C is for CNY Cookiieee
29/01/2011
shortbread cake with blackberry jam
Been slightly busy at work, but it’s going well. Am having fun at work, and people are nice. Cafeteria food is, cafeteria food, but I have managed to infiltrate other non-cafeteria bound groups for a good variety.
Been baking a little more, and had more success with cookies than with cake. Tried making pandan cupcakes the other day, but it didn’t go well. This weekend it’s cookie weekend – think that will go down better. Might also make some tarts, bought lots of butter, the good kind 
Earl Grey Tea Cookies (Recipe from Martha Stewart)
- 1 cup butter (softened)
- 1/3 cup sugar (original asked for 1/2 cup, but it was wayy sweet. I’d pinch it down to 1/4 or 1/3 if I had to do this over)
- finely grated rind of 1 orange – take care not to grate the pith (about 2 teaspoons)
- 2 tablespoons of ground earl grey tea (I put it in the food processor)
- pinch of salt
- 2 cups of flour
Cream butter and sugar, until light and fluffy. Add in orange rind. Whisk tea, flour and salt in a bowl, add to butter mixture. Mix until just combined.
Here’s the trick for a harder cookie. Leave it to rest in the fridge. Martha has some fancy way of shaping her dough, but it involves freezing it too. I found my dough too soft to really handle, so I stuck it in the fridge for a couple of hours, then took it out, cut it into 3 pieces, and shaped each piece into a 1.25″ diameter log. I wrapped the log with Saran wrap, and then shaped it into a square with a bamboo sushi mat. After shaping and everything, I put it back into the fridge. It’d keep well for a few days. When I’m ready to bake, I’m just going to slice the logs up into 1/4 inch squares.
If you like a soft, moist, crumbly cookie, don’t put it in the fridge. Put your soft dough into a piping bag with a large tip (extra large star will do well here) and pipe them out onto a cookie sheet. Looks very fancy.
Will bake in a 350F oven for about 15 minutes until golden.
Read (and watched) a few horoscope readings for the Year of the Rabbit, and it seems like it’ll likely not go well for both Mr C and I. He’ll have a tougher time, but it’s going not going to be a great year for my sign either. I think I would have been a little more upset a few years back, but now that we’ve been through a few “bad” years, I’m more prepared to just take it in stride. I’m not going to fret, nor am I going to ignore thousands of years of empirical evidence. I’m going to take it under advisement, and watch out for the pitfalls, but it’ll make the year longer just fussing over it. At this point, I just want the year to be over. 
Ah well. We can only take it a day at a time.
The weather has been unseasonably pleasant – while it’s snowing buckets on the East Coast, it’s a balmy 68F here with plenty of sunshine. The cherry blossoms have been fooled into thinking it’s spring, and the ones on our block have started blooming like crazy. Love it! Can’t wait for Spring.
Let them have cake!
31/12/2010
I was so sad about the new year I baked a cake. Devil’s Food Cake recipe too, and I upped the amount of chocolate. That’s how sad I get on New Year’s Eve.
Here’s the recipe, in case I’d like to replicate my success (and I do like to do that sometimes). It was a little on the dry side, so maybe next time around I’ll ease up on the flour. This will fit a round 6″ pan nicely. 6″ diameter, in case you’re wondering.
Devil’s Food Cake (aka chocolate cake, heavy on the chocolate). Adapted from a recipe I found on Allrecipes.com.
Serves up to 8 (if, like KF’s family, you only have room for a small wedge after a large dinner)
Ingredients:
- 1 cup flour (sifted)
- 2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder (i sifted this as well)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- a pinch of salt
- 1 egg
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup butter
- 2 oz unsweetened chocolate (i used 100%)
- 1/2 cup boiling water
- 2 tablespoons milk
- 1 teaspoon vinegar
Preheat oven to 350°F
Melt butter and chocolate, leave to cool. Cream egg and sugar until thick and pale (4 mins on electric mixer). Add melted chocolate into the egg and sugar batter a little at a time (so the egg does not cook!). Mix well. Add boiling water in the same way – gingerly. Add flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt; I used the balloon whisk at this point because it’s just easier. Scrape down the sides. Finally, add the vinegar into the milk, and into your batter. Only add the vinegar into the milk right before adding it to the batter, if you do it way ahead, you’ll get cheese. Mix well, pour into 6″ cake pan. Bake for 30-35mins (depends on your oven – mine took about 45 mins). The cake is done when a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Mine was a tad dry, but given the amount of fat I used, I figure it was good. Maybe more water next time, we’ll see.
