Ban Jiang Kueh

I am not sure whether I am allergy to something but ever since the weather turned cold, I kept having either a blocked nose or a running nose.  Some days, I will just keep on sneezing and some day it was okay.

This morning, I was woken up by a blocked nose.  Couldn't go back to sleep as my dearest next to me started snoring.

The first thought that came to mind after I woke up was Ban Jiang Kueh.  Crazy as it sounds, but there are mornings that I will crave for something to eat.  

Decided not to waste time trying to go back to sleep.  I got out of bed and went in search of a recipe.  I know I had one tucked away somewhere but I am not going to go through my huge pile of “to do” list early in the morning.

So this is what I found from Simply June.

The result was not what I expected though hubby said it was okay.  I also find that the batter was way too thick, thus I added in more water at the last minute.

Overall, this is not what I am looking. 

So friends, if you have more any good recipe that you know, hope you can share with me.  Thanks.

Have a great weekend.

For my reference, I am noting down the recipe.

What you need:

170g plain flour
100g rice flour
30g corn starch
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 large egg
1 tsp vanilla
200g water
80g sugar

Method:

Whisk everything together in a bowl.  Cling wrapped and chilled for 3 hours.

Grease pan and pour batter.

Cook till crisp on the side.

Roti Prata

Though hubby was home this weekend but we were unable to really do something fun as a family as it is the last weekend that little one can spent the time doing last minute revision as well as getting composed.

Even though we spent time at home, we didn't really do full force revision as I didn't want her to be stressed out after all, there were lots of extra time from tuition this week as well.

Thus we rest and relax in between and doing things that were relaxing.  Like making Roti Prata and cooking Ipoh Hor Fun which my little girl has been requesting.

Actually I spent the last few nights watching YouTube on lots of How To.  One video caught my attention was How to flip a Roti Prata taken from ieatishootipost.  Dr Tay is really comprehensive and the instruction was detailed and with a video that I finds interesting.  Yes I am a visual person.  Words lost me most of the time.

So I went about gathering all the necessary ingredients.  Of course not the 25kg flour that he lugged home.  I substituted it with his recommendation.

Anyway, I don’t know what got into me but I somehow read the instruction wrongly.  Geesh, didn’t I say comprehensive and yet I made this blunder.  Of course I have to be blamed because I was way too eager to start off.  You see, my kiddos love Roti Prata!  I remembered my son ate this for the WHOLE year during his primary school days.

It is also this dish that he started picking up spicy food.

Now it is my girl’s turn.  She won’t touch anything spicy except those curries that come with Roti Prata.

Every Halloween, we will make a trip down to our favourite Roti Prata place after our trick or treat.  It is quite funny walking into the restaurant with those hideous make up and getting all the stares on my kiddos.  Anyway, this year, we won’t be able to do it as little one is having her tuition.  Pity but I guess we will have to move on from here.

So here I present you my home made Roti Prata with store bought Mutton Curry that is available near my place.  Actually I wasn't happy with the outcome last night and done another batch right after.   

Overall, I was able to achieve the crispy exterior except it is rather bland but once dipped with curry, it makes up for it.  After trying twice, my conclusion is that you got to stretch the dough really thin.   I was pretty clumsy with the flipping method and thus opted for the second recommendation that was the lay and stretch method.   Try to stretch it as much as possible and paying attention to the rim of the dough as tendency of leaving a thick "rim" if overlooked.  This will results in a dough like texture on the prata.   Personally I find that it helps with more oil so that it won't break that easily. 

Will I consider this a success?  Yes!  Next one I will try the tenderly version.  

Thanks Dr Tay for all your hard work in researching!

And as for dinner, we had Ipoh Hor Fun.  This dish definitely brought back fond memories of my childhood days living in the East.   Its sure been a long time since I last prepared this one dish meal.  The last time I cooked this was way back in 2005!   Gosh! that was long time ago.

Even though it is one of my favourite but I don't know why I hardly cooked this at home. 

I guess it must be good for my girl finished her dinner first!  (for she usually the last to finish).  Guess I should cook this more often from now on.  

