Broccoli and Cheese Soup

I had this urge to gobble down Quizno's Broccoli and Cheese Soup a few weeks ago but since we don't have any Quizno's Sub around, I decided to make some from this recipe i found on RecipeZaar.

2 tablespoons butter
1 medium onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1/2 cup butter
1 quart half-and-half
2 cups fresh carrots, grated
1 lb broccoli, washed, cut
1/2 cup flour
1 cube chicken stock diluted into 1 quart of water
salt and pepper, to taste
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
8 ounces grated sharp cheddar cheese

1. Saute onion in butter. When onions are golden, stir in garlic and set aside.
2. Make the roux. Melt 1/2 cup of butter and stir the butter and flour over medium heat. Stir constantly and slowly add the half-and-half. Add the chicken stock whisking all the time. Simmer until it thickens.
3. Add the broccoli, carrots and onions. Cook over low heat until veggies are tender. Add salt and pepper.
4. Pour in batches into a blender and puree.
5. Return to pot and add the grated cheese and stir till well blended.
6. Put on low heat and stir the nutmeg.

Sharp cheddar cheese is simply aged/matured cheddar. And be careful when you make the roux. The kitchen saw me screaming for my mom in dire need of some extra hand. maybe i'm just retarded.

I don't have the pictures for this post coz the soup made its way to the tummy faster than i thought.

Phew...! It's Been Ages.

Yes, I know. I've not been here for a very, very long time. Well, I have my studies to put all the blame on. This semester is a crazy one because I have 5 subjects to take instead of just 4.

Anyhow, I managed to cook up this claypot chicken rice today. My first trial but it fared up quite okay.

Claypot Chicken Rice

200g uncooked rice

250ml water

200g boneless chicken thigh or breast, cut into bite-size

2 tablespoons oyster sauce

1 tablespoon dark soy sauce

1 tablespoon soy sauce

1 tablespoon fish sauce

1/2 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon white pepper

2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

4 slices ginger

2 tablespoons oil

4 dried shiitake mushrooms, soaked until soften, stem removed and cut into halves

2 slices of salted fish in oil, diced

2 eggs

some sesame oil

chopped scallions and sliced red chili for garnishing, but I didn't use it here because I don't have them..

1. Wash chicken and drain. Marinate oyster sauce, dark soy sauce, soy sauce, fish sauce, sugar and pepper for about 30 minutes.

2. Heat 2 tablespoons oil on medium heat and fry garlic and ginger until aromatic. Add shiitake mushrooms and salted fish and fry for about 5 minutes.

3. Add marinated and continue stir-frying for about 5 minutes. Remove and set aside.

4. Wash rice well and combine with water and put in a claypot. Cover and cook on low heat until almost dry.

5. Place cooked chicken mixture on top of rice, cover and leave on low heat until rice mixture is dry, about another 10 minutes.

6. Switch off the fire and break eggs on top of the chicken mixture and leave pot covered for 5 minutes before serving.

7. Drizzle with some sesame oil an garnish with chopped scallions on top of rice and sliced chilies in soy sauce by the side.

Buffalo Chicken Wings with Blue Cheese Dip

Ok this one was adapted from a recipe I found in Recipezaar. Made these for Pearl who was craving for them. 

Buffalo Chicken Wings

10 to 20 chicken wings

8 teaspoons melted butter

2 teaspoons vinegar

2/3 cup hot pepper sauce (I used Tabasco because I can't find any other brand of hot sauce here in Malaysia, which was  not quite right for these buffalos..)

some cayenne pepper

1. Mix melted butter, vinegar and hot pepper sauce in a deep bowl and plunge all the chicken wings in it. As an alternative you can also transfer the marinade mix into a zip-lock bag and put in the wings.

2. Let it soak for 2 hours.

3. Bake at 200C for 20 - 30 minutes until the wings are cooked through and make sure to baste them one time during cooking.

