Typical Weekend Dinner

Dinner on a weekday at home is considered relatively simple compared to the efforts put into preparing for dinner on weekends when more people are home.

Yesterday, this was what we had for dinner:

Tofu-tomato-button mushroom-minced meat soup

And I actually tried to recreate this soup some time ago. It really looks like a watered-down version compared to my mom's. :(

Stir fried Spinach and Mushroom in Oyster Sauce

One of my favourite! But I don't recall the taste of those juicy mushrooms. Hey!

Steamed Fish

I have no idea what fish this was. I only know one type of fish - Garoupa. But this does not mean I know how a Garoupa looks like. All dead fishes look the same to me.

Sweet and Sour Pork

Yummy! However, there's some fatty meat on the pork, so I'm torn between satisfying my taste bud and the potential threat of having a few grams added to the scale. So for every piece of pork, I had a piece of pineapple. Don't know why I did it...I just felt better somehow.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

For the past few days, I had been mulling over how to best optimise the large quantities of mini chocolate chips in my fridge. And today, I finally decided to go back to one of the basic baking recipes -chocolate chip cookies. It has been some time since I last baked these cookies.

I found a recipe online and I tweaked it a little. Without realising, it can in fact be considered a vegan cookie if not for the addition of chocolate chips. Is chocolate chips considered vegetarian? I got the following extract from my Google search:

"Vegan baking requires particular attention to reading labels. Many chocolate chip brands contain dairy ingredients. There are several varieties of chocolate chips on the market that do not contain dairy, and natural food stores also stock chocolate chips made from grain-based sweeteners."

Nevertheless, it's easy to replace the chocolate chips by dried raisins or nuts to make vegan cookies.

I managed to 'mass produce' sufficient quantities for giveaways at Sausage Co. :)

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour I added slightly more based on the consistency of the batter

3/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup canola oil

1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar I added slightly less

1/3 cup granulated sugar I added slightly less

1/2 tsp vanilla

chocolate chips

almond nuts, chopped

Method:

(1) Mix flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

(2) Mix canola oil, brown sugar, granulated sugar, 3tbs of water and vanilla essence well.

(3) Stir in flour mixture.

(4) Stir in chocolate chips and nuts.

(5) Drop batter in one tablespoon portions about 2" apart on baking sheet.

(6) Bake in a preheated 180°C oven for 10 - 15 mins or until golden brown.

Verdict:

(+) It is super fast to make the batter.

(-) Cookies can be too hard for some.

(=) If you like the cookies from Famous Amos, then you'll like this cookie too! The 'hardness' of the cookie is comparable.

Generation Gap - define Quick Dinner

My version of a quick dinner:
(i) instant noodles
(ii) get someone to buy take-away
(iii) bread with ham
(iv) Quaker oat meal
(v) grabbing any snacks within 3m radius
and the likes...

My mom's version of a quick dinner:
(i) a meal consisting of not more than 2 dishes
(ii) with preparation time of not more than 30 mins


See below for an example of my mom's version of a quick dinner we had last evening:

Fried Been Hoon

Dried Bean Curd Skin Dessert (my favourite!)

(though given more time, she would have added gingko nuts or barleys)

Duck Shred Porridge

I have been having too much good food since my mother came back. So today, I decided to 'detox' a little by cooking porridge with shreds of duck meat for lunch.

Duck Shred Porridge

Ingredients:

1/2 cup rice (using those rice cups)

1 egg

duck meat, shredded

pepper

1/4 chicken stock cube

Method:

(1) Wash the rice with water a couple of times before filling the pot with water. The quantity of water should cover the rice completely. I like my porridge to be more mashy so I added more water.

(2) Add the shredded duck meat.

(3) Add the chicken stock cube.

(4) Once the rice is soft to the consistency you want, beat an egg and stir it in.

(5) Add a dash of pepper and it is ready to be served.

Verdict:

(+) simple to cook

(+) no fat

(=) My all-time favourite!

Mid-Autumn Festival Dinner

Today is the 15th day of the 8th lunar month, also known as the Mid-Autumn Festival. From where I'm sitting with my laptop, the full moon is already highly perched on the cloudless sky.

