Green Tea Rolls

So much has been said about the benefits of green tea for the body. Among those benefits are to aid digestion, prevent illness, refresh body and mind, promote healthy skin tone and hm.. hm... help weight loss. This green tea rolls are made using Omaccha, powdered Japanese green tea, which is quite pricey. I have been using it in cheese cake, chiffon cake and milk shakes. You can hardly taste the green tea, since only a tiny amount (1 tsp or more) is used in each recipe, but it definitely gives a nice flavour and brilliant colour to food.



Ingredients:
2/3 cup milk
30 g butter
30 g sugar
1 tsp salt
200 g bread flour
1 1/3 tsp matcha
7 g dry yeast

Topping:
2 tbsp sesame seeds
1 tbsp tea leaves for topping

Method:
Put ingredients into bread machine in the above order, set the machine at dough-bread setting.
After the cycle is completed, divide the dough into 8 portions and leave it to rise for another 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 180C.
Shape the dough into round balls. Place on a baking sheet and leave for 20 minutes to rise for the third time.
Using your fingertips, wet the top of the dough with a little water, sprinkle with sesame seeds and tea leaves, or any dried herbs.
Bake for 12-15 minutes.

Snowskin Mooncakes

Finally, after searching here and there, my sister managed to locate a shop that sells koh fun (cooked glutinous rice flour). So, last Sunday I made this mini snowskin mooncakes using the recipe from M4M. However, instead of shortening (no Crisco here, only Copha), I used lard. The result is not bad in term of taste, but I still couldn't get the imprint to appear nicely. And also, my wrapping skill still left a lot to be desired.

Japanese Souffle Cheesecake

This Japanese Cheesecake is denser in texture compared to the one I tried before, and less eggy. It is more 'cheesecakey' than 'chiffony'. Personally I prefer this one, although the cake is pretty low. I might have to scale it up a bit next time. The amount of lemon juice in the recipe is just nice, not sour at all. And the apricot glaze is a definite must! This is the second time I baked this cheesecake. After trying out other recipe that calls for 6 eggs on 8 inch tin, I was a bit disappointed to see a low cake on the first occassion I tried this recipe. I thought it could have been my fault. But now after baking it another time, I was pretty sure this recipe yields a low cake on 7 inch pan, as shows in Kyoko's website.



Ingredients:
200g full fat cream cheese (room temperature)
50ml milk
3 eggs (separated)
100g caster sugar
30g cornflour (cornstarch)
2 tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp cream of tartar

Glazing:
2 tbsp apricot jam (or whatever you like)
1/2 tbsp water

Method:
Pre-heat the oven to 175?C (350?F) or gas mark 4. Line a 7 inch (18cm) cake tin with greaseproof paper.
Soften the cream cheese with milk in a bowl. Add half of the caster sugar, egg yolks, cornflour, lemon juice and cream of tartar and combine together.
Place the egg whites in a large bowl, whisking them until they form stiff peaks and then keep whisking, adding the remaining sugar in 2 - 3 batches until the mixture stands in stiff peaks.
Fold the half of the egg white mixture into the cream cheese mixture as gently as possible, then fold in the remaining egg white mixture gently but thoroughly.
Transfer the mixture to the prepared tin and level the surface. Put the tin into a larger roasting tin and create a bain-marie by pouring boiling water in the roasting tin. Bake on the lower shelf in the oven for 35 to 40 minutes. Leave in the tin until cool enough to handle.
Put the jam in a sauce pan on a low heat with the water and warm up until it's melted. If necessary, thicken this glaze by simmering a bit and then spread the glaze on top of the cake.

Cook's tip: If the surface of the cake becomes too dark while baking, cover with a piece of tin foil but be careful not to open the oven door until it has been in the oven for at least 20 minutes. It's easier to remove the cake from the tin if you insert a knife around the cake whilst it is still hot, however don't remove the cake yet - it will collapse if not left to cool

Serves 6

Cappuccino Muffins

I am not a real muffin lover, so I hardly ever baked muffins. But today I came across this very simple and easy muffin recipes, so I decided to give it a try. My instant coffee was the granulated type, not the powdered one. So I dissolved the coffee in a little bit of hot milk, then mix it with the milk & oil mixture.



