Fluffy Pancake

COVID - 5

My youngest asked whether I can make pancakes for one of the breakfast. So, here I go again, searching up the internet for a homemade pancake recipe. I found one on Taste of Home (do visit the website as there is also an instructional video to guide). Looks easy enough and here I go .....

Ingredients
(makes 8)

1 cup all purpose flour (128g)
1 tbps sugar
2 tsps baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 large egg
3/4cup milk (184g)
1/4cup shortening or butter, melted (55g)


Method
1) In a small bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.
2) In another bowl, combine egg, milk and shortening/ melted butter.
3) Put (2) into (1). Mix well.
4) Use a ladle and scoop 2 ladle-fulls of batter onto a greased hot griddle. Turn when bubbles form on top of pancakes. Cook until the second side is golden brown.

Gula Melaka Huat Kuih

COVID - 4

With more mouths to feed constantly as well as the inconvenience of going out to make grocery purchases, I have ventured more into providing homemade breakfast.

During a trip to Malaysia late last year with my extended family, I have this supply of gula melaka in my store. Hence, I wanted some use for it and I found this recipe on Mykitchen101en. Do visit this website as there is also an instructional video on the making of this huat kuih.

Ingredients
(makes about six 7.5cm cupcakes)

160g gula melaka (coconut palm sugar)
160g water
3 pcs of pandan leaves
120g evaporate milk
250g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tsps baking powder
4 tbps corn oil (or any other vegetable oil)


Method 

1) Combine gula melaka, water and pandan leaves in a sauce pot and cook till the sugar has melted.
2) Strain sugar syrup into mixing bowl
3) Add in evaporated milk, mix well, set aside until slightly cooled.
4) Bring the water of steamer to the boil
5) Sieve together plain flour, baking soda and baking powder.
6) Sieve the flour again into gula melaka mixture, mix till blended. (Reminder : add in extra 1-2 tsps of water if the batter is too thick
7) Add in corn oil, mix until combined
8) Sieve through to have a smooth batter.
9) Pour batter into 6 lined baking cups (7.5cm)
10) Steam over medium-high heat for 17-18 minutes
11) Unmould when slightly cooled down, then cool completely on wire rack. Put into container with cover for storage

Mee Hoon Kueh

COVID - 3

I have heard how easy and nice to have homemade Mee Hoon Kueh at home. For a very long time, I have already searched for a recipe to follow but just did not get to practise it. Now, it seems like the TIME....

I followed the recipe from Delicacious. I have already tried it for 2 times. Both times yielded good feedback from the family but I felt that my kueh-dough could be better, Well, lets leave it to the 3rd and nth times to figure it out.....

Ingredients :
(for 2-3 serves)

Dough for mee hoon kueh
250g all purpose flour (plain flour)
100 ml water
1 egg (lightly beaten)
1 tbsp oil
1 tsp salt

Soup
100g ikan billis, washed and cleaned
2litre water
150g minced pork
1 tsp corn flour
1/4 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp soy sauce
white pepper
egg
2 cups leafy vegetables

Garnishing
100g ikan billis, oven toasted till golden brown and crisp
spring onions, chopped

Method :
Mee Hoon Kueh
1) Combine flour and salt in a large mixing bowl
2) Combine water, egg and oil in another bowl.
3) Make a well in the flour mixture and pour the liquid ingredients from (2) into the well
4) Use a wooden spoon and mix till well combined.
5) Knead dough for about 5-10 minutes until dough is smooth and less sticky.
6) Cover bowl with cling wrap and set aside for 1 hour.

Soup base
1) Boil ikan billis in water for about 45 minutes
2) Strain soup and set aside

To cook
1) Heat some soup base in a small pot. Add some minced pork (shaped into rounds)
2) Tear flat pieces of mee hoon kueh dough and drop it into the boiling soup
3) Add egg and vegetables and allow to boil for  a few minutes
4) Season to taste with salt and pepper
5) Garnish with spring onions and ikan billis
6) Serve hot


After thoughts :
1) Serving size is reasonable. To dish this for my entire family (5A + 1C, of which 2 teenager-boys), I have to make twice the recipe portion.
2) For the soup base, I will always fry the ikan billis and some garlic in oil till fragrant and then add in the water to boil. Simmer for about 1 hour
3) Other than following the dough recipe diligently, I did not follow the rest of the recipe as I adjusted according to my family's preferences, including the soup base.

Stir-fry beef with ginger and scallion

COVID - 3

Beef is an important meat in my family as the children likes it. I have tried out the recipe from Rasa Malaysia a few times and find it easy and quite flavourful. Thus, I would like to repeat the recipe and method here. But do visit the page if you want.

