Hari Raya cookies

I started baking late and only managed to come out with these for the last 2-3 days.

I will only update the recipe later but if anyone would like to have the recipe, do leave me a message.

Chicken with Mango Salsa

I marinated some chicken fillets for my vietnamese springrolls but they never made it there. The fillets ended up in my wrap which I had it with mango salsa *yums* The mango salsa was inspired by a show featuring caribbean cuisine.

This is a truly no fuss dish, the wraps were store bought and the mangoes were juicy and sweet.

The filling before wrapping

the wrap

4-5 wraps

Chicken
Ingredients
6 chicken fillets
1-2 tsp five spice
salt & pepper
2-3 tbsp hoisin sauce
extra virgin olive oil for grilling


Method
1. Marinate cleaned fillets with five spice, salt & pepper and hoisin sauce for about 30mins or more
2. Heat oil in a pan
3. Grill fillets till the sides are brown. Make sure that the meat is not too dry
4. Slice them and put them aside


Mango Salsa
Ingredients
1 ripe mango, chopped
2 shallots, thinly sliced
1-2 fresh chillies, de-seeded and chopped (you can use red or green peppers too)
lime juice from half lime
some coriander, chopped
salt & pepper

Method
1. Mix mango, shallots coriander and chilli
2. Add lime juice and sprinkle salt & freshly ground pepper
3. Toss till they are well blended


Assemble
1. Put slices of chicken on the wrap
2. Top chicken with salsa, arrange neatly
3. Roll up and ready to eat (you can heat the wrap in the oven. Brush wrap with oil before grilling it)
4. Top with sauces for extra flavour

Easy Tandoori Chicken

Tandoori chicken is one of my favourite dish because I just love the spicy and sourish combination of the dish. For this dish, I cheated using a premix by Maggi. I took a chance when I saw it at Giant hypermart in JB and bought 2 packs of it. I was lucky because Mellie from NK tried it and recommended it ... yayness !! (thanks Mellie *muack*)

The premix

Apparently, this premix cannot be found at the major supermarkets here in Singapore. I am not sure about the other smaller provision shops or supermarkets. If you happened to see it here, do let me know :-) But if you happen to go to JB, do purchase a few packs of it *wink* It's worth trying.

I used half chicken for this dish. I just followed the instructions at the back of the pack but increase the amount of yoghurt and leave it to marinate overnight. Serve it with sliced white onion and lime wedges.

Beef Noodle

I love to eat beef hor fun. It is not really difficult to make and not only it is versatile, but a great one dish meal too - you can add seafood, chicken and lots and lots of vege. For this version, I used rice spaghetti which is like laksa noodle but slightly slimmer. My initial plan was to use hor fun, but was too tired to get fresh ones from the market ... heh

I would like thank Gina from KC for introducing to me the use of potato starch as thickening agent instead of cornflour :-) I find the result is better than using the latter.

Ingredients
200gm-300gm beef slices (get the one for stir fry)
1 packet rice spaghetti, boiled till cooked and drained well (you can replace this with fresh hor fun/yellow noodles/bee hoon)
chye sim/cabbage/carrot, cut according to your liking
800ml-1ltr water
2 chicken stock cube
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 egg, lightly beaten
2-3 tbsp potato starch mix with water to make it into a paste
2 tbsp oil
salt to taste

Beef seasoning
1-1.5 tbsp worchestershire sauce
1 tbsp dark soya sauce, you can put less or more if you like
1 tsp sesame oil
pepper

Noodle seasoning
2-3 tbsp dark soya sauce
2 tbsp oil

Method
1. Marinate beef with beef seasoning for about 30mins or longer
2. Heat oil in the wok, add cooked noodles/hor fun/bee hoon/yellow noodles and noodle seasoning and stir fry till they are coated with oil and seasoning, put it aside
3. Add 2 tbsp oil to the same wok, add minced garlic and stir fry till fragrant but not burnt
4. Add beef and stir fry till cooked, once cooked remove beef and place it on top of the prepared noodles
5. Add water and chicken cube (you can use chicken stock also) and let it simmer
6. Once simmer, add vege and stir till the vege are half done
7. Lower heat, put 2-3 tbsp of potato starch mix and stir the gravy, if not thick enough add a little bit more starch mix
8. Pour beaten egg and stir it to thread it, add salt to taste
9. Let the gravy simmer and pour over the prepared noodle with beef
10.Serve hot with pickled green chillies

