Mum Loves Cooking

Brenda's Cream of Chicken Soup

2012-02-12T07:04:00.000-08:00

Best. Soup. EVAH!!!

This is the first time I made Cream of Chicken soup, but because I had my family over, I made a huge pot because I know how much my family enjoy soup. But amazingly, every drop of it was gone... even the bowls I set aside for my cousin to ta-bao, and the serving that was meant for my nephew (who wasn't able to make it for dinner) were given over to the second and third helping requests.

And yes, my daughter even said, "So yummy! Can you made this soup again?"

So to safe-keep the memory of how to make this soup, I'm putting up the recipe here. ;)

Ingredients:
2 Boneless Chicken Legs with Skin
2 tbsp Butter (I use butter for the flavour, but you can use olive oil too)
2 medium-sized Onions, chopped
3 stalks of Celery, sliced thinly
2 Russett Burbank Potatoes, diced
1 Carrot, cut into strips
1.5L Chicken Stock
1L Water
Dried herbs: Dried Oregano, Dried Basil, Crushed Black Pepper
Salt to taste
1 tbsp Flour
1 can, Nestle Cream

Method:

Fry the Chicken Leg skin-side down in the Happy Call Pan, on low-medium heat for 3 minutes, to allow the chicken fat to come out. Keep the pan closed.
At the end of 3 minutes, open the HCP to see if the skin is cooked golden. If it is, then use a tong to turn the chicken to cook the other side for 2 minutes. Keep the pan closed because to enable the chicken to cook without drying out. Once this is done, set the cooked chicken aside and DO NOT throw away the chicken oil. (If you don't have a HCP, you can fry the chicken in a normal pan, but make sure your pan is covered to prevent oil splatter. The alternative would be to bake the chicken first, but with the skin side up... but same principle, don't throw away the drippings because that's where the chicken taste is. It might be more work to use a large oven for only 2 chicken legs; or having to clean up a toaster oven for cooking the chicken legs one at a time, which is why the HCP is more efficient for this recipe. ;) )
Whilst the chicken is cooking, put the butter in a pressure cooker pot, and sweat the onions on low heat. When the onions have turned translucent, throw in the potatoes and celery and stir it in. When the potatoes are coated in oil, add in the carrots, chicken stock, most of the water AND the two fried chicken legs. Add in the dried herbs and a bit of salt. (Not too much salt because we would still need to adjust the salt at the end of the soup.)
Close the pressure cooker and cook for 15 minutes. (Initially, I would have used the thermal pot and cooked this much earlier - at least 2 hours for the veggies to get soft. However, my mother-in-law gifted me with an 8L pressure cooker, so I decided to try it out instead. ;) If you don't have either the thermal pot or a pressure cooker, you can also stove-top-cook the soup until the celery and potatoes are softened - about an hour. But do remember that in stove-top-cooking, water evaporates much more, so you may have to add more water to account for the water loss.)
While the pressure cooker is cooking the soup, add the flour into the HCP at medium to low heat, to mix with the chicken oils to form a roux. Essentially, fry the flour evenly until you see the flour bubbling, and it gives a biscuit-like scent. Then lower the heat and add in the rest of the water a little at a time, until you get a brown sauce gravy. It is this flavourful gravy that will thicken the soup.
When the soup is done, remove the 2 chicken legs and allow it to cool before shedding the chicken meat and put it aside. (You don't need the skin any more... although my kids fight to get the skin because it's just so yummy and chewy...lol!)
Add the gravy into the pot and stir until the soup thickens a bit.
At this moment, the soup is still very chunky, so remove about half to 3/4 of the soup and blend it in a blender.
Add about a ladle of the soup to the cream and stir it to mix well. Once all the cream has been mixed into the soup, pour the mix into the pot.
Finally, add the shredded chicken meat to the soup and warm it up to allow the soup to thicken and mix its flavours. At this point, add salt to taste, and you're done! :)

Serve it with warm toasted bread. Or just slurp it all up on its own. I'm sooooo going to make this again and again, because it's really worth every step. :)

"So yummy! Can you made this soup again?"

Happy Call Pan Diced Potatoes and Peas with Minced Pork

2012-02-06T18:55:00.000-08:00

A simple dish to be eaten with rice, this dish is so easy to do with the HCP!

Ingredients:

2 potatoes, diced
100g minced pork, marinated with light soya sauce, cornflour, pepper, and sesame oil (about 1 tsp each, or to taste)
1/2 an onion, chopped
Frozen green peas
1 tbl cornflour + 1/4 cup cool water
Pepper and Salt to taste

Method:
1. Into the pan goes the potato with a bit of oil. Then lower the heat to have it bake/cook until half done.

2. Once the potato is done, remove it from the pan and fry the onion. I closed the pan to sweat the onions a bit before stirring it around.

3. And then, the minced pork which has been marinated with light soya sauce, some cornflour, pepper and sesame oil goes in to be fried. I added a bit of cooking oil to break up the minced pork.

4. Once the meat is in this stage, in goes the potato and peas to be cooked until the potatoes are done. Do add in a little water to create a steamy environment for the ingredients to incorporate. Also, add in pepper and salt to taste.

5. Once the potatoes are soft enough, add in a mix of cornflour and water, and stir it up to thicken the dish.

Done! :)

6. Serve with rice.

Happy Call Pan No-oil Chicken Chop with Enoki Mushroom Sauce

2012-02-05T21:57:00.000-08:00

I'm not starting with the first foods I've cooked, but with the one I did yesterday. ;)

And there's only one pic of the result and here it is:

The principles of using the HCP is very simple - low heat, timing and evapouration.

Because of the pan's construction, heat is distributed very quickly, so at medium heat, food can char very easily beyond 3 minutes.

Therefore, the best friend of the HCP isn't the silicon cooking utensils to prevent scratching on the non-stick ceramic surface (although that's a close second ;P), it's the timer on my iPhone! :)

The final priniciple is to remember that the HCP has a seal. This means that most of the water that's evaporated from the ingredients are trapped in the pan, creating a steam-like environment, which is great for veggies, but not so much when you want crispy meats or fish.

So, how then do we achieve perfect Chicken Chop that tastes tender and moist, and yet has a crispy exterior?

It's simple with a HCP.

No-oil Chicken Chop
Ingredients:
Boneless Chicken meat with skin
Salt & Pepper to taste

(Yes, that's all. No marinates needed. ;P)

Method:

Use a kitchen hammer and hammer the chicken chop. The purpose of this is to tenderise the meat, and to get it uniformly flat. If you skip this step, the chicken meat may not sit well on the pan, and some parts of the surface may be crispier than others. ;) I usually use boneless Chicken legs which I buy frozen in 2kg packs from NTUC.
Salt and pepper your chicken after hammering.
Turn on the fire to medium heat and place the chicken skin side down on the pan and close the lid. (There's space for 2 to 3 large chicken pieces, so to save fuel, just put in as many as would fit) Set the timer for 2 minutes. Refrain from the urge to open the pan and lose all that lovely steam, which will cook the chicken into tender moistness. ;)
Open the pan to check the progress of the chicken at the end of 2 minutes. My medium heat and your medium heat are different. For me, I'll need another minute to get the skin a little more golden. If your medium heat is a bit higher than mine, and you've already achieve some golden crispiness and chicken oil seeping out, you're done with this step. If yours need more cooking, set your timer at 1 minute intervals to check until you get a light golden skin.
At this stage, use a silicon-coated tong to turn the chicken pieces, so that the skin side is up. I know some people would prefer to flip the entire pan, but I don't like to do so. I find it messes up the position of my chicken and I lose all that lovely heat that's evenly distributed on the bottom pan. ;) Set your timer to 3 minutes and lower the heat. Don't fully close the lid though - put something thick between the magnetised handle to all the lid to cover, but not seal the lid. We want the steam to evaporate and retain all that crispy skin. I use the handle of my stove lighter to wedge the handle, but you can use a wad of thick cloth, or find a bottle or something to wedge the handle. By now, you'll note that the bottom of the pan has oil that came from the chicken... all those lovely chicken fats are full of flavour, and it's the best oil to fry the meat side of the chicken. :)
At the end of the 3 minutes, open the lid and check the progress of the skin side. Determine if you need more time for a golden finish (it ought to be darker than the skin side), or if it's just nice. If it's ok, you'll just need to flip the chicken one more time, for one more minute at this heat for the skin to really crisp up. Remember to have the lid partially open with the wedge so that the steam can evaporate.
Remove the chicken from the pan and then put it in an aluminium foil and keep it covered for about 5 minutes (or until all the chicken chops that you're cooking are done). This final step, also known as 'rest', helps the chicken juices to redistribute through the meat so that the meat is moist. Don't cut the chicken before it has rested - otherwise all the moisture will be lost, and you end up with dry, gummy chicken!
If you're cooking more chicken, pour the residual chicken oil on the pan into a glass/porcelain bowl and wipe the pan down with a kitchen paper before beginning the process again. I usually use a tong holding the kitchen paper to scrape down the debris and throw the paper away. Save that chicken oil for making the sauce!
When the 'rest' is done, you'll find that there is a lot of fragrant chicken juice left at the bottom of the aluminium foil. Add this juice to the chicken oil to make the sauce.

This method of cooking chicken skin-side down first, is also the way I cook my Salmon fillets. The heat renders the fats and I don't need to add extra oils to cook my meats on the non-stick surface. With the fragrant fats, I find I don't need to use too much condiments to add taste to the food. ;)

Simple Brown Sauce

And it's really simple. Brown sauce is made from thickening the fats that have dripped from cooking meats. If baked in the oven, the fats and juices are retained and cooked with flour, and water is added to form a gravy. It is then seasoned to taste. In a HCP, this is very easily done.

Ingredients:

Flour, about 1 tablespoon

Hot water, about half a cup

Salt and Pepper to taste (Salt can also be replaced with light soya sauce or a mix of the two is also fine)

Method:

After frying the chicken and while the chicken is resting, there's no need to pour away the oils or wipe down the pan. Just pour whatever oils and chicken juice that's available into the hot pan and add in about a tablespoon of plain flour to the pan. Once most of the flour is absorbed, heat the pan to low heat and stir the mix until it's brown - it takes about 1 minute.
Add in water to the pan and close the lid for 1 minute. When you open the lid, stir to blend the mix so that it looks like gravy. Add more water if you need to thin it, or allow the pan to evapourate the water if it looks too watery.
Add in the salt and pepper to the taste you want.

The brown sauce is versatile in that you can add other flavourings to get different kinds of sauces. For a wine sauce, replace the water with red wine. Others have added A1 sauce for a more sourish-sweet sauce, or honey for a sweetish finish. Play and experiement to your preference; try adding fresh herbs etc, and then strain the gravy through a sieve for a smooth finish if necessary.

Enoki Mushroom Sauce

For my Enoki Mushroom Sauce, all I did was to add 2 packets of Enoki Mushroom into the Brown Sauce and close the lid for 1 minute (I cooked 5 chicken legs for dinner). After that, I adjusted the water, and stirred the mushroom a bit and it was done. After I did the sauce, there was still more juice from the resting chicken during the time I cooked the sauce, so I added those into the sauce and stirred it in. Yum!

Because I wanted to retain my chicken's crispy skin, I put the Enoki mushroom on the plate first and then the chicken on top. Not only it looks better, I won't end up with soggy chicken skin. :)

Enjoy your Happy Healthy Happy Call Pan Meals! :)

Jailbreaking the Happy Call Pan

2012-02-05T20:30:00.000-08:00

Image from Gmarket reviewer.

I joined the crowd of happy Happy Call Pan users in October last year, following a spree organised by some good friends who raved about the pan.

Since then, I've been happy to switch most of my wok-cooking to using the HCP.

HCP is a very good kitchen hardware with excellent design. It's not Teflon-coated, which means that its non-stick ceramic surface isn't likely to create health issues, especially at high temperature. Its base and lid are designed with a ridged surface, which enables heat to be distributed very quickly to the food, and the silicon seal with a strong magnetised handle allows the pan to act like a pressure cooker/oven to seal the heat in the pan to enable it to cook faster and even bake foods at a lower direct temperature.

HCP users have created a repository of recipes using the HCP at munchministry.com. There are recipes for baking cakes, cookies, alongside the usual suspects like fried and stewed foods. Most foods that require oven baking can be adapted to using the HCP - a plus for many households that doesn't own an oven.

For me, the choice of using the HCP and oven really depends on the amount of food I'm cooking, and the fuel that's needed. I prefer to use electricity with my oven/Airfryer over gas stove because my house isn't fitted with piped gas, and I need to keep calling the gas shop to deliver their gas tanks when mine runs out. However, I've also noted that with the HCP, I'm actually using less gas compared to using the wok. I've not needed to use the largest burner, which I naturally would need to when using the wok. The maximum heat I use for the HCP is medium, and even then, not for more than 3 minutes, otherwise the food would burn! That's how efficient the HCP is!

The HCP is very versatile, but many users complain that the design of the hinged lid is also the flaw - the hinge creates a problem for washing up and for removing foods efficiently from the pan. Not a problem for me - I've simply removed the c-pin that keeps the hinge together, and my HCP lid can be easily removed from the bottom pan for cooking or washing. It even makes tilting the food onto a plate so much easier because I don't have to grapple with the weight or bulk of the lid.

Here's how I jailbreak my HCP ;) :

Use a screwdriver to gently pry the c-pin from the hinge.

Here's how it looks with the c-pin removed. The hinge still works fine. :)

Now I have 2 pans! ;) The one with the red edge is the lid. To use, just hook the lid into the slots on the bottom pan.

A simple slot back. You'll get the hang of it after a while. :)

With the magnetised handle, even without the c-pin, the lid stays firmly closed and will not move, even if you do need to flip your pan.

This will be my first HCP post. I'll soon be posting a few recipes I've adapted for the HCP, and a few that I've tried from munchministry. ;)

Happy Happy Call Pan Cooking! :)

Konnyaku Fish

2012-01-23T08:26:00.000-08:00

年年有余!

Happy Lunar New Year!

It's the first day of Chinese New Year today, and like all Chinese festive days, it's a day marked with great emphasis on family, well-wishes, traditions and practices. Naturally, a great festive day cannot go without food - and CNY foods are always given wonderful names of blessings.

In Chinese, one of the food items that cannot be left out of the banquet table is the fish, for 'fish' in Chinese sounds like 'Abundance' (Yu). The Southern Chinese eat a dish called Yu Sheng, which is raw fish salad, because it sounds like "abundance increase". A New Year greeting, "年年有余" (nian nian you yu) means "Every year, there's abundance", but at the same time, it sounds like "Every year, there's fish".

Today's dessert is wonderfully simple to make - 15 mins tops, plus an hour to set - and is a perfect end to any CNY feast. ;) I first had it when my brother's girlfriend served it at our family Reunion Dinner. Since then, I've made 3 batches of this for CNY dinners. ;) You can also make this to serve your guests when they come a-visiting. :)

Ingredients:
1 sachet/packet, plain Konnyaku Powder - gather the ingredients following the instructions on the packet for making the required amount of jelly for the mould you have
2 to 3 tsp* Sweet Osmanthus Flower aka 桂花 (Gui Hua) - easily obtained from any Chinese Medicine shop
1 to 2 tbsp* Wolfberry aka Goji berry aka 枸杞 - also easily obtained from any Chinese Medicine shop
Fish Jelly Mould

*depends on the amount of water in the Konnyaku Powder indicated on the packet. Generally, about 1 teaspoon of Osmanthus flower for about 180-250ml of water. If you'd like less speckled fishes, add less. As for wolfberries, I estimate based on number of fish moulds I have... see Method step 4. ;)

Method:

Steep the Osmanthus Flower and Wolfberry into the required amount of hot water for about a minute and then strain the flowers and berries out. The water is then used to boil in a saucepan for making the Konnyaku jelly. Do not throw the flowers and berries out though - you'll need them for the jelly later.
Prepare the jelly according to the packet's instruction. In place of water, you'll have to use the water you strained from the flowers and berries. Follow the amount of sugar instructed by your jelly packet.
When jelly is almost ready, put the flowers and berries back into the saucepan and give it a stir to mix it all in.
Ladle out the berries and flowers into the fish mould. I'll count out the berries in each mould to be 2 (if the mould is very small) because 2 is an even number and the Chinese believe that 'good things come in pairs'... also because it sounds like 'easy'; 6 because 6 sounds like 'prosperity'; 8 because 8 sounds like 'to prosper'; or 10 because 10 connotes completion to the Chinese. I'll be careful to have even numbers because odd numbers are considered unlucky, and 4, which sounds like 'death' is also avoided.
Allow the jelly to cool for a few minutes before putting it in the fridge to set. Konnyaku jelly sets very fast, and would be ready in about an hour's time.
Remove from mould and serve the fish in pairs... again, the whole idea of even numbers.

I hope you'll try this dessert soon, because not only is it easy to make, sounds good, it's also good for the body too. The Osmanthus has a light peachy fragrance, and is suppose to be good for the skin, aids digestion, and has a calming effect on the consumer. Wolfberries are good for the eyes and boost the immune system... and Konnyaku is a high in fiber, aids digestion and apparently has the ability to clean toxins in the intestines. Therefore, it's the perfect food for the CNY festivities!

Here's wishing everyone a blessed, healthful New Year! :)

Pineapple Tarts

2012-01-17T18:49:00.000-08:00

The Sign that Chinese New Year is upon us!

The reason for my video on the rubbing in method with a pastry blender is simple - I've been making pineapple tarts! :)

I can't remember when I began making pineapple tarts for Chinese New Year, but I know that the recipe that I've only ever used is the one belonging to Joyce aka Dutchess-of-Cookalot.

She has a recipe for the pineapple jam, but I prefer to use the ready-packs available at Phoon Huat, and tweak them.

But her recipe for the pastry!!! OH!

I love her pastry recipe for its simplicity and result. There are so many recipes out there with ingredients like custard powder, milk powder, corn flour, and even cheese! And in a myraid of teaspoonfuls and half teaspoonfuls that clutters what is a very simple shortbread pastry.

The whole pineapple tart eating experience after baking these all these years is simple:
Enough crunch and crumbly buttery pastry, to enhance the chewy, fragrant, sweet-sourish, sticky mouthfeel of the pineapple jam. A hint of spices hits the nose. And all in one satisfying mouthful of pineapple tart.

The effort put into such a satisfying endpoint is certainly worth it. And with a bit of organisation, making these wonderful festive biscuits isn't that difficult.