Ipoh Hor Fun

What you need: 
Serve: 5

2 packet Hor Fun (rice noodle) 
4 chicken breast or tigh (steamed and shred) 
chicken broth  (I prepared it with two chicken breasts, four carcasses)

3/4 tbsp oyster sauce
2 tbsp light soya sauce 
1 tbsp dark soya sauce 
1 tbsp fish sauce

pepper 
2 tbsp potato starch 
Chye Sim

Braised Mushroom

Method:

Steam your chicken. Keep the juice from the chicken.  (I find this more flavourful than cooking it in the broth) 

Bring chicken broth, fish sauce, soya sauce, the juice from the steaming and pepper to a boil. Adjust the flavour to your liking.   Depending on how dark you prefer, add your dark soya sauce accordingly.  (Reserve two ladles full of stock for braising the mushroom).

After getting the taste right, mix the potato starch with water and slowly pour into your sauce, stirring constantly. 

The broth will thickens. I didn't like mine to be so starchy, so tune accordingly. 

Cook your noodle, pour the sauce over it and add the shredded chicken and vegetable

Serve with a dash of sambal chilli if you prefer it hot. 

 

 Braised mushroom

2 ladles of chicken stock

10 mushrooms (soaked, and sliced thinly)

1 piece of pork skin

Light Soya sauce

Dark soya sauce

Oyster sauce

Pepper

Method:

Put the above into a pot.  Fill with another cup of water and bring it to a boil.

 Season with soya sauce, dark soya sauce and oyster sauce to your liking.  Add pepper.

Slowly simmer for ½ hour till mushroom is soft.

*****************************
Source: ieatishootipost (please refer to Dr Tay's site for full demo on flipping the prata and as well as comprehensive understanding on how to make a good prata)

Crispy Roti Prata

What you need:

600g Plain Flour

300ml Water

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp sugar

1 tbsp Oil

1 egg

Method:

Mix liquid and whisk them well together.

Add in dry ingredients and mixed well.

Sit for 20 mins.

Knead for 10 min with 5 min interval on speed 2 in KA.  Repeat cycle if you wanted a softer dough.

Divide dough into balls (100g) each, making sure there isn’t any crack or fold lines. 

Oil the dough generously before placing them into a container to proof for 8 hours or more.

After proofing, place balled dough into a well oiled table top.  Flatten with your palm and do the lay and pull stretch method until you reached a very fine membrane looking dough.   Oil generously throughout process, making sure the rim of the dough is thinned out.

Once you reached that texture, fold the dough. (pls see Dr Tay’s video).

Heat frying pan with oil and pan fry till crisp.

Serve with your favourite curry.

Molly's egg tart

Just like me, my girl loves egg tarts.  She has been asking me to bake egg tarts for her quite some time back.  With the house move, me falling ill twice during the last 3 months, her request was delayed.

She has to resort to barter trade with me.  Saying if she scores full marks for her 听写, will I bake her some?

How can a mother deny such request right? 

To a homebaker like me, I am always on a quest to see how other's recipe fare.  Even though I had found a reliable and well love recipe, I am still curious to attempt others.  You never know, 一三比一三高.  (oops did I use this phrase correctly?). 一山还有一山高 . Thanks to Mixue for correcting me.  Now I learnt.

Seeing many positive review on Molly's egg tart from one of the website, I decided to give it a shot.  After all, one never cease to find a better recipe if given the opportunity right? 

Verdict: I will reduce the sugar alittle more.  The crust is rather dry in handling, a tablespoon more milk or water will be good.  The egg custard is good though but I didn't have enough egg mixture to fill in all my crust despite mom commented that my crust is too thick. 

Update: I was told that this is pretty similar to Hei Ma Ma's.  Will attempt that one to make a comparison real soon.

Overall, it is an easy recipe to attempt especially for beginner. 

Thanks Molly.

Recipe: Refer to Rumbling Tummy

Kueh Bingka Ubi Kayu

Ha I just realised that this post was published till now. 

We spent Mother's Day cum Dad's birthday celebration last week.  Come to think about it, we have been doing this joint celebration for many years.  I guess it is hard to find an appropriate time for my brother in law works on shift work so doing a joint celebration makes it easier and also to beat the crowd.


The night before Mother’s Day, it was sweet thoughts as both my kids decided to bunk in with me.  Son commented that it was his gift (his company for the night) to me as Mother’s Day gift.  I was feeling fussy as it is a rare opportunity these days.