Vietnamese Pancake

I was first introduced to this dish by my hubby a couple of years ago - in which during that time, I was not into cooking or baking. The first thing that I noticed about this dish was the amount of beansprouts .. most of their dishes have loads of bean sprouts, mostly raw. One thing I find about vietnamese during my visit there is the amount of raw vege that they consume. You can hardly find any overweight ladies or elderly there. Majority of them are petite - which makes me feel like a 'king kong' when I was with them *LOL*

Ok back to the dish, this is a very simple dish. There are many ways that you can eat it, but I like to wrap it in lettuce, mint leaves and dip in the sauce. Yummy !!!

A plate full of them :)

What you see above was made with a premix. I have also made using a recipe shared by one of the forum member at Jodeli's forum, tt and find the homemade ones tastes better.

Ingredients
Batter
1/2 cup cooked rice
2 1/2 cups coconut milk or water or milk (I used half coconut milk, half milk)
175g rice flour
50g potato starch
1 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 tsp salt
oil

Toppings/fillings
1 medium onion, sliced thinly
200g chicken fillet, sliced (I omitted this)
200-300g small shrimp, remove skin and head
300-400g bean sprouts
1 cup cooked mung beans (I omitted this)

lettuce, mint/basil for garnishing

Method
Batter
1. Put rice and coconut milk in a blender and blend until smooth
2. Mix the rest of the ingredients together and let it rest for about 1/2 hour before use

Pancake
1. Add a little oil to a non stick pan
2. Add some onions, shrimp and chicken, stir fry until 1/2 cooked
3. Add some batter and “twist” the pan so the batter coats the bottom of the pan evenly
4. When the pancake is half cooked, sprinkle bean sprouts and mung beans in the middle
5. Cover and cook over medium heat for about 3-5 mins, until the pancake is crispy
6. Fold the pancake in half and continue to cook for about 1-2 mins and transfer to the plate
7. Repeat same process for the rest of the batter and filling
8. Serve with herbs and dipping sauce

Easy Peasy Udon Soup

This is my second udon soup dish. Unlike the other one, this version is soo simple good when you have very limited time to prepare dinner. As usual, I cheat using chicken and ikan bilis stock .. heh

Ingredients
Udon noodles
1.5L water
1 medium onion
1 clove garlic
1 chicken bouillon cube (Maggi, no added msg)
1 ikan bilis bouillon cube (Maggi, no added msg)
some fishballs
some fishcake, sliced
pepper to taste
local lettuce and fried shallots for garnishing

Method
1. Blend onion and garlic into paste
2. Boil water and add onion/garlic paste and the stock cubes
3. Let the soup boil for 15-20mins and make sure that the cubes are dissolved
4. Add fishballs and sliced fishcakes and continue simmer for about 10min
5. Add pepper to taste
6. Blanch noodles and lay lettuce in the bowl
7. Place the noodles on the lettuce and scoop the soup over with fishballs and fishcakes
8. Sprinkle fried shallots and sliced chilli and serve hot

Durian Ice-Cream

Still with some durian in the fridge, I decided to make this lighter version ice-cream which I have been itching to try since the last 1.5 mths. Finally made it and it is great. Creamy despite uses only egg white, sourcream and sugar. I got this recipe from allrecipes but sort of changed the measurement slighty.

Ingredients
3/4 cup egg white
300ml light sourcream (you can use normal sourcream if you like it creamier)
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla essence
durian pulp from 6-10 seeds

Method
1. Heat egg white in the microwave for about 30-35sec. Don't cook it just make sure that it is heated through
2. Whip egg white and sugar till soft peak formed
3. Stir in sourcream, vanilla essence and durian pulp till well combined
4. Freeze the mixture and stir every 30 mins or so till frozen

Half of the recipe I used the ice-cream maker and the other half I freeze it in the freezer. I found that the texture is better using the ice-cream maker. The picture taken is from the freezer batch.

