Ovenbird's Home Cooking Adventures

Ovenbird's Home Cooking Adventures Hello there from sunny Singapore! Hi there from tropical Singapore! Ovenbird's Home Cooking Adventures chronicles my cooking experience. I love wine too!

I'm a Stay-at-Home dad who loves whipping up meals for my growing family and I run a weekend Japanese-Singaporean fusion Omakase Supper Club. I'm a home cook who loves to experiment with different culinary techniques across multiple cuisines. Being a Singaporean, I'm pretty much plugged into the major cuisines of the world, especially that of Singapore and Southeast Asia. And once a month, I organ

ise experimental kitchens where I cook for a small group of guests to share my food and wines in an Experimental Kitchen. The menu changes every month, and it's always paired with wines that I source personally. I also have a healthy obsession with kitchen knives :)
I share all my recipes on my blog at http://www.ovenbirdonwheels.tumblr.com
So if you're game to join me on my home cooking adventures, follow me on Facebook, or come for one of my experimental kitchens (see events page for details)!

Back at my favorite hangout. Best chicken liver in the world. This time round, there’s Hokkaido milk cow, Omi beef intes...
25/02/2023

Back at my favorite hangout. Best chicken liver in the world. This time round, there’s Hokkaido milk cow, Omi beef intestines stir fried in mala sauce with kailan, Kumamoto Kurobuta bacon with stir fried lotus roots, Omi gyu miso zuke beef cheeks, grilled sayori overnight aged, and Swede in Yoshida Ranch raclette gratin. Plus a bonus super rare dram. My kind of special place.

And I’m off to my first proper break since opened … well… since Covid happened, really. And where else but Japan. The c...
16/02/2023

And I’m off to my first proper break since opened … well… since Covid happened, really. And where else but Japan. The country whose cuisine and knives inspired me to take up a career which I’d never have dreamt I would leap into.
I’m looking forward to the next 11 days or so. Starting with a couple of days at a whisky festival in Saitama with friends, then a few days in Fukuoka and Saga - with a brewery tour and dinner at one of my favorite sake producers, Nabeshima. Then it’s back to Tokyo again for the last leg of my trip.
Lots of posting ahead to do. Now, I’m off to the boarding gate!

It’s the season for big Buri. 11kg up. Every year, as it approaches December, my big 225mm deba gets blunted faster, my ...
06/11/2022

It’s the season for big Buri. 11kg up. Every year, as it approaches December, my big 225mm deba gets blunted faster, my fish aging paper runs out like toilet rolls, and my back and arms ache day and night from handling these big fishes.
This year’s buri crop is already looking stellar, and we aren’t even in December yet. Definitely a year for buri lovers!

One of the best fish this year is the Kue - long tooth grouper. It is a big apex predator and supreme among the groupers...
21/10/2022

One of the best fish this year is the Kue - long tooth grouper. It is a big apex predator and supreme among the groupers. This year’s changing climate has thrown up a massive harvest of these usually elusive and very expensive species. The Kue needs time to mature. I personally think to serve the Kue as sashimi, or a sushi Neta, a minimum of 2 weeks aging is required. The rich, refined fat needs the dense, muscular fibers to be softened through proper wet aging first. Even then, a bit of shabu won’t hurt.
The best part of the Kue isn’t just the meat - it’s the whole fish experience. I keep the head, bones, collars and grill it before making a rich broth laced with cognac, sake and root vegetables. Kue bone broth makes the most unbelievably delicious Claypot cooked fish porridge.
I’m looking to put in one more 4/5kg Kue before winter. One last hurrah.

