Steamed Pumpkin Muffin

With pumpkin & coconut powder readily available in pantry, can't wait to try out this steamed muffin when saw Wendy made this few days ago :D Weather's been gloomy this few days and therefore not enough natural light to capture proper pictures. Glad that I've used coconut milk instead of normal milk, it taste so yummy!!

Recipe adapted from Table for 2

Ingredient (8 muffins)

• 125gm steamed pumpkin flesh
• 1 egg
• 100gm sugar
• 100ml thick coconut milk
• 30gm olive oil
  
• 180gm cake flour
• 20gm rice flour
• 1.5tsp baking powder
• pinch of salt
  

Method

1. Prepare your steamer and bring the water to a boil.
2. Using a hand whisk, beat egg, sugar, milk and oil till sugar is well dissolved. Stir in pumpkin puree.
   
3. Sift cake flour, rice flour, salt and baking powder into a mixing bowl.
4. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour pumpkin mixture. Mix until well combined.
5. Spoon into lined steaming cups and steam on high heat for 15 minutes. It will bloom by itself, no need to make a cross with oil.

Seafood Tom Yum Soup

Northern Style Tom Yum Soup, spicy & sour clear soup instead of the usual red spicy milky soup base.

Ingredient

• 5 lemongrass, use the white ends
• 50gm blue ginger, smashed
• 70gm coriander
• 5 stalk spring onion
• 8 chilli padi
• 5 kaffir lime leaves
• sugar 1 tbsp
• 4 green lime, extract juice (I used normal green lime instead of the kaffir limes as shown in pics)
• fish sauce to taste
• prawn
• squid
• fish fillet
• mussels

Method

1. Place all fresh herbs ingredient in a pot with 1200ml water. Bring to boil and simmer for 30mins.
2. Strain liquid, bring to boil. Add your favourite seafood ingredients. Season to taste with fish sauce, lime juice & sugar. To serve, garnish with more coriander leaves & lime juice if necessary.

Stuffed Portebellos

I loves portebello mushroom! fat & juicy texture ^-^

Ingredient

• 150gm minced chicken
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tsp corn flour
• 8 mini Portebellos mushroom
• olive oil
• cheddar cheese
  

Method

1. Remove stem from mushroom. Chopped finely and set aside.
2. Marinate minced chicken with salt, pepper, worcestershire sauce & corn flour.
3. Heat 1 tbsp oil in pan, saute garlic & onion till fragrant.
4. Add minced chicken and chopped mushroom stem. Stir fry till mixture is cooked for abt 3mins. Cool down slightly.
5. Brush mushroom cap & bottom with some olive oil. Scoop some chicken mixture over the cap, pressing down slightly.
   
6. Line a baking tray, place mushroom in a hot oven grill and grill for 5mins.
7. Remove from oven, top with shredded cheddar cheese and continue to grill till golden brown, takes abt 3-4mins.
8. Serve with salad as desired.
   

Carrot & Pineapple Cupcakes

Wish Everyone Have A Happy &
Bountiful Bunny Year Ahead!!

Ingredient
* 110gm unsalted butter
* 90gm sugar
* 2 eggs
* 1/4 tsp salt
* 110 self-raising flour
* 1/2 tsp cinnamon powder
* 1/4 tsp baking soda
* 100gm carrot, coarsely grated
* 80gm pineapples, diced

Meth0d
1. Combine butter, sugar, eggs, salt, flour, cinnamon powder and baking soda in a mixing bowl. Beat till smooth & pale for 3 mins.
2. Fold in carrot & pineapple until combined.
3. Spoon batter into cupcake cases and bake in preheated oven at 180 deg cel for 25mins.

Sugar Free CNY Cookies

These are my tested sugar-free cookies which I've baked for my parent-in-laws whom are diabetes :D. The cost of the subsitute sugar (Sucrolose) is of course higher than normal refined sugar, but the amount used is equivalent lesser.

Sugar-free Almond Cookies

Sugar-free Pistachio Cookies

Sugar-Free Almond Cookies
Ingredient (60 cookies)

• 175gm unsalted butter
• 12gm Splenda (substitute sugar)
  
• 125gm plain flour, sifted
  
• 60gm corn flour, sifted
  
• 100gm ground almonds
• 1 tsp almond essence
  

Method

1. Sift flour together.
   
2. Cream butter & substitute sugar. Beat in almond essence. Add flour in 3 batches and beat till combined.
   
3. Using a spatula, fold in ground almond until evenly mixed. Chill dough in fridge for 1hr.
   
4. Shape dough into small balls. Bake in preheated oven at 180 deg cel for 15-20mins.
   

Click here for Pistachio Cookie recipes (I replaced the sugar with 12gm of substitute sugar, rest of ingredients remain the same)

Other recipes using Splenda...

Pineapple Tarts 4

Final batch of cny cookies baking for me!! really tedious for this open tarts 'cos of the stamping, almost give up >0< took me over 1 hour just to cut out 75 cookies! so tired after baking & cleaning, could not wait for them to cool down I went to my bed cos is already 1.30am!! zzzzz......

Extra pastry dough, mould into Bunnies Family! cute?

Recipe source : Happy Home Baking

Ingredients

• 227gm butter
• 30gm icing sugar
  
• 2 egg yolks, lightly beaten
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 400g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 egg yolk + some water for glazing
  

Method

1. With an electric mixer, on medium speed, cream butter & icing sugar till the mixture turns pale. Add in the vanilla essence and whisk to combine.
2. Dribble in the egg yolks and continue to whisk the mixture till fully incorporated.
3. Sift in the flour and salt into the mixture. Mix the mixture with your hand and gather to form a rough dough. Transfer to a work surface and lightly knead the dough for about 5 minutes until the dough becomes smooth.
4. Wrap the dough with cling wrap and chill in the fridge for about 30mins.
5. Meanwhile, roll ready-made pineapple jam into small balls 7 gm each.
   