If you are going to use an ice-cream maker, it would be better to chill the mixture first before use.

Green Bean & Durian Porridge (Sweet dessert)

Bought 2 boxes of durian recently to make some mooncake and a durian cake. Still have quite a bit of leftovers and decided to make this. It has been a long time since I had this. I also like to eat this dessert with cream crackers, just crush them and sprinkle them on the porridge - gives a little crunch to the dessert.

Ingredients
200g green beans, soaked for 4 hours (I used boiling water and soaked for 2 hrs)
500ml coconut milk (I used Ayam brand which is about 270ml and added water to make it 500ml)
80g gula melaka (dark palm sugar) or dark brown sugar (you can reduce if you don’t like too sweet)
40g white sugar (can reduce if you don’t like too sweet)
1 tsp salt
3 pandan leaves, knotted
100ml fresh milk (original use coconut cream)
4-5 seeds durian
some water if you like it dilute

Method
1. Boil soaked beans till soft, if too much water, pour them away, leave about the level of the boiled beans
2. Add coconut milk, both sugars, salt, pandan leaves and durian into the pot and let it simmer over medium heat till bubbly.
3. Once slightly boiled, add milk/coconut cream and simmer till slightly thickens (I don't like it too thick)
4. Serve hot with crushed cream crackers or bread for dipping

Macaroni Chicken Soup

It has been a while since I had a bowl of macaroni soup. So I decided to make this simple dish last Friday for dinner. Coincidentally, Ramadan is just around the corner and I have been cracking my brains to list down dishes that I can prepare for iftar, so this will be in my list :)

The soup is my mom's simple chicken soup. So easy to make yet tasty. Great for children or for the sick.

Ingredients
half chicken cut into 4 pcs, skin removed
2.5 - 3L water
2 potatoes, cut into chunks
1 carrot, cut into chunks
4 clove garlic
1-1.5 cm ginger
8 shallots, thinly sliced
1 tbsp white peppercorns, freshly ground ( you can add black peppercorns if want it to be a little more spicy)
salt to taste
some chinese celery, chopped
lime, sliced (optional)
macaroni, boiled till al-dente

Method
1. Fried sliced shallots till brown and keep both the oil and fried shallots
2. Blend garlic and ginger into paste
3. Boil water and once it starts to bubble, add garlic/ginger paste and ground pepper
4. Add chicken pieces and let the soup boil for about 20 minutes
5. Add chinese parsley, carrots and potatoes and continue to simmer till they are cooked
6. Once the soup is done, take chicken pieces out and shred the chicken meat
7. Put cooked macaroni into a bowl or plate, pour soup over the macaroni
8. Sprinkle shredded meat, fried shallots with its oil and chinese parsley onto the macaroni
9. Squeeze some lime juice and serve hot

Snowskin Mooncake

I would like to apologize for not updating this blog for awhile. I had a pretty hectic schedule lately and could not find the time to update this blog. I have not been cooking nor baking lately but managed to make my very first snowskin mooncake. The recipe is not difficult and bought almost all of the items from the store.

I always like eating snowskin mooncake and decided to make my own after I found an easy recipe shared by one of the member at M4M. I modified it slightly by reducing the sugar and added condensed milk to give it a creamier taste.

The cross-section of the mooncake.

I halved the original recipe and able to get about 11 mini mooncakes.

