Mandarin Orange Muffins

I came to know about a food event known as, Muffin Monday Round Up, while surfing around for muffin creations. I decided to take part in this event, since I love baking muffins, and furthermore, it is hosted by Elena of Experiments, from Singapore.

Here's my entry for the event: Mandarin Orange Muffins.


I came across a blueberry muffin recipe from a Japanese-Chinese translated cookbook...Sweet Simple Dessert. I love the way the muffins look...very pretty, with nice and smooth domed tops. Most of the time, my muffins turned out to have very cracked tops :(

I followed the recipe but replaced the blueberries with mandarin oranges since I have been wanting to bake something with them. Instead of the usual "muffin" method where the wet ingredients are added to the dry ones, this recipe is based on the creaming method, i.e. cream butter with sugar.

I was rather satisfied with how the muffins turned out. The tops didn't crack that much as compared to my previous bakes. The texture is very soft and light, almost like cupcakes. The sweetness is also just right, with only a slight tang from the mandarin oranges.


Ingredients:
(makes 12 cupcakes)

200g plain flour
20g corn flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
50ml milk
2 tablespoon plain yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
110g butter, softened
160g caster sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
2 mandarin oranges, cut into small chunks

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degC.


2. Sift together plain flour, corn flour and baking powder. Set aside.


3. Mix yogurt and milk together in a bowl. Set aside.


4. Whisk butter still soft. Add in sugar and salt and continue to whisk till mixture turns light and fluffy.


5. Add the eggs, one at a time, and whisk until combined. Mix in the vanilla.


6. Add in half of the flour mixture, stir with a spatula until just combined. Add in half of the yogurt & milk mixture, stir until just combined. Continue to add in half of the remaining flour mixture, followed by the remaining yogurt mixture, and finally the remaining flour mixture. Stir until just combined between each addition.


7. Fill muffin cups to half full with the batter. Distribute orange pieces evenly among the cups. Spoon remaining batter on top. Decorate with one slice of orange on top, if desired.


8. Bake for 25 mins until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Low-Fat Orange Yogurt Cake

I am always skeptical when it comes to low-fat desserts and bakes. I really doubt they will taste as good. However, after the feasting and binging on Chinese New Year food and goodies, it's time that I try making something that's low-fat. Earlier this week, I made curry chicken with low-fat milk, after hearing good reviews from my friend. Indeed, the curry tasted as good, except that I missed the sweet aroma from the coconut milk.

I made a "loaf" of low-fat orange cake last night. I adapted a Cranberry Pecan Cake recipe from Alice Medrich's Chocolate and the Art of Low-Fat Desserts. As I just needed a simple cake, I omitted the cranberry and pecan, as well as the frosting. I used a wooden spoon instead of an electric mixer as I was too lazy to do the cleaning up. Although, on hind sight, I should have use a manual whisk instead. I think it would be easier to whisk the butter and sugar with it as it took me a quite a while to cream the butter mixture till pale & fluffy with the wooden spoon :(

The cake is meant to be baked in an 8-cup tube pan, since I don't have such kind of pan, I used a disposable foil loaf pan. Fortunately, the cake turned out to be very soft and light, unlike those moist and dense pound cake or butter cake. I believe the use of cake flour and yogurt helps to give the cake such a soft texture. This is meant to be a low-fat cake, but I think the sugar ought to be reduced further by at least 20 to 30%, I still find it a tad too sweet for me!


Ingredients:

250g cake flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
70g butter, soften at room temperature
zest of 1 orange
180g sugar (original recipe calls for 200g of sugar)
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup plain, non-fat yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
2 tablespoon orange juice

Method:

1. Preheat oven at 180 degC. Grease or line a 8" by 4" loaf pan.


2. Sift together cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Set aside.


3. In a bowl, mix together yogurt, vanilla essence and orange juice.


4. With an electric mixer, beat butter and orange zest for 1 min. Add in sugar and beat on high speed for about 3 mins.


5. Add in eggs gradually, about 1 tablespoon at a time, beat constantly for about 2 mins.


6. On low speed, beat in 1/3 of the flour mixture. On medium-high speed, beat in 1/2 of the yogurt mixture. On low speed, beat in half of the remaining flour mixture. On high speed, beat in the remaining yogurt mixture. On low speed, beat in the rest of the flour mixture.