6. Remove dough from fridge. Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface to about 5~7mm thick.
   
7. Cut out the dough with the tart mould and transfer to baking tray, lined with parchment paper.
   
8. Bake in preheated oven at 180 degC for 10 mins. Remove from oven, glaze with egg yolk and place pineapple paste on each tart base. To decorate, you can either top it with a tiny ball of dough or cut out thin strips of dough and lay over the top of the pineapple paste.
9. Return to oven and continue to bake for another 10-12mins. Leave to cool on baking tray for a few minutes before transferring to wire rack. Let cool before storing in air-tight containers.

Ochazuke

Simply light & refreshing that I've prepared this for dinner for straight 2 days! :) Plus is fuss free to prepare also....

Ingredient (1 serving)

• 1 green tea bag (steep in 250ml hot water)
• cooked rice
• 1 tbsp light soya sauce
• dash of sesame oil
• Furikake (can be bought at suprmarket at Jap section)
  
• fried toufu
• shiktake mushroom lightly sauteed
  
• pan-fried salmon
• omelette

To serve : Scoop rice into serving bowl, pour over green tea and drizzle over light soya sauce & sesame oil. Top with your favourite toppings and sprinkle over Furikake, serve immediately!...

Pineapples Tarts 3

Finally done a batch of pineapple tarts last night! Every year I will try out different pineapple tarts recipe to test out except last year I've so busy with my confinement that I missed making that :) Still feeling lazy to make the jam by scratch I've opt to use 'Bake King' pineapple jam which is most recommended by people whom have used it. It taste not too sweet and have some bites of pineapples fibre in it, but I still prefer homemade jam which is more sourish ^-^

This pastry recipe is extracted from Ooi Lin's recipe book which my friend recommended to me. It has the melt in the mouth texture which I like ;)

Ingredient (approx 63pcs)

• 440gm pineapple filling
• 180gm cold unsalted butter
• 240gm plain flour
• 1.5 tbsp cornflour
• 50gm icing sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 egg yolk
• 1/4 tsp vanilla essence
• egg glaze : 1 egg yolk mixed with few drops of water
• cloves for decoration
  

Method

1. Roll pineapple filling into small balls (1 level tsp) approx 7gm each.
2. Sift plain flour, cornflour, sugar & salt together.
3. Mix egg yolk & vanilla essence.
4. Cut cold butter into cubes. Using fingertips, rub butter into flour mixture till a dough is formed.
5. Add egg mixture and mix till combined. Do not overmix. Wrap the dough and chill for 30 mins to firm it up.
6. Divide dough into small balls (1/2 level tbsp) approx 8gm each.
7. Lightly flatten the dough, place a ball of pineapple filling in it and wrap over.
8. Bake tarts in preheated oven at 180 deg cel for 10 mins. Remove tray and brush the tops of the tarts with egg glaze. Stick a clove in the middle of each tart. Return to bake for another 8-10mins. Cool completely before storing.
   

Pandan Sago Cookies

One of my favourite Chinese New Year cookie! like the melts in the mouth texture & coconut flavour :D I've baked 2 batches this round, one is original flavour & the other is pandan flavour! Do not want to left with any unused sago flour, I dry fried the whole packet of 800gm flour. In the end the flour volume decrease to 700gm after frying with some pandan leaves. Therefore I've used 300gm flour for the original & 400gm for the pandan flavoured cookies. I simply adjusted the other ingredient proportionally using the present recipe (link as below) I just added 1 tsp pandan paste to 400gm recipe.

Click here for recipes

Aspiring Bakers #3: My Favourite CNY Cookie (Jan 2011)

1st taste of cake (:

Slice of cake from the fondant cake :) Though overbaked the cake but is still quite moist inside!

"I want I want, yum yum yum"...wailed when I stopped feeding her hahaha...

Happy 1st Birthday, Yu Zhen!!

My 1st posting of year 2011 dedicated to my Princess 1st Birthday on 20 Jan 2011!! Been busy since last Christmas, already fulfilled my customer orders for Chinese New Year, but yet to start baking cookies for myself & family!! After my dear daughter birthday, finally can spare some time to start baking CNY cookies!!

This is also my 1st fondant tier cake creation! It has been some time I've handle marshmallow fondant and I've never use it to decorate a whole cake. Therefore is quite a challenge for me to create a tier cake without prior experience. So I've to search around the web site and learn a couple of crucial tips from my baking friends :) I'm not a very creative person so I choose a simple design. A pinky cake with small little flowers around it would not go wrong anyway, with an additional precious moment figurine, it helps to beautify the whole cake. Luckily I've manage to pull through with couple of hiccups in between.

A 4" strawberry madeira cake & and 6" lemon medeira cake. I've actually overbaked the 6" cake, as you can see the thick brown crust forming around the cake!

Ingredient

• 225gm unsalted butter
• 200gm sugar
• 225gm self-raising flour
• 115gm plain flour
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
• 1 lemon zest

Method

1. Sift flour together. Cream butter & sugar until light & fluffy.
2. Beat in eggs one at a time and beat till combined.
3. Mix in vanilla essence & lemon zest.
4. Fold in flour and mix evenly.
5. Pour batter into a lined 7" cake pan and bake in preheated oven at 160 deg cel for 60mins or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
6. Cool slightly before unmoulding.