Weekend Specials #2

Last weekend was such a delightful one. We had so much good food I can't even decide which meal I liked best. They were all chinese food, cooked by my awesome dad. First up is a nice comforting dish for a weekend brunch, we had Century Egg Porridge, or otherwise more popularly known as Pei Tan Chok. I love the pungent aroma of the Pei Tan and its creamy yolk. It works well together with salted eggs, which Dad also included to give the overall a pleasant savoury flavour.

Recipe
(for 5 adults)
-2 cups of rice
-1 litre water
-minced pork
-2 century eggs (sliced)
-2 salted eggs (diced)
-soya sauce
-fish sauce
-white pepper
-sesame oil
-spring onions (chopped into small pieces)
-fried shallots

a. Marinate minced pork with 1tbs soya sauce, 1tbs sesame oil, white pepper.
b. Once porridge comes to a boil, start scooping small batches of marinated minced pork into porridge.
c. Add salted egg pieces, followed by century egg slices into porridge.
d. Once porridge is cooked, add in seasoning ( soya sauce, fish sauce, white pepper, sesame oil) to your own liking.
e. Garnish with spring onions, fried shallots and chilli slices (optional) when ready to serve.

Next, we had Ipoh Hor Fan for dinner. For the stock, Dad used chinese mushrooms, chicken and a special mushroom sauce. For this dish, Dad wasn't able to tell me his proper recipe offhand because as I mentioned in my earlier post, he's an agar chef. :p

Here are some photos of the Ipoh Hor Fan we had.

I will write about the rest of the food we had for the weekend in the another post. Till then, take care!

Fruitcake Special

It's the weekend again so it's time for a new blog entry! Today's post shall be on.........

                                                                                 !!!
I'm actually not a huge fan of fruit cakes because I remember my bad experiences with some wedding fruitcake souvenirs. Those were really sweet and intense, too yucky for my liking. My mum baked a Grand Marnier Orange Fruit Cake some time back. Hers was buttery, firm and moderately sweet, less rich and extremely pleasing to eat.

Preparation for this wasn't as straightforward because Mum had to soak the mix fruit in fresh orange juice and grand marnier for a week before adding to the recipe so that the flavor of the dried fruit could be enhanced. Even after the cake was ready, it was kept wrapped at room temperature for another week before we actually cut and ate it. 

So if you would like to try this out, go ahead and follow the recipe :)  

450g mixed fruit
100ml Grand Marnier
100ml freshly squeezed orange juice

Soak mix fruit in orange juice and grand marnier for a week in the fridge.

250g butter
4 eggs
120g sugar
225g all purpose flour
100ml Grand Marnier

a. Preheat oven to 140C. Line baking pan.
b. Cream butter and sugar until smooth.
c. Add in eggs individually, make sure to beat well after each addition.
d. Sift flour into butter mixture and beat slowly until smooth.
e. Fold fruit mixture into the batter.
f. Pour batter into baking pan and bake for one and a half hours.
g. Remove cake from oven and drizzle Grand Marnier immediately over hot cake.
h. When the cake is completely cooled, wrap cake and keep at room temperature for a week before consuming.

         

Dad's Mee Siam

Introducing one of Dad's signature dishes---M E E S I A M. I really really love his Mee Siam, every time he decides to cook it he'll make sure to prepare a huge pot of gravy because he knows I will eat it for lunch and dinner for several days. HAHA yeah I know. Just like his every other dish, Dad found his recipe through experimenting and trial and error. His version of Mee Siam is unlike the ones we usually find in Malay stalls. How should I put it, its taste is in between Malay and Chinese. He likes to to use alot of Asam, onions, fermented soya beans, shrimp paste and chilli. The ingredients he uses are not any different from other recipes I suppose, but somehow he just knows how to modify it to make it special. In fact, Dad doesn't record his recipes, so every time he cooks it will be based on memory and AGARation. 

Garnished with omelette, spring onions and dried shrimps

YUMMYYYYYY...now proceed to drool drool drool

Aw Ree Oh

Today we would like to share a cool Oreo Sponge Cake Recipe! Don't fret if you don't have an oven, because this is a STEAMED cake recipe!

Heh Heh our nice spongy pillow!