7. Scrape into prepared pan and bake for 45 mins or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.
   

Violets are blue

This post has got nothing to do with baking or cooking. Now, unless you like gardening and flowers, you can skip this posting ;)

I was pleasantly surprised when I watered my plants this morning. A flower bud has sprout out from my pot of african violet!!! I was so happy! This plant has stopped blooming ever since the first set of flowers were gone. The plant has been on my window sill for many months...and I must confess, I really didn't give it much attention or care. I just water it once or twice a week, without even giving it any fertiliser. It is really difficult to grow violets in this kind of weather in Singapore. I used to own several pots of violets while I was still working. I keep my plants in the office as they grow better in air-con environment.

I'm not sure whether it was a pure coincident...as I posted some photos of my "past" plants in flickr.com just a couple of days ago...including a photo of this pot.

Can you see the flower bud?

A closer look at the flower bud:

This was taken when I first bought this plant home, it was in full bloom then:

I hope I could find my green fingers back real soon!

Quick & Easy Fried Vermicelli aka Fried Bee Hoon

I usually cook simple one-dish meals for lunch as there are only the 3 of us. I am really fortunate that my 2 boys are not picky eaters. They eat whatever I cook. A few weeks ago, I made them fried noodles which tasted like rubber-bands, and yet, without any complaints, they finished up whatever that were in their plates. I told myself I really have to brush up on my cooking soon.

This fried bee hoon with stewed pork ribs, is one of the few better dishes that I could manage. I once ate this dish at my MIL's place, and from the ingredients, I figured out my own version.


I know fried bee hoon is one of the simplest local asian dish that any good cook would not deem it fit to even mention it. However, for an inexperienced cook like me, it took me a few attempts before I got the taste right. Thanks to the encouragement and support from my two little ones!

This is a rather straight forward dish as you simply need to fry the bee hoon with cabbage, carrots and canned stewed pork ribs. It can be ready in 30mins. In fact, the preparation time could be shorter, if not for my poor cutting & chopping skills ;)

What you need:
(serves 3 ~ 4)

1/2 packet bee hoon/vermicelli
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 carrot
1/2 chinese cabbage (small)
1 can stewed pork ribs
1 cup water
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp light soy sauce

Method:

1. Soak bee hoon in cold water for about 10 to 15 mins.
   
2. Peel carrot and rinse cabbage. Cut into shreds
   
3. Remove any excess fat from the canned stewed pork ribs. Remove the bones and tear the pork ribs into shreds. Retain the sauce.
   
4. Fry eggs till done. Cut into shreds and set aside.
   
5. Heat 2 tablespoon of oil in a wok till hot. Stir fry carrot and cabbage till soft. Add in stewed pork ribs with the sauce, stir in salt, soy sauce and 1 cup of water. Bring to boil.
   
6. Add in drained bee hoon. Toss and stir gently till sauce is fully absorbed by the bee hoon. Serve garnished with egg shreds.
   

Banana Blueberry Muffins

Muffins again?!

Sorry, but I couldn't help but to bake muffins for breakfast today. As the CNY public holidays are still on, most of the stalls at the hawker centre or coffeeshops will not open for business until tomorrow. As such, we won't be able to have our breakfast outside, even though it is our usual routine to do so during public holidays.

I have left over bananas and blueberries, so I came up with this recipe of my own. I think I have been quite comfortable with making muffins, so much so that I could easily "mix and match" recipes and ingredients to make my own version ;)

Here's my version of banana blueberry muffins. The muffins are much better than the previous batch of blueberry muffins. They are more fragrant because of the bananas and the sweetness is just nice. The texture is rather fluffy and moist, although again, the appearance is not too pleasing to the eyes :(

I do hope I could made tasty and yet pretty muffins very soon!

Ingredients:
(makes 12 muffins)

210g plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 egg, lightly beaten
100g sugar
1/4 cup oil
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
2 medium sized bananas, mashed
1 cup fresh blueberries

Method:

1. Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda in a bowl.
   
2. Working over the bowl, toss the blueberries with about 1 ~ 2 teaspoon of flour mixture in a sieve, and set aside. Coating the blueberries with flour helps to keep them from sinking to the bottom of the muffins as they bake.
   
3. Combine egg, sugar, oil, vanilla essence and mashed bananas in another bowl. Mix well.
   
4. Add the wet ingredients to the flour mixture. Stir until just blended. Fold in blueberries gently.
   
5. Fill muffin cups/liners till almost full. Bake in preheated oven at 200 degC for 20 to 25 mins.