Things got a bad turn this morning. Mainly son was really irresponsible and left his windows open, resulted in a wet wood flooring despite numerous reminders the night before to ensure his windows are shut.


When I reprimanded him on this incident, instead of an apology, he went defensive.  My mood was totally destroyed by him with his nonsensical argument. I seriously am getting so tired with all his groundless argument these days. It is always the ME ME ME attitude.  How I wish he will be enlisted into the army soon, since I failed as a mother.  Perhaps the army will be able to knock some sort of responsibility into his head and stop all those self centred-ness.


With all the well wishes coming in, I just can't help but broke down throughout the day. Why kids these days take everything for granted? We were never like this when young. Why these generation kids are so horrible?  The form of respect taught to us when I was young and pass on to the next generation somehow got lost in him.


Having said this, I had to be fair to my daughter too. She is a total complete opposite of son.   At least half the Mother's Day, I can get credit to.

Thus I wish all Mothers a very Happy Mother's Day. I know our job in this era faced a bigger challenge than our parent` and we totally deserved a pat on the shoulder for choosing this path.


Actually I baked this Kueh Bingka Ubi Kayu just before hubby left. If you like such kueh like my hubby does, attend Valerie Kong's class. It yields a really nice texture and cost a fraction of what you paid outside. (I bought 3 tiny pieces for S$1.80!, notice that I didn't even say small, seriously I think it is really over priced).


My helper pan fried it further to get the crisp.  Love the lovely hue it gives.

Banana Cake/Sesame Muah Chee

I have a personality that I like to get things done quickly. I prefer to plan ahead and execute right away. I like to be on the move and getting things accomplished.

Days whereby I see my son moves around the house slowly and doing nothing, sometimes I find it annoying or when my hubby and kids are glued to the google box on a weekend, I finds that boring. Yes, I have learnt along the way that men de-stress themselves being a couch potato. LOLz.

These days, my weekends are being kept busy with a new project. I am setting up my herb garden. Hubby has big plan for the garden but it is easier say that do. For I am the one realising his dream. It is definitely a lot of hard work especially after each session I will suffer tremendously pain on my back. Now I understand the saying of once broken can’t be healed. Really annoying that physically I can no longer push myself.

Things are looking good in my herb garden. I still need to finalise some position before I call it completed. Then I will wait for my harvest. As for hubby’s dream garden, I will have to take it slowly.

Enough said, late last week, my girl came home with a request for me to bake cupcakes for her Entrepreneur week school project. The teacher was so worried about her over enthusiasm that she actually rang me to confirm that I will be doing it.

Since I already committed, so even though I am exhausted from the gardening, I proceeded on with the baking after I came home. Little one of course was way eager to help. Hubby also felt that it is a good learning ground for her as she gets to understand the effort puts in to the final product being sold.

Luckily I didn't promise anything complicated.

(Sorry for the poor picture quality as I am totally blasted after the baking and frosting)

Since I am already baking, I quickly put together a really easy Banana Cake. I baked this many times and each time with success and this little one soon become a hot favourite with family and friends.

Just in time, D and her family came for a visit and she brought home a loaf. I am glad that her mom loved it.

See I told you I am slowing down. This was done on Friday evening. I was craving for muah chee and since LT gave me a tub of really fragrant sesame powder, I decided to turn them into Sesame Muah Chee using the HCP.

I was told that this is available in a shop in Orchard Road but being a home body, I hardly go down town even though I lived in Central!



Not too sure whether this is comparable but it is good enough for me to get a quick fix though. Next time, I will blend in sesame seeds together with the peanut.

What you need:

200g glutinous rice flour minus 3 tbsp
3 tbsp sesame seed powder
300ml water
1 tbsp shallot oil + 1 tsp
1 tsp sugar
pinch of salt
A generous amount of fried shallot

Peanut, sesame and sugar mixture

150g chopped roasted peanuts
30g fine sugar
10g sesame seeds

Method (Happy Call Pan)

Mix everything in a bowl. Stir till it is lump free. Sieve.

Heat up pan.

Add another tsp of shallot oil.

Pour in the batter and let it cook for 5 mins.

Open the lid and give it a good thorough stir.