I can still recall many years ago when I was half convinced that there was indeed a fairy, an old man and a hare living on the moon. Back then, I would gobble up my dinner quickly before joining the other children who were already parading their paper lanterns along the corridor.

The best part for the little boys would be to light up the candles in the lanterns and sometimes, by 'accident', the lantern would catch fire much to the shrills of the little girls. On the other hand, the girls would be precariously trying to balance and hold the lanterns to avoid it going up in flames.

This would be the one day when we were allowed to play with candles and fire other than the ocassional blackouts in the housing blocks. And very often, some parents would try to limit the number of matchsticks 'allocated' to their children so that whenever they had run out of matchsticks, it would also mean that it's time for the children to head back home.

Those were my idyllic childhood days...

Tonight, I would rather take my time to enjoy the spread my mother has prepared for the occasion.

Nutella Swiss Roll

Nutella Swiss Roll

Ingredients:

3 eggs

1/2 cup granulated sugar, plus extra for sprinkling

1/2 cup all-purpose flour, sifted

1/4 cup cocoa powder, sifted

nutella jam for spreading

icing sugar for dusting (optional)

Method:

(1) Preheat oven to 200°C. Line a 12" x 8" pan with parchment paper.

(2) Combine eggs and sugar in a bowl. Beat with a handheld electric mixer until thick and mousse-like. When the beaters are lifted, a trail should remain on the surfface of the mixture for at least 15 secs.

(3) Sift flour and cocoa powder in a bowl. Carefully fold the flour mixture into the egg mixture until incorporated.

(4) Spoon into the prepared pan, spread evenly to the edges and bake for 10 - 12 mins, or until the cake springs back when lightly pressed.

(5) Spread a sheet of baking paper on a flat surface, sprinkle it with granulated sugar, then invert the cake on it. Peel off the parchment paper. Roll up the cake while still warm. Let cool for 5 mins with seam side down.

(6) Unroll the cake. Neatly trim the edges of the cake. Spread the cake with nutella and roll it up again. Let cool completely.

Verdict:

(+) No butter is required for this recipe!

(+) Extremely fast to make!

(-) The swissroll taste a little dry and it sticks to the knife while I was trying to trim the edges.

(=) Nevertheless, it still tastes good especially with nutella as the filling!

Mid-Autumn Celebration at Lian Shan Shuang Lin Monastery

Besides the "official" Mid-Autumn festival celebration site at the Chinese Garden, this year, I got to know that the Lian Shan Shuang Lin Monastery (beside the PIE along Jalan Toa Payoh) is organising a similar one but on a smaller scale. So after dinner, I decided to check it out - hopefully to avoid the large crowd tomorrow evening.

The monastery was newly renovated and the compound is nicely decorated with both the traditional lantern displays as well as lanterns modelled after popular disney cartoon characters.


There is a booth selling lotus-shaped floating candles priced at $2 each where each candle will be lighted, a wish made and the candle set afloat on a small pond.


Nearby, there is another booth giving away free tea, mooncakes, mooncake cookies and pomelos. The mooncake cookies are my favourite and I got to bring home two of these!


Fortunately, the monastery is not too crowded tonight and it is very nice to stroll into the quiet sanctuaries housing the various buddhist statues without the squeezing and jostling of devotees.

East Meets West

Mother is finally back home last Sunday! And today, I decided to show off my pizza making skills to her - afterall, it's the one proud dish I have successfully re-created during her absence.

However, I did not have the required 600g of bread flour as stated in the recipe so I made do with a smaller quantity and kneaded the dough based on my "ah-gah-ration" skills. This time round, the dough yielded two small pizzas which I managed to roll thinner compared to my previous attempt. For one pizza, I used chicken shreds to replace the hams slices while for the other pizza, I used roasted duck shreds.

Mother prefers the duck shred pizza while I prefer the ham slices. Dad is simply satisfied that the pizza is filling.

In addition, mother stir-fried a plate of vegetables and together with another bowl of white lettuce soup, we had a "East Meets West" theme dinner tonight!

Duck Shred Pizza

Chicken Shred Pizza

Pretzel Cookies

I saw this recipe in a Chinese cookbook and it reminded me of the Danish pretzel cookies which I used to love eating from those big round cookie tin when I was a child.