A slice of that and some vanilla ice cream – that’s how I’m ringing in my 2011.
Here’s wishing you a sweet, chocolatety, rewarding, endorphin-laden 2011.
C is for Cookie… and Christmas
12/12/2010
It’s a couple weeks to Christmas, and we’re done with our Christmas shopping. At least I am. KF volunteered to participate in the Christmas shopping this year, so he’s got to get the presents for his cousins and the nephews and nieces. I took care of the presents for his aunts and uncles, and my family. I’m glad that he’s getting into it finally, especially when he doesn’t really enjoy shopping all that much (especially when it doesn’t involve some weird gadget and/or anything electronic).
With that bit of Christmas taken care of, I’ve been finding other things to obsess over. This year, it’s cookies. I’m still hunting for the perfect cookie, but keep ending up making shortbread cookies cos I’m equally obsessed with butter. I just can’t get over how handy that whole half fat to flour ratio is. My favourite combination this season is one cup butter, creamed with 1/2 cup sugar (ok, I usually cheat and use less sugar) and a teaspoon of either vanilla or orange extract. Add 2 cups flour and combine until it forms a dough. Herein is the fun bit.
If you portion out and bake the cookies now, they’ll be soft. And sorta moist. Bake it at about 350F, for 12-16 min. If you keep the dough in the fridge before baking, the cookies end up firmer. I think I like them firmer. Besides, nothing easier than taking out the cookie dough and just rolling out little marbles onto a cookie sheet. I flatten them with a glass cup, and voila, happy cookies 20 mins later.
make paste
29/12/2009
Just so I remember, the next time I make it.
For 汤圆, you’d use 1/2 to 2/3 amount of water to flour.
First mix the water in till you get lumps. Then really get in there and knead it up.
If you’re doing the Korean pancake thing, then check here. Like a cross between a tang yuan and prata, but far prettier.
happy 冬！
22/12/2009
Move over Autumn, Winter is here. I think it odd that Winter begins at the solstice (I grew up thinking it straddled the solstice) but hey. If it works, it works.
The days will now get longer (the way I like it) and will come in handy as the holidays suck energy levels even for the most extroverted.
My attempts at making 汤圆 have yielded some success. The riceballs are edible, though I almost always end up getting more than I started out wanting. Glutinous Rice Flour is a deceptive one, it is. When you think you finally have enough water, it lets on that hey, you actually have too much. Cheeky.
My grandmothers made them riceballs very differently. My paternal grandmother liked the savoury coconut milk “lemak” version. I was never a fan. But she did make really chewy riceballs. I only ate it cos I adored the riceballs.
My maternal grandmother made a simple clear accompanying soup. Just pandan and sugar, or sometimes with ginger. It was clear that the star of the dish was the riceball. However, her riceballs weren’t as sultry as other grandmother’s, who sort of relegated those riceballs to the supporting role.
Nonetheless. 冬 was always a good time, cos they didn’t make me riceballs any other time of the year.
I make my own riceballs now, and they’re turning out like maternal grandma’s: a little less firm and chewy. But at least I don’t have to share them with countless cousins. Ha!
Happy Winter!
look ear
11/11/2009
Woke up this morning with an ache in my left year. That’s not good. The last time I had a horrible time with my year it was 2006. Very annoying. This time to get it flushed won’t be as simple as walking over to Raffles Hospital and $50.
Well I am now left to try a cerumenolytic for a few days. Hopefully the wax will disperse naturally, if not I’ll have to try syringing it later in the week. This is very annoying, the ear is ringing constantly, and I feel like something is stuck in my ear.
Thing is, in previous episodes, the ear infection came with or heralded a larger issue – either the onset of the flu, or a throat infection. I hope it’s just an isolated issue this time.
In other news, I searched “ear” on my photostream and found this photo. So here it is.
organic gardening
27/09/2009
It’s been a little on the warm this September, and thanks to the prolonged Summer-like weather the bugs in my front yard are going wild.
A bunch of somethings or another have been chewing holes into my viburnums and roses, and it’s been really annoying the heck out of KF.
So after a little research, and perhaps to fulfill the kid in him, we went out and got a tub of ladybugs. Ladybugs, aka Ladybirds, are little beetles, and they make quick snacks out of aphids and leaf-attacking buggies.