Close lid and cook for another 5 mins, repeat one more time by adding a generous amount of fried shallot. Blend well.

Remove from pan.

Cut dough with oiled scissor and coat with peanut and sugar mixture.

*********************

Source: Small Cakes

Banana cake

What you need:

200g - 2 bananas, mashed or puree
150g unsalted butter
230g castor sugar
50g ground hazelnuts
2 eggs, lightly beaten
175g plain flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
133g sour cream

Method

Greased and lined a 18X7X8 cm deep loaf tin.

Preheat oven to 170 degree c.

Cream butter and sugar till light and fluffy.

Add in ground hazelnuts and followed by eggs.

Sift in the flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder and mix well together.

Mix in the sour cream and finally add in the bananas.

Pour into pan and bake for 20 mins.

Samosa Daging Berempah (Beef Samosa)

With us living in a multi racial country, I am blessed to savour some of the good Malay cuisine.

As I grew up in the Chinatown area, I was exposed to limited Malay dishes when I was young. It was until I moved to the East Coast and having a Malay family as neighbour, I was introduced to more Malay cuisine. (yes, I still remembered the big spread of food served during a wedding that my neighbour invited). Then again, I was in my teens and food was the last thing I was interested in.

I didn't know how to appreciate Tau Kwa but one such dish that changed my perspective was Tahu Goreng. You see, my hubby is a complete opposite of me. He grew up with Malay cooking and he was the one that exposed me to more interesting Malay cuisine. One such date was a meal eaten along some alley in Arab street. I must say this old man’s Tahu Goreng is to die for. It was so delicious that from then on, I always order it when I see it.

During a recent visit to the library, I chanced upon a book that featured Malay Heritage Cooking and I was literally drooling on all the dishes.

I tried one of the chicken dish and regretted not blog about it as I didn't manage to get a picture of the dish.

Nevertheless, Samosa Daging Berempah (Beef Samosa) is yet another recipe that is a keeper. My girl walloped at least 6 pieces at one go.

Go on, try it.

Source: Malay Heritage Cooking

What you need:

60 large sheets of spring roll skins
5 tbsp plain flour (mixed with a little water to form a paste)
Vegetable oil for frying

Fillings

2.5cm ginger, peeled and sliced
3 cloves garlic, peeled
250g minced beef
1 tsp pepper
1 tbsp curry powder
3 shallots, peeled and diced
2 springs coriander leaves
salt to taste

Chilli Sauce

6 -7 red chillies, seeded
7 cloves garlic, peeled
250ml water
2 tbsp tomato ketchup
1 tbsp white vinegar
2 tbsp sugar
salt to taste

Method:

Pound ginger and garlic into a paste.

Heat oil and stir fry ginger-garlic paste till lightly browned.

Add minced beef and stir fry till meat is cooked.

Add pepper and curry powder and stir till well combined.

Add onions and coriander leaves and mix well.

Season to taste with salt.

Cook for a further 5 mins. Set aside to drain and cool. Fillings has to be well drain to ensure cripsy samosa.

Prepare chilli sauce

Combine chillies and garlic in a blender and process into paste.

In a sauce pan, gently stir paste with water and let it simmers. Do not boil. Remove from heat and stir in tomato ketchup, vinegar and sugar. Season with salt.

Cut sprinroll skin into 3 equal strips. Cover with damp cloth to prevent drying.

Using double layer of spring rolls (cripy texture).

Fold the bottom left corner upwards to form an equilateral triangle and a pocket for the filling.

Spoon some filling into the pocket and fold the pocket up to enclose the filling. Brush skin with some flour paste to seal samosa.

Heat enough oil for deep frying. Drain well and serve warm.

Durian tapioca Kueh

Yesterday, I was down at the wet market. I remembered there is this stall selling fresh grated coconut and I just decided to buy some home with no idea how to use it. You see, getting from the wet market near my place is tough. You need to be really early or else they were sold out by late morning.

As I was waiting for my turn to place order, I saw tapioca. Apparently they sell that too (in grated form). Out of impulse, I bought that too.

Now with coconut and tapioca on hand, I went in search of a recipe and tada…. Durian Tapioca Kueh is what I churned out. Definitely make hubby happy as coconut is one of his deprived favourite.

Today I make another new friend, this time, a young man that is 25 years younger than I am.