However, even after refrigerating the cookie dough for an hour in the fridge, I still found it too soft to be rolled into a thin strip to be plaited into a pretzel - it kept breaking midway. In the end, I gave up and decided to whip out my pineapple cookie cutter to finish the job fast before rushing off to Alicia's party.

Pretzel Cookies

Ingredients:

160g butter

70g icing sugar

1 egg yolk

1/4 tsp vanilla essence

zest of 1 lemon, finely grated

260g flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp milk powder

some coarse sugar

Method:

(1) Blend the butter and icing sugar well.

(2) Mix in the egg yolk, vanilla essence and lemon zest.

(3) Sift in the flour, baking powder and milk powder.

(4) Refrigerate the cookie dough for an hour.

(5) To shape into a pretzel, roll some of the dough into a 9am strip, 8mm in diameter.

(6) Plait it into the shape of a pretzel, brush with water and sprinkle some coarse sugar on the pretzels.

(7) Bake in a pre-heated oven at 170°C for 15-20 mins.

Verdict:

(-) As mentioned above, it is difficult to roll the refrigerated dough into the thin strip for plaiting.

(=) This recipe yields very crumbly cookies - the type where it crumbles easily after a bite

(=) A bit dry. Need to have a mouth of water to wash the cookie crumbs down the throat

(=) Not too sweet

(=) I don't think I'll be repeating this recipe again

Alicia's First Month Party

According to Chinese tradition, the first month is an important milestone for a newborn. It is believed that during the first month, the newborn is most susceptible (in terms of their health). Therefore, it is a joyous occasion for the Chinese to celebrate the newborn's first month 'birthday'.

The must-have auspicious food item would be the red eggs - hard boiled eggs soaked in an edible red solution - which would then be distributed to friends, colleagues and relatives.

It's quite amazing to observe the fast growth rate of a baby. Just two weeks apart, and Alicia has grown so much! I guess before long, she'll be a toddler scrambling around the house with many people chasing after her. For now, I'm glad she's contented to have just anyone carry her in their arms.

Sausage Co. Stickers

Through a friend, I got the contact to his dad who runs a sticker company. So I decided to order some stickers with the Sausage Co. logo - as a late gift for the new sausage establishment. Yesterday, my friend's dad is really nice to deliver the stickers to me despite the small quantity. Thanks Mr. Tan! :)

Funny Spaghetti

For several years, a man was having an affair with an Italian woman.

One night, she confided in him that she was pregnant. Not wanting to ruin his reputation or his marriage, he paid her a large sum of money if she would go to Italy to secretly have the child. If she stayed in Italy to raise the child, he would also provide child support until the child turned 18. She agreed, but asked how he would know when the baby was born. To keep it discrete, he told her to simply mail him a post card, and write "Spaghetti" on the back. He would then arrange for the child support payments to begin.

One day, about 9 months later, he came home to his confused wife.

"Honey," she said, "you received a very strange post card today."

"Oh, just give it to me and I'll explain it later," he said.

The wife obeyed and watched as her husband read the card, turned white, and fainted.

On the card was written: "Spaghetti, Spaghetti, Spaghetti, Spaghetti, Spaghetti. Three with meatballs, two without. Send extra sauce."

Cotton Sponge Cake

Was in the midst of baking the sponge cake when a call came in. In a hurry, the hand whisk fell from the bowl and spluttered some egg yolk batter on my notebook. :[

The call brought me one good news followed shortly by a bad news. I hate such calls. :(

But after brooding about it for quite a while, I figured it depends on how I see it. There's a famous Chinese saying "赛翁失马焉知非福, 赛翁得马焉知非祸" - which in my own simple words, means that "If something seemingly bad happens, it might be a blessing in disguise. If something seemingly good happens, it might be too early to jump for joy as who knows what might happen next?"