The Pineapple Jam (To be prepared a day in advance)
Ingredients:
1 packet AAA Pineapple Paste from Phoon Huat (This gives a sweet-sourish taste)
1 packet Premium Pineapple Paste from Phoon Huat (This gives a smoother texture to the overall jam)
2x 1.5" sticks of Cinnamon
10 cloves
1 Star Anise
Hot Water (about 1/2 cup - depends on how firm you want the overall jam to be)

Method:

Mix all the ingredients in a large microwave safe bowl. I use a pastry cutter to mix my ingredients because of the hot water, and when it's sufficiently cooled, I get my hands in there to squish the jam and spices together.
Microwave the mixture for about 3 minutes to get hot, but not cooking. Then leave it aside to cool down.
Put it in the fridge overnight for the spices to enhance the jam further.

Once that's done, I roll 1 measuring teaspoonful of the jam, making sure to remove any black bits (stems of the pineapples) or spices that might be in the jam. These pineapple balls are put onto a large tray, in neat rows, and then the tray is wrapped in clear plastic before returning to the fridge.

Jam in neat rows, and all the other parts of the tarts in progress

The Pastry (To be made a day in advance)
I usually make the pastry a day in advance to give it sufficient time to rest. Also, because the weather is hot, the pastry can be very tricky to punch out, so preparing the pastry ahead and allowing it to cool sufficiently is a good idea.

Ingredients:

340g Plain Flour
½ tsp Salt
1 tbsp Icing Sugar
250g Butter, cold (I used unsalted, but if you're using salted, you may reduce the amount of salt in the recipe)
1 Egg Yolk
25ml Ice-cold Water
1 tsp Vanilla Essence

Rolled Pineapple Jam

1 Beaten Egg+Water, for glazing

Method:

Put salt in the bowl, then sift flour and icing sugar into it. Rub in cold butter until mixture resembles breadcrumbs (See video).
Mix in the egg yolk, ice-cold water and essence. Mix well to form a dough. Place in a plastic bag or plastic box and chill in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. I usually leave it overnight.
Roll pastry out to 0.5 cm thickness between 2 baking papers, and either cut out or punch out the pineapple tart mould with a tart cutter. Place the tarts on a lined baking tray.
Return the tart to the freezer to harden. This way, when glazing with the egg wash, the tart doesn't lose its shape.
After the egg wash, fill each piece of cut-out pastry with the rolled pineapple jam filling. Lightly shape the pineapple jam so that it sits nicely in the pastry, and the tarts look uniform.
Bake in preheated oven at 180°C for at least 20 minutes. If you want a more golden look to the tarts, reduce the temperature to 170°C and continue to bake for another 5 minutes or until you achieve the colour you want. Then remove the tray and allow the tarts to cool before storing in air-tight containers.

I use a punch mould.

After freezing the tarts, I apply an egg wash. By the time the tarts are glazed, the pastry is softened by the heat.

After putting the pineapple jam balls on the glazed tarts, it's ready to go into the oven.

Ta-da! Time to cool down and store in airtight boxes.

But beware of Knaves of Hearts, who will steal your tarts! ;)

Have a blessed year of baking and cooking and sharing your bounties with your family and loved ones! :)

Pastry Cutter/Blender

2012-01-17T03:45:00.000-08:00

My first video demonstration! ;)

Please (try to) ignore the background sounds. Edna was practising on her piano, and Ezra was playing with the pots and pans... *sighs*

This demonstration is on the use of a pastry cutter to rub in cold butter into flour for making shortbread pastry and piecrust pastry. To achieve light and crumbly pastry, cold butter (and cold cold ingredients, especially water) are necessary to prevent the butter from melting.

Here's the video, beginning with a block of butter from the fridge:

Durian Puff!

2011-12-11T05:32:00.000-08:00

It's durian season, and what more lovely way to eat it (apart from eating it fresh), is to feast on it in a Durian Puff?

The Puff or Choux Pastry is so simple to make - it took less than 15 minutes to gather the ingredients and ready, and then it's simply just a matter of piping and popping it into the oven to puff up, and then to cool it down, ready to be filled with a creamy durian filling.

In fact, you don't have to use a durian filling - any sweet or savoury filling would taste good in the puff pastry! I've done tuna-mayo filling, custard filling, lemon custard filling and whipped cream filling... and they were all yums! ;)

Pastry
Ingredients:

1 cup hot water
1/2 cup butter
1 cup flour
4 eggs

Method:

Set your oven to 220degC.
Boil the water and butter in a saucepan. When the mixture is boiling, turn off the heat and immediately pour the flour in and stir. Be careful though - the mixture would boil up as the flour goes in, but once the flour gets in, the mixture would settle. Stir the mix until all the flour is absorbed and the mixture doesn't stick to the sides of the saucepan.
If you have a mixer, pour this hot mixture carefully into the mixer, and while the mixer is on, put one egg at a time into the mix. Make sure that the egg is incorporated into the mix before adding a new one. The mixture is hot, so to prevent the eggs from cooking/curdling, you'll have to mix each egg into the mix fast. If you don't have a mixer (go buy one! ;P), you can mix each egg into the mix quickly, and you'll develop lovely toned arms for the efforts! ;)
Once the eggs go into the mix, and you get a lovely, smooth, shiny mix, just put the mix into a pipping bag and pipe the mix into the size and shape of the puff pastry you want. Pipe them onto prepared baking sheets lined with baking parchments. Remember to give lots of space between your mix because these puff pastry aren't called puff pastry for nothing! ;P
Into the oven they go, for at least 20 minutes (or until they turn golden brown). Refrain from opening the oven early - all those lovely steam from the mix helps to cook the pastry and make it crisp and hold up the shape.
Once it's done, cool the pastry down before filling it up with your choice of yummy fillings.

Because I add whipped cream and sugar to taste for my durian fillings, I don't usually need to buy the most expensive durians for making these pastries. Essentially, I need the durian creaminess and fibres to give the Durian Puffs its features, and durian varieties are such that you get a gamut of sweet to bitter durians, so take my recipe and tweak it to your personal satisfaction. ;)

Durian Filling

Ingredients

600g Durian flesh

300g Whipping Cream

Icing Sugar to taste

Method:

Whip the whipping cream until its texture is thickened.
Add in the durian flesh and mix well.
Add icing sugar to taste.
Use a pair of scissors to cut any durian fibres that are too long or clumpy. This helps achieve a smoother filling. But don't cut the fibres too fine - you still want to have some satisfaction of having a durian mouth-feel. ;)
Chill filling in the refrigerator until needed.

I pipe the durian into the pastry from the thinnest part of the pastry. Once done, I put it in the fridge to chill and set.

A light dusting of icing sugar to dress it up! ;)

Durian Puffs with Malteasers eyes! lol!

A Trio of Durian Puff Friends! ;)

Simple, quick and so yummy to feast on! ;)

Air-fried Chicken Chop

2011-10-27T05:45:00.000-07:00

I bought a Philips Air Fryer about 2 weeks ago, and was inspired to try modifying a baked crispy chicken recipe.

The initial recipe can be found here, but I felt that the baking time of 60min is too long for boneless chicken parts. Anyway, the idea of using mayonnaise as a coating base appealed to me - it sounds perfect as a coating base for the Air Fryer.

The Air Fryer works like a mini-oven, but with a better air-circulation, thus ensuring that food is cooked on all sides evenly. Unlike oven baking, where one side is usually heated more than the other, and there is a need to flip the food, the Air Fryer eliminates this need.

Anyway, this is my easy version of Air-fried Chicken Chop:

Ingredients
Filet of Chicken
Herb, Spices & Salt for marinate
Mayonnaise (I used my homemade mayo)
Crushed Cream Crackers mixed with pulverised Oats (but you could use Breadcrumbs or panko)

Method

1. Use a meat hammer to flatten the chicken. Doing so not only ensures that the meat has an even thickness so cooking is even, but it also tenderises the meat. Then, marinate the chicken with your favourite blend of herbs and spices and salt. Try to keep it a dry marinate. For this particular version, I used dried oregano, basil, paprika and pepper. You don't have to marinate it long - about 10 minutes will do. However, if you want to marinate it longer, it's up to you. ;)

2. Because it was a dry marinate, dipping it into a mayo undercoat ensures that the chicken is evenly coated. After the mayo dip, dip the chicken into the Cracker mix.

3. Put the meat into the Air Fryer basket, and fry the chicken for 10 minutes at 180degC.

And that's it... crispy coated chicken, with a moist, tender texture. Yummy, simple and if you're using homemade mayo, heart-healthy oils. ;)

Edna's Chicken Chop with Mashed Potato

Adult version

This is the full meal - mashed potato with herb butter, and Fresh Tomato Soup.

The chicken chop can be made smaller like nuggets, or served as a main course, or even between bread or in a bun like a chicken burger. ;)

Heart-healthy Roasted Garlic Herb Butter

2011-10-23T05:05:00.000-07:00

This is so easy to do and the end result is so delicious and its impact on your plate and palate is so WOW!

Ingredients:
1 bulb roasted garlic (Don't peel the garlic. Just remove as much of the outer skin as possible and put the entire bulb in a toaster oven for about 10 minutes. Once the garlic is done, let it cool, and then squeeze the individual garlic out of its pod. Trust me, it's less messy this way. ;) )
1/3 cup olive oil
1 block butter soften to room temperature

Any favourite herbs, fresh or dried (I have a pot of rosemary plant, and I used one stalk for this, along with dried oregano, basil, paprika and pepper)

Salt to taste

Method:

Blend the roasted garlic with the olive oil and other herbs.
Put the butter in to blend well.
Done!

The butter mix is now very soft because of the addition of the olive oil. This is actually good because it means that spreading the butter on bread for garlic bread would be very much easier. Also, if used by itself to accompany potatoes or meat, the butter would melt to the food faster. However, it doesn't look too appetitising to put a dollop of the butter mix on food, does it? So, take it a step further, and whip out your pretty IKEA ice-trays...

I find it a challenge to scoop the butter into the trays and get it into the crevices, so I use my piping tube to help me out:

Then I pop the ice tray into the freezer overnight and then to save freezer space, I take out the frozen cubes and arrange them in an air-tight freezer container, separating each layer of butter with plastic wrap:

Aren't they pretty? And since they're made in advance, all I need to do is to just arrange them on a plate to serve with warm rolls, or on top of a hot juicy steak or a nice fillet of fish. ;)

Don't forget to keep them in the freezer so that they maintain their lovely shapes. :)

Almond Biscotti

2011-10-23T04:42:00.000-07:00

I just bought a Dolce Gusto to make lovely lovely Cappucino at home. And what better to accompany that perfect cup of coffee than a slice of crisp, almond biscotti?

I had this recipe for ages - ripped off a Popular Bookshop Magazine, POPclub, years ago, but never had the impetus to actually make the biscotti until today. :)

I'm retyping the entire recipe here, and will comment on it after:

Ingredients:
120g Plain flour (sifted)
a pince of salt
3 egg whites
100g caster sugar
1tsp vanilla essence
180g unblanched almonds

Method:

Beat egg whites with salt until form. Gradually add in castor sugar and vanilla essence. Beat until it thickens.
Add in flour and almonds.
Spread mixture into a well-greased 18cm by 18cm square tin.
Bake for 20 to 25 min at 170degC until light brown.
Remove and place it on a wire rack to cool.
Wrap dough with foil and keep for 2 days under room temperature.
Cut the dough into thin layers, and place a single layer onto a baking tray.
Bake in oven 160degC for 12 to 15 minutes or until it is dry and crispy.

Comments:

I didn't have 3 egg whites - only two because I used the yolk for baking 2 pies. Therefore, I reduced all the ingredients proportionally. Also, I didn't have a 18cm by 18 cm square tin, and so I used a 16cm circle tin, which I sprayed with oil.

After baking and cooling, I wrapped the cake/bread in an aluminium foil, and put it into a non-airtight plastic box because I was concerned about ants. ;) After 2 days, I sliced into thin (but I think I could slice it even thinner if I had a sharper knife... too lazy then to sharpen it. ;P) slices and pop it into the oven. It took longer than 15 minutes to get crispy, but the texture is nice - not very sweet - and perfect to pair with a hot cup of aromatic coffee. :)

Ice... Cream Cake?

2011-10-01T00:55:00.000-07:00

It being Children's Day, it would be the perfect time for cupcakes and ice-cream... only in this heat, how could an ice-cream retain its shape? Ah-ha! The perfect solution then: an "Ice" Cream Cupcake! ;)

This is really an easy and fun project for the kids to do too. I started out with a flat bottom ice-cream cone wafer. Flat bottom, because I wanted to end up with a cake that looked like McDonald's Vanilla Cone, and also because it would be less of a hassle to bake.

I used my favourite chocolate cupcake recipe and poured it into the cups. I used the muffin tray to help hold the cones evenly separated. With the recipe, I was able to make 18 cones.

Next, I made a perfect buttercream for this weather: Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

I discovered this recipe while looking for a better buttercream recipe, and this was the result. Swiss Meringue, because of the way it cooks the egg whites, creates a buttercream that holds well in our hot and humid weather, and yet has a silky, creamy texture - much like a soft, creamy marshmallow. *dreamy sigh*

Instead of posting up the how-to, here's a video of how simple it is to make:

Although the ratio for the eggwhite:sugar:butter is 1:2:3, I actually used 70g egg white (from 2 eggs), 125g sugar and 200g butter.

After the cake was cooled, I covered the top with the cream and then piped the soft-swirl look on the cones...

And ta-da!

Happy Children's Day, young and young-at-heart! =)

Got a minute? Let's make Mayonnaise!

2011-09-27T22:16:00.000-07:00

This may look like a lot of ingredients, but it really only has 4 - and is so simple to make with a great leeway for variations.

This is the famous Masterchef Australia Food Processor Mayonnaise Recipe that I used. It's really quick, simple and you get something that tastes a whole lot better than the store-bought mayo. ;)

Basically, you only need:

1 egg

2 tsp Dijon mustard

1 tbs white balsamic vinegar

A little salt

1 cup olive oil

I love it that I don't have to use only the egg yolk for this recipe because I hate having to store the whites and think about what to use it for... more meringue perhaps? ;P

I didn't have Dijon mustard or balsamic vinegar, so I substituted it with Mild American Mustard and Apple Cinder Vinegar. Also, I don't really like the heavy olive oil taste, so I had about 1/3 cup of olive oil for its goodness and 2/3 cup of canola oil for its non-taste. (Non-taste? Hmm... ;P)

Into the food processor the egg, mustard, vinegar and salt went. 15 seconds to process it into a mixture; in goes the olive oil, 15 seconds to process it into a liquid paste; in goes the rest of the canola oil, and 30 sec to whip it into a creamy textured mayonnaise.

Ta-da!

Simple and delicious!

By the way, the food processor you see in the pic is about as old as Ethan - about 11+ years now. It's a beautifully hardy processor, used almost daily when Ethan was a baby to puree his baby food. It's been used often to process and puree many things in the kitchen from spice pastes to chopping nuts to making milkshakes for the kids... and it's cheaper to buy today than when I bought it years ago. ;)

Orange Cake in a Blender

2011-06-23T20:47:00.000-07:00

When I first saw this cake baked by a lovely lady, I was intrigued - a cake that was made in a blender! Jam's photography made the cake look so drooling-good that I knew I had to try my hands at making this cake... and what an utterly quick and easy cake to make it turned out to be! If you can measure out the ingredients, mix in the flour, and pop it into the oven, you're well on your way to savouring this cake! ;P

Orange Cake in a Blender
Ingredients:
1 large Orange (cut into quarters, and half it again. Remove seeds and the white plith where possible. No need to remove the skin - easy right?)
1 cup Sugar
1 cup Oil (I used Canola oil)
3 Eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder

Method:

Sift the flour and baking powder together.
Using a blender, blend the orange, sugar, oil and eggs until smooth.
Add the blended mixture to the flour, and mix them well together.
Pour the mixture into greased pan.
Bake in a preheated oven, 150 deg C for 40 minutes.

The cake has a very light orangey fragrance and is a perfect quick afternoon tea-cake. It's absolutely beautiful with tea. :)

Absolutely yummy and did I mention how easy it is to bake? ;)

ETA:

I just melted some choc and poured over this cake... and the effect is oh WOW! The choc just adds a whole different dimension to the fragrance of the orange cake... mmmm perfect!

When Life Gives You Lemons

2011-05-31T22:13:00.000-07:00

A warm-hearted lady sent me a recipe yesterday, for a "Luscious Belgian Lemon Teacake". The recipe was so simple and didn't involve the use of a mixer that immediately I was intrigued at how it would turn out.

The method to this cake involves cooking a custard filling for the centre of the cake, which I suppose is what gives it its 'lusciousness'. ;)

Ingredients for Cake
1 cup self raising flour
1/2 cup castor sugar
60g butter
1 egg, lightly beaten

Method

Line a 17-cm round cake tin. (I used my 8-in round cake tin, which is about 20-cm).
Sift the flour and add the sugar. Rub in the butter until breadcrumb-like, then add the egg. You'll get a sticky dough.
Divide the dough into 3 parts, and put 2 parts into the bottom of the tin, and spread it out with your fingers.

Ingredients for Lemon Custard
Zest of 1 lemon
Juice of 1 lemon (about 1/4 cup)
1/3 cup of sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
60g butter

Method

Put all your ingredients except the lemon zest into a saucepan and melt on low heat, stirring constantly.
Once the sugar has melted, slowly bring the mix to boil and it will thicken. Once that happens, turn off the heat.

Back to Cake Method

Sprinkle half of the lemon zest over the cake batter in the tin.
Pour the lemon custard over the cake batter.
Cut up the remaining cake batter into teaspoon sizes and drop them onto the custard to cover evenly.
Sprinkle the rest of the lemon zest over the cake and pop it into the oven set at 180 deg C for 30 mins. (I lowered the heat after 15 minutes to 175 dec C because the top of the cake looked very brown. :))
Cool in the tin.
Remove from tin, sprinkle icing sugar on top, and then serve with tea. Yums!

The fragrance of this cake while baking is wow! The whole house is filled with its scent. :)
The cake is crumbly, sticky and parts of it crunchy... what a mouthful of texture and goodness!

So friends,
When life gives you lemons, don't despair!
Make this luscious lemon cake to share -
Your woes are halved, your blessings doubled,
When friends share your lemons and your trouble.

I Can Eat A Rainbow!

2011-05-25T09:10:00.000-07:00

Why are there so many, songs about Rainbows and what's on the other siiiiiiiiiide?

