Mohinga

Mohinga မုန္႕ဟင္းခါး @ Feel, Yangon
( with boiled egg and gourd fritters )

The epic Mohinga ( obviously ),  မုန့်ဟင်းခါး. If you haven't heard of mohinga ( which you should have because if you haven't, you haven't lived ! ), it is a Burmese traditional soup-based noodle dish. There are two ingredients which make mohinga special and different to other noodle dishes. One is the banana stem which gives it a unique crispy texture. Second is the fish which is the most vital ingredient because it makes the soup thick and rich and gives it the 'mohinga' taste. Mohinga is served with thin rice noodles/vermicelli and typically with various fries such as chickpea fritters, gourd fritters, onion fritters and so on. Coriander, mint and bean sprouts are commonly used as garnish along with a slice of lime. This delicacy is an ambiguous mix between savoury and . . . .  not-so-savoury so it's always a delight to enjoy this meal anytime of the day ( well, at least to me it is ). The recipe and taste of mohinga varies with different regions. For example, my family is from the Mon state and the mohinga tastes fairly different from the ones in Yangon. So the next time you're in Myanmar, try out the tastes of different mohinga(s)!

Pancakes !

One day, I decided to fry some pancakes for the family as they normally don't eat pancakes for breakfast. It is simple, easy and quick to make.

Ingredients:
- 1 cup of bread flour ( any flour would do ! )
- 2 eggs ( 1 if you like it less rich )
- 1½ cup of milk
- ½ teaspoon of salt
- cooking oil ( appropriate amt. )

In a bowl, mix the flour, eggs and the milk. Stir until it has become creamy and gooey. Leave it for about 5 minutes and then heat a frying pan for about a minute on low/medium heat. Spread the oil ( using butter gives it a better fragrant ) and immediately, add the mixture when the oil smokes. Spread the mixture using a spatula and flip when the bottom turns golden. This is a quick process ( 2-3 minutes ) so make sure you don't burn it ! After using up the mixture, you can garnish the pancakes with condensed milk, maple syrup, honey, golden syrup or strawberries or a 

mixture of them ! Here in this photo, I've poured sweet condensed milk on top with strawberries. Enjoy !

Frozen Strawberries

One day, a friend decided to come over for a few drinks. He brought his leftover Stolichnaya vodka. I wasn't prepared for anything since it was at around 1 am in the morning and when I checked the fridge, all I could find was a bunch of frozen strawberries left from baking muffins. Something is better than nothing, so I took them out and went to my room. I forgot to bring ice so instead, added the frozen strawberries which was quite fascinating because it gave the vodka a hint of strawberry and replaced the ice !( It made it look sort of posh and fancy so why not ! ) 

Vodka with Frozen Strawberries ( စေတာ္ဘယ္ရီအခဲ နဲ႔ vodka )

Exotic Meat

I'm not a big fan of exotic meat. I don't mind eating them but I'd rather not. However, one day, my sister who also is a very adventurous woman in terms of food, urged me to follow her to Pago ပုဂိုး ( Yangon ) where there are a few restaurants that serve exotic meat of all sorts. These restaurants are not the most high-end or even average quality restaurants you can find and they are a bit dodgy but when I meant dodgy, I meant not the most pleasant restaurant to take out your partner for a romantic dinner but a really chill place where you can relax with a few friends or in this case, my sister and get away from the city while sipping on a bottle of beer or if available, the traditional fermented palm juice ( ထန္းေရ ). The place was roofed with coconut/palm leaves which is not a rare sight in the rural regions of Myanmar. It was shady and cool and the pollution was at its minimum as it is quite distant from the city. Enough about the place, here are some photographs:

Fried Crispy Frogs ( ဖားႂကြပ္ႂကြပ္ေၾကာ )

Fried Wild Cat with Spices ( ေတာေၾကာင္ )

Spicy Sambur:Deer ( ဆတ္သားအစပ္ေၾကာ္ )  

Fried Spicy Shredded Snake ( ေမြသားအစပ္ေၾကာ္ )

The Scene

So if you were wondering what they taste like, they taste like normal meat like chicken and beef. The sambur tasted like beef and the snake tasted more like chicken but a fraction bit tougher. The wild cat tasted like pork or chicken. Well, you get what I mean they basically taste similar but of course each having their own  unique sense of texture. I did not taste the frogs however because the picture in my mind spoilt my appetite. 

So did I regret trying them ? no. Would I try it again ? no, because I've already tried them and would rather stick to the available everyday meat. Would I suggest trying them ? yes, because it's something new ! 

( I know this is going to provoke some critical opinions from some viewers and I don't think it's wrong if it does because I am completely aware that a fortune of money and effort has been spent to protect animals and their rights. However, please do keep in mind that these are one of the very few spots in the whole of Myanmar that serves exotic food like this and as far as I'm concerned, these are very small businesses ( we were the only customers that whole day ) and I don't think more than one or two of each kind of these  animals need to be slaughtered per week so in my opinion, it is fairly sustainable. )

One of the things you take for granted living in an asian country is the abundant amount of instant noodle packets you can find everywhere. This ,however, doesn't happen in the UK. It is not rare, but you can only usually find the 'proper' ones like the thai and korean brands in big cities. The photos below are when I was in Yangon. It was 1 am and I was having jet lag so I couldn't sleep and therefore, decided to cook myself up a bowl of noodle. Because my father does seafood export, I am blessed to have these little tiger prawns readily available. Instant noodles are always fun. You can add basically everything you want to ( edible of course ). So I cleaned these prawns but I didn't remove the head as this preserves the freshness or simply because it looks good. I added some chopped asparagus and carrot and ALL you need is to turn on the TV to watch some late night shows and then sleep like a baby after this hearty midnight snack. 

Intro + Ingyin See Zar

So I've never really blogged or anything but after seeing all these people blog about burmese food and uploading all these mouth watering photographs, I'd give it a try and in turn make other people drool. First, I'm going to start with some old pictures.

Fried Tofu ( တိုဟူးေၾကာ္ ) 

Mhee Shay ( မွီးေရွအေရ )

I have to admit, this has got to be the best noodle dish I have ever tasted in my life. Every time I return to Yangon, I just have to eat this as soon as possible. It is a place called In Gyin See Zar ( အင္ႀကင္း ဆည္းဆာ ) on Pyay Road, Yangon, Myanmar. The shop is in a small street so you may find it hard to get there but if you go past the junction that connects with Inya road, you will find a tiny signboard on the right.

( It is around the green highlighted area shown on the         map on the left. )

The parking space is a bit tight though which is a shame and if it was a main street or road, it would get plenty of customers. The food runs out around 10-11 am and they closes then so it's best you go out for an early jog and fill that tummy with a bowl of hot delicious savoury bowl of Mhee Shay. Yum . .
Rating: ★★★★☆