Wake Up and Smell the Cake

I made my first ever baked rice last Sunday. All in the name of having salmon incorporated in my meals. The first recipe I googled used milk, and so I settled for that! Subsequently I found recipes with cream but I don't need the added fat. Who does, anyway.  So here's the link to the original recipe . I always trust Australian and British recipe sites to give good food. Haha. Salmon Baked Rice 15g butter 1 cup milk 220g salmon, cooked 1 1/2 cups cooked white rice 1 tbsp flour About 1 cup grated cheese (I used Perfect Bake mix) 1/2 head of cauliflower Cilantro Melt butter in saucepan till bubbling, then add in flour. Mix well. Add in milk 1/4 at a time and bring to a boil. Once mixture thickens, turn off the stove and add in 1/4 cup cheese.  Layer in a 7 inch round pan, 1/2 of the rice, cauliflower and fish. Pour some of the milk mixture and sprinkle cheese on top, and repeat for the 2nd layer.  Add more cheese for the top layer! B

It's December! Too fast. Weekends aren't that free anymore, not much of cooking these days. Two weekends ago (or 1 weekend ago?) was daging masak kicap, and the weekend that just passed I didn't really cook save the quick Sunday dinner of sambal sardine with canned mushrooms. My ultimate comfort food best eaten with hot rice. I think I finally got it, tastes like my mum's. Yumyum. 1 can sardines in tomato sauce (Sardines, not mackerel. Ayam brand's the best!) 1 onion, finely sliced 2 garlic, smashed and chopped 1 inch ginger, sliced 1 stalk lemongrass, bruised and cut into 3 3 tbsp chili paste 1 small can mushrooms, drained and washed) Fry the lemongrass and onions till fragrant. Add in garlic and ginger, fry till fragrant as well then add in the chili paste. Fry till the oil separates (yes that's what my mother says), probably 10-15 minutes I didn't time, but the longer the better. Add in mushrooms, stir fry for about 1 to 2 minutes before a

My parents are home! Yay! My mum is still sick though hope she gets better :( The welcome home asam pedas was a success! I realised I didn't have to go all the way to Geylang Serai market on Friday during lunch to get ingredients cos I went to the market to get fish and Chong Pang is pretty self sufficient anyway. It wasn't really cheap at Geylang either! Oh wells. Lesson learnt. This is my second time making asam pedas using the recipe from the Malay Heritage Cooking cookbook. I made some slight changes like the method. Asam Pedas Ground paste: 50 dried chilis, cut into small pieces & soaked in hot water 70g belacan 5 onions, sliced 15 gloves garlic 2 1/2 ginger Asam pulp, 200g soaked in water (but I didn't use all) 3 stalks lemon grass, bruised 2kg ikan kerisi (about 3 tails) Laksa leaves (daun kesum), about 30 leaves Lady's fingers, about 30-40 Salt 1 1/2 tsp Sugar 2 tbsp Prepare ground paste in a blender to form a paste. Heat oil in a

Saturday boy was I busy in the kitchen! Went to the market earlier and was home by 9.40am and got started cooking! The siblings wanted chicken fajitas so I quickly sliced the chicken meat and marinated (fajitas mix + paprika + black pepper + dried basil) before Junior & I went to the market. Junior made my heart melt: all those times spent baking and cooking with him paid off! He now is officially my little baker! I didn't want to bake anything, but he sorta forced me. How can I refuse when he took out the whisk and ladle and even the sugar! But before that, Junior was busy helping me cook! On the menu for the day: Chicken Fajitas Sindhi Briyani (Shan mix) Potato Soup for Junior Potato soup is really simple. Peel & cut potatoes, boil and add cauliflower, broccoli, carrots and fish/chicken cubes in and cook together. I throw in a teeny bit of salt, and some dried basil. It's even yummy for adults! So on to the biryani! I was kind of eager to cook biryani whe

Whoever does work today is not normal. Haha. Eve of a public holiday yet no half day oh the pain! Saturday my siblings came over for lunch, and cooking was yet another diner dash. On the menu was daging masak merah and very simple fried cabbage. Butter cookies was supposed to be an after-lunch activity but it was changed to butter cake because of lack of time. I also had to go to the post office to get Junior's books that arrived but were too big for the mail box. Maybe I should have one big mail box outside my door and ask the postman to deposit it there instead. The queue at the post office was so long! When I came at about 10, I was like 60th in queue?! So Junior and I went to get some groceries while waiting for our turn, and when we came back, the number only moved up by 20. Damn. By the time we were done and back home, It was 11.30! Not enough time to cook the meat! Thankfully Junior explored his new books on his own quietly, so I had time to cook. Multi-tasked: frying

