Mommy's Lucky Win!

Somewhere around the second half of July 2010, Mommy spotted a "Rasa-rasa Semenanjung (Flavours of Peninsular)" recipe contest while browing Tesco Malaysia's website. For the contest, no prior purchase is necessary but participants need to be  Tesco Clubcard members. As for the recipe requirements, Mommy recalled seeing 4 conditions of the recipe, but at this time of writing, Mommy could only remember two - (i) ingredients must include either herb and spices, or flavourings/seasonings/stocks or canned food items, or some other things that Mommy couldn't remember and (ii) the recipe must be original, but if it is not original, at least 4 of the ingredients must be modified. Also, the recipes would be judged for the aroma, taste, colour, creativity, originality and ease of cooking. There were three categories of recipes allowed: main dish, cake/pastry/dessert, and drinks. The prizes? 3 Grand Prizes each worth RM1000 of Tesco vouchers, and 70 Consolation Prizes of RM100 Tesco vouchers each. Tesco also mentioned that only the 20 best recipes will be compiled in a recipe book to be published by Tesco later.

So Mommy submitted this recipe (for main dish category) that Mommy came up with (and is Papa and Mommy's favourite) ever since shifting into the new house:


Hot and Spicy Tom Yam Prawns

Ingredients:

400-500 g prawns

1 Thumb-sized ginger (sliced thickly)
1 big onion (sliced)
4 cloves garlic (chopped)
7 red chilli padi (slit)
1 green capsicum (diced)
6 limau purut leaves
2 1/2 tablespoons tom yam paste
3 tablespoons cooking oil
Salt to taste
Sugar to taste
400 mL water


Method:

1. Shell the prawns (except the tail) and devein. Do not discard the shell.

2. Boil water (400 mL) in a saucepan and add in the shell only to boil (10 minutes). Discard the shell and set the prawn stock aside.

3. Heat cooking oil in wok, stir-fry garlic, then ginger, big onion, chilli padi, green capsicum and limau purut leaves till fragrant.

4. Add tom yam paste, then add the prawn stock. Stir and let it simmer. Allow gravy to thicken as desired.

5. Add salt and a little sugar to taste.

6. Add prawns and stir-fry till cooked.



Serves 2

 
 
Then on last week Tuesday (17th August 2010), Mommy received a phone call from Tesco Headquarters announcing that Mommy's recipe won the Consolation Prize of a RM100 Tesco Voucher! The Tesco personnel then asked from which Tesco store would Mommy like to collect the voucher from to which Mommy indicated Tesco Puchong.
 
So Papa and Mommy went to the Customer Service Counter at Tesco Puchong last week Saturday (21st August 2010) to collect the prize. Then while waiting for the Tesco staff to prepare the voucher, Mommy managed to see Tesco's list of winners meant for their internal circulation:
 
 

Mommy thought there should be 73 winners in all (i.e., 3 Grand Prizes and 70 Consolation Prizes), but how come there's only 20 winners (3 Grand Prizes and 17 Consolation Prizes)? Or maybe Tesco didn't receive enough number of recipes? Can't be because Tesco received about 150 recipes (you can read about it here and here.)
 
 
And finally the Tesco staff came with Mommy's RM100 Tesco voucher! Yippy! Free RM100 worth of groceries for Mommy (and Juan Or and Papa too, of course!)