I suppose a part of me was willing to go along with the game, even though I am not convinced that the ladybugs effectiveness in our case, because ladybugs make great pictures. Ha!
They are indeed fairly cute and docile, they don’t really bite (although my dad is convinced he was bitten once). They’re pretty light too, so I don’t really feel them on my hands. They don’t have particularly hairy or sticky legs, so they slip off with a quick flick, unlike spiders or other bugs.
What I’ve mistaken for their eyes all my life, is actually the protonum. Their eyes are beadier little things in front of it. And their wings aren’t the happy red bits, they’re actually fairly boring looking wings under the red covering.
Next thing you know they’ll tell me they aren’t all ladies.
adventures in the kitchen
26/08/2009
I got a bunch of tea from AL a couple of months ago, and decided I was going to start cooking with tea, because if I was going to drink it, it’d take me forever to finish it.
Last week I started with something simple: tea eggs. We used to get them at pasar malams – KF could get a couple of those, and I’d get my colourful steamed bowl kuehs. Ahh, I miss that. Anyway, the tea eggs turned out well. Was a simple recipe, and I had a decent black tea for it.
This week I got more adventurous and decided on chicken + tea soup. It didn’t turn out too badly from the looks of things. Here are the recipes, try at your own risk. Don’t come crying that you don’t like it, or that it gave you the runs. I expect you to exercise common sense while cooking, and if you can’t you shouldn’t be in a room with sharp implements, open flames or appliances to begin with.
Chicken and Tea Soup
1/2 chicken breast
1/2 carrot
1 tablespoon green oolong (I used an Anxi Jade Guanyin)
4 slices of ginger
2 stalks pandan leaf
1 l of water
Bring water to boil, put everything in, and turn the heat down. Add salt to taste. Simmer on low heat for 40 mins. If you don’t, your tea will cook and make your soup bitter. Not my fault! But I suppose it’s not something a few cubes of rock sugar can’t fix. Theoretically.
Well, to make my chicken go further, I took the cooked breast out, pulled off the meat and tried to make some version of the chicken salad I’ve been ordering at Vietnamese restaurants.
Chicken Salad with Lime-Sesame Dressing
1/3 cup cooked chicken breast, pulled or sliced in thin strips
1 cup (about a quarter of a) sugar loaf cabbage, thinly sliced
a handful of cilantro aka coriander
1/3 cup apple, julienned (optional)
Dressing:
4 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons sesame oil
1 teaspoon soy sauce
3 tablespoons lime juice (I used kaffir lime from AL)
Mix dressing thorougly, and drizzle over vegetables and chicken. Toss and serve.
Apparently 1/2 a chicken breast is a lot of meat! It was probably 350-400g, so I had tons of meat left over despite making my salad (and my salad was pretty much dominated by chicken) so I tried this recipe that was sent to me by Allrecipe: Satay Chicken Pizza. Incidentally I also happened to have Gado Gado sauce ready in the fridge from an attempt at tauhu goreng and Pita bread from AL! Talk about timely. Pizza wasn’t too bad, but KF was complaining it was hard to eat. He insists I put the stuffing in the pocket the next time. So I guess it’ll be Satay Chicken Pockets next time round.
Next week: possibly tea poached fish. Hmmmmmm…
another culinary adventure
13/08/2009
Ever since Shienny boy put those pictures of his rendition of the cult classic – Prawn Mee – up, I’ve been inspired to try it myself. Not his Penang version, but the Singaporean version. It’s not a national issue. He says it’s all in the chilli. And since I’m not a big fan of that, I’ll make do with the version we have at home. The hard boiled egg though, seems like a good idea, so I might knick that.
Last year my sister-in-law very thoughtfully gifted me with The New Mrs Lee’s Cookbook (Vols 1 and 2) for my birthday. They sat prettily on my bookshelf for almost a year (in their shrinkwrap no less) before the search for a winning Prawn Noodle recipe made me check them out tonight. They didn’t disappoint. Well, at least Vol 2 didn’t.
