Korean dramas are like an addiction. They suck you in and hold you hostage until the very end. That’s about 5 episodes per week for an entire month of being glued to your TV! You get so drawn in that you either need your whole family to be equally obsessed OR you need FAST food.
Fast as in homemade food made fast! It is possible!
I’m sure many of you have bought frozen foods for the ‘just in case I have nothing to eat or are just too lazy to cook’ days. Instead of buying frozen foods, why not make your own? At least you know all the ingredients that went into it and you can basically eat homemade anytime. It’s simple really, just make more than you can eat in one sitting and pack it away in your freezer. There are so many meals you could prepare way ahead of time without even thinking twice. When you make that ayam masak merah for dinner, prepare more than you need and portion them into small bags or tupperwares. Label them and put them in the freezer. When you cook that Nyonya chicken curry, again, make more than you need, portion some of them into bags, label and freeze. You can even do this with tea time type snacks such as pisang goreng (banana fritters), fried popiah and kari puffs.
Let’s start with a step by step of how to pre-prepare your pisang goreng so that you can have them fresh and piping hot whenever you feel like it.
Ingredients
- 20 to 25 Ripe Bananas which have been peeled and cut in half lengthwise
- 2 Cups Self-raising flour
- 1 Cup Corn Flour
- 4 Tablespoons Rice Flour
- 2 Teaspoons Baking Powder
- 1/2 Teaspoon of salt
- 1 ½ Cups Cold Water
- 4 Tablespoons of melted Butter
- Cooking oil, (for deep frying)
Instructions
- Peel and then slice the banana in half, lengthwise
- Add the self-raising flour, corn flour, rice flour and salt to the cold water and whisk until you get a smooth consistency.
- Add melted butter to the mixture. If you find that the batter feels too thick, add one or two tablespoons of water. The batter should not be too thick but you don’t want it to be watery either.
- Add the bananas to batter.
- Heat oil in a frying pan or wok until it reaches a temperature of 325 °F or 185 °C
- Deep fry 4 or 5 coated bananas at a time just until the coating sets. The color should remain a pale off white.
- Place the cook banana fritters on paper towels, to absorb any excess oil.
- Once they are cooled to room temperature. Bag 5 bananas at time and seal with a stapler or tie off with a rubber band.
- Freeze!
Now whenever you’re in the mood for fresh hot banana fritters to enjoy with the whole family while watching a Korean drama, simply take out the portioned packets, heat a pan or wok of oil to 325 °F or 185 °C and pop the frozen pisang goreng.
Fry until the bananas turn a lovely golden shade of yellow. It takes about 1 minute!
Side notes:
For those of you who have never had pisang goreng or never tried frying any yourself, please don’t go to the supermarket and just buy any banana. All bananas are definitely not created equal. If you try frying a Chiquita or Dole type banana, the results would be disastrous. These are really meant to be eaten fresh.
In Malaysia, the best bananas for frying are the Pisang Raja, Pisang Abu or Pisang Tanduk. For information regarding the banana varieties suitable for pisang goreng, check out this link: Which Banana Varieties are Suitable for Banana Fritters