Report of Saturday morning's cooking: double chocolate banana muffins, sayur asam jawa and fried chicken! Simple pleasures of food and finally one where there weren't leftovers. I need to manage my portions haha. I was under the weather - and still is - so lunch was simple. I used a ready made paste from Serambi Botani for the sayur asam jawa I bought when I was in Bogor. I just added in corn, long beans, carrot, cabbage and loads of peanuts! LOVE peanuts :) The vegetables made the soup sweet and yummeh. I tried the soup before the vegetables were cooked, and it was yuck. Tasted too much of asam. Once the flavours from the nuts, carrots and corn blends together, it was just what I needed for my throat. Made a quick spice mix of ground cumin, coriander, paprika salt and pepper for the chicken marinade before frying them. Soup + fried chicken + hot rice = yummy homemade meal. I made the double chocolate muffins earlier with Junior. I was craving for double choc muffins,

I'm scared of making things all eggs. Some sort of phobia. Like my egg tart disaster . And my never ending fear of whipping egg whites, be in for a cake , or for frosting . Because no matter how many recipes you read, you still need to see and feel what custards, stiff peaks, ribbon stage looks like. Yesterday night, I was just randomly staring at my fridge and I decided to check my egg yolks. There were 10 perfectly round yolks on Friday, but yesterday a couple had already burst. I sorta panicked, what a waste of 10 eggs! Didn't have any odour so I guess they were still edible. Since I have lemons on hand, why not start the lemon curd project! After all both my boys were asleep, boy #1 won't be nagging at why I'm making baking stuff again, boy #2 won't be clinging to me. Perfect. Zested 4 lemons, juiced, and I'm all set! I didn't use any particular recipe, cos at that moment I wanted to get it done asap. The latest recipe I had opened in my iPhone&

Hello hello! It's been weeks since I last updated. Been busy with lotsa stuff, even went out of the country for a work trip. I'm nursing the little one even as I type this entry. It's the Mother's Day weekend and the best part of it is the sales! I'm eyeing Crocs 20% off all women's shoes hmm. I bought a pair of Crocs flats few days ago sadly the 20% promo hadn't begun. Boo. But I feel like getting another pair heehee. We'll see how tomorrow. Anyway! Since it's mango season, I thought of making mango desserts for my mum and MIL. Have just completed one, which is mango sago for my MIL. Yesterday after work, we went to Chong Pang to get mangoes and they were going for 50 cents each! So I bought 20. HAHA. 6 for MIL, the rest for mango sago and mango cheesecake.  I think I put in a little too much vanilla essence into the dessert oh wells. But I'm sure once it is cooled it'll taste yummy!  Here's what I used: 5 med

Meant to talk about rendang last week cos we made beef rendang the weekend before, and since I made rendang again (by request of Husband) yesterday, the recipe is still fresh in my head so here I am typing on the bus to class. So pardon me for the lack of bullet points etc. Class. Haha. I skipped last week's class cos I was at my mum's hurhur, this week need to go cos next week is the last lesson already, and I can't go for that either because I'll be in Jakarta for a work trip. Busy huh. Anyway back to the rendang! This is my mum's recipe and it doesn't use kerisik, and that should be the shredded coconut thingy? Haha. Anyway this got the approval of dear Husband so I'm happy! Ingredients 1kg beef/chicken 4 onions 8 cloves garlic 2 inches ginger 4 sticks of lemongrass 4 tbsp ketumbar powder 2 tbsp jintan halus powder 5 tbsp cili kisar 200ml coconut cream About 10-15 lime leaves 5 tbsp sugar +/- Salt to taste Slice lemongrass very thin

Ever since the blueberry pancake attempt last Saturday, I've been hooked on pancakes. They're actually like muffins only thing cooked on a pan. I wonder if they're healthier. Hmm. Need to check that. So here's some pancake ideas I might wanna try this weekend! Red velvet pancakes Blueberry & oat pancakes Orange yoghurt pancakes Cinnamon apple carrot pancakes Smashed raspberries and chocolate chunk pancakes So exciting! Or. Maybe I should go back to muffins. Junior can help me mix the batter. We'll see how it goes. I wanna buy a carton of oranges too. One thing I love about CNY is the abundance of yummy juicy mandarin oranges! I have a carton in office already hurhur. Countdown check: 19 days 4 hours. Well at least it's now in the teens.