Hokkaido Nishin Somen - Herring is usually not thought of as a Japanese fish, but off the waters of Hokkaido, the fish i...
10/09/2022

Hokkaido Nishin Somen - Herring is usually not thought of as a Japanese fish, but off the waters of Hokkaido, the fish is fat and sweet. Now gearing up for the spawning season, the average weight of each herring is los to 450-500g. It’s a beautiful oily fish to work with, if not for the numerous Y-shaped bones that interlock around the back and mid-section of the body. The belly is also quite bony, so usually that, and the tail are removed and used for making the broth with the bones.
The fish is filleted using the Daimyo-Oroshi technique, and pickled (salted and vinegared) as per Silver-skinned fishes like Saba and Iwashi (mackerel and sardine).
Before serving, I use the same@hone-kiri method to finely bone slice each fillet at around 1mm intervals. This makes it edible without having to pin bone the fish (which will ruin the meat).
A truly tasty, simple fish that delivers every single time@

Saba or mackerel is a fish that can be bought cheaply in most supermarkets. It’s used in home cooking, Food courts, cas...
04/09/2022

Saba or mackerel is a fish that can be bought cheaply in most supermarkets. It’s used in home cooking, Food courts, casual diners, well, practically everywhere and anything in between right up to 3 Star Michelin restaurants and top sushi restaurants.
In Edo Mae sushi, Saba is an essential hikarimono that graces every meal. The search for quality, and the perfection of pickling it in salt and vinegar are the hallmarks of top chefs and their skills.
I’m a huge Saba fan. The fish is absolutely delicious and very nutritious. All year round, Saba is available.
This 1.3kg Nagasaki wild caught Saba is possibly the biggest Saba I’ve used and it is an incredible specimen that is superbly well marbled.
In a small stall in a mall, I can’t afford to offer high grade bluefin or expensive uni. Not at the price point I can ask for anyway, so I focus on working hard and putting in my best efforts on fishes like Saba to make them as delicious as possible.
This Saba needed 160 mins to pickling, overnight drying, and further preparation before it was ready for a handroll course.

As a cook, I’m witnessing global warming first hand without stepping out of my kitchen. The seas around Japan are changi...
28/08/2022

As a cook, I’m witnessing global warming first hand without stepping out of my kitchen. The seas around Japan are changing. The produce has become so unseasonal that it’s no longer feasible to follow a “seasonal” approach strictly.
Salmon soft roe in early August.
Buri/ Warasa so well marbled it looks like it’s late fall, not late summer.
Sawara resembling October- November right now.
Monkfish liver in the height of summer.
Cod milt in late august not October.
Disappearing pacific saury, and Saba that’s unseasonably fat.
We need to pay a lot more attention to climate change. We have to do something. Otherwise, it’s not just the weather extremes, our oceans risk collapsing ecosystems too.

Fish butchery 101 - sanmai oroshi. Basic filleting of a 9kg Buri (Japanese Amberjack) that has been aged a week. I used ...
12/08/2022

Fish butchery 101 - sanmai oroshi. Basic filleting of a 9kg Buri (Japanese Amberjack) that has been aged a week.
I used a 180mm Fu-Rin-Ka-Zan Ai Deba for the job.

Kuromutsu season has started!!
04/08/2022

Kuromutsu season has started!!

Always a delight aging kanpachi. Next to shima Aji, it’s probably the least fussy fish to age. Both are less bloody and ...
30/07/2022

Always a delight aging kanpachi. Next to shima Aji, it’s probably the least fussy fish to age. Both are less bloody and easier to bleed cleanly compared to most fishes. The meat is also firmer and less moisture laden. And the skin is naturally not prone to picking up moisture easily, if Tsukibiki is done well. There is simply no excuse to serve farmed versions of these two fishes when the wild ones are so much better.

I spent the best part of 10 minutes earlier this week patiently slicing off the scales of this 6kg Hiramasa from Nagasak...
25/06/2022

I spent the best part of 10 minutes earlier this week patiently slicing off the scales of this 6kg Hiramasa from Nagasaki.
There was a time not too long ago that I’d ask myself why would anyone in their right mind bother to take a knife, spend time sharpening it, then spend more time slicing scales off a stupid fish.
Now that I’m a cook, I think this is the most therapeutic and meaningful me-time I can spend at work.
It took me almost half a decade to figure out cooking And working with fish are my calling. 😂
(That and 14-16 hour days and staying wide awake at 2:30am)

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