Ingredients

75g glutinous fried rice flour (kou fein), can get it any baking supply stores
90g powdered sugar
33g shortening
75g cold drinking water
1/2 tsp condensed milk
Vanilla essence or other flavours that you fancy
Colorings of you choice
Lotus paste, can be bought from baking supply store
Salted egg yolks, steamed on an oil plate for about 5-10min


Method
1. Sieve flour and powdered sugar
2. Add shortening and mix them till you get crumb like texture
3. Add water, condensed milk, essence and colouring, mix well until it forms a smooth dough
4. Set dough aside for at least 20mins
5. Make the fillings into ball shapes each 30g (inclusive of yolk if you using one)
6. Divide dough into small portion each 20g
7. Flatten dough to wrap up the fillings
8. Seal up dough to enclose filling completely
9. Press into mould and knock the mould to loosen the mooncake

Note: Ensure that you roll the dough with fried glutinous rice and sprinkle some of it in the mould to ease releasing the mooncake.

Easy Mocha Cake

I got this recipe from the internet but could not remember where. I was looking for an easy cake recipe to make and this particular one caught my eye. The original recipe was a cappucino cake but I changed it to mocha, replacing part of the coffee with cocoa. The cake turned out well and my daughters love it.

Ingredients
1 sponge cake (you can buy or bake)
250ml condensed milk
250ml water
2 tbsp instant coffee
1 tbsp cocoa powder
2 tbsp gelatine

Method
1. Let gelatine bloom in water for about 10mins
2. Heat up gelatine+water mixture and once gelatine dissolves, add instant coffee and cocoa powder. Stir well till dissolved and no lumps
3. Turn heat off, add condensed milk and stir till well blended
4. Place sponge cake in a baking tin, pour mixture into baking tin
5. Chill in the fridge till set
6. Take the set cake out of the baking tin and frost it with whipping cream or buttercream if you like with chocolate flakes

Note: Use baking tin and NOT a cake ring

If you want to make a cappunico cake, replace the cocoa powder with instant coffee.

Potato with Tuna in Ginger & Soy

We had porridge for dinner today and I came up with this dish for my girls :D A very easy but pretty tasty dish suitable for kids. Nothing fancy, just potatoes, mixed vege and a can of heinz Tuna in Ginger & Soy.

This is the tuna that I used. You can get it Cold Storage easily if you can't find it at NTUC or other supermarket. Cold Storage is having an offer at $1.85 per can.

Ingredients

3 medium local potatoes, cubed
100gm mixed vege
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 medium onion, sliced thinly
1 can Heinz Tuna in Ginger & Soy
oil for frying

Method

1. Fry the potatoes till golden brown and put aside
2. Fry garlic and onions till soft and slightly brown
3. Add mixed vege and stir till cooked
4. Add potatoes and mix well
5. Dish out the potato/mix vege mix on a plate and top it with tuna flakes
6. Mix tuna and potatoes well and serve immediately

Green Tea Red Bean Flaky Mooncake

I finally got hold of a mooncake making book recommeded by Elaine from KC yesterday. This book has 33 recipes ranges from chilled mooncake to agar-agar version.

Seriously if you ask me, I do not know how good the recipes are since this is the first time I am making it. However the one I just made tasted pretty alright to me. Also based on the ingredients of the other recipes, they look pretty good.

My virgin attempt in making mooncake :D I still have not bought the mooncake mould, so I chose this one since it doesn't require one. Ok, this particular one that I have just made is supposed to have durian lotus seed paste. Since I only have red bean paste in my fridge, I used it but regretted for not adding melon seeds. I think it would have tasted even better.

The inside of the mooncake

Ingredients

A. Water Dough
100gm plain flour (the book put medium protein flour)
25gm castor sugar
40gm shortening
40gm water

B. Oil Dough
1 tsp bakeable green tea powder (I got this from Phoon Huat)
100gm plain flour (the book put medium protein flour)
40gm shortening
15gm butter

Filling
Red bean paste

OR you can use the durian and lotus seed paste

250gm lotus seed paste
25gm durian paste
25gm melon seeds/kuaci
3 salted egg yolk, halved

