Magical stolen swords, physically skilled and resilient Chinese ladies warriors to pursue stolen treasure during Qing dynasty epic a popular and legendary wuxia story on “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”. These images inspired me to create a wuxia-style dish with a blend of modern fusion cuisine.
My adaptive dish is named as “Crouching Tiger (Prawn) with Hidden Treasure”. It started with 5 good friends, Crouching Tiger Prawn warriors who are tasked to search for long-lost hidden treasure in mystical, mountainous terrain. The hidden treasure that the little warriors pursuing for is a Seared Scallop surrounded with crater full of lime and miso dressing on top of inactive volcanoes of avocado puree. Along the treacherous journey, mistrust, hunger and greed built-up among the little warriors to start monopoly the search for hidden treasure. Hence, the war between little warriors starts now….
Preparation for the war (dishes):-
1 hour
At the peak of war (Cooking time):-
30 min
Ultimate winner (Serves):-
1
Each little warriors starts to plan a good strategy to topple each other.
Warrior A monopoly ingredients for Hidden Treasure (Scallop & Avocado Puree):-
1 scallop – (put it into water till it become soft)
1 ripe avocado
juice of half a lime
salt, pepper to taste
1 tbsp brown miso paste
1 tbsp palm oil
Warrior B monopoly ingredients for Marinade to drizzle over the scallop:-
1 cm fresh ginger (grated)
juice of a lime
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil
Warrior C monopoly ingredients for Sambal:-
1 birdeye chilli, chopped
6 spring onions (white part only)
2 kaffir lime leaves, shredded
1 garlic clove, peeled, chopped
2 sticks lemongrass, white part only, thinly sliced
1 tbsp shrimp paste
juice of a lime
Warrior D monopoly preparation for Tiger Prawn:-
Rinse 5 tiger prawns under running water and pat dry with paper towels.
Remove shells from the prawn but leave on tails and heads (for decoration purposes).
Deveined the prawns and use toothpicks to pin both side of prawn’s body to make crouching tiger prawn.
Marinade with 5 tbsp Chinese rice wine.
Warrior E monopoly cooking steps for this special dish:-
1) To make avocado puree:-
a) Cut avocado into halves, scoop out the flesh and remove the stone. Mash avocado finely, add lime juice and season with salt and pepper. Add the stone back into avocado puree to prevent it from turning brown. Put aside.
2) To make sambal :-
a) Place all the ingredients into food processor and blend it until smooth paste form.
3) Preheat palm oil in frying pan over medium heat. Smear little brown miso paste onto each side of scallop. Sear both side of scallop until turn lightly brown. Remain middle of scallop translucent as possible. Put aside.
4) Stir fried sambal paste until brownish colour in the frying pan you just used for frying. You can smell the aroma of shrimp paste. Add prawn and cook thoroughly.
5) Put avocado puree on top of small size chunk of cucumber. Put seared scallop on top of avocado puree. Decorate the sambal crouching tiger prawn onto plate.
6) Combine all the ingredients for marinade in saucepan. Drizzle over scallop just before serving.
7) Garnish the dish with cucumber and spring onion-turned flower.
8) Ready to serve.
At the end of the day, 5 little warriors realized the importance of each and everyone effort in search of hidden treasure. They rekindled their brotherhood bonds and ultimately, successfully found the hidden treasure. Of course, they happily savor their fruitful effort together.
We’re giving RM10,000 and other amazing prizes to the winner of our first ever R.AGE Food Fight!
The five finalists will get to learn from the best, our Food Fight mentors:
– Chef Wan, Malaysia’s original food celebrity
– Chef Rodolphe Onno, Le Cordon Bleu master chef
– Chef Darren Chin, of Restaurant DC
– KY Speaks, top Malaysian food blogger
– Chef Liang, performing artiste and up-and-coming restaurateur
They’ll also get media and video production training from us at R.AGE, before they face off against each other at the Food Fight finale for the RM10,000 grand prize.
The competition’s closed, but you can always check out the other Food Fight submissions at https://rage.com.my/foodfight
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