For those who are interested to know about the story behind this Chinese saying:

Long long time ago, there lived an old man who love horses. He had a fast-racing mare (female horse) and naturally, it became his favourite. One day, the mare went missing and he was so sad that he could not stop lamenting about his loss. However, not long after, the mare reappeared and brought with it a herd of stallions (male horses). The old man was simply overjoyed by the change in his luck! The old man had a son who immediately set about training these wild stallions. Unfortunately, while his son was riding one of the wild stallions, he fell and broke his leg. The injury was so severe that rendered his son crippled and wheelchair bound. Once again, the old man plunged into another depth of despair. Soon, a war broke out in the country and the military launched a country-wide recruitment of young men to be trained as soldiers. All the young and healthy men had to leave the village to fight the war except for the crippled son. After the war, few men returned to the village and it was only then that the old man realised that it was indeed a blessing in disguise for his son to become crippled. Otherwise, he would have lost more than just a limb.

That's all for story time. Now, the recipe:

Cotton Sponge Cake

Ingredients:

60g melted butter

80g flour

80ml UHT milk

1 egg + 5 egg yolks

5 egg whites

90g sugar

pinch of sugar

Method:

(1) Beat 1 egg and 5 egg yolks until creamy and fluffy. Fold in the flour and alternate with the milk. Add in melted butter and mix well.

(2) Whisk the egg whites with a pinch of salt and sugar until soft peaks form.

(3) Fold the egg white mixture into the egg yolk batter until well incorporated.

(4) Pour into a fully lined baking pan.

(5) Bake at preheated oven of 170°C for 25 mins, then reduce heat to 150°C for another 10 mins or until the cake is done.

(6) Let the cake sit for 2 mins and unmould it. This cake will collapse in height after cooling as there is no stabilising agent added to it.

Verdict:

(+) Simple recipe to follow if a hand mixer is readily available.

(=) Cake is soft to the touch - but not as cottony soft as the name suggests.

(=) Nevertheless, it tastes light and not too sweet - almost similar to the Pandan Chiffon Cake with the exception of the pandan fragrance and taste.

(=) Excellent choice if one is craving for a light snack.

Steamed Broccoli With Mushrooms & Egg White Sauce

I made this vegetable dish to complement the steamed fish and rice for dinner tonight:

Steamed Broccoli with Mushrooms & Egg White Sauce

Ingredients:

Dried mushrooms, soaked in hot water and trimmed

2 tbs oyster sauce

1 tbs chinese wine (Hua Tiao)

1 tbs light soy sauce

300ml chicken stock (made from a stock cube) I used only half a stock cube

salt to taste I did not add salt

2 tsp corn flour mixed into 2 tsp water

2 egg whites

broccoli, cut into florets

Method:

(1) Steam the broccoli.

(2) Combine mushrooms, oyster sauce, chinese wine and light soy sauce with chicken stock in a wok. Bring to boil, then simmer for ~10 mins. There is too much sauce so I had to scoop half a bowl away. As the oyster sauce I used is alread salty, I added in some plain water to lessen the salty taste.

(3) Season with salt to taste and thicken sauce with cornflour mixture. I did not add salt as the mixture is already quite salty.

(4) Turn off fire and slowly stir in beaten egg whites. It should be sufficient to add only one egg white.

(5) Arrange the steamed broccoli on a plate and pour mushroom sauce over the vegetables.

(6) Serve immediately.

Verdict:

(+) Relatively simple dish with minimal ingredients required

(-) The sauce is too salty for my taste. Had to add plain water to dilute the sauce.

(=) A fast dish to prepare. Will be making this dish if I'm opting for a quick, homemade meal.

Menu Update from Sausage Co.

After dropping by Sausage Co. a couple of times, I observed many customers asking to look at the sausages, toppings, sauces et cetera. And so, I proposed to create a pictorial menu for the shop.

The idea of taking photographs at the shop came to my mind after I patronised a Hong Kong themed cafe located in the eastern part of Singapore. The photographs shown on the menu looks really fantastic - with it's large serving size and appetising photo shots. However, the disappointment set in when we saw the actual food serving. It was half the size of what was shown on the menu. Food tastes rather so-so too, definitely not worth the price we are paying. So I gathered that by taking photographs of the food items in the shop for the menu, WHAT YOU SEE (WILL BE IN FACT) WHAT YOU GET!

If the boss nods his head, the menu will be on display at Sausage Co. soon. My menu! :)

Chocolate Fish from Cadbury Land

I was searching for some snacks and decided to sneek a peak at the freezer compartment. And wah lah - I found some chocolates from my trip to New Zealand!