A bit about The New Mrs Lee’s Cookbook(s). They were written, I suppose, over many years, many years ago by Mrs Lee Chin Koon. Hence the Mrs Lee. Before I opened the books from the shrinkwrap I was wondering just what made Mrs Lee and her recipes so special. I mean, I love Mrs Wee’s cooking, so I suppose if I wrote out my mom’s recipes and her very detailed instructions, Mrs Wee’s Cooking Guides for Dummies might be a hit! Anyway. In Vol 1, I found a sweet and heartwarming foreword written by Mr Wee. Mr Wee who? Well, no less than Kim Wee. So I’m thinking, Mrs Lee must be something, since that Mr Wee likes her enough to write her preface not once, but twice! Once for the original Cookbook, and then again for the version updated by Mrs Lee’s granddaughter. With me so far?
Here I am, wondering. Lee is a common surname in Singapore, but it’s by no means a common surname in Singapore. But I toss it to the back of my mind. After all, they can’t be everywhere, can they?
Evidently, they are. For the foreword for The New Mrs Lee’s Cookbook Vol 2 is written by no less than the MM himself. I have to say, the dude has a way with words I have the utmost respect for. He’s succinct, and puts across with such silent lucidity (while 298th grade writers like me rip off cheesy titles off old Queensryche songs). And since this is the best foreword I’ve read in a looonnng while (most times I don’t even read those things cos they take up 25% of the freaking book – yes, I’m a rebel) here’s an excerpt:
My mother loved good food and liked to cook for her children. [...]
A year ago, my niece, Shermay Lee, updated my mother’s cookbook and called it The New Mrs Lee’s Cookbook Vol. 1: Nonya Cuisine. It won an international award.
She has invited me to dinner at her cooking school in Chip Bee Gardens. Her dishes evoked memories of my mother’s food. But either with age my palate has become dulled and jaded, or the ingredients are no longer the same; in my memory, my mother’s dishes were better. However, for those who have never tasted my mother’s cooking, Shermay’s will be the next best available.
So, what did we learn from that last paragraph? That the pen is mightier than the sword or, as it were, the chopper. And that the way to a man’s heart is to cook exactly like his mom.
So wish me luck, for tomorrow I will embark on a new culinary adventure. To Kitchen Stadium and beyond!
i made chicken curry and it was good!
06/07/2009
Right before we left for the states those years back, some sort of panic came over me, and I started hogging these Prima Taste Packs like I’m moving to a far flung corner of the Third World. My mom and dad shook their heads in disdain, warning me no good (taste) would come of it, but I figured it was somewhere to start. Turns out, in many ways, it’s very Third World-esque here. Oh, and my folks were right. On the dot.
Anyway. Turns out curry is ridiculously easy and quick to make. All you need is steaming hot white rice or a baguette to go with it. The best part is I love how scalable it is. You can make a tiny batch just enough for dinner and maybe tomorrow’s lunch (tastes better the next day, actually).
Here’s what I did for my jaw-dropping, appetite-satisfying chicken curry. Serves 2 for dinner (and lunch the next day).
Ingredients
- 1/2 a large white onion, or a bunch of shallots
- 2 boneless chicken thighs, cut up into bite sized pieces – I usually marinate it with sesame oil and soy sauce
- 4 small potatoes, cut up into bite sized pieces (a fairly waxy or hard potato will hold up better than a fluffy one – so I go for the red or white potatoes, not RB)
- curry powder (I like Earthern Pot meat curry powder) – I don’t measure it out, but I probably use 1/3 of a package
- broth (or water) to make enough gravy you desire
- yogurt or sour cream or coconut milk or (even) evaporated milk – I like yogurt/sour cream cause I always have that in the fridge
Process of putting it together
To start: Heat a small wok with enough oil to cover the onions well. I usually sprinkle some salt in there for the onions (and lemongrass, garlic, ginger, etc if I’m in the mood). Toss in the onions, and saute until soft (pretty quick).
Main event: This is where I toss in the potatoes, mix them up a bit with the onions, and let it cook for another 5 minutes or so (with the heat turned down to medium so the onions don’t burn). If you’re in a super hurry, boil the potatoes separately while you are heating up the wok. When the potatoes are half done, add the chicken, and let it brown. Then give it a good stir, add in the curry powder, stir more, add the broth (or water – I even used the boiled potato water once, earthy!) and stir till well combined. Add salt to taste.
Finale: Finally, stir in the yogurt, sour cream or coconut milk to thicken.
Good with steamed rice, though if the gravy is thick enough, I like it served on egg noodles (which for some reason tends to water down my curry despite my best efforts).
There. Easy peasy.