It started with me joining a gardening club as I was clueless on how to set up a herb garden. This young chap offered to help me to with this little project. I was so touched by his gesture as we were total strangers.

We were meant to get started on this project on 18 March but he said he want to see how the area looks like so that he can draw up a plan. So today we met up.

The look and see turned into some serious digging. Adding burnt soil and compost. By the time the planter box is done, we were already in total work out.

You are an angel sent down to help me. Thanks KW for helping me. Without your help, I believe I will be still digging for the next couple of days!

On our next meeting, I have to remember to bring some nice goodies for this young man to share with his mom.

Love this nice feeling to end the week.

What you need:

150g Durian (puree)
500g grated tapioca
150g tapioca flour

250g sugar
300ml thick coconut milk
120ml water

steamed for 10 mins
Shredded White Coconut (mix with a pinch of salt and mix well with a few pandan leaves)

Method:

Boil sugar and pandan leaves for 5 mins to infuse the pandan flavour. Set aside to cool a little.

Combine grated tapioca and tapioca flour together and mix well.

Add coconut milk and sugar mixture, durian puree to the tapioca and mixed well.

Pour the mix into a 8” tin and steam for 30-45mins.

Leave the Tapioca kueh to cool.

Cut into pieces and coat with shredded coconut and serve.

ondeh ondeh (orange)

The weather of late is really awesome besides the rain though and the thoughts of our laundry and I don’t think I will ever owned a dryer. Other than that, I really love it! You see I am more afraid of heat (which often gives me migraine) than the cold.

With a chilled out Sat as son is away for his soccer training and there isn't any more Sunday School (yes it is on a Sat), we spent a carefree and relaxing Sat morning.

After sending son off to school, I decided to swing by the wet market and then impromptu, I got some grated coconut for I wanted to make oneh oneh as I brought some purple sweet potatoes before the weekend.

I love ondeh ondeh but I dislike eating the desiccated coconut but surprisingly, this one is alright for me. It didn’t get stuck in my throat!

I just love how it turned out. The purple ondeh ondeh matches so nicely with the white grated coconut! And I love the texture as well!

Join me.

Recipe can be found here

Ajitma (糖心蛋)

These days, my girl and I lunch out twice a week for she has tuition right after school.

Months ago, we found a new (at least to me) Japanese restaurant in one of the shopping mall near my girl's tuition place. We both had ramen. One of the side order that came was this very interesting hard boiled egg. I can't recall what they called it but somehow, I found a forum member sharing this recipe.

I immediately KIV it for I know I will want to attempt it. I am not fan of hard boiled egg. I find the hard boiled egg yolk hard to swallow, it has this cakey powdery feel thus I always asked for half boiled eggs or soft boiled eggs.

Anyway, Ajitma (糖心蛋) as I found out, is a hard boiled egg with soft egg yolk. I really like it very much.

So when I saw cute small eggs available in the supermarket, I knew this will be perfect as our finger food. I bought two dozens.

Unfortunately because the eggs are smaller, I think my timing to cook the egg was also off from the instruction.

I didn’t get the orangey egg yolk but it was that far off either. I am sure if I fine tuned it a little, I will get it right.

Thanks for sharing, for now you have changed my perspective of a hard boiled egg.

Please refer to https://rumblingtummy23.blogspot.sg/ for full recipe.

A day old pau (no pix)

After my two last blunders, I am determined to complete my char siew pau trial. The filling has been sitting in the freezer and I really don't want to delay too long. I am curious whether I can really do it too. Perhaps thinking about my kids' love for char siew pau spurs me.

So last night, I went about with the starter dough. Making sure I got the right flour and right time this round. hahahaha.

I needed to be up early to do this trial as my kids are starting their new school term today. So time management must be precise. I timed my starter dough so that it is actually 12 hours to start the process the next day. It was good, because by the time I have completed it with steaming.

I just hit 8:30am! Just in time for my breakfast. hahaha I noticed that my starter dough didn't balloon like as when I was using bread flour. Thus I am unable to tell whether it was a success.

I find that the dough after mixing in the starter dough was a little too dry. I actually added a little more water to it so that it can form a ball. Rolling and filling was really easy. I have no problem.

I based on 40g dough and 20g filling.