4. Sprinkle the cayenne during the last 5 minutes of cooking to add in more heat.

Blue Cheese Dip

1 cup mayonnaise

2 teaspoons finely chopped onions

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley

1/2 cup sour cream

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 teaspoon white vinegar

1/2 cup blue cheese, crumbled

1. Mix all the ingredients together and leave it chilled overnight (if possible).

Super easy, right? Though Tabasco may not be a good sub for hot pepper sauce, these buggers still do taste awesome!

Caramel Crunch Cheesecake

This one here wasn't very successful because it was made amidst of a baking frenzy and some last minute order. But luckily, this was made for domestic consumption, so it was alright. And because of that, here's the recipe to be shared...

The Cheesecake

125 g plain chocolate biscuits (I used Tiger Chocolate Shortbread)

1/4 cup butter, melted

2 x 250 g packets cream cheese, softened

1/3 cup caster sugar

2 tsp grated lemon rind

3 eggs

1/3 cup cream

1 tbsp plain flour

50 g bar chocolate-coated honeycomb (I used Cadbury Crunchie), chopped coarsely

1. Line based of 21cm springform pan with foil, line the sides with baking paper.

2. Process biscuits until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add butter, process till you get the texture of damp sand.

3. Press crumb mixture evenly over based of prepared tin. Refrigerate 30 minutes or until firm.

4. Preheat oven to 150C. Beat cheese, sugar and rind in medium bowl with electric mixture until smooth. Beat in eggs, one t a time. Add cream and flour. Beat again till smooth.

5. Stir honeycomb and the caramel filling into the cheese mixture.

6. Place tin on oven tray. Pour cheesecake mixture into tin. Bake for 1 1/4 hours or until just firm. Cool in oven with door ajar.

7. Spread chocolate topping over cheesecake. Refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight.

Caramel Filling

2 tbsp butter

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tbsp sweetened condensed milk

1 tbsp golden syrup

2 tbsp hot water

1. Combine ingredients in small saucepan, stir over low heat until sugar is dissolved. Boil, stirring occasionally about 4 minutes until a deep caramel colour is reached. Let cool.

Chocolate Topping

150 g dark eating chocolate, chopped

1/4 cup cream (I only had like 2 tbsp leftover cream from my previous bakes so I used just that)

1. Combine chocolate and cream in small saucepan. Stir over low heat until chocolate has melted and mixture is smooth. Cool.

Important note : If I were to make this again in the future, I'll omit the lemon rind and I won't use the Tiger Shortbread. The lemon rind interferes with the caramel flavour and the shortbread doesn't taste good at all! I'll use some other brand of chocolate biscuit next time. And of course, I will make sure I have that 1/4 cup of cream to go with the chocolate topping. This one I made was as hard as a bar chocolate when it sets. Haha!

Easy Lasagna

After not having so much success with the macarons, I decided to make lasagna for dinner. This also my first experiment, but with this I was pretty sure it won't screw up so much like those macarons. And though it might not look pretty here, it is definitely soothing to the palate and soon enough, all my frustration about those feetless macarons of mine went away.

Meat Lasagna

250g instant lasagna (it has to be instant so u don't have to pre-cook it before layering)

Meat sauce:

2 tbsp oil

1 onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, chopped

1 can button mushroom, sliced

500g mince meat

5 tbsp tomato puree

2 fresh tomatoes, diced

2 cups chicken stock

salt and pepper to taste

a pinch of basil

1. Heat oil in a saucepan, add onion, mushroom and garlic, cook until soft.

2. Add mince meat, cook until brown. Then stir in tomato puree, diced tomatoes and chicken stock.

3. Season with salt, pepper and basil and let cook for 20 minutes.

Cheese Sauce:

2 tbsp butter

2 tbsp plain flour

2 cups milk

125 g mozzarella or cheddar cheese

1. Melt butter in a saucepan, stir in flour and cook for 2 minutes over low heat.

2. Remove from heat and stir in milk.

3. Return the pan back to heat, stir until thick and smooth, then add in the cheddar.

4. Season with pepper and salt as needed and stir until cheese melts.

Assembly:

1. Preheat oven to 180C and pour 1/4 of the meat sauce into a lightly greased baking dish.

2. Alternate layers of lasagna, meat and cheese sauces, ending with cheese sauce layer (make 4 layers).

3. Sprinkle with grated parmesan if desired and bake for 30 minutes with the dish covered in foil.

4. Remove foil and continue baking for a further 15 minutes until the pasta is cooked through.

And the Macaron War Begins...