Ingredients:

4 Eggs (separated)
100g Caster Sugar
250g Cream Cheese
160g Evaporated Milk
110g Top Flour
1 tsp Vanilla Essence
1 1/2 tsp Nescafe and 1 tsp water
1 tbsp browning/ Choc Emulco
10 pcs Oreo Cookies (crushed)

Method

1. Beat egg whites until soft peaks and gradually add half of the sugar. Beat until stiff.
2. Beat cream cheese with the remaining sugar until smooth.
3. Gradually add in the egg yolk and beat till smooth (milkshake like).
4. Add in the flour and milk alternately (mix well).
5.Add in the vanilla essence.
6. Lastly add in the egg white mixture.
7. Add in the portion of Nescafe and browning.
8. Grease and line tray.
9. Pour in white batter and sprinkle crushed oreos.
10. Scatter few dollops of coffee batter. Cover with white batter. Repeat this action until finished.
11. Steam for 30 minutes.

A pretty marbled effect!

Bak Zhang (Rice Dumplings)

Every time when it comes to Duan Wu Festival, I get to eat Grandma's home made rice dumplings. My favourite has got to be Nonya Zhang, the one with the nice coriander powder fragrance, sweet winter melon cubes and chestnuts. Making rice dumplings is alot of work, from the preparation to frying the ingredients and wrapping. I remember a few years back when Grandma brought everything over to our house to teach us how to make Bak Zhang from scratch, it took us an entire day and the frying made the kitchen oily! I concluded that wrapping a dumpling really IS a skill and takes alot of practice to master. I'm ashamed to say that I'm so useless at it...

Well unfortunately, Grandma hasn't made Bak Zhangs for the past 2 years because she now finds it too tiring. She would rather buy than to prepare them herself and she knows exactly where to get good ones! We had some Grandma bought somewhere in Aljunied this year.

It was satisfactory, but still, nothing beats the ones Grandma made before :/

Mighty Chiffon Cakes!

I find it hard to swallow breakfast especially during early mornings. It's a habit I've developed from young, eating too early just makes me feel like throwing up. Skipping breakfast is also partly due to how I always wake up to leave only enough time to wash up, get changed and then rush out of the house. :p I know I know, it's very bad. That's why Mummy's cakes are here to save!

That's right, as the title says, today's post is on Chiffon Cakes. My mum is now a pro in baking chiffon cakes. Friends and visitors to our home particularly enjoy her Matcha flavored one, but I didn't photograph the previous ones she baked, so what you'll see below are the Orange Marnier and Coffee flavored ones. I find chiffon cakes easier to stomach when I really have to force myself to eat something. It's soft, light, fluffy and just very convenient to eat!

Chiffon cakes are Mum's signature bake, and they will be made available for order upon request!

A bit of Grand Marnier Orange Liquer was added to enhance the orange flavor.

The next one here is a coffee flavored chiffon cake. Baileys added as well but only a little. Alcohol taste is mild and subtle.

Weekend Specials

I am so blessed to have a dad who cooks so very well. When it comes to weekends, Dad takes over the kitchen and we all get excited because awesome home cooked food awaits us! Dad took up the challenge of cooking Lor Mee last weekend after we saw it on TV.

I just went

" Ahhh we haven't had Lor Mee for such a long time."

and he went

" You feel like eating it? I can cook it for you tomorrow."

That's it and he tried cooking it for the very first time.

It was unbelievable because I didn't think that he'll really be able to come up with the dish :p but it was so good! It reminded me of the one I used to enjoy at Tiong Bahru Market. The gravy was tasty, not too starchy and we each modified our own bowls with garlic and black vinegar to our own liking. 

Instead of the typical thick yellow noodles Dad used bee hoon. And because there wasn't any ngo hiang in the fridge, he topped each bowl with wantons.

  

Other ingredients included fish paste and meatballs.

Kakak has since mastered cooking Fish Porridge after she learnt it from my dad. We Teochews eat porridge Teochew style. It's different from the normal fish porridge because here the soup and rice are cooked separately.  The soup is added to the rice only when you are ready to serve. The batang fish slices used are succulent and smooth!

Tomato cubes and chilli slices are a must!

Garnished with coriander!

