Choc Banana Bread Pudding

Made this last nite. Have been thinking about this ever since we had the delicious mouth watering bread pudding at EnO buffet lunch last month.

Mine was okay. I think I can improve. As usual, everything is nice for Ed.

Pandan Chiffon Cake Finally!

Just look at the pictures. I made it. My chiffon cake rose very well and did not deflate .. yippee.

I am so happy. I am going to do it again on Saturday to bring back to Prai for my mum. Heheheheh show off lah.

Well... this is my 7th attempt! ... sorry it is 8th attempt actually...

Me and my persistence :) (or stubborn?)

Oops after reading thru my previous post on chiffon cake... correction, this is my 8th attempt!

See link for previous post on my attempts at this:

http://chiak3.blogspot.com/2009/05/chiffon-cake-me.html

pandan chiffon cake 6th attempt

i m not crazy.... just persistent :)

this is the 6th attempt... still not very successful.... i m giving myself a month rest...and have been reading all tips i can get on baking a chiffon cake.... to ensure that my 7th attempt will be a success. 7 is a good number

why i failed this time:

1. the cake collapsed 1 cm!

Star Shaped Cake

This year, Ryan asked for star shaped cake. Last year was elmo. Gosh... i went looking for all the shops in pg island for a star shaped baking pan but could not find any. So.. the engineer in the house got to cut the cake.

I wonder what he is going to ask for next year....

we R back

It has been quite a while since we update this blog. Well, what happened was a few weeks back I found another site copying one of our post .... the whole post and even pictures. I was pissed and also at the same time freaked out. So I blocked this site. I finally had the time to remove some pictures and now we are back. Moving fwd... we will only post pictures of food...

food fest Q3 09 aka "How to lose weight laah, you tell me??"

My dad stayed over a few weekends ago and as you usual it was food fiesta time again... How to lose weight laah you tell me?? We bought some stuff from the pasar Ramadan and Lp made some stuff as well… LP made pork ribs Seasoned with soy and slowly cooked in the claypot for 2-3 hours

Its black because of the soy sauce…. Moist, sweet and tender flesh just slipping off from the bone. We’ll definitely do a grilled version if we ever get the BBQ up.

She also made a puff pastry with tuna filling topped with cut tomatoes and chillies. Very light scrumptious and definitely a good breakfast food I was actually quite disappointed this year with the fare from the pasar ramadan. Nothing that I bought tasted nice, not even remotely mediocre… And to make matters worse, our adventure to “karrukudi “ was just such a big letdown.. the briani rice was just plain bland and wet. And I’m never going back there again.

On the bright side, I found a place that sells better briani rice. Its from a nasi kander shop called tajuddin in queen street. And where is queen street? Well, it right there next to kings street and china street.. :-) (Googlemap it laah) Its only cost $3 for the rice which is quite a huge portion and $4 for a huge piece of chicken. The rice was very fluffy and it was very nicely spiced. Overall, it was so much better than the one we had at karrikudi for this one i could taste the spices, cinnamon, onions, cardamon, star aneis...etc... Mee goreng from the stall in front of the pulau tikus “mata-keng” . my personal all time favourite.

Mee goreng was as usual quite good but my dad commented that the mee rebus was not as good anymore.. also, I never buy from the Bangkok lane stall … I actually cant remember why its on my “banned” list..

And last but not least, not forgetting bran who had his porridge… hehehe…

Hari Raya Cupcakes

Initially we wanted to buy chocolates for our Muslim frens during Raya open house. Then I thought why dont I bake some cupcakes... it is home made. Had to make do with 2 icing tips that I have on hand. Misplaced 2 tips. Sigh. So typical me. I am thinking of getting the box with 26 tips... coz I cant do much with 2 tips - limit my creativity nia... hahahahah

I mixed a few colors for the icing... green (as the official hari raya color), pink and purple. The green did not turn out to my liking. So end up.... masuk perut Ryan and Ed.

Few months back I bought this nice cupcake box. Cute leh. To all my Muslim frens, Selamat Hari Raya!

no baking for the past 3 weeks

did not bake for the past 3 weeks coz my right thumb hurt going to bake tomorrow.. baking a chocolate cake for a good friend as raya gift

Agar Agar

Ang Kor Nga Peah

This is our favourite shop for Ang Kor Nga Peah - Hock Lock Siew Biscuit Trading @ Jln Nordin. It sells many types of biscuit... like loe por peng...tau sar peah...and many more. Ang Kor Nga Peah with coconut fillings. Our fav is red bean paste.