Today was my first attempt of making macarons after many, many days and months of being a lazy ass. I used a basic recipe for the macarons and made some dulce de leche for the fillings. The result, as you can see, is not too satisfying but nevertheless, I am proud to have finally tried making these buggers. Just compare my job to these lovely ones from Paulette...

Whipping up the meringue was easy, I just had to make sure there were no traces of oil in my utensils or else the egg white won't rise. The baked macarons looked like they wanted to grow feet (really, they looked so promising, but still, I get no feet, only a few almost had feet). They tasted great, however, but I had a hard time removing them from the parchment paper. I ended up eating all the broken ones in my attempt to remove the little devils.

Now if anyone of you readers want to join me in this war, I'm leaving the recipe here, in this post.

Basic Macarons

3 egg whites (make sure they are at least a day old, that's what I was told)

1/4 cup of caster sugar

1 cup icing sugar

1/2 cup ground almond

1. Whisk the egg whites like you're making a meringue until it turns foamy.

2. Then add in the sugar and whisk again until the egg whites become glossy with soft peaks forming.

3. Add the icing sugar and the ground almond to the meringue and fold together to mix. The batter should be very thick now and flattens if you dropped a dollop of it on a surface.

4. Pipe circles of the batter from a piping bag onto a parchment paper placed on a baking sheet, leave them out for an hour at least and then bake them at 315F for around 10 minutes, till you see the feet form, then lower the temperature to 300F and bake for further 3 to 4 minutes with the oven door slightly ajar.

5. Let cool and remove from parchment paper and serve with the dulce de leche filling sandwiched in the middle.

The name dulce de leche may sounds a bit daunting, but really, it's easy and it's just made of caramelized condensed milk. Ahah! So don't fear, believe me, the making of the macarons are what anyone should be scared of. 

Dulce de Leche Filling

1 can of sweetened condensed milk

1. Boil the can of milk in a pot of boiling water for an hour. Always make sure the can is always immersed under water all the time. (And remove the paper label outside the can, before you dunk it in water!)

2. Cool the can before opening or else the condense milk might spurt into your face. Whip the milk in a small bowl until smooth and keep refrigerated till you're ready to use it.

There's another way of making this, but I'm telling you the easiest way of making it. My dulce de leche went well but it was a little too runny to hold up between the macarons. Maybe I should just settle for some ganache or buttercream the next time.

So, good luck to you and to myself too. Till my next macaron war, I reckon I'm gonna be successful the next time around.. Tata!

Super Easy Peanut Butter Pudding

Hi peanut butter lovers! This is like the easiest pudding ever. Or you can call it simple cheesecake or pie or whatever you wish to call it. I had some leftover peanut butter from the last cupcakes I made for Wanie's family. So before it expires, I thought it will be better to turn it into something edible...

Let me share this with you.

For the crust/base :

24 pcs of peanut butter sandwich cookies
60 g soft butter

Crush the cookies with a food processor or a mill until they look like fine sand. Then, in a mixing bowl, combine the cookie crumbs with the soft butter and rub them against each other until the mixture is thoroughly mixed and the texture similar to wet sand. Press this into the bottom of an 8 inch springform pan. Refrigerate this for at least 30 minutes.

For the filling :

225 g cream cheese
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 cup caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup whip cream, unwhipped

Mix in the cream cheese, peanut butter, sugar and vanilla and whipped them on medium speed until the mixture turns fluffy and the sugar completely dissolved. Next pour in the whip cream and stir until it is well combined. Now, pour this peanut butter cheese mix onto the prepared base and refrigerate for at least 5 hours, it will then be ready for everyone to enjoy.

Here, I topped the pudding with some coarse chunk of roast peanuts for garnishing. Happy trying!