1. Mix lotus seed paste, durian paste and melon seeds evenly and cut into 6 equal portion of about 50gm each

Method

1. Blend ingredient A till the dough is smooth. Divide into 3 portions and rest for 10 min
2. Blend ingredient B till it becomes a dough and divide into 3 portions
3. Flatten A and wrap B in it and roll into a rectangular shape
4. Roll it up like a swissroll, turn it 90 degree clockwise and flatten it again
5. Roll it up like a swissroll again and cut into 2
6. With the cut side facing down, flatten the it into a round shape and wrap up filling to form a ball
7. Brush the top with egg white and sprinkle black sesame (original recipe uses poppy seeds)
8. Bake in preheated oven at 200 degree celcius for about 20-25mins

Beancurd & Beansprout in Coconut Milk Gravy (Lemak Taugeh & Tahu)

I realised that I have not been cooking lots of Malay dishes. For a change, cooked something local today. A very simple dish suitable for both kids and adult. This is another high protein dish since the main ingredients are beancurd, beansprouts and tempeh which I omitted this time round.

Ingredients

2-3 firm beancurd, cut into quarters
100-250gm beansprouts, roots removed
1 fresh red chilli, thinly sliced (more if you like it spicy)
1 clove garlic
1 medium onion
1 1/2 tbsp silver fish, soaked
250ml low fat coconut milk
salt to taste

Method

1. Blend garlic, onion and silver fish into paste
2. Boil 400ml water in a pot
3. When water starts to boil, add blended paste and stir. Leave to boil
4. Once boils, add coconut milk
5. Once mixture starts to bubble, add beancurd and leave for about 10 mins
6. When gravy starts to bubble, add beansprouts and sliced chilli
7. Add salt to taste and simmer till gravy boils. Do not overboil.
8. Turn heat off and cover the pot for about 10mins before serving
9. Serve hot with steamed rice

Rose Swissroll

It has been quite a while since I last baked and hands were itchy to bake something for the weekend. Inspired by Janny's (from Rainbow Connection) post on the rose patty cakes, I made this rose swissroll instead. With some slight modification to one of the swissroll recipe that I have, it came out pretty well except that I should have baked it in a slight larger pan. Had a bit of struggle trying to roll it because of the thickness. Nevertheless, it was pretty good :)

Ingredients

3 eggs, separated
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup self-raising flour, sifted
1/4 cup corn flour, sifted
2 tbsp hot milk
1 tbsp melted butter
2 tsp rose water
1-2 drops of red colouring

Filling
300ml cream, whipped
2 tbps jam (I omitted this)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degree celcius
2. Sift both flours together and put it aside
3. Place egg whites in a clean, dry bowl and beat till stiff peaks form
4. Add sugar slowly and continue beating till thick and glossy
5. Add egg yolks one a time, beating well after each addition followed by colouring
6. Lightly fold in flour with milk till well combined
7. Add melted butter and lightly mix it till no streaks followed by rose water
8. Pour batter into a greased and line swiss roll pan and bake for 8-12 mins or springs back when touched or the sides shrink away from the sides of the tin
9. Leave the cake in the tin for about 5 mins and take it out to cool on a wire rack
10. When cool, place the cake on a clean tea towel and cut the sides away
11. Spread with jam followed by cream
12. Roll the cake holding the sides firmly and leave it wrapped in the tea towel for about 10mins
13. Remove swissroll from the towel and slice it to serve. Otherwise, wrap swissroll with cling wrap and store it in the refrigerator

Ca Kho To (Fish simmered in caramel sauce)

This is a vietnamese dish that is being served in almost all vietnamese restaurant. I did not have a chance to try this dish when I visited the place a few weeks ago but had the opportunity to smell this great tasting dish (my colleague ordered this dish while I was enjoying my shrimp *LOL*) I totally forgot about this dish until a member of KC posted the recipe and I went "wow, this is great !!" =D I just had to try it as it brought back memories of that wonderful aroma.

This dish is usually served in a claypot but you can cook with any thick based pot that you have. My end product looks far from what is being served in those vietnamese restaurant but taste wise is yummy. This is generally a child friendly dish because there is no chillI/peppers, but you can add it if you like. My daughters and myself love this dish.

I used the recipe shared by Thu from KC but modified it slightly. This recipe uses caramel sauce that was prepared earlier but you don't need to do that. The only difference is to make the caramel sauce then add the other other ingredients. You can refer to the caramel sauce method for reference.

