Chicken Laksa

I was craving for laksa and decided to try cooking it using the laksa spice paste (purchased from the NTUC supermarkets in Singapore). The taste of the laksa gravy was savoury and tasty but was not exactly what I expected...I was hoping to taste the ‘Singaporean-type’ of laksa (as indicated on the packaging of the laksa paste). The laksa gravy turned out to be slightly pale orange – yellow in colour. Perhaps I may have added slightly too much coconut cream. In any case, it was still a source of comfort food for someone who misses a spicy Asian rice noodle dish.

There were cooking instructions at the back of the laska paste sachets, but I added chopped onions, garlic, extra dried chilli and coriander flakes to give that extra spicy and South East Asian flavour to the dish.

Procedure:

1. Lightly season the chicken meat with salt and pepper.

2. Pan-fry the chicken meat thoroughly in cooking oil until it turns lightly browned (the meat should not be fully cooked as it will be cooked again in the spicy paste). Set aside the chicken meat.

3. Add oil in the wok and cook the chopped onions and garlic (for a short while) before adding the laksa paste and dried chilli flakes. Cook the laksa paste mixture till fragrant.

4. Add the pan-fried chicken meat back into the wok and mix well.

5. Add coconut cream, water and coriander flakes into the laksa mixture and bring to a boil before simmering for about 30 minutes in low heat.

6. While the laksa mixture is simmering, boil the rice noodles and prepare the hard boiled eggs, crabsticks and bean sprouts.

7. Once the laksa mixture is cooked, place some rice noodles, bean sprouts, hard boiled eggs and crabsticks into a bowl. Pour the hot laksa gravy with the chicken meat over the condiments and serve immediately.