FITBIT: Anti-aging Exercise & Nutrition tips

Happy New Year 2018! 

By Jessica Gan
A year older, a year wiser? Whilst we cannot control age, we can certainly increase our awareness and knowledge of fitness exercises suitable for anti-aging.

Research has found that HiiT (high intensity interval training) helps to fight anti-aging. Why? It improves several markers of health, like insulin sensitivity, muscle strength and mitochondria function. The latter declines as we age, so improving it helps aging. 

It is estimated that more than 50% of all women and 20% of all men over the age of 50 will suffer an osteoporotic fracture at some time in their lives (U.S Dept of Health & Human Services, 2004). Therefore, nutrition therapy of osteoporosis includes adequate calcium intake and Vitamin D intake.
Vitamin D sources include fortified milk, fish, eggs, butter and of course sunlight.

To that end, whilst we are enjoying the sunny tropical Singapore weather, we should remember to have sufficient sunscreen available on our finger tips. Hope these tips are useful. Let's enjoy each moment, healthily and happily!

Disclaimer: Do check with your doctor before embarking on new exercises or diet.

  More tips email:  jessica.gan@alumni.utoronto.ca

Dark side of Beautiful

Text and photo by Herb Pilles

Question:  What can you buy in a Singapore food store for under a dollar?

Answer:  A packet of squid ink!  S$0.80  for two.

Actually, you need five of them to make squid ink risotto and you can get it at Huber’s or The Swiss Butcher.  There is something to be said about black squid ink on a dinner plate, offset by pinks, and white, and green, and different shades of red.  But it’s not just the visual.  There is something about the flavour of squid ink that simply connects you to the sea.  Your guests will love it.  Just look at Maureen’s face.

To make a black squid ink risotto, you need 1 tbsp butter, a large shallot, and two cloves of garlic chopped fine, a glass of good white wine, two cups of a good quality Arborio rice from Italy, five 4 g packets of squid ink, good low sodium chicken stock, grated rind from a lemon.

Melt a table spoon or so of butter in a pot over low heat.  Add the shallots and garlic, fry gently but do not let it go brown. If it goes brown, throw it out and start again.  Add the rice and stir continuously for about 5 minutes.  Add the wine, stir until all the wine is absorbed.  Add the squid ink.  It will make a glorious mess. Just keep stirring. Start adding the stock, a ladle full at a time, stir until it is all absorbed, then add more stock.  Don’t even think about walking away from the stove.  Keep adding stock and stirring until the rice is al dente, about 20 minutes later.  If you need more liquid add hot water or wine.  When it’s done, add the grated lemon zest, and a squeeze of lemon juice.  Plate and top with whatever you have in mind.  I served mine with poached salmon with dill mayo on top.  On the side there’s grilled asparagus, fennel, and Portobello mushrooms smothered in a salsa of red onion, tomato (no pulp), red capsicum, peas, corn, thyme leaves, and a vinegrette of olive oil and verjuice.  If you don’t have verjuice, use lemon juice or white balsamic this time, but make sure you put verjuice on your shopping list.  It is now available at C.S.

Black on a plate is beautiful. If you don't want to make risotto, you can buy squid ink pasta, which is also wonderful — and quicker.

Wet Market, Part 5, “Wing or Sting?”

By Herb Pillar

Skate Wing or Stingray?  They are different in the sea, but in the kitchen they are the same!  Almost unheard of in Canadian grocery stores and fish markets, and completely absent from restaurant menus, skate wing presents a marvellous culinary opportunity here in Asia.  Don’t decide to make skate wing this weekend – find it first!  Even here in Singapore, it is not always available, so when you do see it at the wet market, snap it up!

Stingray is a regular offering at Singapore hawker stalls, (ikan pari bakar), but it is very difficult to find it in a North American cookbook.  It does have a long presence in French cooking.  When properly prepared, it is tender, succulent and delicious and has a wonderful texture - but like squid, it can become rubbery and tasteless if overcooked.  Perhaps that’s why people tend to shy away from it.  This is the exact reason why I am going to give you a foolproof method for preparing stingray at home, French style, poached and with beurre noire and capers.

