One of my favourite food blogger and photographer is Ellie Hoeve, the genius behind Almost Bourdain. I salute her efforts to insert step-by-step photos of all her cooking and I aspire to be at that sort of level one day. She could make just about anything from scratch.
This oil her is one of them although I tweaked it a bit to suit my taste. Almost Bourdain is no longer in operation, that’s because she went on a tag-team with Rasa Malaysia’s, Been Yinn Low to create more culinary greatness. She has a new blog called Gourmand Recipes and I just can’t wait to see what these two will do.
SZECHUAN CHILLI OIL
Adapted from Almost Bourdain
Ingredients;
1 tablespoon of Szechuan peppercorns
5 dried chillies, chopped in halves
3 star anise
Scallions tied to a knot
150 gms of chilli powder
2 cloves of garlic
1/2 teaspoon of chilli padi powder (totally optional)
1 1/2 cups of sunflower oil
Steps;
1. In a heat-proof big bowl, place your chilli powders and your star anise. In a pot, pour in your oil and add add your garlic. Turn the heat in a low temp first. Let it heat for 5 mins. This is to infuse the garlic flavour.
2. Turn up the heat to medium, take out the garlic before it burns. As the oil becomes hot, add your Szechuan peppercorns, knotted scallions and dried chillies and swirl it around in the hot oil with the heat off. Let it cool a bit.
3. Pour the oil into the chilli powder mixture. Take out the scallions. Give it a mix around with a spoon and let it sit and seep overnight.
4. Skim off the separated oil floating on top and keep in a jar or bottle.
Note; Plenty more recipes to come using this oil. Great as a dipping sauce too.
