in my garden would blend in very well and of course, there are other things that may go well with it too like some bunga kantan petals, for instance.

I blanched the taugeh, taking care to see that it was not overdone, and tossed it really well with the ingredients I had prepared and served…

No, it was not as nice as what my missus made before but it was pretty good. My girl tried and commented that it tasted like the taugeh and whatever else in nasi kerabu. In other words, she quite liked it and I would say it really wasn’t too bad.