Ingredients

3 fish fillet, cut in thirds
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 shallot, chopped
1 tsp fresh ginger, sliced/julliene
1 lemongrass, sliced thinly
3 tbsp water or chicken stock
2 green onions/spring onions, chopped
1 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp caramel sauce (recipe below)
2 tsp light soya sauce
salt & black pepper
1 tbsp vegetable oil

Method

1. Heat vegetable oil in a clay pot or medium fry pan over moderate heat
2. Add minced garlic and chopped shallot. Stir until fragrant, about 2 to 3 minutes then add lemongrass slices
3. Add catfish pieces and cook until they turn almost white, for about 2 minutes
4. Add caramel sauce, fish sauce and soya sauce and gently stir for 1 more minute, until the fish has slightly caramelized for about 12 to 15 minutes. You can simmer it longer if you want a drier version
5. Remove from the heat and garnish with thinly sliced green onions and ground black pepper
6. Serve hot with steamed rice

Caramel Sauce
1/2 - 1 cup sugar
some boiling water

Preparation for the Caramel Sauce:

1. Warm up a pale coloured pan/pot gently for about 1-2 mins
2. Pour sugar into the warm pan
3. Leave the sugar until it begins to melt (do no stir)
4. Once the sugar starts to melt, you will see the colour slowly changes to brown
5. Twirl the pan to ensure that all the sugar are melted evenly
6. Use a wooden spoon and stir until the sugar is totally melted and resembles dark runny honey 7. Take the pot off the heat and gradually add boiling water and keep stirring (you have to be careful here because there could be some splutter)
8. You may want to return the pot back to a gentle heat to re-melt lumps of caramel that have formed.
9. Once the caramel is smooth, turn off the fire and leave it to cool before keeping in an airtight container and store it in the refrigerator.

Pasta Al-Tonno (Tuna)

It has been a while since I last updated this blog. Finally after regaining back my old self, I made this extremely simple dish for dinner. My hubby has been craving for pasta dish which I haven't been doing lately especially before my work trip :D So I decided to make this one especially for him since I had this when I was in Vietnam. Ok, funny isn't that I had a western dish at Vietnam? Ah well, my colleagues and I usually frequent this eating place that serves western and local dishes. Generally, the place is catered for foreigners, so we usually have our lunch and dinner there.

You can use whatever pasta you like. I used penne because that was what I have in my pantry. I would prefer to have it with spaghetti though.

For this version I cheated using pasta sauce I bought from the supermarket, my all time favourite brand Leggo's. You can make your own sauce too because it is a very simple dish, simpler than bolognaise to me at least. You can also use salmon if you like too or better still, add tuna and salmon :)

Ingredients
200-300gm pasta, boil till al-dente
1 jar Leggo's napolitana sauce (or other sauces that you like)
1 can tuna flakes in oil
handful of basil, chopped
oregano, basil herbs if you like

Method
1. Boil pasta till al-dente, drain the water and put it aside
2. Heat pasta sauce till bubbly and add tuna flakes, stir well and add herbs if you want more flavour
3. Add pasta into the heated sauce and toss till well coated
4. Sprinkle chopped basil and serve immediately

If you want to make sauce from scratch, the ingredients are as follows:

1 clove garlic, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
1 can tomato sauce (in a can, more if you like)
oregano and basil
salt to taste

Fry chopped garlic and onion till soft and add tomato sauce. Add a little bit of water and add herbs and salt to taste.

That is generally it. You can also add chopped tomatoes (preferably from the can) to the sauce for more flavour.

Chempedak Fritters

I do not know the english name for chempedak, but it looks a little bit like jackfruit but smaller and sweeter. It has a very strong smell almost as stinking as durian. To me it smells a little like gasoline if it is not opened. But once you open up the fruit, it doesn't smell as bad.

My mom gave me one medium size chempedak yesterday and I ended up making fritters out of it this morning.