They are fish-shaped marsmallows coated in milk chocolate. Yummy! Don't think I ever saw this being sold in the local supermarkets.


Do you know that there is Cadbury World in Dunedin - New Zealand?

There, the choco-fanatics can sign up for a tour where they'll get to see the real chocolate waterfall (of course not as magical as the one in the movie "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"), get loads of free chocolate sample bars, taste newly launched flavours and get to buy chocolates at super cheap prices by the kilograms!

Ahhhh....think I almost went beserk back then! I can still remember carrying 2-3kg of chocolates through the customs. :)

Hawaiian Pizza

This is my sixth attempt at pizza making. Success after failures tastes especially sweet.

Attempt 1: My first time making a pizza at the cooking school, Palate Sensations. Under the watchful eye of Italian chef, Daniela, I tasted my first home-made pizza.

Attempt 2: Tried the same recipe at home and offered it as dinner for my family. Total flop. No idea what went wrong. The pizza dough tasted like a lump of cooked flour.

Attempt 3: Refused to give up. Afterall, it really seem so straightforward at the cooking school! I pressed the dough really thin and in the end, I got a really tough cracker-like dough. My parents' dentures almost fell off!

Attempt 4: Downloaded a recipe from the internet. Looks simple and promising. But while kneading the dough, the proportion of fluid and flour just didn't seem right. So the result was rather obvious.

Attempt 5: Downloaded another recipe from the internet. Tried this dough immediately after the failure of attempt 4. I'm just on a losing streak. :(

Attempt 6: After weeks of 'recuperating' my morale, I happened to chance upon this pizza recipe in the Sunday Times on 9 September 2007. And BANG...I MADE IT FINALLY!

Hawaiian Pizza

Ingredients:

2 tsp dried yeast

1 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

1.5 cups water, at room temperature I used abit more water as the dough was too dry

600g bread flour

3 tbs olive oil I didn't use this at all. It was left out in the method!

flour for dusting

mozzarella cheese, grated

pasta sauce

ring pineapples in a can, cut into cubes

mushroom, sliced

ham, diced into small rectangles

Method:

(1) Mix yeast, salt, sugar with water in a bowl and wait till mixture bubbles.

(2) Put flour in a large mixing bowl. Make a well in it and pour in yeast mixture.

(3) Mix until the flour and yeast come together in a ball.

(4) Let the dough rise in a cold oven for at least one hour.

(5) Dust dough with some flour.

(6) Roll the dough out into a 20cm round or stretch it by tossing in the air several times. Place in a pizza pan or metal pan.

(7) Spread pasta sauce evenly on the dough and add the toppings.

(8) Bake in a preheated 200°C oven for 10 mins, until cheese is bubbly.

Verdict:

(+) This recipe totally rocks! I made my own pizza in about 2 hours!

(-) I tried to roll the dough flat hoping to get those thin Italian pizza bread but had some difficulties doing it as the dough seems to always 'pull' back towards the centre.

(=) Nevertheless, when the pipping hot pizza came out from the oven, the bread was crispy on the outside and light on the inside! It's like Pizza Hut style!

Visit to Sausage Co.

I brought some friends to the Sausage Co. this evening and realised that there are some changes to the menu.

For a start, the slow-selling sausages will be phrased out while new sausage flavours (after repeated requests from customers) will be launched.

The garden salad bowl was newly launched where the customers have the option to either be totally healthy and eat only vegetables or to add a grilled sausage to the salad bowl - either way, it's a good option for those who prefers a light lunch!

The coleslaw will be replacing the mixed pea salad - HURRAY!!! Coleslaw is my all-time favourite! I'm such a big fan of the KFC coleslaws but it's a pity that for a small cup of coleslaw, they are charging quite a bit.

And of course, the shop will be giving the Horlicks Doggie Cookies as giveaways for the Mid-Autumn festival.

I volunteered to make a poster for the shop.... let's hope it'll be head-stopper, attention-grabber.

This is my dinner: Bockwurst + lettuce + tomato + american beef chilli (my must-have dressing!)