Perhaps it's because rainbows are one of the most uplifting, joyful images we have. =)

When I was volunteering at no. 3's class to teach the pre-nursery kids to play with their food (;P), I promised the class that I would make them a rainbow cake. The night before, I made friends with a lovely lady, Selphie, who blogged about making a Rainbow Cake. Instantly, I was inspired to try my hand at this. After all, the premise was simple - tinting the cake batter and then assembling it - but the effect! Wow!

In the interim period, some of no. 3's friends would remind me of my promise whenever I go to the school to fetch no. 2 & 3. Since this was the last week of school, I decided to get this done, otherwise they would probably forget about the whole idea of eating a rainbow! ;)

I would have used a cake mix for this in a pinch, but I didn't quite have the time this week to hit the stores. Therefore, I googled for a simple cake mix, and this one had good reviews. In addition, what I like about this recipe is that I needn't separate the eggs. For me, simplicity is key! ;)

I knew that a 7-layer cake would be quite tall if I doubled the basic cake recipe, so I went for 1.5 times the recipe. In all, the cake was a good size to share with a class of 10 preschoolers and their teachers.

The Vanilla* Cake Recipe
* I use Vanilla extract here, but I suppose you can substitute it for any essence you like. No. 1 is already thinking of mango or lemon... ;P
Ingredients

300 g white sugar
170 g butter
3 eggs
15 ml vanilla extract
280 g all-purpose flour (sifted together with the baking powder)
10 g baking powder
180 ml milk
Red, Yellow and Blue Wilton Food Colouring Gel

Method

In a medium bowl, cream together the sugar and butter until the butter lightens. This would take about 8 minutes.
Add in the eggs one at a time, creaming each one well after cracking it in. Scrape down, mix, and then crack in the next egg.
Add in the vanilla extract. (Or any other substitute.)
Make 3 batches of the flour mix and 2 batches of the milk. Add in the flour to the cream mix first, followed by milk, flour, milk and finally flour. At each addition, make sure to mix it well.
Being one of those needing exact measurement, I weighed out the cake batter - 1073g - and divided it up into 7 portions - about 153g each portion.
Using the 3 primary colours, add enough gel paste to colour the portions Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Violet and Indigo (Dark Purple).
Line and grease 2 or 3 8-inch cake pans and bake them in a 165 degC oven for 15 minutes. Once the cake is done, turn it out onto a cake rack, and reline the cake pan for the next layer.
Allow all the cake layers to cool before frosting.

Because I baked the night before frosting, I placed each layer of cake on a dinner plate, covered it with a plastic food wrap and put it in the fridge overnight.

Assembling the cake

I used the butter-cream cheese frosting that I've posted before, but used vanilla extract instead of strawberry, in order not to clash with the vanilla cake.

Starting from the indigo layer, use about 1 heaped tablespoon of the frosting to coat the layer before placing the violet layer on. Do likewise to the violet layer all the way until you get to the red layer. While frosting the layers, take care to 'fill-in' the sides, especially if your cake layers are like mine, tapering off at the sides.

Building upwards...

Frosting, frosting...
And building upwards...
until the last layer...
Of course, frost the final red layer and sides before putting it in the fridge. =)
Once the cake has a frosted coat, return it into the freezer to harden before frosting the cake proper.

I toyed with the idea of making a fluffy looking frosting that is cloud-like, but because of time (I had to tie no. 2 hair for school!!!) I kept the frosting simple.

My cakeboard was sufficiently 'cloud-like' with the scalloped edge. ;P

At the school, I talked to the preschoolers (3-year-olds) about the colours they see in the sky - blue, pinks and black - and the colours of clouds. We talked about favourite colours and those that can be found in a rainbow... and then I cut a slice out and their eyes literally widened! =)

We didn't do this, but I suppose we could have sung:

Red and yellow and pink and green

Purple and orange and blue

I can EAT a rainbow,

EAT a rainbow,

EAT a rainbow too.

DIY Pizza Party!

2011-05-17T06:34:00.000-07:00

Individual DIY Pizzas made by my guests

DIY Pizza Party is easy to do... and when you've got a perfect recipe for homemade pizza dough, things are so much simpler! =)

Brenda's Pizza Dough:

Ingredients:

500g Plain Flour, sifted

1 sachet Instant Yeast

300ml Lukewarm Water

1 tsp Salt

1 tsp dried Oregano

1 tsp Garlic Powder

Olive Oil

Method:

Mix the yeast in the water with 3 tablespoons of the sifted flour. Set it aside for 15 minutes for the yeast to activate.
In a bowl add the oregano, garlic powder and salt to the flour. Make a well in the flour and pour the activated yeast mixture in. The activated yeast mixture should smell yeasty and look foamy. Use a spoon to mix the flour with the liquid so that it comes together as a dough.
Turn it out onto a floured table, and knead the dough for 10 minutes. This part is an excellent arm workout! ;)
Shape it into a ball and coat it *thinly* with olive oil. I pour out about a teaspoon of the olive oil in my hand, and then lightly cover the dough with it.
Leave the dough in a bowl to double its size. Cover the bowl with a towel and put it aside for about 1 hour.
Punch down the dough, and weigh out about 110g of dough for each serving. Roll out circles (or something like circles ;)) on cut-out baking paper, so that each person can have their own pizza to put their favourite toppings on. =) Each dough recipe should make about 7 or 8 smaller pieces.

Brenda's Homemade Pizza Sauce:
Ingredients:
2 large tomatoes
1 large onion
a handful of fresh basil leaves
3 cloves of garlic
a little pepper

1 small can of tomato paste
1 tablespoon of olive oil for frying

Method:
Blend all the ingredients together, except for the tomato paste.
In a saucepan, heat up the olive oil. Add in the blended ingredients to the oil and fry until some of the fragrance is released. Add in the tomato paste and heat it up until it bubbles and come together.
Allow the sauce to cool before use.

Pizza Sauce, and other favourite toppings: Ham, pastrami, onions, capsicums, egg, basil...

...baby spinach, olives, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, pineapple slices, mozzarella and cheddar cheese...

Adding a raw egg on the pizza is Pizza alla Bismark.

Into a preheated oven set at 220 deg C for 15 minutes

DIY pizza parties tend to get my guests excited because for some of them, it's a fun way for some creative cooking expression. For others, it's a good way to avoid foods they don't enjoy, but don't have to worry about whether their avoidance of certain items might lessen another person's enjoyment of it. For kids, they pile on their favourites with no worries about that yucky stray pineapple slice that seems to hide under a mozzarella because they can simply not put that in! :)

Of course, among my guests, many were only too happy to share a slice of their pizza version with another, and it certainly adds to the overall conversation and atmosphere.

Along with the pizzas, I also serve a cream soup; in this case, my cream of mushroom soup.

Have fun at your own pizza party! =)

Kiwi & Strawberry Meringue Nests

2011-04-23T21:24:00.000-07:00

Meringue Nests are so simple and easy to make, and such a delight to eat.

The fruit possibilities are endless, and this dessert is so simple to make and refrigerate before guests arrive.

Swiss Meringue
Ingredients:
90g Egg White, room temperature
175g Sugar
1/2 tsp Cream of Tartar
1 tsp Vanilla Extract

Method:

Boil a pot of water and keep it at just below boiling heat.
Put a metal bowl on the water in the pot. Put in all the ingredients and beat the mixture using an electric beater on low until all the sugar dissolves. This will take about 3 minutes.
Remove the metal bowl with the mixture from the pot, add the vanilla extract, and then continue to beat the egg whites on high speed for another 10 minutes. You'll need to get to a point where the egg whites are glossy white and stiff.
Transfer the egg white into a piping bag. On a baking parchment's reverse side, use a tea-cup to draw round circles with a pencil. Carefully pipe a base starting from the centre of the circle outwards.
Complete all the circles, and then pipe the sides up to make a container or nest.

Bake in a pre-heated oven at 100 deg C for 75 minutes, and leave it in the oven for another hour.
Store in an air-tight ziplock bag until needed.

I had initally used my previous meringue cookie recipe, but I was intrigued by the Swiss Meringue method of heating the egg white and sugar to achieve a smoother and lighter meringue, which indeed makes a slight difference to the texture. That said, the French method of just beating the egg whites and sugar without heating it up is simpler, and the crunchier texture will contrasts well with the whipped cream too. I suppose the choice of methods is really up to you. :)

Anyway, to assemble the Meringue Nest is as simple as whipping up some whipped cream with a little sugar to taste and spooning a tablespoon or two into the nests, cutting up some seasonal fruits (or fruits on offer at the supermarket ;) ) and arranging it prettily in the nests, and refrigerating them until dessert time.

The effect of this dessert when presented is almost always a look of surprise and lit-up eyes. It's really worth the look of joy on their faces when it's really a simple dessert to assemble.

A word of warning though - this dessert cannot be kept overnight. The meringue nest will soften. Therefore, make the meringue last - just before your guests arrive - to put into the fridge. That way, the meringue will remain crisp. :)

8 Oct 2011, Edited to add:

Since the time I made this meringue, I've purchased a Kitchenaid (KA). Naturally, I wasn't able to use a hand-held mixer to beat the egg white over the hot water.

Therefore, what I did is to do a modification based on the Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

To my 2 egg whites (about 70g), I used almost double that amount for sugar (about 138g), 1/4 teaspoons of Cream of Tartar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, and all these I put into the KA bowl, and heat it up over boiling water, all the while stirring it with a whisk. I did this until the sugar dissolved into the mix, and then put it on the KA to beat on low speed for about a minute, then on high speed for about 6 to 8; when it more than doubled its volume.

I made smaller nests this round, because the initial eggwhite amount is smaller (70g, compared to previously 90g). But again, the meringue nests are really a very simple and easy dessert to make. ;)

14 Feb 2012, Edited to add:

I've tinted the meringue with a little red gel food colouring to get pink nests for a Valentine's Day dessert.

Also, because of time, I've made a larger pie-like nest instead of individual nests for the adults at the dinner to share. The kids got mini ones all to themselves. I piped the words with Nutella. ;)

My Little Helper

2011-04-13T23:33:00.000-07:00

Who needs soap-and-water when you've got a little volunteer to lick up your beaters? ;)

"Instant" Cream of Mushroom Soup

2011-03-23T03:26:00.001-07:00

NTUC had a sale on sliced button mushroom... S$2.10 per pack of 200g. And with Edna bugging me to make "her favourite mushroom soup", it was a good opportunity to make the soup.

INGREDIENTS:

400g Fresh button mushroom, chopped, but reserve about 50g and set aside.

1 tablespoon Butter

1 tablespoon Flour

1 large Onion, chopped

2 stalks Celery, chopped

2 cloves Garlic, chopped

2 cups Fresh Milk

1L Water

1 Chicken Cube (or Vegetable cube if vegetarian)

Salt and Pepper to taste

METHOD:

1. Heat up butter in a pot, and add flour to it when melted. Stir it until you get a yellow ball, then add in the onion, celery and garlic and fry for about 2 minutes.

2. Add in the milk and stir to thicken, then add in the mushroom and let it simmer for a minute.

3. Add in half the water and wait for mushroom to soften - about two minutes.

4. Remove the entire soup and put it into a blender. Or if you have a hand-held blender, that works well too.

5. Return the blended soup into the pot and add in the rest of the water to dilute it to your preference. Add in the reserved chopped mushroom to give the soup more texture.

6. Add salt and pepper to taste.

7. Serve with grated cheese as garnish.

If you make it in a thermal pot, you can put the completed soup into the outer pot until needed.

The soup's so fast and easy to make that we don't buy instant soup anymore. ;)

Slurrrrrp!

"My favourite soup! It's already my second bowl of soup!"

Steak and Guinness Pie

2011-03-19T01:37:00.000-07:00

I didn't know that 17 March was St Patrick's Day, when I decided to make this pie. St Patrick, of course, is the Patron Saint of Ireland, land of Guiness Stout, a main feature of this pie.

Before starting out, I googled a few Steak/Beef pie recipes, but in the end, I settled for Jamie Oliver's version, from his book "Happy Days with the Naked Chef".

Not all the ingredients are easily available here, though, so I made do with some substitutions. Also, this amount is almost double the recipe because whenever I make pie, I usually make enough to keep for another meal within the week. The time going into pie-making must be worth it, don't you think so? ;P

INGREDIENTS:

1kg Beef steak (I bought 2 x 500g of frozen beef cubes from NTUC, and then I sliced each cube into half)

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Flour enough to coat beef

Olive oil for frying

3 medium Onions, peeled and roughly chopped

2 medium Carrots, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch-pieces

7 sticks Celery, washed and cut into 1/2 inch-pieces

1 sweet potato, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch-pieces

Liberal dashes of dried oregano, thyme and 3 pieces of bay leaves

1L Guiness Stout (I bought 2 x 500ml can)

5 very large tomatoes, skin removed and cut into 8 pieces each (Click here to learn a painless way to skin tomatoes)

1 tsp tomato paste

METHOD:

Because the stewing process took at least 2 hours, I used an induction cooker. I didn't want to use the thermal pot for this stew because the thermal pot won't be able to reduce the stout into the thick gravy I needed.

1. Season the beef pieces with salt and ground black pepper. Sprinkle in the flour and toss until coated. Heat olive oil in the pot and fry meat in batches. The meat need not be cooked through, but the surface has to be sealed in. This will ensure that the meat will be juicy and tender during the stewing process.

2. After the last batch of meat is done, return all the meat back into pot and add the onion. After one minute of stir-frying, add the carrots, sweet potatos, celery and liberally add in the herbs. Fry for a further 4 minutes and then add Guinness and tomatoes. Bring to a boil, then simmer uncovered for 2.5 hours or until meat is really tender, and the sauce is thick. Add salt and pepper if needed at this point.

3. Jaime Oliver advise that at this point, the stew could be served as a stew with mash potato, or to leave it for 5 days in the fridge to improve its flavour. For me, I needed the stew cooled to put it into my pie. =)

4. I used my Yogurt Pie Crust recipe (doubling the amount) for making the pie crust, but it's mostly because it's not easy to get premade pie crust; use premade if you are able to find, and flaky pie crust ones are best. I did consider using frozen prata for the cover, but at the time, I had made more than enough crust, so I didn't need to do so... perhaps I'll half the amount the next time I make it and use the flaky prata dough for the cover. =)

5. Brush a beaten egg over the pie and poke a few holes in the pie crust for vents. Bake the pie in the oven at 180 deg C, for about 30 minutes.

The pie! Oh the pie is flavourful - mildly bitter from the stout, but the taste is intense. The pastry helps provide that delicious mouth-feel of crumbly butteriness with the chewiness of biting into tender steak. Because the beef isn't cut too small, you'll literally get to chew on steak. Yum!

Dinosaur Cakepops

2011-03-18T04:55:00.000-07:00

A mini-dino conference!

This is so easy to do! My dinosaur-loving nephew had a party and I made these for him.

Just fashion the cake into a dinosaur shape with a big head and a long tail. Use a skewer to shape arms and legs. Dip the shape into chocolate coating and attach white sprinkles for the eyes. Dot the sprinkle with an edible ink pen.

While the chocolate is still soft, attach jumbo heart sprinkles all the way down the back of the dino. If the choc is already hardened, then dip the heart into a little of the melted choc and attach it to the dino.

I made only 4 Dino cakepops for him, and he was so nice to share it with his cousins. =)

Headless dino!

The Hello Kitty Post (Part 2)

2011-03-18T03:43:00.000-07:00

Continuing the theme of Hello Kitty cakes, I had intended to bake and decorate a Hello Kitty cake for the girl's birthday party. Then I stumbled upon this:

The minute I saw this cake set, I realised how simple making the Hello Kitty cake could be. From Edna's party last year, I realised that cutting the cake was usually a messy event. Making cupcakes would be far easier, but the effect isn't as nice as a large whole cake.

Therefore, the puzzle cake set was a perfect in-between - I had a big cake, and it's made up of cupcakes!

All singing "Meow"!

After baking the cake, I levelled the cups and arranged it like this:

I used my cookie sheet and wrapped it in foil as a base. After arranging, I filled in the spaces with frosting:

Then I frosted over the entire cake with white frosting:

After frosting over, I sketched out the pattern of how I'd be frosting the cake. Essential items of Hello Kitty would be the ribbon on her left ear. Also, the cake shape for the ear is curved, but I shaped it into a point. I figured that I'd deal with it when I outlined the cake later.

After frosting the cake, I used 2 chocolate Malteses for Kitty's eyes and yellow Nerd sweets for Kitty's nose. The cake was beginning to look like Kitty.

I outlined Kitty with the chocolate coating I used for Edna's cakepops. It was an inspired move because the chocolate hardened and helped hold the frosting together. I melted the choc in a HD plastic bag, cut a tiny hole at a corner and used it to pipe the outline. As there was already an impression in the frosting, the piping held neatly. I topped off Kitty's whiskers with Pocky sticks.

In case there wasn't enough cupcakes to go along, and in case of the usual "Could I have a smaller piece?" request, I also made mini cupcakes which I decorated like this:

I used the melted choc to pipe the whiskers and eyes. A Nerd sweet made up the nose. Two Jumbo hearts and a red M&M made the ribbon.

In all, we had 36 cupcakes - 12 mini ones and 24 normal size ones... more than enough for Edna's party. And on an environmental note, the cups can be reused because they are made from silicone. Therefore, before handing out the cups, we let our guests know that we were collecting the cups back, and they could help us by putting the cups into the cake box. =)

Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe:

2 boxes Cream Cheese

1 block unsalted butter

Icing sugar to taste (about 1.5 cups to 2 cups)

Flavouring of choice

Beat cream cheese and butter together. Gradually add icing sugar until frosting stiffens. Add flavouring of choice.

For this cake, I used a Strawberry essence, which went well with the chocolate cake.

The Hello Kitty Post (Part 1)

2011-03-18T02:32:00.001-07:00

My daughter is a Hello Kitty fangirl, and she requested a Hello Kitty cake for her 5th birthday this year.

Last year, I made cupcakes for her preschool because I thought that it would be so much easier for the kids to each have a little cake to eat, rather than have the teachers cut the cake and deal with the mess that will inevitably result. Therefore, I thought I'd revive making Hello Kitty cupcakes, but I was inspired by Bakerella's Hello Kitty Cakepops to try that instead.

So what are cakepops? It's simply a word combination of cake+lollypop. Cake is crumbled and frosting is added as a binding to keep the cake together. It's then fashioned into a shape and put on a lollypop stick before dipping into a candy coating so that the cake is encased and the shape is retained.

Sounds simple, doesn't it? And you know what? It really is as simple as it sounds.

