Easy Romantic Recipe For Two: Seafood Tom Yam Spaghetti

I wanted to surprise my husband with a delicious dinner as it is our wedding anniversary. I wanted to cook for him a romantic dish for the two of us without sending too much time in the kitchen. As you know, a man gets very impatient when he is hungry and temper arisen in a very short time. If I spent more than an hour in the kitchen, he would grab the car keys, start the car and head to the nearest hawker stall for a simple plate of fried rice.

Hence, in order to serve a romantic dinner for two that is delicious, home-cooked meal in more or less 30 minutes, I had to depend on prepacked Tom Yam paste, a packet of spaghetti and some seafood that I could find in my refrigerator.

My husband loves seafood, chicken or fish dishes that could satisfy his hunger pangs. I was lucky to have stumbled upon some easy romantic recipes for two person in the Google website. You know, this giant website is a miracle place for you to find solutions whenever you are in emergency state.

For your information, this romantic dinner recipe for two is suitable for other occasions such as Valentine's Day, Birthdays or just a simple dinner at home after a hard day work.

I found this recipe; Seafood Tom Yam Spaghetti from Knorr website and had bookmarked it a couple of days ago. Originally, this recipe calls for fresh seafood such as prawns and calamari, also locally known as "sotong" or small squids.

Unfortunately, I did not shop for calamari for a long time and had stored up some prawns and a couple pieces of fish cakes in the freezer. These seafood ingredients became handy at a nick of time.

• Seafood Tom Yam is easy to cook. You just need to parboil the spaghetti as per the packet instructions and estimate how many sticks you need for 2 person. I took a handful of raw spaghetti and threw them into a wok of boiling water mix with ¼ tsp of salt.
• Remember NOT TO WASH THE SPAGHETTI ! These Italian noodles will clump together and you will have some problem to unstuck them when cooking. It is easier to cook in a wok rather than a pot as you know the raw spaghetti sticks do not bend easily until they are in the boiling water.
• Breaking them into halves wasn't a good idea at all. Makes the spaghetti shorter in length. I like my spaghetti in full length to make those “slurpee” sound when eating.
• Remember to keep stirring the spaghetti. Otherwise, the spaghetti will stick to the sides of the wok.
• It takes around 10-15 minutes to cook the spaghetti under high heat.
• Once the spaghetti are al dente, try chewing one of the cooked Italian spaghetti to test the tendency by using a fork or a pair of chopstick. Make sure that the noodles are soft and edible.
• Turn off the heat and pour the cooked spaghetti into a strainer under running tap water in order to cool off the noodles.
• Transfer them into a big bowl and sprinkle a little olive oil and toss them high with a pair of chopsticks. This is to ensure that the spaghetti do not stick to each other when they cool off.

• Choose medium or big prawns for more meaty seafood.
• Remove the shells including the heads and tails.
• Hold the the back of the prawn upwards.
• Use the kitchen knife to slit through the back of the prawn.
• Remove the black strip of shits.
• Wash briefly and marinate with a little salt and pepper.

• After the chopped garlic and onion had been stir fried for a couple of minutes, you could smell the fragrant crisp garlic.
• Add in the strips of fish cakes and fresh prawns.
• Make sure that the prawns are semi cooked by looking at the color of the prawns. The seafood should change to pinkish and white color.
• Then, add in the vegetables and continue to stir fry for another few minutes.

• Mix a packet of Tom Yam paste into a small rice bowl.
• Add in 3 tablespoon of water and mix well.
• This mixture will be used later on to coat the spaghetti and the ingredients together.

You could add in approximately 1/2 bowl of water into the Tom Yam paste if you think that the sauce might not be able to coat all the spaghetti well.

Well coated Seafood Spaghetti with Tom Yam paste which is mild spicy. That is a strip of fish cake that you can see on the top. The rest of the prawns were buried underneath the spaghetti.

Sprinkle with chopped coriander or oregano to tantalize your taste buds.

When choosing spaghetti, I prefer to purchase Angel hair type which is a long, thin noodle with a round shape.

It is extremely fine pasta , thinner than the normal spaghetti or pasta. Spaghetti are usually sub-categories into different assigned number which indicate the thickness of the content. It is usually "spaghetti n3, spaghetti n5 and many more. Angel hair is very light in weight and cooked easily at the shortest time. It suits well with any pasta sauces such as :

• Mushroom pasta sauce
• Roasted Garlic Parmesan Pasta Sauce
• Tomato, Garlic and Basil Pasta Sauce
• Cheese and Herbs Pasta Sauce
• Alfredo Mushroom Pasta Sauce
• Traditional Pasta Sauce

You could choose whichever pasta or spaghetti that you prefer, whether long, short, round, oblong or whatever shapes that you can find. Spaghetti could hold up thicker pasta sauces and stocks and it is not oily at all if you compare with Asian yellow noodles.

If you want to consume a light romantic dinner for two without much noisy slurping, try Angel hair pasta for a change. Easy to chew and digest.

Most ready-made tom yam paste are made by pounding all the herb ingredients such as lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime leaves, chilli paste, lime and fish sauce into a paste. Next, the paste is being stir-fry in oil, common seasoning and preservatives are added before it is packed into individual sachets, bottled in jars and sold to supermarket, hypermarket and grocery stores.

When selecting Tom Yam Paste, choose different brands in small sachets which will cost you a few cents. Test out your food with different tom yam paste before selecting the final brand which suits your taste bud. Each Tom Yam paste flavor differ due to different quality and characteristics of fresh herbs used during manufacturing process.

I chose either Adabi or Maggi brand Tom Yam Paste because they are cheap, cost me around $0.80-$1 per sachet, easily bought and taste similar to original Tom Yam that you could eat in Indonesia restaurants. Adabi and MaggiTom Yam Paste do not taste sour or spicy. They are mild spicy and adequate for 2-3 servings. A packet of yellow noodles of 400gm or a handful of spaghetti noodles requires 1 sachet will do.

Once you are confident that this Tom Yam paste is right for you, buy the medium bottle jar which is much cheaper due to weight and price.

Learn How to Get into Mood

• Surround the room with lovely fresh pink or red roses picked from your garden or purchase them at the florist the night before.
• Keeping fresh roses in the fridge will freshen up the petals and avoid from dehydrating.
• Have your favorite DVD classic songs play to keep your man in mellow mood.
• Wear the evening dress that your man love most, not what you like.
• In order to improve the mood, it is best to stake your dress according to his taste to make him happy and enjoy the romantic dinner together.
• You don’t really need wine or champagne to celebrate your wedding anniversary or Valentine’s Day.
• Even a bottle of sparkling ginger ale or grape juice wine poured into pretty drinking glasses or champagne glasses will turn the occasion into romantic mood.