Horlicks Doggie Cookies

I found this recipe on the web recently and was extremely excited to try it out! The cookies look so cute (I actually thought it looks like a bear) and most importantly, it tastes great as well!

The last time, I made hotdog cookies as giveaways at Sausage Co. during the National Day week. And I was rather pleased to have some customers exclaiming at how cute they look, some couldn't bear to eat it, while a few came back to buy more hotdogs so as to get their hands on more hotdog cookies!

So this time round, feeling more encouraged, I decided to give these cookies away with purchases of hotdogs at Sausage Co. again. The theme would be for the Mooncake Festival. Totally unrelated, simply an excuse to give away free samples for my cookies! For those who would like to try the cookies, please kindly patronise Sausage Co. @ Icon Village!

Horlicks Doggie Cookies

Ingredients:

180g butter

80g horlicks i used the instant horlick packet mix

100g chocolate chips

200g top flour

25g cornflour

25g milk powder

koko krunch

15g sugar (optional)

Method:

(1) Sift the top flour, cornflour and milk powder.

(2) Cream the butter and horlicks for 3 mins at low speed. Do not overbeat.

(3) Add the sifted flour and beat for about one min to form a dough.

(4) Divide dough into 10g each. Embed 2 chocolate chips into each piece of dough and roll into a ball.

(5) Insert 2 pieces of koko krunch to form the ears, 3 chocolate chips to form the eyes and mouth.

(6) Bake at 140°C for ~ 25 mins.

(7) Cool before storing.

Verdict:

(+) Recipe is very easy to follow

(+) Doggie cookies are easily moulded

(=) This is one great recipe to make with children! Minimal ingredients, horlick-flavoured, fun to make, nice to look at and good to eat!
(=) This simple recipe produces crusty cookies

(=) The cookie itself is not sweet at all except for the chocolate chip fillings inside. So for those with a sweet-tooth, you might want to add some castor sugar into the butter mixture

Awwww.......Mother's Cooking

Yesterday evening, the entire family paid baby Alicia a visit and I finally got to taste my mum's cooking after nearly 2 weeks!

The familiar aroma which filled the living room is reason enough to put a smile across my face. This is one of the things which I believe many have always taken granted for.

Sometimes, I'll wonder if in the generations to come, will home-cooked food be something which is more easily available everywhere else other than at home?

I have tried sometimes to recreate the tastes in some of my mom's dishes but it's never the same. My mum doesn't go by tsp or tbs or cups or grams. After a dash of this or a pinch of that, she always does a taste check by dipping her finger into the sauce or gravy and delivering it straight into her mouth. Then it's either a satisfied "hmm" or a pinch more of something else to complete the dish. There's no guidelines or recipes to follow.

It's all about the sense of taste...the art of cooking...or simply the common sense as my mother puts it - which I'm still trying hard to grasp.

Poppy Seed Pound Cake Muffins

Yes, you read it right. It's POPPY SEED muffins! I bought the poppy seeds in New Zealand as I couldn't find it in Singapore. If anyone knows where I can get it in Singapore, please let me know. Vielen Dank!

Poppy Seed Pound Cake Muffins

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 tbs poppy seeds

1/2 tsp salt

1+1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup unsalted butter

3/4 cup granulated white sugar

2 large eggs

zest of one lemon

1 cup plain yoghurt (do not use non-fat yoghurt)

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Method:

(1) Preheat oven to 180°C and place rack in center of oven. Line a 12 cup muffin pan with paper liners or spray with a non-stick vegetable spray. Set aside.

(2) In a small bowl, whisk or stir together the flour, poppy seeds, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Set aside.

(3) With a hand mixer, cream the butter and sugar.

(4) Beat in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

(5) Beat in the lemon zest, yoghurt and vanilla until well blended.

(6) Stir in the flour mixture until just moistened. Do not overmix.

(7) Spoon the batter using either 2 spoons or an ice-cream scoop in to the prepared muffin pan and bake for 18-20 mins or until a wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. (If making jumbo muffins, increase baking time to ~25 mins)

(8) Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool for 5 mins before removing from pan.

Verdict:

(+) Excellent recipe. It's easy to follow through the recipe and yet yields yummy-licious muffins!

(=) If an occasion requires me to bake muffins, this will be my number One choice!