Have your stingray wing cut into pieces like the one on my cutting board in the photo.    Bring some fish stock (court bouillon) to the boil.  If you don’t have fish stock, use water, a small handful of peppercorns, and a glass of dry white wine.  There should be enough stock to cover the fish.  Take the boiling stock off the stove and immediately slide your stingray piece into the pot, cover, and let sit for about 12 minutes. 

While the fish is poaching off the stove, slap a few tablespoons of unsalted butter into a small saucepan on low heat.  The butter will melt, become clear, and the solids will settle to the bottom of the pan.  Leave them there.  They will gradually turn golden, then brown, like in the photo.  Toss in a tablespoon of capers.   Keep warm, but don’t let it burn!

When the fish is done, take it out of the liquid, peel off the skin, and with a spoon, scrape the meat off the cartilage, both sides.  It will come away easily, in lovely long strands, like spaghetti squash.   Gently spoon some of the warm buerre noire over the top, and serve immediately, with tiny boiled potatoes and your choice of green vegetables – asparagus or ladyfingers would be nice.  Serve with a very dry, very chilled white wine, such as a New Zealand Riesling.  Very tasty and very special!

You learned it here in Singapore.

Food Less Travelled

By Herb Pilles

We all know that the fresher our fruits and vegetables are, the better they taste.   There is nothing like the aroma, the full flavour, the bursting goodness of a big red tomato fresh off the vine.   How many of us are fortunate enough to have tasted a peach right off the bough of a tree in summer?   There is scant resemblance to the peaches we buy at the grocery store!  But here we are on an island of four million people in South East Asia.   The “Hundred Mile Diet” might make sense in Vancouver, but how does one eat locally in Singapore?  Well, the Cameron Highlands of Malaysia are 400 kilometres away, and while that is not exactly “local”, it’s a lot closer that Peru!  Produce that is unpacked from crates at the wet markets in Singapore in the dark, wee hours of the morning was probably picked the day before.  The operators of the stalls at your local wet market can tell you exactly where every item came from, and when it arrived.

One of my family’s all-time, all-Canadian favourites is Ontario peaches’n’cream corn, from the back of a pick-up truck in the Canadian Tire parking lot in August.  I have steadfastly avoided the naked cobs in shrink-wrapped pairs at the grocery store here in Singapore, but the other day the lovely woman who always waves me over at my neighbourhood wet market was more persistent than usual, pointing to a pile of fresh green cobs, with “Must try! Must try!  Two colour corn! Cameron Highland.”  It looked like peaches’n’cream, broken stalks still white and fresh moist silk at the top, so I took a dozen home for my Canadian guests that evening.  It was amazing!  Sweet, crunchy, and fragrant, and tasting of home!

Now, if you really want to intercept freshness, even before the produce gets to your local wet market, make your way to the Pasir Panjang Wholesale Market!  It is located on the West Coast Highway, near Haw Par Villa MRT station.  Bring BIG bags.  You will find an endless variety of not only fruits and vegetables, but frozen and dried foods, such as nuts, as well.  Anyone can shop there, at astonishingly low prices.  It is an enormous area, taking up several city blocks, very busy, and not set up as a shopper-friendly retail store, so watch you don’t get your ankles nipped by a fork-lift truck.

Is it possible to “eat locally” in Singapore?  Can we get “food less travelled”?  Well, you can certainly get closer to the source of your food at your local markets than at the supermarket.  Give it a go.

Fish

By Herb Pilles

After wandering through Sentosa’s new aquarium I was flush with inspiration and rushed right over to my local fish market the next morning.  If your Singapore experience has not included an early morning visit to the wet market, and if you love fresh, local produce and food-less-travelled, you have missed something quintessentially Asian.  Sure you can buy fish at the supermarket, but you would miss out meeting some great characters (the fish sellers, not the fish), and you would miss an astonishing  variety of seafood that could not be any fresher unless you had caught it yourself.