I will definitely need to increase it to 30 - 35g next round.

I used an electric steamer, thus I wasn't able to control the heat. Perhaps next round, I will use a wok to steam. I don't know whether it is because of this reason.

The first 6-10 mins of my pau fluff up prettily as you are able to see the pleats. After the 11 - 15mins, my pau's pleats disappeared.

Now it looks like tau sar pau instead. :( I am not sure whether reducing the ammonia will affect the quality of the pau but it definitely didn't give up a nice aroma to the pau. In fact, you have to overcome the pungent first sniff to sink your teeth to the steaming hot bun. Only then, you are able to enjoy it.

Personally I find that the texture of the skin is not what I am looking for. Though it doesn't really stick to your teeth, it has that a little tad too dry feel. I like my concoction of my fillings though. Not too sweet and not too sticky.

I am already eyeing on another recipe found in Jo Deli. Let's see when I will feel adventurous again.

These buns sure didn't come easy. hahahaha Note: A day old pau:

After reheating in a microwave with a cup of water inside. The texture of the pau remains same as freshly done ones (soft but still dry feel).

I noticed that the smell of ammonia become less noticeable.



Pau Skin Recipe extracted from My Home Kitchen.

What you need:
Starter Dough:

110g tap water
185g Hong kong flour
1/2 tsp Double Acting Baking Powder (I used Dove Brand)
1/8 tsp instant yeast

Mix everything together in a bowl. Cover with a hot damp towel and let it proof inside oven with no power turned on.

Skin dough:

375g Hong kong flour
200g sugar 23g shortening
75g tap water (might need to increase the amount as I couldn't get a ball stage)
20g double acting baking powder
5g ammonia (I will research and see whether I can reduce this amount)
1/2 tsp vinegar (I used distilled vingegar)

Add all the above ingredients to the starter dough. Using a dough hook, mix on speed 3 for 6 minutes. (Mix till the dough is not sticky and form a ball.)

Take out dough and scale to 40g each. (with 35g of fillings)

Shape each piece into a ball before rolling.

Fill with chilled meat filling and steam immediately at high heat for 10 mins)

Note:

1. Maximum proving time for starter dough is 14 hours. Over fermenting will make your baos sour.

2. This recipe will yield 30 buns if you scaled to 30g each.

3. When rolling dough, keep the edges thinner and the centre portion slightly thicker.

4. For char siew baos, steam for 10 minutes.

5. For baos with raw meat fillings, steam for 15 minutes.

6. If making big chicken/meat baos, steam for 20 minutes.

7. Prepare the fillings after you have made the starter dough and leave it in the fridge. (Chilled fillings is easier to handle.)

For the fillings
What you need:

600g lean char siew, diced small
5 shallots, diced finely
2 tbsp white sesame seeds (optional)

Seasonings:

60ml water
1 tsp oyster sauce
1 tsp dark soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil 1 tssp sugar
1 tbsp corn flour

Method:

Heat wok with a little oil, sautee onions till soft.

Add in seasoning and stir till it becomes thick.

Add in char siew and mix till it is well coated with seasoning.

Mix in sesame seeds and remove.

Tea Egg/Pumpkin with fermented bean

Three of my daughter's classmates are down with Hand, Foot and mouth disease. For prevention, a few of them are not going to school. The parents are afraid that this will spread to the sibilings who are either in the midst of preparing for exam or having their exam.

For me, I too become paranoid as my dear prince can't afford to skip school.

Having the little one at home meant that I more time at home and don't have to "hang around" for them to finish school. But I need to fill the time out productively as of late, she is quite glued to her cable TV. Something that I am not really in favour of.

I have a tray of "baby eggs", I couldn't resist not buying them as they were soooo cute. Really tiny.

My first thought was it will be great as Tea Eggs 茶葉蛋!!

Actually I have been craving for them for quite some time. The smell is simply hard to resist whenever we passed by such stall but I just refused to buy these as now the prices had gone up and yet not really fantastic in taste.

So I got my little one to help me to crack these hard boiled eggs and went about preparing them. The whole house was filled with the beautiful fragrant smell of tea eggs while  simmering. Simply awesome.