A few things to note though:

1. The cake to use ought to be one that's crumbly in nature. Dense and crumbly works better than light and fluffy cakes.

2. The cake pops works better if the room temperature is cool. Almost half of my Kitty pops melted by the time I got to my daughter's preschool. The good news is that I managed to salvage them by refrigerating the cakes; the bad news is that I wasn't able to do it at the school.

3. The candy coating that I used (Wilton) is thick. Thick isn't good for coating because its harder for the candy to drip off the cake. I learnt from a Phoon Huat staff to thin the candy with cocoa butter. I read that the candy coating could be thinned with shortening or even cooking oil, but I used cocoa butter.

4. Chocolate coating is the easiest coating to use because of its texture.

5. Freezing the pre-coated cakepops is an essential step. The frozen temperature helps the coating set more quickly, and the cake retains its shape better because of the frozen frosting in them.

6. The shorter lollypop sticks are more stable than the long ones. The cakes on the short ones are less likely to break apart.

Anyway, here are some of the pics from my attempt at my Hello Kitty Cakepops.

'Naked' Kitties. The choc chips helped shaped the ears after dipping.

Poor blind kitties... I was waiting for the candy coat to dry before drawing in the eyes.

Transporting them. You can see that they were already starting to melt in the sun. :(

The hardest part of making cakepops, I discovered, is in displaying them. I didn't want to go out to buy a styrofoam just for the cakepops, so I used an old disposable sushi tray and a soldering iron to put holes in them. I experimented with a holder of sorts under the tray, but I found in the end that it was much less hassle to just let the cake pops hang down the holes.

I used an upturned stand to allow the sticks to hang down, but display the cakepops well.

A closer look at the kitties. :)

Besides Kitties, I tried making other cake pops to vary it. Besides, I noted from my sons that the boys weren't likely to eat Kitty, so I made 'gender-neutral' cakepops like cupcake cakepops and lollypop cakepops. Heart-shaped cakepops were easy to make too.

Naked cupcakes. I used a skewer to make the indents on the base of the cake.

Completed cupcakes. These were sooooo much easier to make than the Kitties. lol!

The kids really enjoyed the cakepops, but I think it was partly the novelty of it all.

Chocolate coated heart

Lollypop studded with M&Ms... and a half-eaten cupcake

Fairy-sprinkled lolly

Heart and fairy-dust lolly, with a Kitty cakepop in the back.

8 Steps for a Super Easy No Effort Needed Oven Cleaning Method

2010-11-05T05:21:00.000-07:00

What a mouthful for today's title, right?

Maggie noted that my oven looks so clean and to tell you the truth - it really is! =)

I've been using this method to clean my oven since 2007, where I posted the following post on m4m in August that year:

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http://www.websiterepairguy.com/articles/household_tips/clean_oven.html

I stumbled on this website because of an earlier thread about sodium bicarbonate and its uses. I didn't really believe it until I tried it today. I mean, the science of it sounds true - and that was what convinced me to try it.

And guess what? It works! Sumpah! O.O

The best part of cleaning the oven with the baking soda is that I don't even need to use elbow grease. The 3 teaspoons of baking soda did all the work and I just wipe down the oven with a damp cloth to remove the dirt - and what dirt it was! The pail of water I used to rinse the cloth turned into coffee, but I didn't have to use a whole lot of energy to scrub the oven, nor did I have to scour the oven with detergent etc.

In fact, I managed to even clean the fan behind the grill in the oven - or at least get some of the grime off with the baking soda solution.

Try it and spread the news, people! :D

======

Since then, I've only ever used this method of cleaning my oven, and my oven has since progressively cleaner and cleaner, and now, even the oven fan is grime free. =)

I love it that the only cleaning agent is bicarbonate of soda, which is something that is often added to food and is therefore non-toxic. It's also cheap and it's on hand because we bake a lot, so we don't have to buy something in addition just to clean the oven. ;)

I hope today's post will bring a lot of joy to oven users, especially when you see the dirt literally dries up and wipes clean away. =)

The Cheater's Calzone or In-A-Pinch Pastie

2010-10-26T01:27:00.000-07:00

A calzone is a pizza that has been folded over with all the toppings inside. A pastie is an English version of a calzone, with the same principle of a meat filling inside a semi-circle - a portable pie. In Singapore, this is sort of like our curry puff, but not with curry filling, of course.

A good friend posted the method of using frozen pratas in her Facebook to make these delicious versions of the calzone or pasties. The fillings is really up to your imagination and whatever you have in the kitchen.

The Cheater's Calzone or In-A-Pinch Pastie

INGREDIENTS

8 Frozen Prata

1 can Luncheon meat

1 Onion chopped

2 tsp Minced Garlic

Dried Basil (I used fresh Basil as I had leftovers, but dried is fine)

Dried Oregano

Black Pepper

Sliced Cheese

METHOD

Combine the luncheon meat, onion, garlic, basil, oregano and pepper.
Put the mashed mix on one side of the frozen prata.
Put half a slice of cheese over the mix.
Fold over the prata.
Crimp the open sides of the prata with a fork to seal the prata up.
Arrange the filled prata on a lined baking sheet.
Pop it into the oven at 180 deg C for 20 minutes or until you see the prata nicely browned.
Serve as is, or with veggies and baked beans.

I made another filling a few days later, this time with corned beef instead of luncheon meat. As you can see from the picture below, I also added avocado slices to the cheese, onion and garlic.

You can also try using tuna, sardines, curry or chicken pie fillings - the sky's the limit for these delicious and simple to make pasties! =)

Chicken Porridge

2010-10-26T00:02:00.000-07:00

We usually have Chicken Porridge for our Sunday lunch, because it's just so simple to make.

All the ingredients go into the Thermal Pot in the morning before we walk 5 minutes to church. After church, we simply walk home to a piping hot meal of Chicken Porridge.

CHICKEN PORRIDGE

INGREDIENTS

2 Chicken Legs, bone in

1 tbsp Cooking oil

2 cups Rice

1 litre Hot Water

5 slices Ginger

Salt to taste (about 1 tsp - we can always add light soy sauce later if the porridge isn't salty enough)

Fried Shallots, Sesame oil, White ground pepper and Spring onions for garnishing

METHOD

Wash the rice, drain it and put it into the inner pot. Put the salt and cooking oil into the damp rice and shake it about to coat it. My granny swears by this method to get a very smooth congee. ;)
Into the pot, add the chicken, the ginger slices and the hot water, and set it all to boil. I usually boil the water in my electric kettle to save on boiling water on the stove; it's quicker for me, especially when I'm trying to get 3 kids ready to get out of the house. If you don't have hot water, just simply add water into the pot and then boil it with the other ingredients.
After vigorous boiling for a minimum of 5 minutes, turn off the heat and put the inner pot into the Thermal Pot.
Go out. Have fun. Go online. Watch grass grow.
After about 2 hours or more, remove the chicken from the pot and shred the meat. BE CAREFUL! IT'S STILL VERY, VERY HOT!
Pour more hot water into the pot to get the consistency you prefer. Since my kids like their porridge thick, I usually scoop their out first. I love my porridge thin, so I'll add more water into the pot after I've distributed the porridge out into bowls.
Put the shredded chicken on top of the porridge and garnish with fried shallots, sesame oil, white ground pepper and spring onions.
Serve with you tiao if you can find it. ;)

I like my porridge with egg, so before ladling it out to my bowl, I crack an egg and put it in the bottom of the bowl. I make sure that the porridge is HOT before ladling it on the egg. The heat from the porridge will cook the egg, thickening the porridge to a yummy texture.

The Instant Noodle Post

2010-10-25T02:28:00.000-07:00

Do we eat instant noodles? Of course we do! =)

There's something absolutely yummy indulging in instant noodles that instantly makes our mouth waters, that invokes steaming salty soup, with yummy eggs and crunchy veggies - a sure satisfying mouthful when the hunger pang strikes. Or my favourite dry instant noodles - Indomie - with its salty-sweet slippery chewiness, topped off with a fried egg.

However, it has been quite a long time since we last bought a real pack of instant noodles. These days, we buy the noodle cakes without seasoning and make our own soup base, or in the case of this post, make our own 'Indomie'-styled noodles.

Recently, Taiwan has banned Indomie (Today Online),
which naturally raised some concerns in Singapore, as Indomie's Mi Goreng is very popular here.

This news didn't affect us much, though. Long before this, we were already enjoying our version of Indomie's Mi Goreng.

This time, the recipe is a step-by-step pictorial explanation of how to make my version of Indomie's Mi Goreng:

Brenda's Indomie

You'll need:

1 Instant Noodle cake (These can be bought in packs of 6 to 8 cakes, all without seasoning from the supermarket.)

1 to 2 tsp Fried Shallot with oil (You can make your own, or buy ready made ones)

1 tbsp HABHAL's Sweet (Soya Bean Sauce) (RED LABEL)

1 to 2 tsp of homemade Sambal Tumis (You could also get ready-made ones; just look for Nasi Lemak Chilli at the supermarket, if they don't stock Sambal Tumis.)

METHOD:

Cook one cake of noodles. I like to add my leafy veggies after the noodles soften a bit.
Meanwhile, prepare the ingredients to replace the seasoning powder you find in the instant noodle packets. On a plate, put the shallot oil,the sweet soya sauce,and the sambal tumis.
Drain the noodles and veggies, and mix them with the oil, sauce and chilli on the plate, until the noodles are well coated. The beauty of making your own is that you can have it spicier if you wish, or sweeter, or more shalloty fragrant. ;)
We like to have a fried egg on top of our Mi Goreng, and have the semi-cooked egg yolk coat the noodles. YUM!

Pasta Fast to Cook, Good to Eat

2010-10-25T00:13:00.000-07:00

Pasta - before instant noodles, these were the instant noodles! ;)

We had 2 versions of a pasta lunch today, and I thought it would be good to blog about how to cook these fast to cook, good to eat meals. Unfortunately, it's a lot of estimation because I literally just threw in stuff into the pot... we've made these so often that I didn't measure it out.

Chicken Alfredo (for 2 Adults)

INGREDIENTS

1 Chicken thigh, cut into strips

1 stalk celery, sliced thinly

About 1 tablespoon Olive oil

About 1 tablespoon Flour

About 1 cup Milk

120g Dried Pasta, cooked in water until ready to use (we used Fusili today)

Salt and pepper to taste

Grated Cheese for garnishing

METHOD

In a pot, heat up the oil and fry the flour lightly. When the flour has browned a little, whisk in the milk until you get a thickened white sauce.
Add in the celery and chicken strips.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
The sauce is done once the chicken is cooked.
Either separate the pasta into 2 dishes and pour the white sauce over, OR put the pasta into the sauce, give it a good stir and then serve it out into two dishes.
Garnish with grated cheese. You can add in sliced olives too.

Prawn Aglio (for 1 Adult)

INGREDIENTS

6 to 8 prawns, shelled and the shells kept aside

1/4 cup Olive oil

1/2 Small Onion

1 tsp Minced Garlic

1/2 stick Celery (or equal amount of hardy veggies like French Beans)

Sliced Olives

60g Dried Pasta, cooked in water until ready to use (I used Fettucini today)

A dash of Paprika

Salt and pepper to taste

METHOD

In a pan, heat up the oil and fry the prawn heads and shell with a little salt, until you get the lovely, yummy fragrant prawn scent. Use a sieve and a spoon to squeeze and drain the oil from the prawn shells.
Return the reddish prawn oil into the pan and add in the onion, garlic and celery. When the scent of the spices are released, add in the prawns, cooking it until they're done.
Add in the pasta and olives, and give the mixture a good stir to coat the pasta.
Finally, add in the paprika, salt and pepper to taste.
Serve it up on a plate.

Sugar Cookies Icing

2010-10-23T05:47:00.000-07:00

This post is just for the icing recipe I used on my cookie.

It's simple to make, dries out nicely and so easy to pipe!

INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
2 teaspoons milk
2 teaspoons corn syrup
1/4 teaspoon flavoring (vanilla, lemon, rose or almond flavoring are good too)

Colouring, if needed

METHOD
1. Stir sugar and milk together in a bowl until icing mixture is smooth. You might get lumps, but try to press in the sugar into the lumps.

2. Beat in corn syrup and flavouring until icing mixture is smooth and glossy in appearance. I used a egg-whisk because the amount was small.

3. Add food coloring to desired shade.

4. Put icing in a plastic bag and cut out a tiny hole at one corner of it. Use it to squeeze the icing out like a pen.

5. Ice cookie and set aside for the icing to harden. This would take more than an hour, depending on the humidity etc. To be sure that the icing hardens in time, try to ice the cookies half a day to a day before needed.

If you double or triple the amount of icing made, you could make the initial amount using a mixer. Then add colouring after the icing is made.

If you want to use the icing to coat the cookie, then thin the icing using more milk. Add the milk in by half teaspoon increments until you get the consistency you need. You can use a clean paint brush to help you decorate your cookie.

Another method is to pipe the "outline" of the cookie and then pour in the thinner icing into the shape left by the outline.

Whatever you do, enjoy the creative process and have fun decorating your cookies!

These are cookies made from a special cookie cutter that impresses letters while cutting out the cookie shapes.

A close up.

Below are cookies that I iced with the icing I made. I didn't add in any colours because the base colour of the cookies were so vibrant. After icing these 10 big cookies, I still had half of my icing recipe left. The silver ball sugar bits are available from Phoon Huat, and they make a lovely accent to the cookies.

Lizzy's Cookie Monster Cupcakes

2010-10-03T02:11:00.000-07:00

I promised my 11-year-old niece, Lizzy, these Cookie Monster Cupcakes months ago, ever since she used a Cookie Monster cupcake as a profile pic for her Facebook.

That version of the cupcake used a muffin, blue-coloured grated coconut, and a particular type of sweet for its eyes which isn't available in Singapore.

Therefore, I had to improvise.

I debated with whether to go ahead with muffins or a cupcake, but since it was her birthday, I decided to go with a cupcake base.

I used my chocolate cupcake recipe and a light buttercream frosting I found online.

Light Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:

5 tbsp Flour

1 cup Milk

1 cup Unsalted Butter (227gm)

1 cup Fine Sugar (NOT icing sugar)

1-2 tsp Vanilla Extract

Method:

Whisk together in a saucepan the flour and milk to make a roux. Cook over medium heat for a minute or two until the mixture thickens. Be careful not to let the mixture stiffen. (Mine did - and it created lumps in the frosting later, which made it very difficult to pipe as the starchy bits got stuck in the holes. I had to run the entire frosting through a sieve before I was able to make use of the frosting.)
Run the roux mix through a sieve to get rid of lumps.
Beat the butter and sugar until the butter lightens in colour. Beat in the cooled roux about 2 tablespoon at a time, until the buttercream is well mixed.
Add the vanilla extract.

Cookie Monster Cupcakes

Assemble:

Mentos sweets (enough for 2 eyes for each cupcake)

Chocolate chips (one for each Mentos)

Chocolate chip cookies, one for each cupcake

Non-coloured buttercream frosting

Blue-coloured buttercream frosting

Grass piping tip

Method:

Begin by baking the cupcakes. Allow it to cool before preparing for frosting, otherwise the heat in the cupcake will melt the buttercream frosting.
Whilst waiting for the cupcakes to bake/cool, make the Cookie Monster eyes. Attach a chocolate chip with a bit of non-coloured frosting onto the Mentos, making sure to put it off-centred.

Once the cupcakes are cooled, make a cut into the cupcake, remove a cavity large enough to hold a chocolate chip cookie comfortably.

Make blue buttercream frosting by adding enough blue colouring to the buttercream frosting. Spread some frosting into the cavity for the cookie, so that it can hold the cookie well.

I bought the grass piping tip from Phoon Huat (Wilton #234), to pipe the fur. Make sure to pipe under the cookie as well.

Put the eyes close together. For really cute Cookie Monsters, try not to place the pupils of the eyes too evenly. Cookie Monster goes a little crazy when he has a yummy cookie in his mouth. ;P

I'm happy to report that Lizzy was happy with her little Cookie Monsters. They were a hit with everyone. =)

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffin with Crumble Crust

2010-08-10T03:46:00.000-07:00

It's been some time since I last posted a baking entry, and this one is not only simple to make, but simply delicious.

Hubby had stuffed a bunch of 6 Del Monte bananas in my bag after Day 1 of Ethan's fencing tournament, and when we got back home, imagine our ~~shock horror~~ surprise when the bananas looked so bruised and battered! ;P

What to do? What to do? I had made Jemput Jemput Pisang just a few days prior, and I didn't want to make something fried for Ethan's fencing tournament the next day. Therefore, I decided to make banana muffins for him to eat in-between bouts to boost his energy. Banana muffins were ideal and what better energy boost than adding chocolate chips to the mix? ;P

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

6 bananas, mashed

3/4 cup white sugar

1 egg, lightly beaten

1/3 cup canola oil

1/2 cup chocolate chips

1/3 cup packed brown sugar

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 tablespoon butter

Directions

Preheat oven to 190 degrees C. Line a muffin/cupcake tray with 12 muffin papers.
In a large bowl, mix together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat together bananas, sugar, egg and canola oil. Stir the banana mixture, chocolate chips into the flour mixture just until moistened - don't over-stir, otherwise the muffin might be hard. Spoon batter equally into prepared muffin cups.
In another small bowl, mix together brown sugar, 2 tablespoons flour and cinnamon. Cut/crumble in 1 tablespoon of solid butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Sprinkle topping equally over muffins.
Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean.
Enjoy!

I'd love to claim that my muffins helped Ethan do well in his tournament - he was placed joint-3rd - but I know that the hardwork belonged to him alone. =)

Gulab Jamun

2010-08-10T02:48:00.000-07:00

We were first introduced to this Indian dessert last year when hubby and Ethan went on a Heritage trail through Little India with a group of hubby's student from the NIE. They bought home some Indian desserts from a very old and famous Indian dessert shop along Serangoon Road.

I enjoyed the Gulab Jamun in particular because it has a lovely milky, sponge-cake like texture, soaked in a sweet, rose-flavoured syrup.

Therefore, this year, when Edna's school asked parents to volunteer making an ethnic food item for their Racial Harmony Day, I decided on trying my hands at making the Gulab Jamun. I felt that Edna's school friends were probably more familiar with Chinese and even Malay desserts, and like our family, have little experience with Indian desserts, delicious though they may be.

Therefore, I scoured the internet for recipes for this. Recipes are not hard to find, nor is the process difficult to do (according to what I read, anyway. ;)), but when I first tried the recipe, it didn't work out as well. Then I stumbled upon another recipe, and this one not only worked out well, it really was a very simple, yet had a wonderful outcome.