My Traditional Quiche Lorraine

This, I made about a week ago. Quiche is a good way to use up leftovers and most importantly, it's economical.

To make it you will need :

1 1/4 cups plain flour
90 g butter, chopped
2-3 tablespoons iced water

For the filling :

3 smoked chicken slices, chopped
6 button mushrooms. sliced
1 teaspoon oil
60 g grated gruyere cheese (you can use mozarella if you can't find gruyere)
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup cream
1/2 cup milk
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1. First of all, sift the flour and add the butter to it. Rub butter into the flour until the mixture is fine and crumbly. Add almost all the water and mix it to a firm dough (add more water if necessary). Then, roll the dough out and line a medium size tart tin. Cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 20 minutes.

2. Prepare the oven and cut a sheet of greaseproof paper, big enough to cover the pastry-lined tin. Take out the pastry and line it with the paper and spread a layer of dried beans or rice over it. Bake for 10 minutes and then remove the paper and grains. Put the pastry back in the oven and bake for a further 10 minutes.

3. For the fillings, lightly cook the chicken slices and mushrooms in a tablespoon of oil. Drain them and spread over the pastry. Sprinkle with the cheese.

4. Combine the eggs, cream and milk and pour into the base. Finish it with a sprinkle of nutmeg.

5. Bake for 30 minutes, until the whole quiche is set and golden.

So here's the quiche. You can serve it hot or cold.

Potato, Onion and Tomato Bake

Also, I was alone not so many days ago and because of that, I took the chance not to have rice and made myself a meal from the oven. So I used as much leftover materials as I could find from the fridge and made this bake.

4 large potatoes (extras I had from the gnocchi project), peeled and thinly sliced
2 tomatoes, thinly sliced
1 onion, thinly sliced
30 g butter, cut into smaller pieces
freshly ground pepper to taste
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup cream
1/2 cup chicken stock
1 cup grated Cheddar cheese (I used parmesan instead because I had some left from the previous work)

1. Preheat oven to 180C and brush an ovenproof dish with melted butter.
2. Layer the potato, tomato and onion alternately in the dish, finishing with the potato layer. Between each layer, dot some butter and sprinkle with pepper.
3. Combine the milk, cream and stock. Pour over the layered potato and top the assembly with cheese. Dot with any remaining butter.
4. Bake for 1 hour 30 minutes or until the potato is tender and golden brown.

Because I used Parmesan instead of Cheddar, the finished product doesn't look that good. Parmesan generally does not melt when baked. Unlike Cheddar, Parmesan browned. Nevertheless, the whole thing still tasted great!

Creamy Blue Cheese Gnocchi

Last week I made these gnocchi with creamy blue cheese sauce for dinner. It was pretty easy since I wasn't in the mood to cook the usual full course Malay meal that day. Here's how..

For the gnocchi :

3 really huge potatoes, peeled
2 cups plain flour (I used superfine because that's what I had)
30 g butter, melted
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
some freshly ground pepper to suit your taste

1. Cook potato in large pan of boiling water until just tender; drain and then mash.
2. Add flour, butter, Parmesan cheese and pepper. mix until well combined and knead until smooth.
3. Form dough into small 2.5 cm rounds and indent each one of them with fork prongs to shape.
4. Heat a pan of water until boiling and lower batches of gnocchi into the boiling water. Gnocchi are cooked when they float to the top. Drain and keep them warm.

For the creamy sauce :

60 g butter
2 tablespoons plain flour
2 cups milk
1/2 teaspoon mustard powder
freshly ground pepper
125 g blue cheese, crumbled
3 spring onions (here I used parsley because the mart was out of spring onions)

1. Heat the butter in a medium pan; add flour. Stir over low heat until flour mixture is lightly golden.
2. Add milk gradually to pan, stirring until mixture is smooth. Continue stirring over medium heat until mixture boils and thickens.
3. Add mustard, pepper to taste, cheese and spring onions, stirring until cheese has melted.


Well, lastly of course, pour the sauce over the gnocchi and serve at once.