What you need:

 30 eggs
2 tbsp salt
30g black tea leaves
3 star anise
2 stick cinnamon
2 slices tong kwai
3 tbsp sugar
3 tbsp soya sauce
6 pieces kum cho (licorice)
2 pieces orange peel
 1½ tbsp pepper
1 tbsp rhizome 川芎
szechuan lovage root or cnidium
1 slice 熟地 cooked rehmannia root
2 litre of water (approx, depending on the size of your pot)

Method

Prepare the hard boiled eggs. Once cooled, cracked them gently.

Place cracked eggs into a pot and fill it with water. Make sure the water covers the eggs.

Add in spices/herbs.

Bring to a boil and gently simmer for ½ hours.

Best to leave overnight for more intense taste.

I didn't managed to get that marbeling effect as I suspect that either we didn't "crack" it enough or we didn't allow the eggs to sit long enough in the tea mixture.

Let's see whether tomorrow the marbeling will appear that is, if there is any left.
Wish me luck. Last but not least, I would love to submit this entry to World Egg Day.


**********

 I saw some delicious looking pumpkin just now and started to miss my mom's home cooking. Immediately I bought it and prepared this for our dinner.

My mom used to cook this with fermented bean and goes so well with white rice.

 Though my son dislike pumpkin for whatever reason, I am sure he is going to enjoy this Pumpkin with Fermented bean. Yum.

What you need:

half pumpkin (skin removed and cut into large cubes)
300g minced pork
1.5 tsp soya sauce
a dash of pepper
a dash of sesame oil
1 tbsp fermented soya bean (either black or white) - minced
5 clove of garlic (minced)

Method:

Marinate minced pork with soya sauce, pepper and sesame oil. Set aside.

Heat wok with a little oil.

Add minced fermented soya bean and garlic. Saute till fragrant.

Add in minced pork and fry till cooked.

Add in pumpkin and stir fry.

Add in water and let it simmer for about 10 - 15 min or till the pumpkin is soft.

Yam cake (no recipe)

Finally I was able to buy a really good yam. Thanks to a nice chap who is working in the supermarket. He was really helpful in helping me to choose the BEST yam!!!

In the past, whenever I seeked help, none will offer. They either shrugged their shoulder to say they don't know or they will say it is all good. Then I will happily bring one home and discovered it is not that great.

I love my yam to be of those flaky texture type. I also hearsay that yam originated from Thailand are the best.

Personally, I don't think it is really true all the time. Anyway, I was really happy this time round. Since my mom isn't in town as she has a really good recipe so I adapted this recipe from Jo Deli's.

Verdict, my hubby would prefer this with a little bit more salt to this Yam Cake.
I will take note of this for my next round of yam cake and hopefully that nice chap will be still around to help me out. *wink*

P/seed muffins, fried wanton and microwave chocolate cake

In a forthnight's time, my son will be having his FINAL exam. How time flies. As the usual norm in Singapore, all moms are stressed up when their kids are having exam.

I am no different from them. As we don't really speak Mandarin at home, I am really concerned about his Chinese Paper (from what I gathered, next year will be even harder). So I have been "drilling" him even though I feel sad to put him through this.

While hubby is revising Math with son, I merrily destressed in my kitchen.

Here is what I accomplished.

For breakfast, we had P/seed Muffins (adapted from Muffins and Quickbreads).

I gave it a twist by having orange glaze instead of lemon glaze.

What you need

185g plain flour
40g toasted wheat germ
90g poppyseeds
90g sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
250ml milk
1 egg
60g unsalted butter, melted

Method

Preheat oven to 200°C. Grease muffin tins.

Stir and toss together the flour, wheat germs, poppyseeds, sugar, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

Whisk together the milk, egg and melted butter till smooth.

Add to the dry ingredients and stir till just blended.

Spoon into muffin tins and bake at 15 - 18 mins.

Cool in tin for 3 mins and then remove.

Glaze with orange glaze.

Orange Glaze

100g icing sugar, sifted
2 tbsp orange juice
2 tsp orange zest
pinch of salt

Method

Combine all the ingredients and whisk briskly till smooth and well blnded.

Brush over muffins while muffin are still warm.

For snack, Fried Wanton. My nephew and nieces whom dropped by, enjoyed this as much as my family.

Since I don't have any seafood in the fridge, I added crabmeat stick to the pork and waterchestnut fillings.