We have fish porridge rather often especially on Fridays when the family abstains from meat. I like the fact that it is simple and healthy and I never really get tired of eating it.

Granolas and Terrariums!

Chewy granola bars are perfect snacks if you are into healthy eating. These bars contain all the fibre, proteins and carbohydrates to fuel you during the day. Sometimes when I don't get to have lunch in between lectures, granolas come in really handy. Just 3 to 4 bars is enough to keep me full for a few hours :)

Recipe:

190 grams oats

90 grams dessicated coconut

100 grams sliced almonds

30 grams raw sunflower seeds

30 grams raw pumpkin seeds

60 grams dried cranberries

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

60 grams unsalted butter

45 grams light brown sugar

160 ml honey

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1.Preheat to 175 degrees celcius.

2.Line baking tray with parchment paper. ( 23 by 33cm)

3.Mix the rolled oats, coconut and sliced almonds together in a large bowl.

4.Transfer to a baking sheet and bake for about 15 minutes (until lightly browned), stirring occasionally. 5.Transfer the heated oat mixture to a large mixing bowl.

6.Stir in the sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, cranberries, salt, and cinnamon.

7.Melt the butter, brown sugar, honey, and vanilla in a small saucepan with medium heat.

8.When the sugar mixture boils, reduce heat and simmer for a few minutes.

9.Pour sugar mixture into oat mixture. 

10.Stir the granola so that all the dry ingredients are completely coated with the sugar mixture.

11.Pour the granola into the prepared baking tray and press the granola evenly into the pan with damp        hands.

12.Bake for about 20 minutes (until golden brown).

13.Then remove it from the oven and let it cool for 3 hours before cutting into bars. 

Reference: http://www.joyofbaking.com/barsandsquares/GranolaBars.html#ixzz2Us40d5xj

This honey mixture below is what enables the contents to to stick together but more importantly it provides fragrance and flavor.

Healthy snack done! Now the painful part comes when u have to chop them up into bars. And i really mean CHOP because Mum literally had to bang her knife in to break it up into bars 

Dad brought back his first terrarium 2 years ago after he attended a course on how to build one. We saw it and immediately fell in love with this beautiful miniature indoor garden. It's really interesting how it works. It's basically a self-contained ecosystem because in a sealed transparent container, the plants release water vapor which condenses on the glass walls, then trickles down and re-waters the plant again! So the cycle goes on and on which makes it really easy to look after. We usually give it 15 sprays of water every fortnight and just leave it under sunlight. Here's one which Dad recently made last weekend :)

Some good soil mixture and we used pretty nerve plants.

Coloured pebbles and stones to beautify the environment

After it is done! Dad gave it a few sprays of water and sealed it up. Under the right conditions it grows really well. It's only been a few days and we are already seeing some new shoots!

Home made Nian Gao

Nian Gao is traditionally eaten during Chinese New Year but Mum likes to steam one every now and then. It takes 6 hours to steam one Nian Gao so she only makes it whenever Dad sets up the charcoal fire and she can just leave it to cook. Imagine 6 hours on the stove and the amount of gas that goes into steaming just one nian gao..that'll be crazy! and gas is so expensive, like what $40 per cylinder. Our family still orders gas because we dont have a direct gas line.

After the nian gao is done, we dont eat it immediately but instead store it in the fridge for about week so that it hardens. Nian Gao makes a really nice dessert when steamed with sago. There are many ways you can have your nian gao, sometimes we pan fry a few slices with eggs and other times we simply just steam it as it is, to appreciate its original sweet and sticky texture. I personally enjoy Sago Nian Gao Kueh because it reminds me alot of Oneh Oneh.  To make this, you will have to slice a few pieces of nian gao and arrange them nicely in a bed of sago.

This is how it looks after it is done. All that's left to do will be to cut them up and roll them in a bowl of shredded coconut.

TADA!! I didnt manage to photograph it nicely but really, this kueh kueh tastes better than it looks. Overall, the shredded coconut adds to it a delicious flavor and texture and the sago-nian gao combination is very light and chewy! Yum Yum! If you are interested in trying this out, check out this recipe: http://happyflour.blogspot.sg/2012/03/sago-nian-gao-kuih.html

There are many other recipes available online but we followed this one and it turned out good so yeah, have fun trying it out! :D