Choc Moist Cake

My recent bakings..... choc moist cake.

pies galore

my aunt made some pies over the weekend. somehow these always taste better than the ones at cbean or dome or sbucks...

the chicken pie with regular baked crust..

chicken pie exposed

my aunts sheperds pie with mash potato crust.. look at the layers of mash potato... yummy

ry just before he launched his attack.. pies were harmed sadly..

Milan Cookies: DB July's Challenge

The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

So for this months challenge, there were 2 cookies to choose from: Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies or the Milan Cookies. I chose to make the Milan Cookies.

Ingredient wise, the recipe used butter, sugar, egg white, flour, lemon, vanilla extract and heavy cream and chocolate for the cookie filling. i already had most of the items handy.except for the heavy cream as i don't usually use that.

Method wise it was pretty straight forward as well: mix all the ingredients in a mixer until the batter is smooth. spoon into a piping bag and pipe on to the cookie tray and bake. What i did not expect was that the cookie batter would spread as much as it did. i knew it would spread but i underestimated it and my 1st batch of cookies, sort of , all stuck together. :-)

well, live and learn. The 2nd and 3rd batches turned out much better. After the cookies cooled, i spread the filling and assembled the "cookies sandwiches". And ta daaaah.. I present... Milan Cookies... Taste wise, its pretty sweet :-D Actually i found the cookie to be sweeter than the chocolate filling itself and the slight hint of lemon is quite interesting.

The texture is what i would call "semi-spongy". The slightly more "browned" cookies were more chewy and my husband seems to like them a lot. This is definitely not your regular cookie.

now that i'm done with the July challenge, i eagerly await august.

Milan CookiesRecipe courtesy Gale Gand, from Food Network website

Prep Time: 20 minInactive

Prep Time: 0 min Cook Time: 1 hr 0 min Serves: about 3 dozen cookies • 12 tablespoons (170grams/ 6 oz) unsalted butter, softened • 2 1/2 cups (312.5 grams/ 11.02 oz) powdered sugar • 7/8 cup egg whites (from about 6 eggs) • 2 tablespoons vanilla extract • 2 tablespoons lemon extract • 1 1/2 cups (187.5grams/ 6.61 oz) all purpose flour • Cookie filling, recipe follows Cookie filling: • 1/2 cup heavy cream • 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped • 1 orange, zested 1. In a mixer with paddle attachment cream the butter and the sugar. 2. Add the egg whites gradually and then mix in the vanilla and lemon extracts. 3. Add the flour and mix until just well mixed. 4. With a small (1/4-inch) plain tip, pipe 1-inch sections of batter onto a parchment-lined sheet pan, spacing them 2 inches apart as they spread. 5. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 10 minutes or until light golden brown around the edges. Let cool on the pan. 6. While waiting for the cookies to cool, in a small saucepan over medium flame, scald cream. 7. Pour hot cream over chocolate in a bowl, whisk to melt chocolate, add zest and blend well. 8. Set aside to cool (the mixture will thicken as it cools). 9. Spread a thin amount of the filling onto the flat side of a cookie while the filling is still soft and press the flat side of a second cookie on top. 10. Repeat with the remainder of the cookies.

Spaghetti olio with tuna

Normally, I would make this in a pot or pan but this time I used a claypot instead. It worked quite well actually. This is a very simple dish than can be done in around 30minutes

As usual start off with the olive oil in the pan (or pot). Add the chopped onions, garlic, and mushroom. If you’ve made spaghetti olio before you’ll know that the oil is not supposed to be “spitting” hot. It should be on medium heat so that you can let the garlic/onion slowly brown. Once they’ve browned, you can add in the shredded tuna. In the meantime, boil the spaghetti. Once it’s cooked, drain and pour the spaghetti in with the garlic, onions, mushrooms and tuna. Toss evenly in the pan for a couple more minutes and serve hot.

You can sprinkle coarse black pepper or cayenne pepper as well. By the way I don’t eat this, I prefer bolognaise version. Only ed eats the olio version.

simple cinnamon rolls

its a been very productive weekend for me and its only Saturday. the next thing that i baked was a simple cinnamon roll. since the sweet dough buns were quite good, i decided to "experiment" with that and make cinnamon rolls.