P/s : Blue cheese smells really strong so u might wanna reduce the amount if you are not a fan of stinky smell. ;)

Pearl's Vegetarian Bruschetta

Pearl finally made her bruschetta. Here are the ingredients she used for the snack :

1 whole baguette
2 ripe tomatoes, diced
1 very huge onion, diced
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons basil
a dash of salt to taste
some grated mozzarella

The baguette was first sliced and dabbed with olive. In another bowl, she mixed the diced ingredients with basil and salt.

She then topped the baguette with the mixed ingredients, then the grated mozzarella. I would have preferred feta instead of mozzarella, but Pearl insisted on the latter.

Bake the bruschetta in the oven at medium heat (approx. 100C) for 5 minutes or till the cheese melted.

A Healthy Snack

Yesterday, Pearl and I made some healthy snack. It was an inspiration from Nigella's.

We crumbled some Mc Vitie's wholemeal cookies (around 4 to 5 pieces). I bought some frozen strawberries from the supermarket a couple of days ago, so we pulsed the whole 500g pack with 1-2 tablespoon/s sugar in a blender/food processor. It has to be frozen strawberry so it will give you some coarse chunks, not soggy ones. I also had some plain low-fat yogurt which is best for this snack. I was tempted to use whip cream, folded with some melted white chocolate (the variations you can have), which will definitely be tastier, but I had to say no to that. So next, we layer the ingredients in some clear cups. First, the cookie crumbs went in, then the strawberries and then the yogurt. Repeat the layers until the cup is full, making sure that the final layer will be the yogurt. Sprinkle some cookie crumbs again on the yogurt for garnishing.

Mars Bar Crispy Rice

I ran out of paper cups and was not in the mood to get personal with the oven. And so I made these. Easy as it comes out of a pot, or pan, or wok. Whatever you use to cook it over fire.

I used..

5 Mars bars (the usual 40 g bar, not the tiny snack size)
4 tablespoons butter
3 1/2 cups crispy rice cereal
7 ounces melted milk chocolate (you can use dark chocolate if you don't want it to be too sweet!)
Some snack size Mars bar for garnishing, if you wish.

1. Chop the Mars bars coarsely.

2. Placed the chopped bars and butter in a pot and stir over low heat until they become smooth and creamy.

3. Stir in the rice bubbles. Make sure they are coated with chocolate thoroughly.

4. Press mixture into a sheet pan, or alternatively you can press them into individual baking cups, paper cups, that is.

5. Spread the top with melted chocolate, top with the snack size Mars bar (cut into smaller slices) and refrigerate until set.

Have fun!

Coconut & Lemon Cupcakes

A friend is throwing a party for his child's birthday today and I made some cupcakes. At least that was about all I could give since you know, I'm not working...

I modified the recipe to make it less sweet. Too much sugar ain't healthy, see. Here it is.

Coconut & Lemon Cupcakes

1/2 cup butter, softened
2 teaspoons finely grated lemon peel
2/3 cup sugar (make it 1 cup if you want them sweet)
2 eggs
1/3 cup milk
3/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
1 1/4 cups cake flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1. Beat the butter, lemon peel, sugar and eggs until light and fluffy.

2. Stir in milk and coconut.

3. Fold in the flour.

4. Bake them for like, say..half an hour. Don't forget to check on the doneness.

I iced the cakes with the frosting from the Perfect Buttercream Recipe. And they're done! Easy peasy..

A Belated Birthday

I made a carrot cake yesterday. It wasn't the best carrot cake recipe but I tried it anyways. I won't be writing recipe for this, because, like I said, it is not the best. Still, I like the taste of the cake.

I love the topping which was cream cheese. And because I think the topping is one of the best I've ever tasted, here's the recipe.

Yummy Cream Cheese Topping

1 cup cream cheese (at room temperature)

1/2 cup butter (softened)

2 tablespoon whip cream

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

2-3 cups icing sugar (depending on how much you need to flavour and to reach desired consistency)

1. Cream the cheese, butter, vanilla essence and whip cream together in a bowl.

2. When the cream turned fluffy, add in the icing sugar, a cup at a time until you get the type and taste that work best for you.