The fruit

The final product :-D

Crispy on the outside but soft and sweet inside

Ingredients
chempedak
3/4 cup rice flour
2 tbsp self raising flour
1/2 tsp limewater (you can omit this)
pinch of salt
1 to 1 1/2 cup water
Enough oil for deep frying

Method
1. Mix flours and salt
2. Pour water into the dry ingredients slowly and stir till batter is somewhat like pancake batter
3. Add limewater and stir mixture till well-blended
4. Heat oil in a wok
5. Coat chempedak with batter and deep fry till golden brown
6. Serve hot with tea

Strawberry Yoghurt Ice-Cream

I was reminded of my tub of yoghurt and a small box of whipping cream in my fridge by Gina (KC) after she made her yoghurt ice-cream. A good idea to clear them and at the same time free some fridge space, I made this in the morning using my ice-cream maker.

I sort of cheated using strawbery paste instead of fresh strawberry puree but added some chopped strawberries into the yoghurt ice-cream. The ice-cream came out perfect for me. I like it a little sourish, so I added more yoghurt.

Ingredients
450gm plain yoghurt (less if you don't want it to be too sour)
200gm whipping cream/pure cream
1/4 to 1/2 cup powdered sugar (more if you like sweet)
4 strawberries, chopped
1 tsp lemon juice, added to the chopped strawberries
1 - 1 1/2 tsp strawberry paste/emulco*
pinch of salt

*you can use fresh strawberries puree. Take about 4-6 strawberries and blend it into puree and add some lemon juice to it

Method
Using ice-cream maker
1. Mix yoghurt, cream, sugar, salt and strawberry paste/puree and blend till well mix. Keep them in the fridge to chill it.
2. Assemble the ice-cream maker, pour the chilled mixture into ice-cream maker and follow the instruction of the manufacturer.

Manual
1. Whisk yoghurt, cream, sugar, salt in a chilled bowl for about 1 min
2. Add strawberry paste/puree and continue mixing till well blended
3. Pour into a container and store it in the freezer till set.

Sambal Goreng Pengantin ala Zu

This is one of hubby's favourite dish. One of the least healthy dish, it is generally made of some cow's organs like liver and lungs, prawns, beef/mutton or even tripe. This is my mom's recipe which I am soo used to eating and to me, it is so far the best sambal goreng. I modify her version slightly by adding beancurd and tempe which are my hubby's favourite. It took me awhile to get used to the combination but I am pretty alright with it now.

I hardly make this dish because of the amount of time needed to prepare it. Firstly, the cutting, everything has to be cut into bite size followed by the frying of every ingredients - that is why I said this is one of the most unhealthy dish around.

For this version, I only used beancurd, prawns and lungs (yeah lungs).

dumped all the ingredients after frying

Ingredients
4 firm beancurd, cut into bite size/cubed
200-300g fresh prawns, remove head and shell but leave the tail
200-300g lungs, cooked and cubed
5 large fresh red chillies, thinly sliced
4 large onions, thinly sliced
3tbsp chilli paste (more if you like it spicy)
4cm belachan (shrimp paste)
tamarind juice from tamarind pulp about the size of a small lemon
4 large clove garlic
3cm ginger
4cm galangal
3 lemongrass
100-150ml coconut milk
100-200ml water
salt & sugar to taste
3-5 tbsp oil

Method
1. Fry beancurd, prawns, lungs, sliced onions and chillies till cooked, without over cooking it and put it aside
2. Blend garlic, ginger, galangal and lemongrass into a paste
3. Add belachan with the tamarind juice and put it aside
4. Heat oil in wok and add chilli paste
5. Stir fry the chilli paste till oil separates then add the garlic/ginger/galangal/lemongrass paste
6. Fry till fragrant
7. Add coconut milk followed by tamarind/belachan juice and stir well
8. Add 100ml of water, you can add more water if you prefer to have more gravy
9. Add salt & sugar to taste and simmer till gravy is slightly thickened
10.Add the fried ingredients, and stir till all the ingredients are well coated with the gravy
11.Simmer till slightly dry - there should not be too much gravy
12.Serve hot with steamed rice