Ingredients :
For the beef :
227g sliced beef
1 tsp cornstarch

For the sauce :
1 tbps oyster sauce
1 tsp maggi seadsoning
1 tsp sesame oil
4 tbps water
1 tsp cornstarch
1/2 tbps shaoxing wine
1 tsp suger
1/2 tsp salt
Dashes of white pepper powder

Others :
2 tbps oil
1-inch ginger, peeled and thinly shredded
3 stalks scallion, cut into 2-inch length

Method :
1) Coat the sliced beef with the cornstarch for 10 min.
2) Combine all the sauce ingredients, mix well and set aside
3) In a wok, heat up the oil until very high heat. Stir fry the shredded ginger until fragrant.
4) Toss in the beef and continue to stir-fry for a few minutes or until beef is almost cooked.
5) Add in the sauce and stir-fry a couple of times or until the sauce thickens.
6) Add in the scallions, stir dish out and serve.


After thoughts :
1) I have used double weightage of beef in my picture above as I have meat-eaters at home.
2) I always like to pour in a final dash of shaoxing wine at the end of the cooking for a flavour

Quick Toast with Egg and Cheese

COVID -2

I can't remember where I saw this recipe. It is so simple that I did not even save the webpage/ social media page, so, apologies to the original creator of this quick recipe.

Method :
Simply follow the above pictorial illustration.

Ingredients :
Simply vary according to your preference.


After thoughts :
1) Use a flat frying pan. I have also used an induction stove so that the heat is more evenly spread.
2) After adding the sliced cheese and 'closing' up the bread together, do not toast the bread for too long as the cheese will have melted too much. It became liquid instead of "stretchy".
3) Idea : To stack up the toast, can add bacon (already fried beforehand) and tomato slices before closing up the bread and let the melted cheese hold everything together.

Nasi Lemak

Due to the COVID situation and Stay-At-Home situation, there is a need for me to cook more regularly. So, I will term this as COVID - 1 :) though it is not the first dish that I made during these trying times.

I cam across this easy recipe for Nasi Lemak on a food blogger, Dinogoozatfood. I had just used the recipe for the rice itself and not the chicken skewers.

I am repeating her recipe here :

Ingredients :

Nasi Lemak Recipe

1.5 cups of rice
1.25 cups of coconut milk
1 cup water
1 thumb size ginger (pounded)
1 lemongrass (pounded)
1 pandan leave
1/8 tsp salt


Chicken Skewers/ Satay Recipe (without peanut sauce)

200g chicken meat (cut into chunks)
0.5 tsp corn flour
0.25tsp salt
1.5tsp curry powder
1/2tsp tumeric powder
1 tbps oyster sauce
1/2 tsp tumeric power
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1/2 tsp sesame oil
3 clove garlic, mashed


Method

For Rice : just mix all the ingredients together and put into rice cooker
For the Chicken Skewer : just mix the seasoning, marinate the chicken and put into the fridge, preferably overnight. Then grill.



After - thoughts :
1) I have used Kara's Coconut Cream 2 X 200ml (researched internet and it says that 1 cup coconut milk is equiv to 250ml) as I needed to cook 2.5 cups of rice. However, I will use Coconut Milk the next time as these cream simply just coagulated on top of the cooked rice and I needed to re-mix the rice. Inaddition, for the coconut cream, I did not use twice the amount as I also wanted to see how it covers the rice. I think it was the right decision. By almost doubling, my rice would have been 'porridge' :(.
2) Also, 2.5 cups of rice is not enough to feed my entire family.... 

Banana Huat Kuih

Recently, have been buying more bananas as usual as the second child wanted more proteins in his diet. However, before we could finish the bunch of bananas, some started to turn black.
So, what do we do with the overripe bananas ??? Banana butter cake again ?

I decided to try this out instead .... Banana Huat Kuih !

I tried the recipe from My Kitchen 101en. A nice change and taste.... Turns out not too bad.

I repeat the ingredients and steps below.  Watch the video from My Kitchen101en for more clarity !

Ingredients :
(makes about 12 cupcakes of 2")

200g ripe bananas
110g soft brown sugar
200g full cream milk
50g rice flour
200g plain flour
4 tbsps corn oil
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda


Method :
1) Mash the bananas with a fork.
2) Put the brown sugar and milk into the mash bananas and mix well.
3) Sift the flour mixture into the batter. Mix well.
4) Add the oil and mix again.
5) Bring a pot of water to boil (for steaming the cake)
6) Scoop 3 to 4 tbps of the batter into a small bowl and add the sifted baking power and baking soda. Mix.
7) Put the mixture from step (6) into the earlier batter. Mix well again
8) Line baking cups with cupcake liners. Scoop the batter into the cupcake liners to almost full.
9) Arrange the cups onto the steamer rack and steam for about 18 minutes on medium high heat.
10) Remove the cups from heat and let cool for a while.
11) Unmould the cupcakes from the cups and let cool.