Chinese eggplant

Chinese eggplnt is one of my favourite dishes of Asian cuisine. It is not an easy topic because it quickly absorbs the oil on which it is being cooked and you always have to add more and more. In order to prevent that and make the dish light, you need to pre-soak the eggplant in the water with salt.

Secondly, eggplant does not have such a strong taste and that's why the sauce in this recipe is quite aromatic and makes the taste more interesting. I also recommend making this dish with some pork meat. You can just finely chop the meat and fry after adding ginger, garlic and onion.  

Chinese plum sauce

This aromatic sauce is a perfect match for fatty meat dishes, especially the duck. The recipe comes from Asian cuisine and the ripe plums and five-spice powder are the basis for it. I learnt about five-spice powder when I was making the crispy Chinese duck. It turned out that you marinade the duck with it. The five-spice powder consists of SOLELY the following ingredients: anis, pepper, cinnamon, fennel seeds and ginger. Always check out the ingredients! When I went to the supermarket and I took the spice of a popular producer called "five-spice powder" it turned out that it contains artificial aromas and other chemical additives. Plus, it did not even contain the five spices. That's why I bought it in a local herb shop. It's also available in online shops or else you can even do it yourself by mixing the spices I have enumareated before in equal proportions. But coming back to the sauce. Here's the recipe!

King prawns with coconut milk

The recipe comes from a friend of mine who has been working in the Asian restaurant industry for more than 20 years. I learnt a lot from him and I love the way he cooks. He always uses garlic, ginger, chili and onion as the basis for nearly each Asian dish and I think it's both healthy and tasty. The recipe is for a spicy yet delicate dish due to the coconut milk which balances the hot taste. 
King prawns are a very rich source of Omega 3 fatty acids which are essential for our health. Their intake can lower the risk of cancer, arthretis and heart disease. It's good to include them in our everyday diet- seafood like king prawns are one of the good sources.