I decorated the cake especially for my sister, Saty, whose birthday was a week ago when I didn't have the time for baking.

Devil's Food Cake

It's a marathon! After completing the birthday cake, I decided to bake a Devil's Food for our own consumption. I've been pestered by my sister, my mom and also, my boyfriend.

So here's the devil..

Devil's Food Cake

165 g (1 cup) cake flour

90 g (1/3 cup) cocoa powder

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

250 g (1 1/4 cup) caster sugar

2 eggs, lightly beaten

250 ml (1 cup) buttermilk

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

125 g (1/2 cup) softened butter

1. Mix the butter, egg, milk and essence in one bowl.

2. Mix the dry ingredients; flour, cocoa, sugar and soda in another bowl.

3. Combine the two mixture and beat them up with a mixer for 5 minutes or until the mixture is fluffy and all the clumps are smoothed out.

4. Bake for an hour or until the cake is totally done at 180 C.

Chocolate Ganache

60 g (1/4 cup) unsalted butter

60 g dark chocolate

60 g white chocolate, melted

As usual, I sliced the cake into two horizontal layer. I whipped up some 4 fl oz of whip cream and simply spread the cream on top of one layer and put the other layer over.

The dark chocolate and the butter are melted together and then spread onto the cake. And before the dark choc set, I piped circles with the melted white chocolate on the cake, starting from the centre. With a skewer or a toothpick, quickly drag the skewer from the centre to the outside of the cake. Do it all around like a clock.

And then I placed two Hershey's nuggets at the centre. :)

Birthday Cake-Second Order

I made another birthday cake today for a little boy who just turned 3. I was determined to make this cake a better produce than the earlier one. I was not a fan of multi-coloured cake, but I had to opt for many colours because my mom said, "It's for a kid. It should be colourful." And so I obliged.

Madeira Apple Cake

250g butter
250g caster sugar
5 eggs
240g cake flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon soda bicarbonate
1 tablespoon milk
2 apples (peeled, cored and grated)
60g ground almond
1/2 teaspoon mixed spice

1. Beat the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy.

2. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

3. Fold in the flour, then add in the milk. Mix nicely.

4. Add in the grated apples, mixed spice and ground almond. Fold them altogether untill well mixed.

5. Pour the batter into a baking pan and baked for 1 hour and 25 minutes at 180 C. Check for doneness as usual.
I leveled the cake and divide them into two horiaontal layer after it is cooled. I glazed the top of the first layer with apricot glaze (you can also use jam). Then, I spread on the almond filling.

Almond Filling

10 fl oz thick cream
60g ground almond
1 tablespoon icing sugar

1. Whip the cream and the sugar in a bowl until fluffy. Make sure you do not overbeat.

2. Fold in the almond.

I found another great buttercream recipe which is perfect for icing whole cakes. It is not too sweet and has a perfect texture. You can also adjust the consistency to your needs. I used this recipe for this birthday cake. This recipe made enough to cover and decorate one 8 inch cake.

The Perfect Buttercream

1 cup shortening

4 tablespoons butter (you can use all shortening to make a stiffer icing, but butter makes it tastier)

2-4 tablespoons heavy whip cream

1 teaspoon vanilla

2-4 cups icing sugar

1. Beat the shortening until smooth. Add the butter (if you are using some) and beat together until smooth, light and fluffy.

2. Add smaller amount of heavy cream in the recipe and the vanilla. Mix well.

3. Add in half the icing sugar, one cup at a time and beat for 5 minutes on low-medium speed.

4. Adjust the sweetness and the consistency of your icing with the icing sugar and the whip cream. Add more sugar if you want it stiffer and add more whip cream for a more runny texture.

Lazy White Chocolate Cupcake

I was lazy when I got home from the States. But I still wanted to make some cupcakes because I miss baking so much. Plus, Pearl bought me a new recipe book that made me eager to try the white chocolate cake recipe.

