Popiah

Popiah is a hot family favourite, especially Ah Ma's popiah. Whenever we went to Ah Ma's place, we look forward to her popiah. But in recent years, Ah Ma hasn't done popiah due to all the preparation involved. So I found out from her and also from Jiji our family's recipe. She includes belly pork in her recipe, but I left that out, so that our helper can enjoy it as well.

Having popiah when friends come over is a good idea since only the filling need to be heated up. We can take our time to eat it. So we had popiah when our friends came over on the 2nd day of Chinese New Year. The only problem was finding fresh popiah skin during the new year period. Mummy found out from Jiji that a shop at Bedok North Ave 4(industrial estate) sells popiah even during the CNY period! At a higher price of course!

Grandma’s Popiah

Filling

A
3-4 turnips
3-4 bamboo shoots
1 pkt green beans
2-3 carrots
2-3 leeks
4 pcs beancurd

10 cloves garlic
3 Tbsp tau cheo (red date salted bean paste)
Prawn / ikan bilis stock—4 cups

Method:

1. Slice or grate A finely.
2. Fry garlic and taucheo until fragrant.
3. Add in A. Season with salt.
4. Add stock and boil. Simmer for 20 minutes.

Accompaniments:

1.5 kg popiah skin
1.5 kg prawns – head and shell removed and steamed
50 cents of bean sprouts—blanched in hot water
10 eggs – boiled and chopped
600g chinese lettuce
cilantro
400g peanuts—roasted and chopped
Garlic – grind to paste
Chilli – grind to paste
1 big bottle sweet sauce
Flat fish – fried and grind to powder

Popiah Party

At last CL is back from HK for the May Day weekend. My family loves popiah, especially those made by Ah Ma. She makes really good hokkien popiah! Since we love popiah so much, I just had to learn from Ah Ma, who has since passed down her gongfu to Jiji. What Jiji has taught me is by "agaration"--everything by estimation and feel and instinct. Well, Mummy and CL did not complain about the fillings, so I guess it's passable. At least now we can have popiah whenver we feel like it, just that it's a lot of work. But now that CL is back, we have more reasons to prepare it.

Also took the opportunity to try out the Kueh Pie Tee recipe from Amy Beh's website. It is really good! HN says they're good enough to be sold. The pie tee shells have the right crunch and texture.