Fried rice that packs a punch |
- Fried rice that packs a punch
- South African undertaker charged with sawing off corpse’s legs
- Guatemalan ex-police chief gets life sentence for prison murders
- Curfew lifted in four tourist destinations in Thailand
- Nigeria’s military targets newspapers over security fears
- US economy shows strength with solid jobs gains in May
| Posted: 06 Jun 2014 05:54 PM PDT
Sometimes, you just want something that can be prepared fast, yet never fails to make an impact on your tastebuds. Well, this Tom Yam fried rice is definitely one of those! Combining the wonderful flavours of Thai cuisine with the tummy-filling properties of white rice, this is a simple and easy one-dish meal that you may not be able to resist. For the Tom Yam flavouring, I'm using Tean's Gourmet Tom Yam paste, a paste made from onions, garlic, galangal, lemon grass, lime leaves and lemon juice among other ingredients, which provides the perfect source of taste to the rice. Of course you can make the Tom Yam flavouring from scratch if you want to, but when you have perfect flavouring in the form of an instant paste, why bother? All you have to do is mix the paste with some cooked rice, add in a host of other ingredients and you have the best Tom Yam fried rice right from your kitchen! The ingredients you add are really a matter of personal preference, whether it's baby corn, little shreds of chicken, prawns, chillies or tomatoes. They not only provide more flavouring to this dish, they also add variety to the textures. As usual when it comes to fried rice, it's best to use old rice, preferably a-day old. Unlike freshly cooked rice which can be quite moist, old rice would be more dry and grainy, allowing them to absorb the myriad flavours present better. This enhances their taste, resulting in some Tom Yam fried rice you're gonna lurve! Tom Yam fried rice Preparation time: 5 minutes Cooking time: 10 minutes Serves: 2 2 cups of cooked rice 3 tablespoons vegetable oil 1 tablespoon Tean's tom yam paste 200gm tiger prawns, deveined and shells removed 100gm chicken fillet, roughly chopped 6 cherry tomatoes, cut in halves 4 shallots, skin removed and finely chopped 2 fried eggs, sunny side up 1 tablespoon sugar 1 teaspoon fish sauce handful of Thai basil leaves and sliced cucumbers for garnish 1. Heat a wok over high heat until it starts to smoke. Add shallots and stir fry quickly until shallots are fragrant, then add chicken and prawns and cook for 1 minute. 2. Add 1 tablespoon Tean's Tom Yam paste, cooked rice, sugar and fish sauce to the cooked ingredients in the wok. Mix ingredients thoroughly and stir fry over high heat for about 2 minutes. 3. Add a handful of basil leaves and cherry tomatoes just before turning the heat off. Toss together with other cooked ingredients. Turn heat off. 4. Transfer to 2 separate plates, each with a fried egg and some freshly cut cucumbers. 5. Serve immediately. For more recipes, click here.  |
| South African undertaker charged with sawing off corpse’s legs Posted: 06 Jun 2014 05:43 PM PDT
Ronel Mostert, who ran a funeral parlour in the southern city of Grahamstown, appeared in Grahamstown Magistrate's Court on Wednesday after one of her employees blew the lid on a three-year-old secret. Mostert allegedly ordered staff "to get an angle grinder and cut off the legs" because the 33-year-old "man was too tall to fit into the coffin", according to court documents. The employee, Siphamandla Dyasi, claimed the incident had been haunting him and so he decided to come clean. "I still hear the sound of the angle grinder in my head. I could not take it anymore," he said in written testimony. "For all these years I have had difficulties sleeping." He alleged that Mostert had threatened them with dismissal if he told anyone about incident. The remains of the man have been exhumed as part of the police investigation. They showed burn marks where the legs had been sawn off. Police told AFP more allegations of corpse mutilation at Mostert's Siyakubonga Funeral Services had surfaced since the case began last month. The case has been postponed until June 27 for further investigation. — AFP |
| Guatemalan ex-police chief gets life sentence for prison murders Posted: 06 Jun 2014 05:36 PM PDT
Reading out the verdict to a packed Geneva court, chief judge Isabelle Cuendet said Sperisen had been found "jointly responsible" for six murders and was "directly responsible" for one more. One of Sperisen's lawyers called the ruling "shocking" and announced that his client would appeal. Guatemala President Otto Perez said his government respects the court's decision and would continue to follow the case as Sperisen fights the conviction. Speaking from San Jose on an official visit, Perez called the charges against the former police chief "terrible," emphasising they refer to crimes committed before his presidency. Sperisen, 43, holds Swiss and Guatemalan citizenship and, having left his homeland for Geneva, could not be extradited to stand trial for killing prisoners in the mid-2000s. But Swiss citizens can be tried at home for crimes committed abroad. The case was launched after a lawsuit filed by the mother of one of Sperisen's victims, and the trial opened on May 15. Sperisen, who insisted he was innocent, was charged over the summary execution and subsequent cover-up of the murder of seven inmates in Guatemala's Pavon jail in September 2006. He