However, my fatigue must have affected the cakes I made that day. I didn't give it enough white chocolate for the batter and I skip one ingredient; coconut extract because I was too lazy to go out and buy some. So the cake was indeed a failure. The frosting on the other hand, tasted perfect. Not sweet, but yet creamy. No doubt I was lazy with the decorations too, but the point is, I finally found the perfect frosting.

And because the cake was a failure, I'll skip the cake recipe and post the frosting recipe instead.

French Buttercream Icing

2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup milk (add this gradually to reach the right consistency)
1 cup cold butter

1. Mix sugar, flour and salt in a saucepan.

2. Pour in half of the milk and cook over medium heat.

3. Stir constantly until very thick and adding the rest of the milk until you get the consistency you want. It is good to make it very thick and stiff because you'll be adding the butter later on to the mixture.

4. Cool the mixture to room temperature.

5. Add 1/2 cup butter at a time and beat at medium-high speed until smooth.

6. Add vanilla and beat well.

7. Chill the icing before decorating.

Not My Grandma's Gingerbread Cookies

Our favourite line up.

Yesterday I made some gingerbread cookies. And this morning Saty and I worked on decorating the cookies. It's our first trial batch made for Saty's colleagues and they tasted good even if the taste of ginger was not so strong.

First few trials..

Not My Grandma's Gingerbread Cookie

4 cups cookie flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

3 teaspoons powdered ginger

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon nutmeg

2 teaspoon mixed spice

1 cup shortening

1 cup granulated sugar

1 1/4 cups molasses

2 eggs, beaten

1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Thoroughly mix flour, soda, salt and spices.

2. Melt shortening in a saucepan. cool it slightly before adding the sugar, molasses and eggs into it. Mix them well.

3. Add 4 cups of dry ingredients and knead it to make a firm dough. Add more flour if necessary.

4. Like all other regular cookies, roll the cookie dough to 1/4 inch thick and cut the shapes out using cookie cutter.

5. Bake 10-15 minutes.

Various dots..

We decorated the cookies with royal icing. Here, we used two types; soft peak consistency for lining out the design and runny type royal icing for filling up/coloring the design.

Broken heart, checked heart.

Royal Icing

3 tablespoons meringue powder

4 cups confectioners' sugar

6 tablespoons water

1. Beat all ingredients at low speed for 7-10 minutes until icing forms peaks. This made the soft peak consistency.

2. To make them runny, in order to fill up the border, add 2 tablespoons more water to the already soft icing.

Tux and evening gown..

Overall, we are both happy with these cookies. Later we'll pack them up in individual plastics and tie them up with ribbons.

Chai Spice Layer Cake

Today was layer cake day. Mak has been pestering me on making this particular layer cake for months and finally, I agreed to do it for her. And here's my Chai Spice Layer Cake. I modified a recipe from the native Sarawak layer cake recipe and add a suitable amount of Chai Spice into the batter and made sure that the flavour was more intense than the usual store bought layer cakes.

The proud Chai Spice Layer Cakes.

Chai Spice Layer Cake

A
25 egg yolks
4 egg whites
200 g caster sugar
180 g Hong Kong flour
1 tablespoon ovalette

B
400 g butter
4 tablespoons condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

C
4 teaspoons Chai spice


1. Beat all ingredients in A without the flour until white and fluffy.
2. Fold in the flour thoroughly.
3. Also beat ingredients in B until light then mix both A and B in a large bowl.
4. Mix the batter well.
5. Add in the Chai spice and stir it in and ensure the spive is distributed evenly throughout the batter.
6. Heat oven on grill mode at 180 C.
7. Layer the batter one thin layer at a time as per my previous method of baking a layer cake.

From the outside, it seems like the layers were not well defined..

Once you're done with the cake, remember to leave it to cool in the cake pan. Then turn it over on a wire rack, trim the sides and it's ready to be eaten. Simply delicious. And it can be kept in the fridge for 1 week without losing its moisture.

But once I cut it, the layers were more obvious and were really, really fine and thin. Thanks to Mak who insist that I make it as thin as possible.