The Hokkien mee was just a recreation of something my grandmother used to cook whenever she wanted to make a quick, one pot meal. It was just noodles fried with sliced fishcake, some vegetables and sliced chicken or pork. It was simple, quick and delicious. It's one of the dishes I've always had in my mind and have not had anything close as most shops tend to use starch to make a thick gravy. My grandmother didn't, and I think that was the biggest difference with her cooking and the hawkers.
The next day, my mom suggested I try making fried prawn noodles and that was a bit of a problem when I didn't have the stock to flavour the noodles. However, I managed to make a quick one using stock cubes, boiled with a bit of pork, and also partially cooking the seafood in it. Somehow that makeshift stock managed to make the noodles taste right but I think a proper stock would be much tastier.
The last one was the weirdest of the lot. We were having a steamboat buffet and they offered fried mantous. My mom saw the mantous and was saving a bit of stomach space to get a few in. I, on the other hand, wondered why they offered it when chilli crab is the dish it goes best with and that dish wasn't on offer. Mom also wished they did have some chilli crab. It so happened that they had all the ingredients needed to make the dish, just no proper way to cook it. Somehow, with a lot of patience and definitely a handful of madness, I managed to make a simple chilli prawn dish which was enough to satisfy. In the end, making her over indulge with the mantous.
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