personally shot one of the prisoners dead, the court ruled. But it rejected separate charges of involvement in the summary execution of three prisoners who had escaped from the Infiernito jail in 2005. Cuendet said that Sperisen's motives were "egotistical and particularly disgusting", noting that his behaviour "showed a total lack of scruples". She also said he had displayed no empathy towards his victims, and that simply bolstered the need to hand down a life sentence. Sperisen, who is nicknamed "The Viking" due to his hefty build and ginger beard, remained calm as the verdict was read out, but several relatives in the public gallery gasped and began crying. Appointed police chief in 2004, he left Guatemala in 2007 amid a scandal that saw him and the country's interior minister Carlos Vielmann resign that March. Sperisen's paternal grandfather was a Swiss immigrant to Guatemala, giving him the right to Swiss citizenship. His father is Guatemala's ambassador to the World Trade Organisation, which is based in Geneva, and Sperisen was arrested in the Swiss city in August 2012. He has been in jail since then, with Geneva justice authorities arguing that there was too great a risk that he would flee Switzerland if he was released on bail. Sperisen's former right-hand man, Javier Figueroa, was called as a witness in the case. Figueroa was prosecuted by Austrian justice authorities on similar charges, and acquitted in 2013. Former interior minister Vielmann, who holds dual Guatemalan and Spanish citizenship, now lives in Spain and is due to be tried by a court there over the prisoner killings. — AFP |
| Curfew lifted in four tourist destinations in Thailand Posted: 06 Jun 2014 05:30 PM PDT
Curfew was lifted with immediate effect in the provinces of Krabi and Phung Nha and Cha-am district (Petchaburi) and Hua Hin district (Prachuabkirikhan), the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) said in a statement yesterday. All the areas located in southern Thailand are famous tourist destinations with beautiful islands. Last week, the NCPO lifted curfew in Pattaya (Chonburi province) in the eastern part of the country and Koh Samui (Suratthani) and Phuket province in the south. Tourism is a major contributor to Thailand's economy but political conflict and the military coup resulted in a sharp drop in tourist arrivals with many hotels and resorts struggling to fill rooms. Millions of people work directly or indirectly in the tourism industry. Thailand which initially targeted 28 million tourist arrivals has the number revised to 26.3 million by its Tourism Board. Curfew from midnight to 4am is still imposed in several provinces including Bangkok. — Bernama |
| Nigeria’s military targets newspapers over security fears Posted: 06 Jun 2014 05:28 PM PDT
The military confirmed the searches, but officers denied that the moves were designed to muzzle critics, even though at least two of the newspapers had published damning articles about the army in recent days. Four dailies — The Nation, the Daily Trust, the Leadership and Punch — all said they were affected, while The Nation said soldiers stormed one of its circulation offices. "One of the military men told us that they were acting on (an) order from above as there were allegations that newspaper circulation vehicles were being used to smuggle arms and ammunition," one of The Nation's distribution managers said. The early morning raids did not appear to target specific editions and the copies seized were destined for all parts of the country, the newspapers said online. Defence spokesman Chris Olukolade said the search "followed intelligence report(s) indicating movement of materials with grave security implications across the country using the channel of newsprint-related consignments". Nigeria's military has been under sustained pressure, including in the media, over its response to the Boko Haram insurgency, which has claimed thousands of lives since it began five years ago. Attacks by the Islamist militant group have increased, with the military apparently powerless to prevent the bloodshed, exacerbated by the kidnapping of more than 200 schoolgirls in April. But Olukolade rejected reports the army was trying to stifle free speech, calling the media "an indispensable partner in the ongoing counter-insurgency operation and the overall advancement of our country's democratic credentials". "As such, the military will not deliberately and without cause, infringe on the freedom of the press," he added, calling the search a "routine security action". Sue Valentine, Africa programme coordinator for the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) warned that "denying Nigerians access to news and information sows the seeds of rumours and distrust". "While we recognise that Nigeria faces security threats, these can never effectively be addressed by media blackouts or persecution of journalists," she added. 