Cekur Manis or what we Chinese call ‘manis chye’ (sayur manis) is a plant that can be easily grown in our backyard. We used to have them growing in short bushy trees and plucked the younger shoots to cook. This is the vegetable that we use in ‘Pan Meen’. Full of fibre and green goodness.
Actually, I tried searching for the recipe for cekur manis and ubi keledek masak lemak but only my recipe turned up on Google. Duh! This is one of the easiest Malay dish to prepare because it doesn’t involve much if you have the basic sambal belacan on hand. My method is the lazy person method which involves no pounding. Just dump and boil.
Recipe :
1 tiny sweet potato, cut into cubes
1 handful of shrimps
small handful of dried shrimps
6 shallots – smashed or pound
3 red chili – smashed or pound
About 3-4 sticks of cekur manis – which will have plenty of leaves
2 bowls of water
200 mls of coconut milk (about one small box)
Method:
Except for the cekur manis and coconut milk, boil everything until sweet potato is soften. Add in the coconut milk and cekur manis, flavour with salt and pepper. Ready!
For added flavour, you may add some sliced tumeric leaves. As for me, I usually use a big dollop of sambal belacan and just add coconut milk, shallots and the vegetables. For today, I actually added a big spoonful of sambal hair-bee or dried shrimps sambal. That’s why the soup looks a bit yellowish.
On its own, cekur manis is a vegetable without much flavour. However, combine it with the sweet potato and coconut milk plus the shrimps, this dish is really delicious.
If there are left-overs, you can knock in an egg to cook and have a delicious meal the next day. This dish taste delicious overnight.
Just cook cekur manis mee hung thiak.,something like pan meen yesterday for my kids. My younger kid just recover fr. a bout of fever( 4 days). So hungry that he finished up two big bowl of cekur manis soup with the rolled out flatten pieces of dough with some fried ikan bilis. Cekur manis with ikan bilis soup and beaten eggs make a delicious soup. Easy and ecnomical also. It is a hardy plant. It won`t die even if it is not watered for many days.. U can fried it with eggs too(after washing the leaves ,squeeze and tear it with both hands) to bring out the flavour.
Cekur Manis known here in Sarawak as Cangkuk Manis or in Hokkien Mani Chai (Somehow, that sounded obscene) is one of my fav all time veg, especially quick fried with with eggs 😛
This dish looks interesting…but high cholestrol oh…lemak lemak
OMG, I totally forgot about this dish. Thanks for the post! I am a HUGE fan of Manis Cai. Everytime I go home, I would buy a bunch of them and make fish ball soup, and then add a scramble egg in the soup. But this dish certainly top the fish ball soup! I will have to try it the next time I go back because I can’t find Manis Cai here. 🙁
That looks superfine!
I just wanted to let you know that I have tagged you for the following meme “The Foodblogger’s Guide To The World”. For more information, please visit my blog…
Kind Regards,
Rosa
Now I remember; my mother and aunt cooked this dish with balitong. Have you tried that before? Yummy!
That’s called ‘shu-chai-choy’ in Kl, rite? Luv it in pan- meen but was told not to take too much as it can cause cancer. Ada betul-kah?
Cekur Manis with keledek Masak Lemak + Friend Ikan Cencaru Belah Belakang + Sambal Belacan with rice… Fuuuhhh Mother in law pass behind also cannot see…
Sometime back I got make Pan Meen. The magic for mee was in the sambal- Chopped Chilli+ Chopped Choy Poh+ Fermented Bean Curd+ Lime Juice= Foooooooooh….
Just by reading the tittle of your entry ”Cekur Manis Ubi Keledek Masak Lemak” , I can taste the sweetness, lemakness and the loveliness of the lauk.Kena dengan nasi panas-panas!Ngancam!
Mmmm….this is one of my favourites. Sometimes instead of cekur manis, she used cabbage instead. Equally sedap and manis! She also uses a LOT of chilli and pounded hair-bee. The soup becomes slightly thick…….yum….! Cannot tahan oredi, must ask her to cook some!