Friday night my brother stayed over at our house so on Saturday morning I made blueberry pancakes! If Husband were around I'm not sure if he'll eat these pancakes, maybe one day I should try. I got this recipe from bbcgoodfood and you can always trust BBC to get wonderful recipes for you. I find that British and Australians have yummy desserts and it's always a safe bet when you get recipes from BBC, or Women's Weekly, or some other bakers from those countries. Even their supermarkets sell wonderful cakes and cookies at such low prices, just goes to show that quality is priority and these people know how to eat their cakes. Here's the recipe! 200g self-raising flour (I used 200g normal flour + 1 tsp baking powder) 1 tsp baking powder 1 egg (I used 2 eggs) 300ml milk knob butter 150g pack blueberries (I used my canned blueberries) sunflower oil or a little butter for cooking golden or maple syrup (I bought golden syrup) Mix together the flour &

Second post in a day! I'm alone at home, that's why. No baby to disturb me wahahaha. Haven't done as much houswork as I thought I would, I wish I could clean the fan, vacuum the floor, iron next week's clothes, but all that is pretty much impossible within a couple of hours. Anyway! I wanted to blog about lunch! I had no idea what to cook, but I know I wanted something soupy. So I boiled angel hair pasta (mee sua would have been my first choice but I'm out of that) and decided to marinate chicken first. Teriyaki chicken with pasta soup. With very few basic ingredients! Perfect for a kitchen that doesn't have much ingredients stocked up. I have now mastered the art of cooking for one, my estimations have improved. Sliced thin strips of the chicken breast that I always use for Junior's porridge, and got started on lunch preparations. Chicken Teriyaki (for 1) 1 portion of chicken, sliced thinly 2 tbsp light soy sauce 1 tbsp sugar 2 crushed & cho

I made curry puffs last Saturday. Wasn't much of a success, Husband didn't gobble them up and now I am eating the final one. Haha. In my opinion though I think it's a decent start. It's my first time making them on my own. The filling was good, but the dough sadly I forgot to add salt and I could have made the dough thinner. I always forget the salt. Or even if I do remember, it's so scant that Husband thinks I didn't put any at all. I'm not a big fan of salt anyway haha. The curry puff was filled with boiled potatoes, minced meat and quarter of a boiled egg. Below is the recipe for the filling: 6 medium potatoes, boiled, peeled & diced 5 boiled eggs, cut into fours 400g minced meat (I like lotsa meat in my curry puffs) 1 tsp salt (too little I guess?) 2 medium onions, sliced 1 tsp ground black pepper 1 1/2 tsp chili powder 6-8 tbsp curry powder? I didn't measure About 15 curry leaves I had some filling leftover, but I guess if I

Weekend was filled with cooking! Okay I cheated on Sunday cos we went my mum's house to cook haha, but Saturday itself was tiring enough! Invited in-laws ++ over for Husband's famous chicken rice and I made sago gula melaka. MIL made sweet sour fish too which was yummy! We wanted to make stir fry vege but at the last minute our stove's spark wasn't working!! Like wth! Oh wells. Luckily the chicken is all cooked! Maybe I'll make the stir fry today for sahur. So after 2 pots of rice, two kilos of chicken fried, three times of boiling sago, 5 big bottles of bandung, we ended up with one messy kitchen but it was all worth it! I am so fortunate to have a husband that cooks well :) Then we went to Geylang after that. Ha. The mandatory, not-my-fave-place-to-visit bazaar. And time flew while we were there! We didn't realise it was almost midnight! Poor Junior fell asleep in his pram :( I wasn't in any shopping mood at all because I was worried about Junior. Any

Finally I can sit down. It's not always that I have non-stop meetings but kinda like it when I do.   Managed to bake twice last weekend! Still have yet to use my cream cheese frosting but since it's sitting prettily in my ice cream tub in the freezer, I shan't disturb it yet. Anyway I have more pressing food items to clear such as my looooonnnggg overdue bread and overripe bananas. Hence I made bread pudding on Friday morning and banana chocolate chip muffins on Saturday. Before you freak out at the looonnngg overdue (read: 1 month old) bread, let me share a good tip for small households where bread doesn't run out that fast. I'm more of a cereal person. Whenever I buy bread, I keep it in the fridge. Lasts about a month or even more! It won't go dry, if it does, just heat it for 20 seconds in the microwave and it's soft like it was just baked this morning. And if you didn't manage to finish the rest of the loaf, fret not! Bread pudding always works!