'Reminiscent of military dictatorship' Nigeria's response to the mass abduction of the teenage girls has been criticised as slow and lacklustre, while a social media campaign has prompted greater international media scrutiny of the counter-insurgency. On Tuesday, the Leadership daily claimed that 10 army generals and five senior officers had been court martialled and found guilty of assisting Boko Haram. The military described the report as "very unfortunate and meant to do maximum damage to the image of (the) Nigerian Army and its personnel". "Those concocting it appear hell-bent on misleading Nigerians and the international community to give credence to the negative impression they are so keen to propagate about the Nigerian military," they said. The Daily Trust said no reason was given for the search but said that on Wednesday it published a story claiming army generals and their wives were using an Abuja barracks for their personal use. Punch said on punchng.com that copies of its edition were seized at Lagos international airport and distribution vans stopped and searched across the country. The operation was "reminiscent of military dictatorship in the country", it said. Nigeria's media came under heavy censorship during the military rule of Ibrahim Babangida and Sani Abacha in the 1980s and 1990s. A number of publications were either shut down or forced underground and editors fled abroad after printing articles critical of the government. Reporters Without Borders ranked Nigeria 112th out of 180 countries worldwide in its 2014 Press Freedom Index. Censorship and crackdowns have in recent years typically targeted reporters working in older media, like newspapers or television. But the government has increasingly responded to sensitive reports published exclusively online. Last month, the military attacked a May 23 New York Times report that suggested a lack of training and endemic corruption in the Nigerian military was hampering the search for the girls. It accused the article's author of "abysmal mediocrity, arrogance and racist sentiments". —AFP |
| US economy shows strength with solid jobs gains in May Posted: 06 Jun 2014 05:26 PM PDT
The US economy added a net 217,000 positions last month, nearly all from private companies, the Labor Department reported yesterday. It took the total number of working Americans to a new high, surmounting for the first time all of the 8.7 million jobs lost during the Great Recession of 2008-2009. But there was still no progress in increasing the very low rate of participation in the workforce, which held at 62.8 per cent, compared to 66 per cent on the eve of the recession. That suggested that the economy still has far to go to reach full employment. Some 9.8 million people remained on the jobless rolls, slightly up from April. The unemployment rate held for a second month at 6.3 per cent, after falling sharply from 6.7 per cent in March, mainly due to data showing a large number of people leaving the workforce. Even so, economists said the May numbers were strong enough to suggest that the economy is picking up speed after the 1.0 per cent contraction of the first quarter of the year. Some predicted even stronger job creation numbers in the second half of the year. "This is a solid report, marking four straight gains over 200,000; that hasn't happened for more than 14 years," said Ian Shepherdson of Pantheon Macroeconomics. More jobs but weak wage growth In an encouraging trend, the number of people forced to work part-time because they could not find full-time jobs dropped, and wages rose slightly during the month. Almost all of the May gains were in the private sector, with governments at all levels adding only a net 1,000 workers. The biggest chunk of new jobs came in the health care and social assistance sector, where almost 55 million positions were added. The leisure and hospitality sector picked up 39,000 jobs, and the trade and transport sectors also added about that much. But the construction sector, which economists have hoped would carry the economy forward, remained relatively weak, adding just 6,000 jobs. Moody's Analytics pointed out that surpassing the pre-recession high for the number of people employed, to reach 138.5 million in May, was still only a modest achievement, given that the population grew by 14 million in the past six years. "The labour market would need to create twice as many jobs to accommodate the growth in the working-age population, even at the current low labor force participation rate," it said. Moody's economists noted that wage growth remained weak, and that with many of the new jobs being created in low-wage sectors, people who have dropped out of the jobs market have little incentive to return. But analysts were split over whether the data was strong enough to press the Federal Reserve to eventually move forward its projections for inflation and when it might begin elevating its base interest rate, now forecast only for mid-2015. "A broad range of labor market indicators suggests the US economy is still some distance away from full employment, possibly three years, contrasting with the unemployment rate's signal of perhaps one year," said BMO Markets economists. "Although the latter could spur tighter monetary policy next year, the former points to a slow trajectory, in line with the Fed's current guidance." Bond markets took a more aggressive view. US bond yields, which had sagged in recent weeks, picked up, the 10-year Treasury rising from 2.54 per cent to 2.59 per cent. The dollar moved higher against the euro, train at US$1.3643 (RM4.38) to one euro late yesterday, and against the yen, at ¥102.49 (RM3.21). But US stocks also pushed higher. The S&P 500 finished the day with a 0.46 per cent gain to a new record of 1,949.44. — AFP |
| You are subscribed to email updates from The Malay Mail Online | All To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