I followed the recipe exactly, but made the balls much smaller, thinking that it would help the preschooler eat it without having to take smaller bites. In all, I made about 120 balls.

The funny thing was that someone commented to me that they look like Tang Yuan - and I agree. However, unlike the glutinous rice balls, the texture and taste of the balls were totally different.

Sadly though, the preschoolers weren't adventurous enough to try the Gulab Jamun. The older preschoolers were more game to try, but the younger preschoolers were happy to eat the Oreos (?!) and Keropoks that were offered. LOL!

Sambal Belacan

2010-08-08T08:14:00.000-07:00

When I was growing up, there were times there may be up to 3 different types of sambals on the table; each as a condiment for a different dish my Granny cooked. That was how seriously she felt about taste, and how serious accompaning sambals were to a Peranakan table.

One of the most versatile sambals on our Peranakan table would undoubtably be the Sambal Belacan. A good Sambal Belacan is all about the belacan. And there are many different types of belacan on the market, of varying quality, shapes and sizes.

When I was younger, before belacan was vacuumed-packed in pretty packages, Ah Mah used a belacan that came in a rectangle shape. So the usual measurement of 'about an inch' or 'about half and inch' made perfect sense - especially coupled with Ah Mah's cooking method of 'agak'-ation (estimation). Later on though, with belacans coming in circle shapes, differing rectangular blocks, well, it wasn't enough to give measurements by length. ;P

Anyway, Granny only uses this brand of belacan:

Brand loyalty on my part? Maybe. But I really find that the taste of this belacan is really good, compared to others that I've tried, because this brand is really, really hard to find in Singapore. My brother buys a few packets of this each time he goes to Malaysia for Ah Mah, and she hoards it like gold! =)

I finally found a stall in Holland Village market that sells this brand of belacan, so knowing that I have a steady supplier in Singapore, I only buy 2 packs each time either hubby or I am in the area. =)

Sambal belacan is one of those things that generally tastes the same, but is different depending on the person making it, precisely because of the quality and quantity of belacan used. There is really no 'standard' taste, but only 2 ingredients take centrestage to make the sambal what it is.

My sambal belacan is extremely spicy. But it's the way I like it. When I made the sambal belacan for my granny though, I used more big chilis which are milder, compared to the fiery hot chili padi, or birds' eye chili.

Ingredients:

400g Big chilis

200g Chili padis

70g Belacan

Sugar to taste

Salt to taste

Method:

Deseed all the chilis. I usually have to put on 2 plastic gloves, one over another, to do this. Trust me, it's an extremely hazardous thing to deseed chilis, which is why whenever I make my sambal belacan, I make a huge batch so that I don't have to revisit this 'torture' anytime soo. ;P Like I said, my sambal belacan is extremely hot, and you should tweak the chili proportions to your ~~threshold of pain~~ tastebuds. Keep the weight about the same, but use a whole lot more big chilis to the chili padi.
Toast the belacan either in a toaster oven or pan-fry it dry. It's important to do so because it will heighten the flavour of the belacan.
Because of the quantity I make, I use a food processor to blitz my chilis, making sure not to blitz it too finely, nor too coarse. The texture I aim for is for it to resemble pounded chili.
Blitz the chilis with the belacan.
Add salt and sugar to taste. Keep the sambal belacan in a clean glass jar in the fridge if used regularly, or in the freezer if not going to be used soon. I usually make 2 jars - one to be frozen to be used after the jar in the fridge is used up.
Use a clean teaspoon to scoop about 2 teaspoons out from the jar. Serve the belacan with lime juice from a small lime (aka Sng Kum).

See? Even the bottle says it's hot. ;P

Ayam Goreng Kunyit

2010-08-08T07:49:00.000-07:00

We just whipped this up in a hurry for dinner tonight. We had defrosted about 12 pieces of chicken drummets and mid-wings to make Chicken in Chinese Wine, but as we decided instead to buy fried rice for dinner, I decided that fried chicken would go better with it.

I had kunyit powder or tumeric powder on hand since the last time I made Ayam Lemak (another post for another day. ;P), so we used it as a simple marinate for this dish.

Ingredients:

1/2 tbsp Kunyit Powder (aka Tumeric powder)

12 pieces Chicken Drummets/Mid-wings

2 tsp cooking oil + cooking oil for frying

Salt to taste

Method:

Dry the chicken pieces with a kitchen paper towel. This will help the kunyit adhere to them.
Using a glove - kunyit leaves a stubborn yellow stain - marinate and coat the chicken with the kunyit powder, 2 tsp of cooking oil and salt. We were in a hurry, so we only marinated for about 10 minutes. If you could, marinate as longer. Nonetheless, the 10 minutes marinate still tastes so good. =)
Heat oil up and fry the chicken pieces until done. Keep to medium heat and fry about 8-10 minutes each batch. Drain well to leave behind a crispy, yummy Ayam Goreng.

And it will be a long time when we next buy Ayam Goreng from any Nasi Padang stall. ;P

Sambal Tumis

2010-08-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

This post is specially dedicated to my friend Maggie, who wants to know how to make my Sambal Tumis. =)

Sambal Tumis is the flavour of my growing up. My granny would fry fish and then fry this sambal to lovingly slather over the fish. My Peranakan granny would make this sambal enough for the fish and have me help her prepare the ingredients by peeling the shallots, garlic and deseed the chilis.

Sadly, it is only after she passed away this year, that I rediscovered and was able to recreat this most versatile and delicious sambal. I found a simple recipe online, and with "agak"-ation (that most typical way of cooking my granny does, by estimation ;P), I've managed to tweak it to that taste that never fails to remind me of Ah Mah.

Furthermore, the website I found the recipe also suggests making the sambal in a larger batch, so that unlike Ah Mah's way of frying the sambal only when needed, all I need to do is to scoop a tablespoon or so out and add it to whatever I have on hand to make a dish - hard-boiled eggs, fishball, prawns, squid and yes, fried fish. =) The sambal is a good intro for young kids to eating spices because despite its fierce RED, the spiciness is actually very mild. The kick to the sambal is actually the blend of the garlic and onions, giving it a lovely pungent flavour to the whole. Part of the redness is from the dried chili - which explains the mildness of the spice. Fresh chilis would have made for a more fiery sambal.

Therefore, the recipe I'm posting here makes about 600+ gram or 2 jam jars of the sambal. I usually freeze one jam jar and they do keep very well because of the oil and spices in the sambal.

Ingredients:

To be pounded or processed into a paste:

100g Dried Chili (After measuring it out, deseed the chili, and soak for at least half an hour. Then drain. You can replace this with fresh chili for a spicier sambal, but the dried chili version keeps better than the fresh chili version.)

400g Shallots (or a shallot/Red onion mix or just red onions)

35g Garlic

9 pieces Candlenut (aka Buah Keras. Or if Candlenuts aren't available, substitute it with Macadamia nuts)

45g Belachan (toasted either in a toaster oven or pan-fry it dry; doing so will heighten its flavour.)

Because of the amount of spices involved, it would take a lot of energy to "tumbok" it in a pestle and mortar. Therefore I use a food processor to blitz my spices. However, to make sure that my spices are blended into a texture like pounding, I process my spices individually and then mix them in a bowl. However, if your food processor is larger, you may blend your spices together, and to help faciliate the blending, just add a little water or oil.

Also, the amount is an estimate. If you prefer a sweeter version of this, add more onions. More pungent? Add more garlic. Spicier? Then go with fresh chilis - or better yet, throw in a few chili padis! More lemak? More nuts. ;P

To be prepared ahead and added while frying:

60ml Assam water (or about 4 tsp Assam/Tamarind pulp mixed with 60 ml of water and strained.)

2.5 tbsp Sugar (or more if you like the paste sweeter)

1/2 tsp Salt (to taste - and depending on the brand of your belachan.)

Method:

Heat up 1/2 cup of heart-healthy oil in a wok. (I use Canola oil. =)) Test the readiness of the oil with a small bit of the paste. When you see the small amount of paste sizzle, add in all the paste into the wok and set the timer for 10 minutes. Keep stirring the paste on and off for this duration at low to medium heat. There won't seem like much going on, just a bit of steaming, but this initial blending of the spices is to prepare it for the second step.

At the 10 minute mark, add the Assam water, sugar and salt. After adding the condiments, you could taste test and add more sugar or salt where needed. Continue frying about 15 to 20 minutes more at low heat.

Towards the end of the frying time, you'll notice that some of the oil starts to separate from the paste, and there's a lot of steam produced. This is a good sign that your sambal is heading for completion. =)

Once the time is up, and you see that your sambal has turned a darker shade of red, remove it from the wok into a clean and dry bowl to cool. Once it is cooled, store it in clean glass jar in the fridge.

To use:

Be as creative as you like:

To oil in a pan or wok, add about 1 to 2 tablespoonful (or more) of the sambal to warm it up and make it more pliable after its stint in the fridge.
Add in other ingredient of choice. eg.

Hard boiled Eggs or Quail's Eggs

Ikan Bilis (Fry the ikan bilis first, then add the sambal into the pan)
Fish ball (Fry the fish balls first)

Prawns or Squid or other seafood (Fry the seafood a little first, then add in the sambal)
Fried fish (Fry the fish and plate it first, then fry the sambal and pour it over the fish)

Or use the sambal as a dipping sauce for Nasi Lemak, or eat it with keropok. Or like Ethan did - he added it to his Macaroni & Cheese! lol!

I love it added to my dry instant noodles - those instant noodles I buy without the soup condiments. It's lovely mixed in the noodles, with a sunny-side up egg on top. =)

It's also good on its own.

Chinese Apple Soup

2010-05-03T21:52:00.000-07:00

Edna has been suffering from coughs for the past 5 days, and the poor dear has been miserable through the night, waking up to cough. Therefore, I was happy to find this Chinese Apple soup recipe, because apparently the soup is cooling and good for dealing with phlegms.

I found this recipe here, but I've modified it with another Apple soup recipe I found online sometime ago.

Ingredients:

2 large Fuji apples (remove core, then cut into 8 pieces each)

1 onion, cut into quarters

200g soft pork bones

10g sweet almonds (南杏)

5g bitter almonds（北杏）

8 dried dates, with seeds removed

3 fig fruits (无花果）

1.5L water

Salt (to taste, but optional)

Method:

1. Blanch the pork bones over boiling water and set it.

2. Rinse the dates, figs and sweet and bitter almonds and set them aside.

3. Put water (I usually boil my water in an electric kettle to save using the gas) in a thermal cooking pot, with all the ingredients listed. Bring the water to boil for about 10 minutes.

4. Put the thermal pot into the outer pot and keep it there for at least 2 hours.

5. Add salt to taste. Serve.

The soup is refreshing to taste. Light and sweet with a sourish, salty tinge. I haven't tried this, but apparently you could half the number of apples and replace it with Chinese Pears (those yellow ones), or even replace the apples with pears if the pears are in season.

What makes this soup good for cough is the following:

(Source: The World of Nourishing and Fine Soups by Kenny Chen)

Sweet almonds (南杏) : It tastes sweet and is neutral in nature. It is non-toxic and relieves cough.
Bitter almonds (北杏): It carries a slight trace of toxins but heals cough and expels phlegm.
Fig fruits (无花果): It clears heat and phlegm, nourishes the lungs and aids digestion with its high fibre content.

I wrote the Chinese names down and went to the nearby Chinese Medicine shop and bought 50g of each of the above. It came to S$3 only. There was enough ingredients to make another batch of this soup, for the amount of figs; but there was still so much of the almonds for a few batches. =)

The next time I make my Chinese Watercress Soup, I'll add the almonds - especially if my little ones have the coughs. =)

Cream of Pumpkin Soup

2010-04-26T06:04:00.000-07:00

I just made Cream of Pumpkin soup today. It was so good that Edna had second helpings and was ready to call one of our friends to tell her how yummy it was! lol!

I'll put up the photos once I've downloaded them. =)

Cream of Pumpkin Soup:
Ingredients:

At least 1/2 a medium pumpkin
1.75 litres water

60g Celery (finely sliced)
3 cloves Garlic (chopped)
1 large Onion (chopped)
1 potato, 1cm cubed
30g butter
40g flour
2 Knorr chicken cubes

1 tablespoon rolled oats
200ml UHT milk
1 tbsp sugar
Pepper to taste

Method:
1. Boil 1.75 L of water.

2. Clean out the pulp of 1/2 a pumpkin, reserve the seeds to toast for a snack. No need to remove the pumpkin skin, but cut the pumpkin to about 1 inch pieces and toast them in the oven for about 20-30 minutes until the pumpkin is soft. Toasting the pumpkin caramelises the sugar in the pumpkin for a lovely sweetness. =)

3. Once the pumpkin is soft, the skin can be removed easily. Put the pumpkin into a food processor or blender, but don't start blending yet!

4. In a frying pan, melt the butter and fry the onion, garlic, potato and celery until soft. To this mix, reduce heat slightly and add the chicken cubes and flour and stir thoroughly for about 1 or 2 minutes. Add some of the hot water until you get a thickened watery mixture. Add in the oats, but you don't need to cook it further.

5. Put this thickened mixture into the food processor or blender, and blend it with the pumpkin. If needed, you can add more hot water.

6. Pour the blended mix back into the soup pot, add in the rest of the hot water, milk and sugar, then turn up the heat.

7. When the soup is boiling, put it back into the thermal pot for a time to let the flavours mix. You do not have to reheat the soup before serving.

8. Freeze or refrigerate whatever soup not consumed.

Yes, the soup base is like that of my Broccoli Soup, so if you're familiar with that easy to make soup, this is just as simple to make, healthy and so good to eat. =)

Oh Wow Oh My Caramel Popcorn

2010-04-09T05:49:00.000-07:00

Basic Popcorn is so easy to make and is such a fantastic low-calorie snack. Unlike the popcorn you buy at cinemas, you get the option of how much butter and salt to add. However, there's nothing... absolutely nothing like crispy, caramel-coated bites of calorie-laden popcorn to tantalise those tastebuds.

To make popcorns, it's a simple 2 ingredient method:

In a medium saucepan with lid, pour in about 1 tablespoon of oil (I use Canola) and about 3 tablespoons of corn kernels. You can buy these corn kernels from the dry goods section of NTUC or most supermarkets.

Close the lid on the saucepan, and put the pot on medium heat. Shake the saucepan gently to coat the kernels with the oil, until you hear or see (if you're using a glass lid) the sound of a popcorn popping. Continue shaking the pot until the popping sound slows down to about 2 seconds between each pop. Remove the popped corns into a fresh bowl and if there are still unpopped kernels, you can return those to the heat.

If you like, you can melt some butter and salt and drizzle the mixture over the popcorn. Otherwise, you could try this easy "Oh Wow Oh My" Caramel Popcorn.

For 100g of freshly popped popcorn,

Ingredients

50 g salted butter

200 g brown sugar

55 ml corn syrup

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp vanilla extract

Method

Preheat oven to 95 degrees C. Place freshly popped popcorn in a very large bowl in the oven to keep warm.
In a medium saucepan over medium heat, melt butter. Stir in brown sugar, corn syrup and salt. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Once sugar has melted, boil without stirring for 4 minutes. This will make the caramel crispy later.
Remove from heat and stir in soda and vanilla. Pour in a thin stream over popcorn in the bowl and stir well to coat.
Place in a large shallow baking sheet and bake in the preheated oven, stirring every 5 minutes, for about a minimum of 15 min. The original recipe calls for stirring every 15 minutes for an hour, but I was in a hurry and the kids were impatient for the treat. ;P
Remove from oven and let cool completely before breaking into pieces. This is very important, otherwise the popcorns will be too hot and sticky. Waiting until it cools makes the treat less sticky.

That's all for now... enjoy the treat! =)

Rose Meringue Cookies

2010-04-04T04:27:00.000-07:00

These cookies are so simple to make and they taste so sweet and light.

Ingredients:
90g Egg White
175g Caster Sugar
1/2 tsp Cream of Tartar
1 tsp Rose Essence
2-3 drops red food colouring

Method:
1. Beat egg white in mixer until frothy, then add in the cream of tartar.
2. Beat the egg white until soft peak appear, then add in the sugar tablespoon by tablespoon so that it mixes in and dissolves. You'll want your egg white to look stiff and glossy.
3. Add in the essence and colouring.
4. Pipe the egg white onto a lined baking sheet in swirls to look like rosettes.
5. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 120 deg celsius for about 60 minutes, turn off the oven and leave it in there for another 60 minutes.

Store in an air-tight container.

You could make variations of these meringue cookies, limited by your store of essences and imagination. Instead of rose essences, you could use lemon or lemon essence for a lemony meringue cookie. Just remember that it's a sweet treat, so your essences need to have a citrusy base or a fruity base to work. ;)

Amaretti

2010-04-04T04:07:00.000-07:00

These are delicious Italian Almond biscuits made with ground almond, egg white and sugar - no flour, so they're gluten-free! =)

I had lots of egg whites frozen from my CNY bakes, so it was a cinch to make these cookies for Easter.

Ingredients:
60g Egg White
250g Ground Almond (bought from Phoon Huat)
200 grams Castor Sugar that has been processed through the food processor
1/2 teaspoon Almond Essence (optional)

Method:
1. In a mixer, add the ground almond and castor sugar and mix for 1 minute.
2. Into the mixer, add the egg white in 3 batches, until everything comes together.
3. Roll the sticky dough, teaspoonful by teaspoonful onto a lined baking tray.
4. Pop it into a pre-heated oven at 190 degrees C, for about 5 minutes, or until the cookies have risen, are a deep golden color and have tiny cracks.
5. Remove from the oven and cool on a rack. When cool gently peel cookies from the baking paper. If they stick, turn the paper over, take a damp paper towel and gently wipe the bottom of the parchment paper to loosen the cookie.

Recipe adapted from: http://www.joyofbaking.com/AmarettiCookies.html

This cookie keeps well and usually taste better a few days after baking... if they can last that long. ;p

Baked Chicken Stuffed with Avocado

2010-03-16T01:26:00.000-07:00

This is so easy and healthy to make. The resulting stock from this dish, we used to make chicken noodle soup with the leftover fettucini. =)

A tip: NTUC sometimes has Avocadoes from Mexico in a bundle of 4 for about S$4, which is the cheapest I've found Avos in Singapore. Most places sells them for about S$1.50-S$1.90 each. Cold Storage retails the Australian Avos for S$2+!