Mr. Chua Han Kuan of Yuhua Market on Jurong East Ave 1 holds up my dinner, a gorgeous red snapper.  It was cooked whole, stuffed with lemon and fresh dill, both sides slashed, then rubbed with tahini sauce, sprinkled with crushed fennel and cumin seeds, and  baked in a hot oven for about 30 minutes.  Still hot from the oven, it was doused then basted with a cup of flaming Pernod.  It was superb!

HOW TO CLEAN A SQUID

“But what do I do with it?”  While most fish are pretty straight forward, some things can be intimidating, such as cleaning a squid, but if you can get over the squeemishness, the results are infinitely rewarding.

1:  Grasp the squid by the head and gently pull it out of the tube.  You may wish to keep the tentacles, but discard the head.   You can keep the tentacles together in the shape of a crown by carefully cutting around the top of the head, keeping a small band intact.

2: Poking out of the top of the sack you will find what looks like a clear piece of plastic.  Pull it out in one piece and discard.

 3:  Firmly grab one of the fins and pull it away from the body, taking the thin membrane of reddish skin with it.  The skin and the other fin should all come off nicely in one piece, but pull off any bits you might have missed.  Discard.

4:  Check the inside of the sack to see if you’ve missed anything, like some undigested little fish. 

5:  From here on, it’s easy.   Cut it into lovely rings, into squares, or leave it whole to be stuffed.  Whatever you decide, and depending on your recipe, cook squid for less than a minute, or for over an hour!

Crispy and Crunchy: The Wet Market, Part 2

By Herb Pilles

You can’t wander through a Singapore wet market without noticing that stuff in the mud that someone is always scraping away at.  What is that stuff, and what do you do with it?  Well, it’s lotus root, and once it’s cleaned up, you can take it home to meet the family.  They will be glad you did! (You can also buy lotus root in the supermarket, shiny and clean and shrink-wrapped, but what’s the fun in that?)

Lotus root is incredibly versatile.  It can be eaten raw, boiled, braised, deep fried, stir fried, steamed, sautéed, curried, or tempura’d.  No matter what, it will always be crispy and crunchy, but tender at the same time.  It’s delicious and packs an impressive range of health benefits, including fibre, vitamins C and B-6, and some important minerals.  For centuries, lotus root has held a special place in the culinary traditions of India, China, Japan, South East Asia, and the Pacific. 

We are going to make chips with it, known as renkon chips in Japan. 

Peel the tubers with a vegetable peeler and slice them cross-ways, as thin as you can with a sharp knife.  Soak in a bowl of water with a squeeze of lemon juice, to keep the lotus from turning brown.  If you don’t care, skip this step.  Dry the lotus slices between paper or cotton towels.  In a shallow pan, heat vegetable oil to medium high.  Slide the lotus slices into the hot oil, and remove with a slotted spoon when they are nice and golden.  No need to turn them.  Drain on paper towels or on a small plate inverted inside a larger plate.  Sprinkle with coarse sea salt, and crushed dry seaweed flakes. 

Crunchy and delicious!  Enjoy.

Hosting a Wine Tasting at Home

By Herb Pilles

A wine tasting is a fun way to learn more about the subtle qualities of wine and move from “just drinking” to a greater awareness and enjoyment of the unique characteristics of different wine varieties and origins. 

At your next dinner party, instead of buying the same bottles on the two-for-one offer, carefully select two different wines of the same grape variety, perhaps an Australian shiraz and a French Syrah.  Serve them both at the same time - just before your main course, two glasses side by side, and let your guests taste and compare.  Or you could choose two entirely different wines and let your guests decide which wine to drink with their meal, and compare notes.

For a blind tasting, blindfold the bottles, not your guests! Take two bottles of the same grape, for example, a red Burgundy and a New Zealand pinot noir, wrap each in a white napkin, and challenge your guests to compare.  You might like to identify which is the “old world” and which the “new world”.  Or which is the more expensive one – not always obvious! 

