Assorted Sweet Buns

I made a batch of sweet buns using the same bread recipe as the milk loaf. According to the original source of this recipe, the bread tastes as good when made into small buns. I filled some of the buns with red bean paste and a few with kaya spread.



I made a few doughs into donut shapes and glazed them with melted chocolate. I don't do any deep frying at home, so, making any donuts is out of the question, even though my boys have also caught on the donut waves lately.



Actually the only thing they like about donuts are the sweet toppings...especially those that are glazed generously with chocolate. The chocolates that I used have got a very smooth texture, I didn't have to add any butter or whipping cream. The consistency was just right for glazing. As I didn't have any white chocolates on hand, I tried melting some white chocolate chips. To my surprise, it was rather difficult to melt the chips...and it was very hard and thick, as such I had to add a few teaspoons of milk in order to get the right consistency for decorating.


To create the effect of the heart shapes, after coating the buns with dark chocolate, simply add drops of white chocolates, equally spaced out, over the surface. With a toothpick, swap it across the white dots. I saw this in a cookbook long time ago, and only had the chance to try it today. Not very impressive, isn't it ;')



I didn't use a donut cutter or any cookie cutter to cut out the centre hole of the donut. What I did was quite 'primitive'! I simply shaped the dough into a round ball, and poke a finger right through the centre. Then I "spin" the dough around with a finger to enlarge the hole. It was only at this point that I realised that I had to use something to prevent the hole from closing up during the second proofing. I couldn't think of any tools to use on hand...and finally, I got out a couple of empty bottle caps and stuck it in the dough. I removed the caps just before baking, and it didn't seems to work. Once the buns were subject to the heat in the oven, they expanded and the hole almost disappeared!

The kids were happy when they saw these...

but I much prefer these plain ones!

Baked Rice

I was initially planning to cook my usual rice-cooker chicken rice for dinner last night. Upon several requests by the rest of the family members, in the end, I came up with this Chicken & Mushroom Baked Rice in creamy sauce.


I have tried making baked rice dishes several times. When it comes to cooking dishes, I have a tendency not to follow the recipes closely. Somehow, I do not have the habit of measuring the ingredients, I simply estimate the amount needed. As a result, sometimes the rice will be too dry, sometimes the combination just didn't seems to be right...most of the time it turned out to be too bland or not creamy enough.


This time round, I still didn't follow the recipe exactly, but at least, I took the effort to measure the amount of cream, and the amount of chicken stock required. This actually paid off. The rice was not dry at all and it was creamy enough, though I should have added more black pepper.

My kids love the golden cheesy crust and both saved it till the last to finish off. In fact, they had a bigger rice portion than what they usually take if it they were given plain rice. I reserved a portion for my better half, and when he called to say he would be home soon, I added the cheese toppings and popped the dish into the oven. When he returned, he was pleased to have a piping hot baked rice fresh from the oven...the only thing he complained was, his portion was too small ;)

Ingredients:
(serves 4)

1.5 cups uncooked rice
2 chicken thigh
100g fresh mushrooms of your choice , sliced thickly
some minced garlic
1 cup cream (dairy)
1/2 cup chicken stock
1 teaspoon salt (adjust according to taste)
some black pepper
some grated mozzarella cheese
dried parsley

Method:

1. Wash and cook rice with rice cooker.


2. Bring a pot of water to the boil, put in the chicken thigh and boil till the chicken is almost cooked. Let cool and shred the chicken into bite sizes. Reserve half cup of the chicken stock.


3. Heat up a deep pan, with some cooking oil (or butter) stir fry minced garlic and mushrooms. Add in the shredded chicken meat. Add pepper and salt to taste. Continute to stir fry till the mushrooms become soft.


4. Add in the cream, stir well. Add in the chicken stock and bring to a boil. (Note, always add cream BEFORE the chicken stock, otherwise the mixture may not be smooth.)


5. Add in the cooked rice. Stir and let it cook for a few mins or until the sauce is almost fully absorbed by the rice.


6. Place rice into a heatproof baking dish. Cover top with grated cheese.


7. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 200 degC, till the cheese turns golden brown. Sprinkle with some dried parsley. Serve immediately.

Easy Plum Cake

I was in a dilemma whether to put up this post after having tasted this Plum Cake.

Initially I was so pleased with the look of this cake when it was taken out from the oven. I was so eager to share the recipe that I actually started typing it out while the cake was cooling off. I really like the nice golden crust rising above the sunken plums, and it looked lovely in this ovenproof dish.


