Tainted Tomatoes

I have copied and paste the news headlines in the US that should concern us too in this part of the world.Many outbreaks of foodborne diseases that were once contained within a small community may now spread like wild fire in global dimensions. The SARS outbreak is one example.
Food safety authorities all over the world have acknowledged that food safety must not only be tackled at the national level but also through closer linkages among food safety authorities at the international level.
In the US, there have been 13 outbreaks of salmonella in tomatoes since 1990, which puts the fruit on the list of high-risk foods that are prone to infection. But unlike the bagged spinach from the 2006 E. Coli scare, the tomatoes don't come with a traceable bar code. "When you're dealing with tomatoes, it is much, much more complex," explains Dr. David Acheson, the FDA's Associate Commissioner for Foods. The FDA's great tomato hunt has an ever-expanding list of suspects. A salmonella victim can point to the supermarket (or restaurant) that sold the offending fruit, but that store probably sources its tomatoes from several suppliers, each of which uses several distributors — and distributors buy from any number of growers.

Even if the FDA can pinpoint the source of the outbreak, it's hard for consumers to know where their tomatoes are grown. Certain imported foods are required to carry country-of-origin labels, but that doesn't apply to domestic produce. "I'm not aware of any tomato outbreak that was not domestic," says Acheson. There is no such thing as a mandatory state-of-origin label for food, and federal authorities have yet to create such a law. "Saying 'product of the U.S.' isn't necessarily going to confer safety," he says. Federal officials hunted for the source of a 16-state salmonella outbreak linked to three types of raw tomatoes, while the list of supermarkets and restaurants removing those varieties from shelves and dishes grew.

In Malaysia, the government has introduced the Good Agricultural Practice (GAP) whereby the Certificate of Farm Accreditation is given for farm produce that have met certain criteria.The SALM (Sijil Akreditasi Ladang Malaysia) has to be backed by documents as evidence of the product source of origin and processes involved from harvesting to packaging.This is to ensure that the products are environmentally friendly and safe to eat.I am sure the US being more advanced that us, would have a similar system in place.Or don't they?If the system is present for domestic produce,whereby each source of product is assigned a number and given a name or brand, I am sure identifying the source of the salmonella contamination would not be a problem.
After this, all vegetable products have to be coded,labelled and branded like what I think is being practised in the oranges, pears and apples industry.But how do you label and brand spinach and cilantro?

Meanwhile,boil your tomatoes and turn them into puree or ketchup.

Playing Cook

I will be away for a few days.My husband and I have already stocked up the fridge with enough foodstuff for the children.Now they have to learn to play cook.I think they have enough knowledge and skills to do so. Sorry I have not enough time to prepare the sauces and freeze them since I only received a short notice to go on an outstation trip.

I have already bought some meat and dory fish.Zaty can coat the cut fish fillets with a bit of flour, sprinkle with salt and pepper and dried mixed herbs and then fry the fish in hot oil.The fish can be eaten with plum sauce or black and pepper sauce. the sauces can be improvised by adding water and pepper or chilies and some vegetables like carrots, capsicums or cilantro.This can be eaten with rice or chips.Voila, you've got a complete meal.

The meat can be marinated with barbeque sauce added with some pepper if you prefer a hot marinade and some oil and mixed dry herbs.You can grill in the oven or cook over the stove at low heat to prevent the meat from being overcooked.

Or if you prefer, cook the meat in soya sauce. Look up the recipe as I can only post it later in the future.

Alternatively,the tougher meat can be pre-boiled for use in use in fried rice or fried noodles.

The children should not go hungry if they take some initiatives in the kitchen.Making omelettes, hotdogs and burger sandwiches is easy enough. They must learn to cook up easy meals as the price of everything has gone up since the hike in petrol and diesel prices earlier in the week.Everybody must learn to save.Someday even hawker food may not be affordable to the ordinary person.Sometimes I feel its not worthwhile buying when you can prepare more delicious and clean, nutritious food if you only try.

Soto

Soto is another popular dish in Johor and Selangor where people of Javanese descend live.My late father in-law loved the soto in Tanjong Karang but it is no longer found there.The soto in the fish market at Sungai Besar is okay except for the not so clean surroundings.Nowadays we eat the soto at the Dataran Sungai Besar which can be considered as having passed our standards.
Soto is basically compressed rice or nasi empet in chicken soup plus a lot of garnishing and added with a sauce made from soya and bird chillies.Instead of rice, one can also eat the soup with yellow noodles(mee) or rice vermicelli (bihun).A tasty and hot chicken soup makes a good soto.Soto can be eaten at any time of the day but normally it is taken at breakfast, just like nasi lemak.Soto is also eaten during Eid celebrations.

Preparing soto takes many steps.An assistant would be a great help.

My soto is made as folows:
Ingredients for soup:
1/2 chicken (cut into 4 pieces)
1 onion
3 cloves garlic
1 stalk lemon grass (serai)
2.5 cm galangal (lengkuas)
2.5 cm ginger (halia)
1 cube Knorr Chicken Stock (no MSG)
4 bowls water
5 tablespoon cooking oil
salt
Pounded Ingredients
(You can also grind the dry spices in a grinder)
8 small onions
4 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon black pepper (lada hitam)
1 teaspoon fennel seeds (jintan manis)
1 teaspoon star anise (bunga lawang)
1 teaspoon coriander seeds (biji ketumbar)
Optional Pounded Ingredients:
4 cm cinnamon stick (kayu manis)
5 pieces cloves (bunga cengkih)
3 pieces cardamoms (buah pelaga)

(You can also use powdered soup base found in the market if you cannot find the spices.However, the taste will be different.)
Some people put turmeric in the soup. That would make the soup yellowish.

Other Ingredients:
600g rice made into nasi empet and cut into 2.5 cm squares.(See nasi empet recipe posted earlier on May 12, 2008)
200g beansprouts (taugeh), tailed and parboiled briefly
50g beanthread,(soo hoon) deep fried in hot oil
2 stalks spring onions (daun bawang),shredded
2 stalks celery (daun sup),shredded
20 shallots, sliced and deep fried till golden brown (bawang goreng)
4 meat balls(pegedil)

Sambal Ingredients:
Bird chillies (cili padi)and garlic cloves pounded coarsely and mixed with black soya sauce, lime juice or vinegar and sugar to taste.(Omit the garlic if you don't fancy raw garlic.)

I will put the pegedil recipe below.You can prepare the pegedil, fried shallots and fried soo hoon a day earlier and keep them separately in airtight containers.

Making the soup:
Heat cooking oil in a big pot. When hot, fry the sliced onions and garlic till golden.Add pounded ingredients and fry till fragrant.Add in water,lemon grass,and galangal and cook till boiled.Put in chicken, salt, Knorr cube, and cook over medium heat till chicken is tender.Remove the chicken,shred its meat and put aside.Bring the soup back to the boil and turn off the heat.
To serve, use medium size bowls.Put in a few pieces of nasi empet, some bean sprouts,bean threads,a piece of pegedil and shredded chicken meat to each bowl.Pour in the hot soup.Sprinkle the shredded spring onions and celery and fried shallots.Serve the black sambal prepared earlier in a separate bowl.

To make pegedil:
Mince some beef and mix with mashed boiled potatoes.Add salt and black pepper powder.
Roll into small balls with the fingers and flat the balls.Do not add water. Dip each ball in beaten eggs before deep frying in hot oil.