Baked Chicken Stuffed with Avocado

http://video.about.com/homecooking/Avocado-Stuffed-Chicken.htm

Ingredients:

8 chicken breasts/legs, pounded flat

4 avocados

6 tablespoons lime juice

1 teaspoon pepper

2 teaspoon garlic powder (You can also use fresh minced garlic)

16g fresh, minced basil leaves

400g diced cherry tomato (You can also use normal tomatoes, but dice them smaller to make it easier to stuff)

150g chopped sweet onion

pepper mill

Method:

Slice the Avocados
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Cut the avocados lengthwise all the way around. Twist the halves and using your knife, strike and remove the pit.
With a large spoon, scoop the avocado out of its peel. Then, with a small paring knife, slice the avocado lengthwise.
Put the lime juice on the avocados to prevent them from turning brown.
Place the avocado slices in a mixing bowl. Add the pepper, the garlic powder, the minced basil, the diced tomato, and the chopped onion. Mix this all together.
Divide this mixture into two parts, so that you will stuff the chicken with one part and retain the other half as an accompanying salad for your meal.
Lightly oil a deep baking dish with cooking spray. Make sure that the baking dish is deep to hold all the chicken stock that will be produced by the chicken.
To stuff the chicken, lay a piece of chicken out on a flat surface. Scoop out a spoonful of the mixture and lay it onto the chicken. Roll the meat over the mixture and tuck in the ends.
Place the stuffed chicken in the dish. Do this with all of the chicken. Then sprinkle the top of the chicken with the cracked peppercorns.
Bake the chicken in the oven for 45 minutes.

Serve the chicken with the carbohydrates of your choice. We like it with Aglio Olio fettucini, as we can drizzle the resulting chicken stock over the fettucini.

Fresh Tomato Soup

2010-03-16T00:56:00.000-07:00

This soup is soooo good, you'll never want to have Campbell's version of tomato soup again! The beautiful fresh taste of tomatoes is preserved, while the smooth creamy texture of the soup will make you crave for more. =)

Original recipe from Allrecipes, and can be found here:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Garden-Fresh-Tomato-Soup/Detail.aspx

Fresh Tomato Soup (serves 10)

Ingredients

1.5 kg skinned fresh tomatoes (approximately 2 large tomatoes per bowl of soup)

1 and a half large onion, sliced

6 whole garlic cloves

1.5 L chicken stock (or 1.5 L water, with 2 Knorr Chicken cubes)

3 tablespoons butter

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon white sugar, or to taste

Optional:

Finely chopped fresh basil and croutons for garnishing

Directions

To skin tomatoes:

Boil a pot of water.
Lightly cut through the skin of a tomato and then immerse the tomato into the boiling water for about 20 seconds, or until you see the skin of the tomato start peeling off. The tomato shouldn’t be in the boiling water too long as you don’t want to cook it. You just want the tomato’s outer layer to soften so that the skin can come off easily.
Using a slotted spoon, transfer the tomato into a large bowl of icewater.
Use your fingers to easily remove the skin of the tomato.
Now cut the tomato into half and remove the hard stalk bit, and then cut the tomato into smaller pieces and put it aside for the soup.

To make the soup:

In a large pot, combine the tomatoes, onions, garlic and chicken stock. Boil for about 10 minutes until the tomatoes and onions soften.
Blend the soup in a blender until smooth.
In the empty pot, melt the butter and stir in the flour to make a roux. Gradually whisk in bit by bit of the blended tomato soup so that no lumps form. Once there is a good amount of smooth tomato soup in the pot, you can just pour the rest of the tomato soup in.
Season with the sugar or add in salt if you wish to taste.

I used a thermal pot for step no. 3, so that after bringing the soup to boil, I put it into the thermal pot for the soup to ‘rest’ and its flavours to blend.

I then serve the soup with fresh chopped basil, which brings out the very bright tomato flavour of the soup. I also throw some homemade croutons into the soup as garnish. Yummy!

Brenda's Cream of Broccoli Soup

2010-01-10T21:39:00.000-08:00

My family loves cream soup, and once I learnt how easy it was to make and freeze my own, we've not bought a can of Campbell's anymore! =)

I use my thermal pot for making cream soups, and here's our favourite cream soup recipe:

Brenda's Cream of Broccoli Soup

2 litres water

600g Broccoli (with stalk)

60g Celery (finely sliced)

3 cloves Garlic (chopped)

1 large Onion (chopped)

30g butter

50g flour

2 Knorr chicken cubes

1 tablespoon rolled oats

500ml UHT milk

Dash of Nutmeg

Pepper to taste

Grated Cheddar Cheese for garnishing

1. Boil 2L of water.

2. 600g of broccoli is about 2 large heads of broccoli. I usually just trim the broccoli of any discolouration and leaves, and then add the whole broccoli with its stalk to the boiling water. Boil for them for about 5 minutes, then remove the broccoli and save the liquid for later.

3. By now, the broccoli is soften (and HOT!). Use a knife and cut out about a quarter of the florets, chop them up roughly and reserve them for the final step. This will give your cream soup texture. Cut up the rest of the broccoli and put it in a food processor or blender, but don't start blending yet! =)

4. In a frying pan, melt the butter and fry the onion, garlic and celery until soft. To this mix, reduce heat slightly and add the flour and stir thoroughly for about 1 or 2 minutes. Add some liquid from the soup pot until you get a thickened mixture.

5. Put this thickened mixture into the food processor or blender, and blend it with the broccoli. If needed, you can add more liquid from the soup pot. How creamy you want your soup depends on how long you blend.

6. Pour the blended mix back into the soup pot, add in the chicken cubes and oats, and then turn up the heat. The oats thicken the soup and gives it a nice flavour and texture.

7. When the soup is boiling, stir in the milk, all the broccoli, nutmeg and pepper. Heat the mixture until it simmers or until tiny bubbles appear at the side. It’s ready to serve. However, if you’re using the thermal pot like me, I usually put it back into the thermal pot for a time to let the flavours mix. You do not have to reheat the soup before serving.

8. Garnish the soup with grated cheddar cheese. Serve with crusty French bread. =)

9. Freeze whatever soup not consumed.

You can also substitute the broccoli with watercress for cream of watercress soup or potato and carrot for potato soup. =) Also, you can add salt or pepper to taste, but our family finds that the soup is tasty enough without additional salt.

I like my cream soup soupy-thick, rather than gravy-thick.

Brenda's Non-drip Sloppy Joes

2008-11-06T02:21:00.000-08:00

Ever since Noel came back from his trips to the beautiful Telunas Beach with a school group for Service Learning at a Malay fishing village, he's been bugging me to make Sloppy Joes. So finally, I googled for Sloppy Joe recipes, and made some for him.

I surprised not only him, but myself as well. Sloppy Joes are so much easier to make than hamburgers and are just as tasty. Also, having modified the method to utilise my excellent fuel saving thermal pot, I can cook this meal with relative ease long before the meal begins. =)

Although I read that Sloppy Joes keep well in the freezer, the amount I made is just enough for my meat-loving family. Keep? Nothing is left for the next meal! But if you do want to prepare this long in advance, the general advise is to put the meat in muffin trays and freeze it. Then remove the frozen meat from the muffin tray and keep it in a ziploc bag in the freezer.

SLOPPY JOE

Ingredients:
500g lean ground beef
50g chopped onion
40g chopped capsicum
2 tsp chopped garlic
1 tsp yellow mustard
3/4 cup ketchup
3 tsp brown sugar
===
1 tbsp oats, mixed with 1/4 cup hot water (if using thermal pot) OR
1 tbsp oats, mixed with 1/2 cup hot water (if NOT using thermal pot)
===
A dash of dried oregano (optional)
ground black pepper to taste

Method:
1. In a large frying pan (or wok) over medium heat, brown the ground beef, onion, and capsicum; drain off liquids. (The liquids can be saved and frozen as beef stock for stew etc.)

2. With Thermal Pot:
Transfer the beef mix to the thermal pot and add the garlic, mustard, ketchup, brown sugar, oats mix, oregano and pepper to taste. Mix thoroughly and cook over medium heat until mixture bubbles for about 2 minutes, then transfer to the thermal pot’s outer sleeve to cook for at least another 30min for the flavours to mingle. (You could make this hours in advance and have piping hot Sloppy Joes for a picnic! =))

2. Without A Thermal Pot:
Add into the frying pan, the garlic, mustard, ketchup, brown sugar, oats mix, oregano and pepper to taste. Reduce heat, and simmer for 30 minutes.

3. Serve the Sloppy Joe on a soft hamburger bun; it’s up to you how dressy you want the burger to be - a slice of cheese? Onion rings? Tomato slices? It’s all up to you. =) However, make sure that when cutting the burger in half, to cut it slightly concave so that the bun holds the meat better. As it is, this Sloppy Joe recipe holds itself quite well because of the oats, but a well-cut bun helps too.

Enjoy!

Lemon Meringue Cheesecake

2008-11-04T23:24:00.000-08:00

At last! The anti-baking/cooking spell is broken. The day after my one month confinement, I got a baking itch and baked a chocolate brownie; simple and satisfying. Then it was a lot of other bakes and food that followed. The only problem was that I didn't have the time to upload the pics/recipe, what with breastfeeding Ezra, homeschooling Ethan and being the all-round BFF to Edna. =) Busy, busy days... but like a brownie, rich and satisfying! *wink*

Inspired by a Cedele Lemon Meringue, I tried looking for a Lemon Meringue recipe, but was sidetracked by a most intriguing dessert I found on www.kraft.com.au - a Lemon Meringue Cheesecake. Besides, looking at the recipe, I realised how simple this Meringue? Cheesecake? is to make.

Unlike a Meringue pie, I did not need to bother with a pie crust. Further, I didn't need to deal with cooking the lemon curd. For like a chilled cheesecake, this recipe only required a sweet biscuit base and using the electric mixer to mix the cheesecake ingredients to chill, and then on with the Meringue top. =)

Or so I thought...

True to form, the cheesecake part was a piece of pie. *wink*

Lemon Meringue Cheesecake
(modified)

Ingredients:
120g Marie Biscuits (crushed in a ziploc bag with a rolling pin. I set Edna to this task and she pounded with gusto!)
115g Butter, melted
500g Cream Cheese (That's 2 block PHILADELPHIA Cream Cheese), softened to room temperature
1 can Condensed Milk
1/2 cup Lemon juice

Method:
1. Mix the biscuit crumbs with the butter well, and then press the mixture into a 26 cm (or thereabouts) springform pan which is lined with baking paper. Use a flat bottom glass to press in the bottom of the pan, and the back of a spoon to press the crumbs to the sides of the pan. Chill in the fridge if you do not intend to use it yet, or freezer if you intend to use it soon.**
2. In an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese until it's smooth, then add the condensed milk and lemon juice. Continue beating until the mixture is well mixed.
3. Pour the cream cheese mix into the prepared biscuit crust. Chill until the mix is firm, which takes about 3 hours, or overnight.

As for the Meringue top, I deviated from the kraft.com.au recipe.

You see, I expected the Meringue top to be a bit flaky/crunchy like Cedele's, which is why my first attempt looked like this:
Certainly, I was a bit disappointed that the Meringue wasn't like Cedele's crispy one, but then I realised that Cedele's meringue is probably done in a Meringue cookie style, characterised by more sugar, low oven temperature and longer baking time - not what this recipe required.

To cut a long story short, what happened is that through doing research on why my Meringue was soft, I discovered The Perfect Meringue! Just imagine a lighter than marshmallow meringue that is so light it disappears on your tongue... mmm....

The Perfect Meringue Topping

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon Cornstarch
1/4 cup Water
4 Egg Whites (it's much easier to separate eggs and whites when they just come out of the fridge. For making meringue, you'll need to allow the whites to get to room temperature. Cold egg whites don't fluff out as well.)
1/2 teaspoon Cream of Tartar
1/2 cup Caster Sugar

Method:
1. In a small saucepan, whisk the cornstarch and water together. Keep whisking while cooking it over medium heat until the mixture thickens. Be careful because this will occur very quickly; in about a minute. Once thickened, remove the saucepan from the heat and continue whisking until it's smooth. Then cool completely before use. Remove lumps if there are any.

2. Place room temperature egg whites and cream of tartar into the bowl of a stand mixer. On high speed, whip until foamy/bubbly.

3. Reduce speed to medium and whip, while slowly sprinkling in the 1/2 cup of sugar. Return to high speed and whip until whites form a ribbon that folds back on itself when beater is raised, about 1-2 minutes (Pre-soft peaks).

4. Stir in the cornstarch mixture and beat on high speed until shiny, soft peaks form, about 2-3 minutes.

5. Then, spread on top of the chilled cheesecake. Save some to pipe around the edges of the pan, or use a table knife to form spikes. Finally, bake in an oven at 180 degree Celcius until the peaks brown and caramelise, about 15 minutes.

6. Remove from the oven and cool before putting it back in the fridge to chill. Cut and serve.

A Close Up

**If you look at the pictures carefully, you'd notice that in the first attempt, I used a springform pan, but in the second attempt, I used an oven-proof glass pie dish. Looks-wise, using the pie dish is prettier, but it's certainly not easy to cut out a slice. In fact, each time I wanted a slice, I needed to microwave the dish for 10 sec to loosen the biscuit crust from the glass. The springform pan was a breeze to cut, but there'll be about an inch of white where the meringue cannot brown. Of course, to "disguise" this white band, you could always press the biscuit crumbs to the top of the springform pan.

Rum & Raisin Chocolate Cheesecake

2008-06-14T23:38:00.000-07:00

I made these yummies for a Masak-Masak challenge. The challenge was to cook/bake/create something that includes the following ingredients: cream cheese, chocolate and a fruit.

I found the following recipe after a quick google and modified it slightly. I love the idea of these cheesecakes because they are in individual portions, and the recipe only requires a 250g block of cream cheese. Most cheesecake recipes require 2 blocks of cream cheese to put into a springform pan. As I'm still in a baking doldrum, I'm rather lazy to dust out the springform for baking. *g*

Rum & Raisin Chocolate Cheesecake

Making the Rum and Raisin:

Soak 95g (1/2 cup) of raisins in 80ml (or 1/3 cup) rum in a covered bowl for at least 6 hours or overnight. I soaked the raisins for a few days because after I began the recipe, I got lazy to continue it. *g*
To use, separate the raisins from the liquid. Keep the liquid for the cheesecake.

Ingredients for the cheesecake:

Cooking spray, to grease muffin tin
200g plain chocolate biscuits
60ml (1/4 cup) light corn syrup/golden syrup
50g unsalted butter, melted
1 tsp powdered gelatine
liquid from Rum & Raisin
200ml carton whipping cream
250g Philadelphia cream cheese, at room temperature
80g (1/2 cup) icing sugar mixture, sifted
150g 70% dark chocolate, melted in microwave
raisins from Rum & Raisin

Method

Spray lightly, twelve 80ml (1/3 cup) muffin pans to grease. These are the usual sized cupcake pans you'd use for making cupcakes. The recipe calls for lining the bases and sides with non-stick baking paper, but being lazy, I just lined it with cupcake liners.
Use a food processor and process the chocolate biscuits until they are fine. In a bowl, add corn syrup and butter to the biscuits. Stir until well combined. I weighed the mix and then divided the mix equally into 12 portions. Each portion is put into the cupcake liners and pressed down with the base of a small glass. Place the muffin pan in the fridge until required.
Put the liquid from the rum & raisin in a small bowl and heat it in a microwave for 30-45 seconds on high. Add the gelatine and stir with a fork until it dissolves. If the gelatine doesn't dissolve, send it back to the microwave for another 10 seconds and stir again until most of the gelatine dissolves. Set it aside for 5 minutes to cool to room temperature.
In a mixing bowl, use a wooden spoon to beat the cream cheese and sifted icing sugar until smooth. Add the cooled rum mixture, melted chocolate and raisins to the cream cheese mixture and beat until well combined.
Use an electric beater to whisk the cream in a bowl until soft peaks form.
Then, using a large metal spoon, gently fold in the whipped cream into the chocolate cream cheese mixture until they are all combined.
Spoon the filling evenly among the muffin pans. Gently tap the pans on the bench and smooth the surface with the back of a spoon. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 4 hours or until set.
Use a skewer to loosen the cheesecakes from the muffin pan. You can either leave the cupcake liner on or not, depending on your preference.

The original recipe calls for extra 50g of melted chocolate to drizzle on the cheesecake, but I've simplified it with just a maraschino cherry on the cheesecake for a cheerful look. And this is the result!

Happy Father's Day, Noel!

Rainbow Cookie

2008-04-23T01:01:00.000-07:00

I teach Sunday School and sometimes, baked goods play a role in my lessons. Since I was archiving some of my lessons on the Sunday School blog, I thought to share these recipes here too. :)

This one is very simple to make, since there really isn't a need to make multiple cookies - just a huge one or two would do. ;)

I got this recipe from here.

1 cup sugar
1 cup butter, softened
2 cups flour
1 tsp. vanilla
1 egg
Food coloring-with red, blue and yellow you can make all the other colors.

1. Mix sugar, butter, egg and vanilla. Add flour and mix well.
2. Divide dough into six balls.
3. Add a different food coloring to each ball.
4. Roll each ball in a snake shape onto a floured surface. (I put the dough into a cookie press and formed a long line with it. The dough is very soft because of the butter, so if you're rolling, put it in the fridge to harden first before doing so.)
5. Arch snake shape and press onto cookie sheet.
6. Add other snake shapes until the rainbow is formed. Red on the outermost, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo (bluish-purple), and Violet (reddish-purple).
7. Bake at 180 deg Celsius for about 8-15 minutes.

=====

Uses:

1. Use the cookie in a lesson on God's Promise. (It goes great with Hillsong's Kids' "Rainbow" as an object lesson.)
2. "Taste and see that the Lord is Good!" Ps 34:8
3. Use the cookie in a lesson on sharing (since the cookie has to be broken into pieces to share.)

Halo 3 Cake; Instant Chocolate Ganache

2007-12-25T21:40:00.001-08:00

Ethan wanted a Halo 3 birthday cake for his birthday. I almost fainted thinking about how to recreate the Halo 3 look - space, the main character etc.

In an inspired move though, I decided to fashion the cake on Noel's Halo 3 commemorative t-shirt, which he got as one of the first persons in Singapore to get the game (See how fanatic my boys are about the Halo franchise? *winks*). Also, since Noel's birthday is also in December, I figured I could make 2 boys very happy with one cake.

I baked 3 8-inch square cakes using my chocolate cupcake recipe. I wanted a dense, chocolatey texture for the cake and I love how moist my chocolate cupcakes remained days after baking it. I had to extend the baking time to about 40 minutes each cake. I then sliced the cake in the middle to get 6 squares, in order to get 3 layers of cake.