Started day 5 with the usual chicken sandwich (new marinade!) and a little extra of banana and chocolate! Let's start with the chicken sandwich. Chicken cubes with lettuce and white bread, easy to prepare, good to eat! Day 1 and 2 I had the same chicken, boneless skinless healthy chicken cubes pan fried in honey bbq sauce, smoked bbq seasoning and black pepper. No salt needed. Was quite yums but I should have pan fried a little longer to get that charred effect. Yesterday I tried something different. The day before I bought dried basil and oregano and chili powder. Regretted not getting garlic powder too. I'm still figuring out basil so I tried the following instead: 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts 1 1/2 tbsp chili powder 2 cloves garlic, mashed & chopped 1 tsp dried oregano 1 tsp vinegar salt & pepper Was kinda good! But maybe I should've marinated longer so the flavours seep in. And probably can add a bit more vinegar too! I quite like stir fr

Weekend is here! I really really really hope there's nothing on for Sunday. I desperately need to clean the house. And probably fill up these mini baguette bowls!! Photo from Chinatown Foods . I got 6 whole bags (yes! That many!) free when I ordered five boxes of mini eclairs for a family event last Sunday. At first I thought it was a delivery mistake, then I saw on the delivery order, 6 packs of mini baguette bowls free. Awesome!! We are, after all, loyal customers huahuahua :D I have yet to think what to fill these with. I've already offloaded 3 bags to my mum. Was thinking along the line of spinach quiche, tuna, chicken something something, custard, that sorta savoury dishes. Or if not I'll crush them all and make into bread pudding, although that's quite a pathetic way of using these elegant little shells. Oh wells! I'll ask my sister if she's interested in mass production of quiche! Have a great weekend all!

Birthday celebrations are never one day affairs these days. We started off with the Battleship movie which I totally was against watching previously, but because it's the boy's birthday, I reluctantly agreed. And I loved it! The plot was kinda normal bang boosh shoot shoot stuff, but there's humour and I especially like the Jap guy who was made co-captain! His ideas are awesome. Oh! And the part where the navy veterans helped out too! Enjoyed the entire two hours haha! Birthday boy gave me that "see I told you it's good" look when the movie ended. Heh. Fine fine I'll join u in such movies again next time haha. Saturday, I planned for a morning picnic at Botanic Gardens and a visit to the farmers' market for some yummy cupcakes but it rained the entire morning so we had to change plan: lazed around at home for a bit and then off to the market to get ingredients for big feast (birthday boy's request). The rain subsided in the later part of the m

So today was supposed to be day 3 or 29 but I overslept. Bummer. Junior has been disturbing my sleep a lot lately. He doesn't really sleep in the day, and at night, he can wake up every hour, sometimes a few times in an hour. Long gone are the days I had uninterrupted sleep. Yesterday Other Half wanted to eat lemak cili padi again after my successful lemak cili padi tenggiri attempt . Haha. But he wanted to cook it this time round, so I can attend to our little mister cranky and feed him dinner. I prepared all the ingredients, cut them nicely and put into bowls for him to cook. This time round I added more red chili cos I wanted to finish them and they weren't hot anyway so might as well. And more cili padi too!! Other Half prefers to blend everything, easy peasy. I on the other hand, prefer to tumbuk the chili using batu lesung just like my mum does it. To me the flavours kinda disappear when you blend. Hence more chili? Hahaha. So I let Other Half cook, and he wanted t

Hello!! I'm on Medical Leave :D Husband's at work, and Junior's at my mum's house. I'm free to do just about everything! Heh. Morning I sent off Junior, and stuck around for a bit before going to my all time fave Chong Pang to get some stuff and most importantly, threading. I've been putting it off for the longest time! With that done, and toiletries bought, I spent $50. How did I spend that much on so few items! And I've yet to buy rice, kicap and eggs! Anyway. So I went home, fried my french beans to go with my daging masak kicap for lunch, and then washed and hung clothes to dry, and then baked a chocolate cake (recipe later), and vacuumed the house and now I'm taking a break before I start ironing. Did all that when I'm supposed to be resting and slacking around haha. Husband's gonna scold me for not resting hehe! Daging masak kicap was done yesterday, I prepared everything and cooked the meat and off to zzzland I went, while Husband