Lately, I have been buying fresh plums whenever I passed by the fruit stalls. I am not a fan of plums, until I came across this variety...they are slightly oval in shape, and look very much like huge prunes. They are much sweeter than the usual plums and the skin is less tart. It was later on when I dropped by the supermart that I realised they are known as Sierra Prunes.

I have came across a few nice plum cake recipes posted by bloggers, but when I saw this apricot cake recipe from this book, Easy as Cake, I thought it is too simple a cake to give it a miss, although I was totally clueless how the cake will turn out, and I have never tasted a plum cake before. And I do believe it is a much healthier choice as only a small amount of oil is used with no butter added.


When freshly baked, the crust of the cake was a little hard and crisp, the texture was almost similar to biting into a piece of cookie. The cake was crumbly and a little on the dry side. Those parts near the fruits were moist though and it tasted alright. Nothing fantastic, just ok. However, I don't really know what to say about the plums...somehow, after baking, the fruits have lost their fresh taste :(


This photo was taken on the day that the cake was baked. I read that some plum cakes will be firm and crumbly when first baked, after leaving it overnight, the texture will become softer. True enough, when I had a slice the next morning, the crust was no longer crisp, and the cake was softer and moist.


Here's the photo of the cake that was left overnight on the table. Sad to say, all of us didn't like it at all...and the plums were a great disappointment, they became rather soggy and tasteless! Naturally, I was left with more than half of the cake. Luckily, I didn't make the full amount of the recipe...otherwise I would have a big problem! I kept the rest of the cake in the fridge and almost wanted to give up posting this recipe. It was only the following day, when I took out the cake to try to finish whatever I could, that I discovered that it actually tasted much better when chilled. In fact, the plums wasn't that soggy, and I even found the taste refreshing?! It was this twist that I decided I should still proceed with this post, at least just for record purpose!

Ingredients

3 large eggs, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup vegetable oil (I used olive oil)
1 ¼ cups plain flour
1 ¼ teaspoons baking powder
8 fresh plums, pitted and halved
2 tablespoons brown sugar

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 deg C, lightly grease and line a 11¾ x 9¼ x 1½ inch pan with parchment paper.
2. In a mixing bowl, with a manual whisk, whisk eggs and sugar until sugar almost dissolved. Add in vanilla extract and oil, mix well.
3. Sieve over flour and baking powder, whisk till the flour mixture is fully incorporated and the batter becomes smooth.
4. Pour batter into the prepared pan and arrange the plums cut side down, on top of the batter.
5. Sprinkle with brown sugar and bake for 45 mins, or until golden brown.

Recipe source: adapted from Easy as Cake by Ruth Jolles

Easy Lunch

I always find it very challenging to prepare lunch for the kids.

Since I am not good at cooking, I always have to rely on very simple and easy meals which I can handle. The entire "process" requires carefull planning as well...I'll have to make sure the lunches do not "repeat" itself too often, and I try not to overlap what we have for lunch with our dinner meals...you know, I'll make it a point not to have chicken for lunch and chicken again for dinner, and so on. On top of that, I still have to ensure the kids get to get their greens and maintain a balanced diet. The rest of the post will feature what I came up with for the past three days.

Set 1: Creamy Chicken & Mushroom Pasta


This is a rather easy meal to whip up, and one of the few dishes that my kids keep asking me to cook for them. Since I ran out of fresh cream, I used a can of mushroom soup for the sauce. To make up for the "illegal" use of canned soup in this dish, I added fresh chicken thigh meat (boiled and sliced into bite sizes) and fresh shitake mushrooms. These were stir-fried with some garlic and added to the pot of mushroom soup...with just a dash of peppers and no other seasoning, the sauce was poured over a plate of angel hair noodles. I liked the "woody" taste from these fresh mushrooms.

We had the pasta dish with some salads...the two of them were trying their best to finish their share of the raw lettuce, zucchini and cherry tomatoes...although the kids do eat cooked vegetables, they are still not comfortable chewing raw greens ;)



Set 2: Cha Soba with Onigiri (Rice ball)

This is the first time I have made this Cha Soba (cold noodles) dish for my kids. I added a few Onigiri (rice balls) to complete the meal. This soba dish was really not authentic as I omitted the other condiments such as raw quail egg, spring onions and wasabi...knowing very well that the kids would push these aside.

These assorted rice balls were filled with pork floss in the middle, and coated with black & white sesame seeds and some furikake seasonings.


My younger boy prefers the rice ball over the cold noodles...he ate 3 in a row!


Set 3: Hotdog

Our lunch today...hotdog with tortilla chips. This is another fast to cook, quick to eat meal :p


My boys helped put together the sandwich when they were back from school. I added some sour wriggle worm candies as a treat.