i basically used the sweet dough bun recipe as a base but infused it with cinnamon powder. i also made a cinnamon mix out of... well, what else, but cinnamon powder and with chocolate chips and chocolate powder. i managed to make 2 rolls which i basically cut up into a total of 11 individual buns. once i got the dough rolled out into a rectangular shape, i proceeded to spread the cinnamon/choc mix evenly on the dough, then rolled it carefully into a tube. then i sliced them into 2 inch circular slices. bake for 20mins @180C i was a bit wary since i used the sweet dough bun recipe as it wasn't the original recipe for cinnamon rolls. BUT....... surprisingly the end result was actually interesting. its actually very nice. the texture of the dough still remained quite soft. the chocolate bits in between the rolls melted nicely and the cinnamon mix formed a sweet crunchy crust. by the way, there's still the scent of cinnamon in the air :-) Recipe for Sweet Dough Buns:

Ingredient A

100g all purpose flour

400g high protein flour (or use super soft bread flour)

220ml water

1tbsp instant yeast

100gm sugar (according to Lanvin yeast feasts on sugar and make the bread rise)

1 egg

Ingredient B

75gm butter

Method (hand knead)

1. Mix A till smooth and all mixed

2. Add in butter and knead till smooth

3. Leave it to rise - double the size. Remember to cover it with a piece of damp cloth.

4. Knead again

5. Leave it to rise. Then form into desired shapes.

6. Leave it to rise for about 10-15 mins, brush with egg and bake for ~ 20 mins.

Sweet Dough Buns

so the flavor of the week.. or of the past 2 weeks is sweet dough buns. its a recipe i picked up and changed many times over these past 2 weeks. its a pretty simple recipe but you need patience when you're waiting for the dough to rise. also i baked them in muffin cups and in cupcakes trays :-D rev0 and rev1 were basically just plain buns but they were quite soft and went nicely with butter.. just like dinner rolls so far, i've experimented with the fillings below: -sambal heh bi -peanut butter -minced pork /char siew -cadbury chocolate (special request from you know who laah..) i was going to do a nutella version but that meant making a trip to the supermarket and time just did not permit that. too bad, maybe next time... my favourite is still the sambal heh bi and as you can see, its overloaded with the yummy prawn fillings.

Knitted Hat

My 1st knitted hat. Took me 3 weeks to complete this project. Giving this hat to Loong. Hope he loves it. Next project is Transformers Autobot hat for Ryan.

Floral Pandan & Santan Jelly

The folks up north is having house warming party tonite and I was given the task to make jelly. Normally I will make Koniyaku jelly which is easy, pour everything into boiling water and cook. This time I thought of being creative so I made these.

I made the santan jelly first and using floral mould I cut the shapes and placed them into jelly moulds. Cooked pandan jelly and poured them into the jelly moulds.

Give it a try. It is pretty easy. .

Swiss Roll Attempt # 4

Finally found the right recipe for swiss roll. The texture is nice, soft and spongy. I just need to improve on the filling. Thinking of making Macha swiss roll tomorrow.

Need to find out why the skin stick to the cloth when I rolled it.

Here is the recipe from http://sakura-lovebaking.blogspot.com/2009/02/yam-swiss-roll.html

Recipe

Ingredients:

A)4 Large eggs whites

35gm castor sugar

4 Large egg yolks

35 gm Castor sugar

1/2 tsp or 2 gm baking powder

1 tsp vanilla essence

10gm cornflour(sifted)

70gm cake flour(sifted)

1 gm salt

B) 40ml Melted butter/canola oil40gm milk

Method

1)Pre heat oven at 350F.

2)Beat egg whites cream and sugar(add gradually)till stiff.

3)Add in 30 gm sugar and continue beating till thick and glossy.

4)Beat egg yolks,ovallete and 30 gm sugar till light and creamy.

5)Lightly fold in sifted flour,corn flour,baking powder,milk and oil into the egg yolk batter.

6)Gently fold in egg whites.(Do not overfold)

7)Pour batter in shallow tin lined with waxed paper.

8)Bake for 15-18 minutes.

9)You need to roll it immediately while it's hot,then let it cool. Unwrap and fill your favourite filling and roll back up.

Swiss Roll

My first attempt at swiss roll. There is still room for plenty of improvements in terms of texture, taste and shape. Found another recipe and going to try it this weekend.

briani rice and mutton

The people up north had a small a gathering in conjunction of moving in to their new place and they ordered some delicious briani rice and mutton rendang. There were mountains of leftovers so I helped myself..:-)

The mutton was very tender and was not all that spicy. and Together with the briani rice, it was a perfect combination.

 

 

assorted food @the bean

Apple crumble

Tomato and herb pasta

Brew of the day

Breakfast set.

think this was the triple layer cheese cake.. texture was very smmoth..

By the way, while we were eating at dave’s deli, ry didn’t finish his spaghetti and told me its because it didn’t taste nice and the one at the bean was nicer..WHAT??!!?? sigh.....