Ingredients:
250 g self-raising flour
scant 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
scant 1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp instant coffee powder
150 g caster sugar
2 large eggs
125 ml milk
125 ml sunflower oil

Method:
1. Sift flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and coffee powder together. Add salt
2. In another bowl, whisk eggs, milk and oil together. Fold this mixture into flour mixture, the batter should still be lumpy.
3. Spoon into greased muffin cups, filling each to two third full. Bake in preheated oven at 200C for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown. Cool for a few minutes on a rack, then serve warm with butter.

Makes 10 pcs

Mooncakes

Made the Cantonese mooncakes for the very first time. If it wasn't for my sister, I probably wouldn't have attempted this. It would be much easier buying a box! Since we cannot get good quality mooncake fillings where I live, I spent one whole day making lotus seed paste, red bean paste and the syrup. And then spending another day making the mooncake with my sister. Finished at 11 p.m. last night. Very tiring indeed, but worth it!

Ngoh Hiang Chicken & Mushroom Spiral Mooncake

I am not sure this is a "Teochew" mooncake, although I came across quite a few reference on the net that this is indeed a Teochew-style mooncake. In my hometown where the people are predominantly Teochew, a different kind of mooncake with paper-like pastry (almost like filo pastry), which we call La Pia is more popular. I am still trying to figure out the recipe for the La Pia pastry.

When I was living at home with my parents, my aunt who lived in Singkawang, a Hakka-influenced place, used to send us boxes of this spiral pastry mooncake. We love it because the savoury filling is a nice change from the normally sweet mooncake filling. And when all of us siblings lived away from home because of our study commitment, my mum used to freeze these mooncakes for us to savour when we went back home for holiday.

This is a colaboration between me and my sister. I made the pastry, and the filling is her 'estimate' recipe. It turned out nearly like the real thing, except for a blunder I made. I inadvertently baked the mooncakes at lower temperature, which means they took longer to brown, resulting in drier pastry.

Pandan Kaya Cake

After seeing some successful attempt at this cake by my internet buddies, I was tempted to try myself. I used Jo's Pandan chiffon cake, and the kaya recipe contributed by Nora.



As requested, here it the recipe of the pandan custard by Nora, and also her excellent tips!

Kaya Topping
Ingredients:
500ml water
160-200g sugar
50g butter (to make the texture smoother)
150ml water
250g coconut milk
80g hoon kueh powder
½ tablespoon instant jelly
Green and yellow colouring

Method:
1. Boil water (500ml), sugar and butter until boiled.
2. Mix coconut milk with water (150ml), hoon kueh powder, instant jelly and colouring together and add into 1 and cook until thick.
3. Must be boiled. (If you find that it is not thick enough, you can use a bit more hoon kueh to mix with some water and add in.)

To Assemble
1. Surround the cake with a 9” cake ring and put layer of cake in then followed by kaya, then cake alternately depending on how many layer you want, but the top layer must be the kaya.
2. If you are using cake tin, then kaya first and then cake then kaya and last layer is cake.
3. Let the cake cool down then put it in the fridge to set for few hours or overnight.
4. Then after you may coat the side with desiccated coconut.