Here's my version...topped with some hot & spicy salsa sauce (my better half gave me this idea). If you like spicy food, this is the way to go!!

Now, what are we going to have for lunch next week?!!

Rainbow Chocolate Cake

This is going to be the most colourful post I have ever posted!

Today is Children's Day. It's a school holiday for children who are in the primary and pre-schools here. I made this cheerful rainbow chocolate cake for the kids this morning.


I used a straight forward chocolate cake recipe, "Devilishly Moist Chocolate Cake" from The Cake Book, by Tish Boyle. Well, I believe, any chocolate lovers will surely be attacted to a cake with such a name. The cake is made with oil, as such, it's suppose to remain soft and moist even when refrigerated or frozen. I decided on this recipe as I have all the ingredients on hand, and it seems to be one of the simpler cake to make.

I didn't use an electric mixer as stated in the instructions. I used a manual whisk and spatula instead. The only problem I faced was when mixing the wet ingredients to the flour mixture...it took me some arm power to get the mixture smooth. Fortunately, my little helper was around, waiting eagerly to take over while I rest my arm for a few seconds. The mixing became easier after my boy helped pour in the hot water gradually. The final batter was very thin and watery! I halved the recipe as a 9" cake is too big for us. Somehow, my mind was not working well, and I used a 8" instead of a 7" pan. As a result, the cake was rather flat and short in height.

To make up for the height, I sliced the cake into two thin layers and filled it with chocolate frosting (melt over low heat, half cup of cream with 150g dark chocolates) and banana slices. I covered the entire cake with a thin layer of the remaining chocolate frosting.

I decorated the top with colourful kids cereals...Trix and Frost Loops, and added a ring of marshmallows on the side. If not for my kids stronger preference for a chocolate frosting, these colourful bits will look better if I were to use whipping cream.

While I was busy with the cake, my elder boy spent the entire morning fixing the two toy robots (Keroro Gunso) I got for them. He managed to assemble all the various small parts without my help. I thought these two figurines really look cool!

Here's the inside of the cake...I still think the cake layer tasted much better when left in room temperature for about 5~10 mins after it has been taken out from the fridge. Other wise it tasted a little hard and dry. Other than the cereals which has lost their crispness, the cake was actually very tasty...extremely chocolaty...something which I didn't expect, as the cake didn't look anything close to it's name, without any frosting. I guess, you can never go wrong when you pair off chocolates with bananas and marshmallows :)


Here's the recipe for the Devilishly Moist Chocolate Cake.

Ingredients:
(makes one 9" cake)

1 1/2 cup (161g) all purpose flour
3/4 cup (61g) natural cocoa powder
1 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 2/3 cups (332g) granulated sugar
1/3 cup (80ml) safflower or other neutral vegetable oil (I used olive oil)
2 large eggs
1/3 cup (80ml) whole milk (I used low fat milk)
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup (240ml) boiling water

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 325 degF. Grease bottom and sides of a 9 x 3 inches round cake pan. Dust the pan with flour and set aside. (I lined the bottom with parchment paper.)
2. Sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt into the bowl of an electric mixer. Add in sugar and mix at low speed until blended. (I used a spatula to mix in the sugar). Add in the oil and mix a few seconds until the dry ingredients are crumbly. (I used a spatula to mix in the oil).
3. In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs until blended. Whisk in the milk and vanilla extract until blended. With mixer at low speed, add the egg mixture to the flour mixture and mix until blended, scraping down the sides of the bowl necessary. (I used a manual whisk to do the mixing. The batter will be very thick at this stage).
4. Add in the boiling water gradually and mix just until blended and smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. (The mixture will become very thin and watery.)
5. Pour batter into the prepared pan and bake for 45 to 55 mins until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan for 20mins before unmoulding. Let cool completely.

To assemble this 20cm rainbow chocolate cake:
- Place pouring cream (I used one tin of Nestle's pouring cream) and 150g dark chocolate in a saucepan over low heat. Stir until melted and smooth. Set aside for 10mins before frosting the cake.
- Slice two large bananas, lengthwise into halves. Squeeze some lemon juice over.
- Slice chocolate cake into 2 layers. Spread one layer with the chocolate frosting, arrange the sliced bananas (cut side down) on the cake layer to form 2 concentric rings. Cut the bananas as necessary in order to form the two rings.
- Spread the other cake layer with chocolate frosting, flip over and layer it over the banana slices.
- Coat the top and sides of the cake surface with the remaining chocolate frosting. Decorate with colourful cereals and marshmallows as desired.

Recipe adapted from The Cake Book, by Tish Boyle