These are some important things to pay attention to in a wine tasting.

1.   The Appearance
Hold the glass up to the light, examine the colour, the clarity - cloudy, brilliant, clear, sparkly, dull? The viscosity - swirl it slightly. Does it have shapely legs (the way the wine runs down the inside of the glass)?  Is it watery, oily, heavy, sparkly?

2.   The “Nose”
Swirl again and yes, stick your nose in the glass and breathe in deeply!  Is there a distinctive, identifiable aroma? Have some fun with words:  “I detect a faint hint of barnyard”, perhaps, or, blackberry, fresh bread, peaches, English leather, gasoline?

3.   The Taste
For most people, this is what really matters!  For white wines, is it sweet, or dry, or bone dry?  Is there a balance between acidity and sweetness?   For reds, is it astringent, hard, dry, soft?  How is the acidity- tart, flat, refreshing?   Is it full-bodied or flat and thin?  When you hold the wine,        do the flavours fill your mouth?  After you swallow, do the flavours linger or disappear?  Does the wine have a satisfying complexity, or is it simple and disappointing?

4.   Overall Impression
After all the analyzing, it is important to bring everything together for a full picture, an overall impression of the wine.  This is where you finally ask the question, “How much did you like it?”

All this dialogue is just fine verbally.  You can get more serious and academic about it, but really, it’s all about learning 

more and enjoying more,  so design a wine tasting that works for you!

Great Cheese! Which Wine?

Text & Photos : Herb Pilles

Bread, wine, and cheese are a classic combination that go way back in time.  I’ll bet there was a generous chunk of goat cheese on the table with the bread and wine at The Last Supper, along with olives and dried figs!

Today, of course, we have a variety of wines and cheeses available to us, and we try to enhance our enjoyment of both by finding just the right combination.

Imagine a platter with a stunning variety of cheeses on it- brie, stilton, a creamy goat, and one or two hard cheeses like grana padano, and well-aged cheddar.  How do you find a wine that matches all of these cheeses?  You don’t.  Consider carefully selecting just one amazing cheese.  Take your time to taste and savour it, then ask, what would go well with this?

Forget about apples, grapes, pears, or other fresh fruit.  They might enhance the cheese, but they destroy the wine.  Dried fruit like figs, dates, and nuts work well if you feel you need something else on the plate.   You can also forget about flavoured crackers like shrimp or seaweed - they get in the way of everything.  Thin slices of good baguette, some unflavoured bread-sticks, or bland crackers such as matza will allow you to enjoy both the cheese and the wine.

Don’t bother with an expensive wine!   It’s hard to enjoy the delicate nuances of a fine wine when you have a mouth full of butterfat or stinky gorgonzola.  An expensive wine might not enhance your cheese, but a rich creamy cheese will make a cheap bottle of red taste fantastic!  (Beware of wine tasting events that serve cheese first!)

To match cheese with wine, start with a fabulous cheese then try to imagine what would complement this taste sensation?  The answer might not be wine.  A strong stinky cheese like munster or limburger might be best with a cold lager.  A fine single malt might be just the thing to honour that wonderful, well-aged cheddar. A young white cheddar with Gewurztraminer, or sauvignon blanc?  A rich dark port with that stilton?  A lovely, delicate goat cheese with a sweet Mosel riesling?

Resist the temptation to google, “What goes with...?”  Taste the cheese and trust your judgement.  Or, offer a number of alternatives and let your guests choose what they like best.  It might lead to some interesting conversation!

Photo caption:
Three Fabulous cheeses meet their match.  The Alps Blossom cheese is rich and earthy, matched with a wonderful flowery French Merlot.  The Chiriboga Blue meets a dreamy late harvest red made from over-matured grapes, and a Spanish Manchego is paired with a Rioja, but would also be set off nicely with a dark Port.  The cheeses come from Toque on Dunhearn Road.