In the night, decided to try out the Microwave Chocolate Cake. Though it is fluffy, personally, I prefer a more moist chocolate cake than this. If I ever make this again, I will add a frosting to counter the dryness of the cake.

Roaste sweet potatoes/Savoury glutinous rice (no pic or recipe)

Few years back when my sister went to Japan, she tried this Roasted Japanese Sweet Potatoes. Her comments was that it was really good. So got some from the supermarket and tried my hand at it. I think I bought this before but I simply couldn't remember whether the flesh is yellow in colour or should it be purple. Anyone care to comment? But it is definitely taste good having it roasted.


Pic missing



Bought a packet of glutinous rice a month ago so need to cook it before it turn bad. Since I have tried making Lor Mai Kai so many times, I decided to cook Savoury Glutinous Rice for a change. I kind of go by instinct what should be added into the rice but I wasn't sure whether to steam the rice with water or without water in it. Luckily, Janny forwarded me a sample recipe to clear my doubt.

Verdict: Good.

Fried Wanton (no pic/recipe)

I stumbled onto this kind of wanton skin that is white in colour. Just I decided to purchase a packet and make Fried Wanton out of. Verdict: I think if you fried it, those yellow skin type taste much better. Maybe next round, I will make shrimp dumplings to test the difference.

Giant Lor Mai Kai (no pix/recipe)

My hubby left town again. This time round, I wasn't really ready for him to go because, I am afraid to face the week ahead without him. Too many things to do at such a short time frame. I have to take on as a 100% study mentor to my son who will be sitting for his tests from Tuesday to Thursday. I have to bake a cake for my daughter's 3rd birthday on Tuesday and another cake for my son's 8th birthday on Friday. In between, I have to make sure that our bags are packed for our forthcoming holiday. So desperately need to clear up the food in our fridge as I mis-calculated our departure date. I tried another recipe on the Lor Mai Kai. This time round, no time to do little cup size. I did a Giant Lor Mai Kai instead, I didn't try this because I was too tired to feel hungry but hubby said it is good. For our lunch, we had Fried Dried Beef Kway Teow, not too bad but I must note that next time round, I will add a little more gravy to it.

Spring Roll

Initially I wanted to make the traditional Spring Roll, that is using popiah skin. Unfortunately, after preparing the fillings, I realised that I had forgotten to buy it. So to substitute, I had to used rice paper from Vietnam.

 

Sotong paste wanton/Fried prawn paste chicken wings

Inspired by Glad's Fish Paste Wanton, and since I have already got some sotong paste in the fridge. I turned it into Sotong Paste Wanton instead.

Verdict: Good

For a long time, we didn't have Fried Prawn Paste Chicken Wings (暇酱鸡). This is a hot favourite with my family and it is so easy to prepare. The trick is to marinate it over night.

What you need

1 tbsp fine shrimp paste
1 kg chicken wing
Rice flour for coating

Method

Marinate it over night.

Deep fried till golden brown.

Note: Per some enquiry, here is the fine shrimp paste that I used. This paste sometime is also known as prawn paste. This is different from those used in rojak.

Mine version is Cantonese Style.

Radish Cake

I am a big fan of Tim Sum especially having it in Hong Kong. To date, I don't really recall having done any dishes by myself. After remembering Judy's Radish Cake that I have missed the last time, my fingers are itching to try out.

So I called my mom for her recipe which we had tried during the Lunar New Year and it was delicious.

What you need:

907g shredded white radish (strained)
750ml water
76g Chinese sausage, chopped finely
38g dried shrimps, soaked, roasted and chopped finely
3 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
2 tsp sesame oil
Pepper

For garnish: 6 shallots, sliced thinly and fried till crispy Spring onions

Method:

Mix together to make batter 340g rice flour 2 tbsp tapioca flour 600ml water

Method:

Combine radish, fried shrimp, sausages, and water in a saucepan and simmer over low heat for 10 to 15 mins.

Lower heat and add batter, stir until mixture thickens

Pour the thickened mixture to a tray and steam at high heat for ½ hour (smoothen surface with either the back of the spoon or spatula..

Test, if not cook, another further 10 mins.

Cool thoroughly before cutting.

Garnish with dried shallots and spring onions.