Next, I slather a layer of "instant" choc ganache to sandwich the layers together, with the final layer a mix of canned dark cherries and choc ganache:

In between layers, I brush the cake with the liquid from the canned cherries mixed in with a little rum (not enough to make drunk kids... it's a kids' cake after all), moistening the cake further. *decadence...sighs* When the 3 layers are done, this is what a slice of the cross-section looks like:

The rectangle cake is then cut into shape. I sliced the bottom square into 2 smaller rectangles, and half one of that rectangle for sleeves:

I shaped a collar and the sleeves, and then covered the entire cake with the choc ganache.

After that, I covered the entire cake with fondant:

After that, I added the collar and sleeve details:

I printed out the Halo 3 logo from the Net, and then cut it out from the blue fondant:

Here's the final product:

I used the leftover fondant to cover the cake base and voila! Cake done!

Here's the cake inspiration:

And the cake close up:

I figured in total, I used about 4 Cadbury 70% Cocoa choc bars just for the ganache filling and frosting below the fondant layer. For the ganache, I did a lot of research to find a simple recipe. I struck gold with this amazingly simple 2-ingredient-2-step method to making the most versatile chocolate ganache from this site.

Ingredients:
170g Dark Chocolate (I used the Cadbury Old Gold 70% Cocoa)
1 can Nestle Cream Pure Dairy Sterlised Cream

Method:
1. Heat the choc in a microwave oven at short bursts of 20 sec at med heat until all the choc is melted. Be careful not to burn the choc.
2. Pour the can of cream into the melted choc and mix well until the two ingredients are incorporated.

Done!

The choc ganache is pliable and holds itself well in our warm weather. Excess ganache can be stored in the fridge and warmed in the microwave before use.

Whilst making the cake, Edna hid in a corner and stole bits of fondant to eat... I finally wisen up when I saw little finger pinches from the fondant pile. *grins*

Banana Balls or Jemput Jemput Pisang or Cekodok Pisang

2007-11-30T05:02:00.000-08:00

The hubby had a craving for banana balls... and I had over-ripe bananas with a wish to be made into anything other than banana cake or remaining a fruit. So after a thorough search online for banana balls, I finally found it in Mama Fa Mi's fotopages.

I've modified her recipe a little, especially since the bananas I had were very sweet and the amount was way more than her 3 ripe bananas. That said, this is really a recipe for the impatient cook - it takes less than 5 minutes to get the preparation done and all it takes is to fry up the banana balls.

Ingredients:
350g ripe bananas, mashed
1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 tbsp milk powder
3/4 tsp Baking powder
2 tbsp Sugar
1/4 tsp Salt
Oil for frying

Method:
1. Sift flour, baking powder and milk powder.
2. Mix the mashed banana, sugar and salt well.
3. Add the dry ingredients to the banana mix. Make sure that the overall mixture is neither too dry nor too wet.

4. Heat the oil and drop tablespoonfuls of the mixture into it. Once the batter balloons and turns a golden brown, scoop it up and drain it well.

5. Enjoy!

It's a heavenly taste - wonderful bite of banana, soft, yet chewy in texture. And it I mention that it's so simple to make? *g*

Homemade Mayonnaise

2007-11-26T19:34:00.000-08:00

In my previous post, I mentioned homemade mayonnaise. And here's how to make it:

Ingredients:
2 egg yolks
1 tbl fresh lemon juice
1 tbl white vinegar
3/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp sugar
1 tsp Dijon mustard
1 1/2 cup vegetable oil mix (I use 3/4 cup olive oil and 3/4 cup canola oil, but it's really up to you. If you find the scent of the olive oil a little heavy, you can use more canola oil. I've not tried this recipe with other oils like soya bean or corn oil, but I suppose those oils might add their own flavour into the mayo, so you can experiment to get the flavour you like.)

Method:
1. In the mixer, beat the yolks, lemon juice, vinegar, salt, sugar and Dijon mustard.
2. Whilst the mixer is beating the above ingredients, drizzle a teaspoonful of the vegetable oil into the mixer at intervals of 5 to 10 seconds. This is to allow the oil to incorporate into the yolk to from an emulsion.

(Here is a whole aside into Science which you can teach your kids - and I do since Ethan's being homeschooled. *winks* An emulsion is a mixture of two liquids that normally can't be combined, eg oil and water or here, vinegar/lemon juice and oil. Emulsifying is done by slowly adding one ingredient to another while simultaneously mixing rapidly, which disperses and suspends tiny droplets of one liquid through another.

However, the two liquids would quickly separate again unless an emulsifier is added to set and stabilise the mixture. Eggs and gelatin are among the foods that contain emulsifiers, and in mayonnaise, the emulsifier is the lecithin in egg yolk.

Emulsification is used in making medicine, and in making various items like paint, make-up, detergents and explosive. Thus concludes this post's Science lesson.)

3. Once you get a pasty mixture from your oil addition, you can add the oil in larger amount, making sure that the mixture remains an emulsion.

4. Once all the oil is incorporated, just put your mayonnaise into a jar and you're done!

For those of you worried about using raw egg yolk in cooking for fear of salmonella, make sure that the egg shell is washed before use. The egg itself doesn't contain the salmonella germs, which are actually found in fecal matter - on the outside of the egg or on unwashed hands. Therefore, wash your eggs in a mild bleach solution if you're worried (and keep those hands clean!), to kill those salmonella germs. Hey, now the Science lesson is really over! *grins*

Welcome to McBrenda's!

2007-11-20T23:11:00.000-08:00

Healthy hamburgers are an oxymoron? Not necessarily so! *grins* Homemade burgers are not only delicious, they are a chockful of healthy veggies, proteins and carbohydrates. Besides, you're almost guaranteed an empty plate after the kids have sat at the dinner table. *winks*

McBrenda's Burgers
Ingredients for Beef Patty:
500g lean minced beef
1/2 red onion, chopped finely
1 garlic clove, chopped finely
2 tbsp tomato ketchup
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp dijon mustard
1 egg yolk
1 dash dried oregano (and other dried spices for taste)
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
1. Mix all the ingredients together.
2. Weigh the entire mixture and divide the amount to get your desired number of patties. This ensures that not only will you get the right number of patties for the number of hamburger buns you bought, but also that each patty is equal in weight... which help you avoid all those "But mmmmuuuum, his patty is bigger than mine!" complaints. heh.
3. Pat the patties into shape and put it in the fridge for about half an hour for the flavours to mingle, and for the patties to retain its shape. If you'd like to freeze the patties, do so by all means - just make sure to separate the patties by sandwiching them between plastic bags. When you want to use them, just thaw them out before cooking.

4. To cook them in the oven, pre-heat the oven to 200 deg Celsius. Put your patties on a rack and grill them to perfection... which takes about 10 to 15 minutes depending on how well-done you like your patties. (Warning: Be careful not to flip the patties too early, otherwise they might break up. If you do feel the need to flip the patties - which I don't - do it at the last minute and let the oven grill it on the other side for a minute or two.)

5. Assemble the burger. Make that a two-all-beef-very-special-sauce-lettuce-cheese-pickles-onions-on-a-sesame-seed-bun... erm... well, it helps, but you can put the usual suspects into the burger - cheese, lettuce and onions. I use my homemade mayonnaise to hold the patties etc to the bun. Serve with homemade baked potato wedges. *grins*

The BE BLESSED Brownie

2007-09-30T22:20:00.000-07:00

Added on 4 Nov:
This was my first bake after my long pregnancy anti-baking (think antithesis of pregnancy craving). Edna's at that age where all cakes are birthday cakes, and all birthday cakes are hers. And what is a birthday cake without a candle? *winks*

As always, this brownie is absolutely chocolaty and aromatic. It's just so simple to bake too!

=====
On request, my Brownie recipe, which originated from allrecipes.com. *grins*

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 1/4 cups white sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans/almonds/macadamia/walnuts
3/4 cup melted butter
4 eggs

Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. Grease and flour a 9x13inch baking pan.
3. Mix together flour, baking powder, cocoa powder, sugar and salt. Stir to blend.
4. Mix in 3/4 cup cooled melted butter and 4 eggs. Make sure the butter is cooled because you really don't want to have scrambled eggs in your brownie. ;P
5. Mix thoroughly and add in the chopped nuts.
6. Spread the batter evenly into prepared baking pan.
7. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes in preheated oven.
8. Cool completely in pan before cutting into 2 inch squares.

I suppose the best thing about this recipe, apart from the yummy factor, is how fast it is to bake it. This is one of those perfect, welcomed dishes when there is a potluck to attend. *grins*

===============

(19/06/2011) Edited to add:
This brownie can be a perfect pre-bake gift for a friend.
1. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together.
2. In a dry and clean glass jar, pour sugar and press down firmly.
3. Add cocoa powder and press down firmly.
4. Pour in chopped nuts, making sure they are evenly layered in the jar.
5. Top off with the flour mix.
6. Seal the jar.

Make a card with the following instructions to attach to the jar:
=================================================================
The BE BLESSED Brownie

You'll need:
An oven. A 9x13 inch pan. 4 eggs. 3/4 cup butter. A large spoon.

Break the seal on the mix and empty the mix into a large bowl.
Engage the ingredients: Use your hands to mix thoroughly!

Beat 4 eggs lightly, and together with 3/4 cup of cooled melted butter, add them into the mix.
Large spoon in hand, mix up everything so that it's well mixed.
Ensure the pan is greased, and spread the batter into it.
Set the oven to preheat at 180 deg C, and bake for 30 minutes or until done.
Simply allow the brownie to cool in pan before cutting into 2 inch squares.
Every square of warm brownie, serve with scoop of vanilla ice-cream.
Delight in the chocolately goodness of the brownie with family and friends!

Brenda's Bergerdils

2007-07-23T19:29:00.000-07:00

Otherwise known as potato patties, these Bergerdils are easy to make and oh-so-yummy! The addition of chopped onions into the patties give these little potatoes a nice kick.

Brenda's Bergerdils
Ingredients
3 largish Russet Burbank potatoes (steamed and peeled)
3 1/2 tbsp dried shrimps (washed, blended, and fried with a very little amount of oil)
1onion, chopped
1 egg
1/2 tsp pepper
3 pieces of cream crackers, crushed (I use Hup Seng brand, and they come in packs of 3 crackers. See pic below.)

1 egg beaten with 40ml water for coating
Oil for deep frying

Method
1. Mash the potatoes and leave them to cool. You don’t have to mash them especially fine.
2. Throw in the dried shrimps, onion, crushed cream crackers (hey, alliteration! *g* I just smash the packet around and throw in the crushed crumbs into the mix), egg and pepper into the potato and mix the lot well. The ingredients flavour the potato enough that you do not have to add any more salt.
3. I like even-sized bergerdils, so I weigh them to about 50g and shape them into flattened balls. It helps in shaping if your hands are slightly wet, so after shaping about 3 or 4 bergerdils, I wash my hands to wet them. If you're making these as finger food, weigh them in at about 30g to make smaller bergerdils.

4. In a wok or pan, make sure the oil reaches about half the height of the bergerdil. Since most of the ingredients of the bergerdil cooks rather fast, the idea is to brown the bergerdil, rather than to deep fry them.
5. Dip the bergerdil into egg mixture and fry till golden brown.

6. Once removed from the wok, let the bergerdils cool on a wire rack to retain most of its outer crisp. You can eat the bergerdil warm or at room temperature (although I love eating them warm).

Bergerdils make excellent party food because they can be made in advance and warmed up before serving. And who doesn't love fried potatoes? heh

Baked Teriyaki Chicken

2007-07-10T19:40:00.000-07:00

Delicious over rice, this baked Teriyaki Chicken is quite simple to make.

Terikayi Chicken
Ingredients:
1 pieces of Chicken thighs (Or any other meaty parts, or boneless parts if you like)

Marinate:
1 tbsp dark soya sauce
1 tsp light soya sauce
1 tsp Chinese cooking wine
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp cooking oil

Teriyaki Sauce:
3 tbsp mirin
1 1/2 tbsp Kikkoman sauce
2 tbsp Japanese sake
1 or 1 1/2 tbsp sugar (depending on how sweet you want)
50 ml of water

Method:
1. Marinate the chicken with the marinate ingredients for at least an hour. It's best if it's marinated overnight.
2. Bake the chicken on a wire rack in the oven set at 200 deg C, for about 10 minutes on each side. Use the leftover marinate to baste the chicken while baking.
3. While chicken is being baked, put all the ingredients for the Teriyaki Sauce into a frying pan and allow the mixture to simmer. Once the sauce thickens to your liking and taste, put the sauce aside.
4. Arrange the baked chicken pieces on a plate and pour the Teriyaki Sauce over the chicken. Serve hot with rice.

Watercress And Honey Agar-Agar

2007-07-10T01:54:00.001-07:00

I had a glass of Watercress and Honey drink for the first time in a restaurant that specialised in Macau food. For the first time ever, I dawned on me that watercress, a veggie that almost only appeared in a savoury soup, could be enjoyed in a sweet drink.

The second time I had Watercress and Honey was in June this year. Edna absolutely loved the drink, and I thought to recreate it at home.

The quantities for the drink is just a suggestion - I suppose it's more to do with 'taste' than a hard and fast rule. Also, I really went by feel in this first try.

Watercress and Honey Drink
Ingredients:
1 bunch watercress, roots removed
5 red dates
1/4 cup rock sugar
Honey to taste
3-4 litres of water

Method:
1. Simmer the entire lot in a large pot for about 1 hour.
2. Pour the golden coloured liquid through a sieve.
3. The drink can be drunk either hot or iced. (I love it hot, but everyone else loves it iced.)

Because I made so much of the drink, I used 1.5 litres of it to make Agar-Agar. It was lovely because it wasn't too sweet.

Watercress and Honey Agar-Agar
Ingredients:
1.5 litres Watercress and Honey drink
15g Agar-agar strands

Method:
1. Boil the two ingredients together until the agar-agar strands dissolve.
2. Pour into jelly moulds and place the agar-agar into the refridgerator to set.

Both the drink and the agar-agar are lovely on hot, hot days. They'll cool you from inside out!

Eh, What's Up Doc?

2007-07-10T00:20:00.000-07:00

Carrots! That's what.

Ethan's favourite veggies, but Edna absolutely won't touch them... unless they're hidden in yummy, moist, spicy, crunchy Carrot Cake!

Carrot Cake

Ingredients:
250ml vegetable oil
150g brown sugar
3 eggs
500g coarsely grated sweet carrot (sweet, as oppose to bland. I like to use the Aussie medium-size carrots found in NTUC supermarkets that are "brandless".)
120g coarsely chopped walnuts (I crush the walnuts individually because I like coarser bits in the cake.)
375g self raising flour
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 tsp mixed spice

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.
2. Grease a 9" x 9" pan and line with baking paper.
3. Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and mixed spice together in a bowl.
4. Whisk eggs and sugar on MED till thick and creamy.
5. Fold in the oil lightly. Don't worry if the oil doesn't bind into the mixture at this stage - because it won't. Therefore, you don't need to stir the mixture too long.
6. Fold in the carrot and the walnuts. Again, don't worry if the carrot and walnuts don't get mixed evenly; the mixture still won't bind well until you...
7. Add in the dry ingredients. In this case, add in a few spoonfuls at a time, until the batter is more or less even.
8. Pour mixture into the pan and bake for about 1hr or till cooked. Test using skewer. If the top is browning too fast, cover it loosely with foil.
9. Stand cake in pan for 5 minutes before turning onto wire rack. Turn cake top-side up to cool.

Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
30g butter
80g cream cheese
lemon zest from 1 lemon
120g icing sugar

Method:
1. Cream butter, cream cheese and lemon zest till light and fluffy.
2. Gradually add in the icing sugar.
3. Cream till smooth.

After the carrot cake is cooled, frost the cake with the Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting. Then sprinkle the with extra lemon zest and coarsely chopped walnuts.

Voilá! Carrots even non-carrot eaters would give a second look. heh.

ETA on 11 July 2007:
If you want to reduce the recipe, or just as a variation, a great way of making this cake is to make cupcakes! Just follow the above method and then fill up the cups 3/4 to the top.

Make sure you bake for only 40min!

You can decorate those cuppies with carrot slices shaped into carrots, like so:

A close-up look - that's a spring onion stalk! heh

Ethan Loves Baking!

2007-07-10T00:04:00.000-07:00

This post has no recipe... only lots of Mummy's pride. heh.

Ethan came home from school yesterday with great excitement. Apparently, he had a "Math Fun Day" in school, wherein his class engaged in different Mathematical activities in a different locations in the school. There were areas where Ethan played with logic puzzles, shapes and matchsticks, but his favourite, and the reason for this post, is the area where the kids followed a Chocolate Chip Muffin recipe to bake 2 muffins that they can bring home.

Alas, the recipe remained in school, but I'm happy to report that my little baker's muffins are moist and yummy - "because we added some milk and an egg!" according to Chef Ethan.

Mousse Magic

2007-05-14T00:13:00.000-07:00

After making the Mango Mousse Cake, I went on to make Durian Mousse Cake and Strawberry Mousse Cake with the same method.

I didn't add colouring to the Durian Mousse, so the more yellow layer is the sponge. The recipe for the sponge, and assembly for the cake can be found here.

Durian Filling Ingredients:
3 egg yolks
50g castor sugar (depending on how sweet/bitter your durian is)
1 tbsp gelatine powder
45ml hot water
250g durian meat
a few drops of yellow colouring (optional)
300g whipping cream

Method:
1. Whip the egg yolks and sugar until creamy.
2. Whip the whipping cream to soft peak.
3. Dissolve the gelatine with the hot water.
4. Mix well the steps 1 and 2 together.
5. Add in the melted gelatine and mix well.
6. Add in durian flesh and mix well.
7. Refridgerate after assembling the cake.

A close-up of the piped durians!

Strawberry Mousse Mother's Day Cake

A layer of fresh strawberry in the mousse

The mousse had such a pretty pink colour that I didn't want to cover it all up with cream.
Piped hearts details

Strawberry Filling
Ingredients:
1 tbsp Gelatine powder
45ml hot water
250g pureed fresh strawberry
3 tbsp icing sugar (optional – depends on how sweet your strawberries are)
300gm whipping cream

Method:
1. Whip the whipping cream with icing sugar.
2. Dissolve the gelatine powder with the hot water.
3. Add the gelatine mix to the pureed strawberry.
4. Add the strawberry mix into the whipping cream and mix well.
5. Refrigerate after assembling the cake.