NOTES BY VARIOUS PEOPLE
1. You can use your own sponge cake recipe, just add pandan essence to make it green if you find troublesome to buy optima flour and ovalette.
2. If it is too difficult to buy optima flour and ovalette, you can actually use the premix for sponge cake, my friend tried and said result is about the same. Just make sure you add pandan paste into your cake mixture instead of pandan essence which I find is better.
3. I think the key point for this cake is the kaya spread.
4. My teacher used a knife to go round the tin to loosen the cake. He said if you don’t have instant jelly; don’t put agar-agar powder as it will harden the kaya. Just need longer time to set in the fridge. Don’t use gelatine too, as gelatine is for making mousse cake. If you don’t have hoon kueh powder, you can substitute with corn flour but hoon kueh smell nicer. (I only can smell coconut but not the hoon kueh.)
5. Actually I did it with agar-agar powder, and the result is just as good. I used ½ tablespoon agar-agar powder.
6. One thing to note is that try making more kaya, because the last time I bake this, I found it isn’t enough to cover the side of the cake.
7. I use a layered cake cutter to cut the cake evenly.
8. Your cake has to be completely cooled, then you boil the kaya. You need to assemble the kaya and cake when the kaya is hot.
9. To get a smooth surface:
a) Use a cake tin, wash it but don’t dry it, it should be wet with water droplets.
b) Pour some kaya into the cake tin, spread it evenly.
c) Then put in a layer of sponge cake, press down the cake a little in order for the cake to stick to the kaya.
d) Then pour some kaya on top of the sponge cake, and spread it evenly.
e) Same as step C.
f) Same as step D.
g) Put the last layer of cake.
h) It is up to individual how many layer you want to make your cake.
i) Then chill the cake.

Luncheon Meat with Potato

This is my interpretation of a dish my mum often cooks. I hardly cooked this because of the work involved in frying up the potato cubes. But now that I have a deep-fryer to do the job, it is a very easy dish to prepare.

Cabbage Rice

Feeling lazy to come up with something elaborate, I thought of cooking cabbage rice. However, I couldn't locate Min's recipe which I have tried before. So I came up with my own version, which is not too bad at all. Another delicious variation of this one-pot-rice dish would be to use pieces of yam and snake beans in it.



Ingredients for rice:
2 rice-cooker cups rice
200 g cabbage, coarsely shredded
1 cup skinned and blanched peanuts
1 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tbsp sweet soy sauce (kecap manis)
2 tbsp chinese cooking wine
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tsp ground white pepper

Topping:
2 lap cheong (dried chinese sausages), finely sliced
2 cloves garlic, finely sliced
5-6 dried shiitake mushrooms, soaked, sliced
handful of dried prawns, soaked, cleaned and well drained

Method:
Cook the rice in a rice cooker, with water level slightly above level 2. Add the sauces. Prepare the topping by stir frying the sausages. Add other dry topping ingredients, add a bit oil if the oil oozed ouf the sausage is not enough to fry the ingredients. Pour the well browned topping ingredients to the partially cooked rice. Served garnished with coriander leaves, spring onion, fried shallots. sliced red chillies and a dash of ground white pepper.

Serves 4

Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Buttercream Icing

A cake I baked for a friend's birthday. Happy Birthday, N. Hope you get what you wish for this year!

It is my first properly decorated cake, ie. crumb-coated, buttercreamed, piped decoration. Because I didn't do a great job the first time around, I prepared another recipe of the ganache and coated it all over. So it is totally chocolate and sugar laden. To people who ate it at Saturday night's dinner, sorry guys if I put you off chocolate for a long while :).

Perkedel Ayam

I normally make perkedel kentang with beef mince. For a change, I tried this recipe using chicken mince instead. I found this recipe a bit too soft, I had to add some flour to firm up the patties.



Ingredients:
400 gram fried (or steamed) potato, mashed
100 gram chicken mince
1 sprig of spring onion, finely sliced
2 tbsp fried shallots
1 egg
oil for frying
1 egg for coating, loosely beaten with a fork

Ground Ingredients:
3 cloves of garlic
1/2 tsp white pepper
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp salt

Method:
1. Combine the mashed potato, chicken mince, spring onion, fried shallots and egg. 2. Shape the mixture into patties, dip in the egg.
3. Fry in hot oil until thoroghly cooked.


Makes about 18 pcs

Beef Risoles with Fresh Green Salad

Because Christmas is coming, i.e. non stop eating for about two weeks, we try to lose weight now in anticipation of weight to be put on in Christmas, if that makes sense LOL. A typical dinner in the Rutt family, which we have about twice a week. Lots of green salad with a simple meat or fish dish.