Banana Plantation

I want to share what I did on November last year during annual vacation at my hometown. I was taking some pictures when I was preparing dinner today that I wanted to share the recipe to everyone (as usual). Then when I was transferring the pictures from camera to laptop, I found these collection of my memories last year and decided to upload in my next entry.

This is my father. He is a teacher majoring in Mathematics. Soon enough he will retire in a few months time so he and his brother decided to plant banana trees in a small few acres land. He recruited some people to work with him as well. Here are a few hundreds banana seeds collected ready for cropping.

New born banana tree that are still growing a few days after cropping. There are certain steps to follow in order to grow this tree. To bury banana seed needs enough depth in order to grow. If too shallow, it wont happen. Make sure the distance between trees is uniform to maximize the usage of land and easier to manage when trees are full grown-up.




"Can you manage this bananas project if I handle it to you?" my father asked me. I said "Off course I will." I am glad and thankful if I have at least 20 acres of land. I will be the boss and taking a good care of all my loyal workers. If this comes true, I will resign my current job!!!

Some of a free area that was not been seeded yet. I am sure it had been cropped with bananas by now.

I was wearing a 3 euro pair of shoe from Dunnes Store. Turn out to be like this - decorated with dry clay dust all over- and it was really obvious cause it comes in black colour!!! I really like this shoe even though its really cheap - very comfortable and lightweight. I wiped off the stain soon after we headed back home.

See how we appreciate of what Allah gives to us. We are human with healthy mind and soul, the strength that Allah created within us makes human superior than other creatures on earth such as animals and trees. Human is the only creatures who can decide of what they want to be, have a power to lead this world. Only a Human. Not an angle, not a devil, not an animal, not even a tree. We should be thankful to Him and follows His order. Always know our limits and always remember Him. God will bless us if we remember Him all the time, use all the resources that He provided to create a peaceful in this world we live in.

The banana tree area is surrounded by rubber and oil-palm plantation. These 2 are the main natural resources from our country - Malaysia and also our neighbours such as Indonesia, Thailand etc...nowadays rubber price in the market has increased to RM 17 per kilo. It is expected that the price can go higher than this current price. All rubber taper are really contented right now. They can earn triple-quadraple from their basic earning more than the professionals salary!!!

Sadly because a drought season hit some part of Malaysia including my hometown, its stunted most of the banana trees. We believe there maybe wisdom behind what was happening. My father still working hard hoping that one day he will earn his investment.

Spicy Black Soy Sauce (SBSS)

All you need are:

1) Soy sauce (preferably SS made in Malaysia such as Habhal Kipas Udang, Adabi, Jalen etc)

2) Bird's eye Chilies (does not matter whether it is red or green colour)

3) Garlic (1 piece is enough)

4) Salt and sugar


Steps:

1) Blend chili and garlic using dry blender/small blender/ice blender

2) After blend it, put the blended mixture into a small bowl.

3) Put sugar, salt and soy sauce into mixture and stir it very well. Add sugar and salt accordingly (make it sweet and salty. If you use salty SS, reduce the amount of salt, vice verca)

4) This is optional. You can add some hot water to dissolve salt and sugar faster. Remember do not put water too much. Your sauce will be too thin.


This sauce you can keep it in the fridge and lasted for approximately 3-4 weeks. So whenever you have fried banana, grab SS from your fridge and you can enjoy your teatime straight away.


Also you can have SBSS with other meal such as Soto, Fried Tempe, Mango etc.........thinking about it, instantly craving......it looks like I have to find banana, bird's eye chili in the nearest supermarket!!!!

Crispy Fried Banana (Pisang Goreng Rangup)

HOw many days now I haven't create blog? Its been a while. I want to share to everyone today how to make a crispy fried banana. Again this recipe is so simple. I am a type of person who like to make things simple and fast.


Fried banana is suitable to serve during teatime. Some people they like to eat it with spicy-soya-sauce (SSS, I will show how to make this in the next chapter), with sugar or even without anything. I preferably like to have it with SSS. Its actually wonderful to add some spices in your fried banana!!!!


Now, all you need to make this are....



*this is a fully mature banana. I dont have the exact picture not/half mature one


1) 5 pieces bananas (whether it is not mature, half mature or fully mature banana, its all up to you. I normally choose half mature one coz its consistency is not too hard or soft and the taste is not as sweet as the fully mature one)

2) 5 full large spoons of rice floor

3) 1 full large spoon of wheat floor (optional)

4) 1 tea spoon of tumeric powder

5) Half tea spoon of Salt (you can add accordingly)

6) Half tea spoon of kapur (optional)---> I will find out what is this in English

7) Half cup of water (you can adjust the amount of water)

8) Cooking oil for deep fry

*if you dont have the optional ingredients, do not worry. Your fried banana is still crispy.


So now you have all these ingredients in your kitchen table.


Next steps:


1) Put cooking oil into deep fryer/deep pan. Heat it moderately

2) Strip off your banana from its skin. Cut banana into medium-large slice. You can see the shape of banana in the picture below

3) Put rice floor into a small bowl.

4) Put also wheat floor, tumeric, kapur and salt to 2.

5) Add water and mixed all the ingredients till the texture become yogurty-like-texture. Make sure the salt is enough (don't make it too mild or too salty)

6) Put the banana cubes into the mixture that you just made and mix it well till all surface of bananas coated.





7) Now its time to fry the coated banana. Just put it one by one into the deep fryer. Cook it till it turns to golden-brown colour. (this is important to make sure the banana is really cook well till it become crispy. Otherwise, the banana will turn up to become soft and that is not nice. Normally it takes 15-20 minutes to cook till crispy)











8) Take it out from the fryer, hold it there till the oil finish to drop down. Put it into the plate (I like to cover the plate with kitchen tissue paper to absorb more oil)








You can eat it while it is still hot or you can leave it till it get colder a little bit. Serve with hot tea or coffee. I am sure your family/husband/children will like it!!! ENJOY!!!!