Chocolate Cupcakes

2007-05-10T20:45:00.000-07:00

Mini-cupcakes

An intriguing debate in baking is difference between Cupcakes and Muffins. Whilst the two yummy baked goods look similar, they are differentiated by the method of baking, texture and perhaps also the way they are eaten.

A cupcake is essentially a small cake. Therefore, to gain the moniker of a cake, the method usually involves creaming the butter with sugar to get a light, fluffy texture for the cake. Additionally, the ingredients are mixed into a smooth texture. Muffins, on the other hand, involves mixing the dry and wet ingredients, to get a lumpy batter; too smooth, and the muffin doesn't taste as good.

For me, muffins are usually unfrosted and eaten warm. Cupcakes, like cakes in general, are usually frosted and eaten cold.

Frosted Cupcakes

This particular recipe hails from allrecipe.com, by Ladan Miller. I've reduced the amount of sugar needed slightly, but I must say that this chocolate cupcake is both simple to make and absolutely chocolatey and delicious.

Chocolate Cupcakes

Ingredients:
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour (171g)
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (96g)
1/8 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons butter, softened (43g)
1 1/3 cups white sugar (268g)
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup milk

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 175 deg C. Line a muffin pan with paper or foil liners.
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add in the eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition, then stir in the vanilla. Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk; beat well.
4. Fill the muffin cups slightly more than 1/2 full.
5. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.
6. Frost with your favourite frosting when cool.

Frosted Mini-cupcakes

This recipe works well with both minicupcake liners and larger cupcake liners. Also, it tastes great a day after baking, retaining its moisture.

A simple frosting for the kids to use is to whip up some whipping cream with icing sugar to taste. Let the kids have fun decorating the cups with piping swirls and sugared bits available from baking shops. Chocolate rice and Hundreds & Thousands (or Fairy sugar) make great decorations too.

Or just bake the cupcakes and have a birthday cake with a difference - let the kids have the fun decorating their own birthday cakes with a candle in honour of the birthday kid!

ETA (20/11/07): You can also decorate your cupcakes with fondant (sugarpaste/gumpaste) figurines. Joyce has an entry in her blog about a sharing session we had at my place with this cupcake recipe.

ETA (20/04/2011): If you want domed cupcakes, fill your cups to 3/4, and heat your oven to 205 deg C. When you put your cups in the oven and close the door, reduce the heat to 175 deg and bake until done. The initial high heat helps make the cupcakes dome up.

If you want a flatter cupcake, fill your cups to slightly more than 1/2 the cup and preheat and bake your cups at 165 deg C. This takes longer to bake, but you'll get a flatter cupcake.

Spaghetti Carbonara

2007-05-03T20:19:00.000-07:00

Watching late night Food Channel is a terrible torture. Watching all those delicious food, so simply cooked by celebrity chefs like Jaime Oliver, Nigella Lawson and their peers easily create a desire to run out at 1am to the nearest food centre and indulge in a hot, hot plate of char kway teow to stem the tide of hunger. heh.

That said, watching the ease of chefs in preparing food is also inspiring. You keep thinking - is that all there is to make that? That's so simple!

The following recipe is adapted from David Rocco's cooking series, Dolce Vita. His programme tries to tell as story each episode, as he weaves cooking and good food into daily Italian life.

Spaghetti Carbonara (for One)

Ingredients:
A little Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 slice Bacon, cut into 1cm x 1cm pieces
100g Spaghetti
1 egg, separated
1/3 cup milk
1/3 cup grated cheddar cheese
Black Pepper

Method:
1. Cook spaghetti in rapidly boiling water.
2. Put egg white, milk, cheddar cheese and lots of black pepper in a bowl.
3. In a saucepan, put a little olive oil to fry the bacon. You may fry a little minced garlic along with the bacon if you wish.
4. When spaghetti is done, add the spaghetti to the bacon in the saucepan, and give it a stir. Immediately, lower the heat and add in the cheese mixture. Stir until the spaghetti is coated with the cheese mixture.
5. Serve the spaghetti with the egg yolk on top, eat immediately. The egg yolk will cook on contact with the hot spaghetti - YUMMY! Garnish or serve with some steamed veggies, like broccoli or french beans.

When cooking for more, just increase the amounts accordingly.

My family loves this, and to me, it's an Italian version of eating dry instant noodles. The ingredients for this are usually found in the fridge. If we don't have bacon at the ready, there's always luncheon meat or sausages.

Chicken Pie

2007-05-02T07:13:00.000-07:00

One of our favourite meals is the humble Chicken Pie. There's something just wonderful cutting into a pie, releasing that delectable aroma of whatever's underneath the pie crust.

Chicken Pies also make great gifts or potluck items because they travel well, and disposable pie tins ensures that you don't need to wait around to collect the serving dish. *winks*

This pie crust recipe comes via Leelee Hugbear. It's very special because of the inclusion of yoghurt, which gives the crust a lovely aroma and a non-oily feel.

Pie Art? Nah, just leftover pie crust, cookie cutters, and a whole lot of imagination! *hee*

A Mini Version

Chicken Pie (with Yogurt Pie Crust)

Pastry for 9" Pie
Ingredients:
200g butter
250g plain flour
1 tsp sugar
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp salt
110g plain yoghurt

Method:
1. Put all the ingredients into the mixing bowl except yoghurt, and mix to a crumble.
2. Add in yoghurt and mix to a dough.
3. Refrigerate dough for at least 30 mins to harden.

Chicken Pie Filling
Ingredients:
350g diced potatoes
1 cup water (2 half cups)
1/2 tsp salt
1 big onion, diced
50g frozen mixed vegetable
1 can of Button mushrooms, sliced
2 chicken fillets, diced
1 tbsp corn starch mixed with 2 tbsp water
1 tsp oregano flakes
1 tsp basil flakes
1 hard-boiled egg, sliced, or 4 hard-boiled quails' eggs, halved, or 8 hard-boiled quail's eggs, whole

Method:
1. Heat abt 2 tbsp of oil and fry potatoes with 1/2 cup of water and salt until soft, then set it aside.
2. In a clean wok, heat 2 tbsp oil and fry the onion until transparent.
3. Add in the mixed vegetable, mushroom and chicken. Fry for a while to break up chicken.
4. Add in the potatoes.
5. Add in another 1/2 cup of water and simmer for about 5 mins.
6. Add in the cornstarch and stir to thicken mixture.
7. Add in the basil and oregano. Stir and then set aside for later use.

Assembling the Chicken Pie
1. Split the pie dough into half, if making the large pie, or divide the dough into smaller amounts required. Keep the dough which is not in use in the refrigerator.
2. Roll out the pie dough between baking paper until the size is large enough to cover the bottom and sides of a pie dish. Don't worry if there is a tear; fix it by pressing leftover dough into the tear. Use a fork and poke some holes into the pie base so that the pie can breathe. You wouldn't want your pie to explode! *winks*
3. Put 1/2 of the filling on top of the pie base. Arrange the eggs evenly on the fillings and then cover the eggs with the rest of the fillings.
4. Roll out another pie dough to cover the top. Crimp the sides of the pie to seal the top crust with the sides of the base dough. Decorate the pie with leftover pie dough, if any.
5. Poke some holes on the top crust with a fork to allow the steam in the pie to escape. At this point, you can refrigerate or even freeze the pie until needed. If freezing, ensure that the pie is well wrapped to prevent freezer burns. Just thaw the frozen pie in the fridge until required.
6. Before baking, give the top crust an egg wash to ensure a lovely warm browned crust. Brush the pie with 1 beaten egg.
7. Bake the pie in a preheated oven at 180 deg C for 30 mins.

Enjoy!

Chinese Style Steamed Eggs

2007-04-30T20:54:00.000-07:00

Oh, this is one dish that is so easy to make, but so delicious with rice. The egg turns out as smooth as silken toufu, with a savoury, fragrant aroma.

In addition, you can add whatever ingredients to the egg mix you fancy - it only depends on what's available in your fridge, and what your tastebuds clamour for.

I've got two recipes here, but the basic steam egg preparation is as follows:
1. 1 egg to 100ml of water (or Chicken stock. The amount is 1 egg to 100ml of liquid.)
2. Pepper and Salt to taste
3. A bit of Chinese cooking wine for fragrance
4. Fried shallots, a teaspoon of sesame oil and spring onions for garnishing.

The method is to simply beat items 1-3 and pass the mixture through a sieve into a dish for steaming. The sieve will remove most of the bubbles so that you get a smooth texture for the egg. After that, you can then arrange the other ingredients you want into the dish.

Finally, the crucial step is in the steaming of the egg itself. Make sure that the dish is covered when steaming. This helps prevent water condensing onto the egg mix, and scarring it; ensuring a shine to the egg. Steam with a very low flame - which means that you should not hear the rapid boiling of water that you usually do when steaming other dishes. Steam until the egg is set, which can be between 15-20 minutes, depending on the amount you made and the size of your wok/steamer.

You can check whether the egg is set by using a knife and poking the centre of the dish. It's done when the egg doesn't run.

Steamed Eggs with Mushroom and Toufu
Ingredients:
3 Eggs
200ml water
100ml Chicken stock (I use the liquid Knorr Chicken stock from the box.)
1 tsp Hua Tiao cooking wine
Pepper and salt to taste
2 dried Shitake mushroom, soaked to soften and sliced
1 box Silken Toufu

Method:
1. Assemble the egg mix as explained above.
2. Arrange the mushroom and toufu as desired.
3. Cover the dish and steam for about 15 to 20 minutes on a low fire, until the egg is set.
4. Garnish with fried shallot, sesame oil and chopped spring onions. You might want to garnish with sliced fresh chilli if you like it spicy.

Steamed Eggs with Quails' Eggs and Toufu

Ingredients:
3 Eggs
200ml water
100ml Chicken stock (I use the liquid Knorr Chicken stock from the box.)
1 tsp Hua Tiao cooking wine
Pepper and salt to taste
6 Quails' Eggs, hardboiled and shelled
1 box Silken Toufu
1 Salted egg yolk

Method:
1. Assemble the egg mix as explained above.
2. Arrange the toufu and quails' eggs as desired. You don't have to stop at 6 eggs - any number is fine. *winks* Put the salted egg yolk in the centre of the dish.
3. Cover the dish and steam for about 15 to 20 minutes on a low fire, until the egg is set.
4. Garnish with fried shallot, sesame oil and chopped spring onions. You might want to garnish with sliced fresh chilli if you like it spicy.

The list of ingredients to add to the egg is really up to the imagination. You might want to try:

Crabsticks
Button mushrooms
Sliced fish (like threadfins)
Sliced fish cakes (especially those cute Japanese patterned ones)
Sliced meat (marinated with a little light soy sauce for between 10 to 30 minutes)
Gingko nuts
Wolfberries
Broccoli
Carrot strips

Mango Cake

2007-04-28T09:22:00.000-07:00

Ah, Mango Cake - so light, so sweet, so mango-y!

Ethan once said that mangoes got a taste that causes his tastebuds to dance excitedly; how true and how aptly described.

This recipe is by way of a wonderful cook, Leelee Hugbear, whom I aspire to be kitchen-wise and in being kitchen-wise. heh. She has a wonderful cooking blog here.

Mango Cake (Based on Leelee's recipe from M4M's archive)

The Sponge Cake
Ingredients:
4 eggs
100g castor sugar
100g cake flour
12g cake stabilizer/Ovalette
20ml water
1/2 tsp mango essence
90g melted butter

Method:
1. Line a 9”x9” square cake tin.
2. Beat all ingredients except melted butter at high speed for about 6 mins or until creamy.
3. Add in butter to the mix and mix well.
4. Bake at 200 deg C for 10-15 mins.

This will yield a cake about an inch in height. Don't worry if it's too flat; the mango mousse filling will give height to the cake later. Allow the cake to cool, then prepare the mango filling when you are ready to assemble the cake.

The Mango Filling
Ingredients:
300g mango puree (about the size of an average honey mango, puréed in a food processor)
13g gelatine powder
1/2 tsp mango essence
a few drops of yellow colouring
300g dairy whipping cream

Method:
1. While processing the mango, add in the gelatine powder. Then boil the mango mix until the gelatine is dissoved. Leave it to cool down.
2. Whip up the whipping cream. Add the cooled mango mix, the essence and colouring and mix the lot well.

Assembling the Cake, Part 1
1. Prepare an 8" cake ring.
2. Use the cake ring and press it onto the sponge cake. Cut the cake to fit into the ring, and then half the cake height-wise. You should get two 8" circles of cake.
3. Put the topmost cake, brown-side down into the cake ring.
4. Pour about 1/4 of the Mango Filling onto the cake in the ring.
5. Add in slices of mango onto the filling.
6. Pour another 1/4 of the Mango Filling on top of the mango slices, making sure that all pockets of air are filled.
7. Put the next slice of cake on top of this layer.
8. Pour the rest of the Mango Filling on top of this cake layer and smoothen the filling out as much as possible.
9. Allow the cake to chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours. Overnight chilling would be best.

Assembling the Cake, Part 2:
1. Once you unmould the cake ring, you get:
2. I whipped up about 150g of whipped cream with some icing sugar for taste to frost the sides of the cake:
3. I decorated the cake with mango slices to my fancy. Using cookie cutters, I pressed out flowers from slices of mangoes. I wanted a 'mosaic' effect for the cake, so it was diamonds and squares and triangles to cover the top. It's actually up to your creativity to decorate the cake.
Leelee also suggests either glazing the mangoes with a simple apricot glaze (apricot jam + water, boiled then cooled) to give the fruit a shine, or before unmoulding the cake to set the top layer of the cake with mango slices in agar-agar jelly.

And here's a view of the different layers of the Mango Cake. Yummy!

A friend suggests that I try this out with durians the next time I bake... and I'm thinking about strawberries as well! This is quite a moderately simple baking project - do give it a try.

The Finger Food Post

2007-03-24T05:02:00.000-07:00

Edna celebrated her first birthday recently (Has it really been a year? *whew*), and we had a party at home for her. Well, the party was in her name, but I suppose it's more a party for the other members of the family because the guests were invariably Noel's friends or Ethan's pals. Edna took it all rather well, though. She had lots of chickpeas to munch on, so she didn't mind the crowd ooh-ing and aah-ing over her antics. *grins*

So, party food!

This is certainly an easy-to-make finger food that can be made in advance. All it requires to be ready is to be popped into the oven and heated up before serving.

Bacon Wrapped Quails' Egg

Ingredients:
Bacon Slices
Quails' Eggs
Cheddar Cheese
Cucumber

Method:
1. Boil Quails' Eggs so that they become hard boiled. Shell the eggs and put them aside.
2. Slice the cucumbers thick, then cut them into half. The cucumbers are meant to act as a base to hold the skewered bacon roll in place.
3. Slice the Cheddar Cheese, and cut the slices about the size of the egg.
4. Wrap a bacon slice around the egg and cheese, skewering the bacon with a toothpick. (See picture above)
5. Push the toothpick through the bacon wrapped egg into a slice of cucumber like so:
6. When required, put the bacon wrap into the oven at 200 deg C for about 10 to 15 minutes, or until the bacon sizzles and the cheese melts.
7. Serve hot!

And yes, before you mention it, this isn't exactly a healthy food item. *winks*
But it's a party, and it's a treat.

A healthier version of the bacon roll would be the cocktail sausages. This is another finger food item that can be made in advance of parties since it's served cold.

Cocktail Sausages
Ingredients:
Chicken Cocktail Sausages
Cheddar Cheese
Canned Pineapple
Cucumber

Method:
1. Cut cucumber into small cubes, removing the seeds. Likewise, cut the cheese and pineapple slices about the same size of the cucumber.
2. Skewer the ingredients together with a toothpick.

Voilá! Enjoy!

Another Bread Post: Roti John

2007-03-07T06:15:00.000-08:00

Roti John has a very interesting history. It was invented in Singapore in 1976 by an enterprising Muslim hawker named Shukor, whose Caucasian expatriate clientéle frequenting his stall at the Taman Serasi Hawker Centre beside the Botanic Gardens, always ask him to fry up an onion omelette to eat with a side order of french loaf. Shukor decided one day to fuse the onion omelette together with the bread that voilá! Roti John was born.

Why Roti John? Well, roti is Malay for bread... and John? Well, at the time, all Caucasians were generically called John. *grins* So in honour of Shukor's clients, he named them Roti John.

The added minced/slices of beef/mutton came slightly later, but you'll be hard-pressed now if you were to find any hawker selling Roti John sans meat.

So here's the recipe:

Roti John
Ingredients:
100g minced beef
1 large onion, chopped
3 eggs
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 loaf crusty french bread, sliced like a subway sandwich, then cut to fit into frying pan

Method:
1. Mix the minced beef, chopped onion, eggs, salt and pepper together.
2. Heat up a frying pan with about a tablespoon of cooking oil.
3. Scoop the beef mix onto a piece of bread.
4. Quickly press the bread, beef-side into the hot oil. Hear the pan sizzle. Smell the aroma of the oil meeting the egg and onions. Use a spatula and give the bread a good press down and then flip it over to make the crust crispy.
5. Remove from the pan and slice the bread smaller if needed.

Serve with Sweet Chili Sauce.

Sweet Chili Sauce
Ingredients:
About 3 tablespoons of Chili Sauce
About 1 tablespoon of Ketchup
About 1 tablespoon of Sugar
About 3 table spoons of Water

Method:
1. Mix all the ingredients together. The mix should be a bit runny rather than thick.

We made Roti John for Edna's first Birthday party last week, and it was a favourite with our guests. We made chicken curry to accompany the Roti John.

The Bread Post: Garlic Bread

2007-02-28T19:20:00.000-08:00

Garlic Bread

We make our own Garlic Spread - it's not difficult at all, and it jazzes up plain bread so easily.

Garlic Spread

Ingredients
100g Butter (left out for a while so that it softens)
5 pieces Garlic (or more if you really like the garlic)
1/4 tsp Dried Oregano Flakes
1/4 tsp Dried Basil Flakes
Salt to taste
A dash of Paprika (optional - and any other herbs or spices you enjoy)

1. Put all the ingredients into a chopper or blender and hit the switch.
2. Once the garlic pieces are pluverised, use a spoon and mix the spread more evenly.
3. Spread the Garlic Butter on any bread and pop it into an oven until you can smell the garlic aroma.
4. Serve the Garlic Bread with soup.

The Garlic Spread can be made beforehand and kept in the fridge until needed. While the spread can go on any bread, we love it on crusty French loaves.