Busy Bee and Will Revert...

A picture of my neighbour that I visited last week!

Nope...am not sleeping nor hibernating...but things have been a bit out of hand...I will update...sooon! Enjoy a Mandarine Orange and feel the Chinese New Year vibe ....... :p

Have a nice day peeps!

Shepherd's Pie

Shepherd's Pie....the kids and hubby love them...me...so so...as I am never a meat person, a bit of chicken ...but I love fish...so I have never thought of attempting this at home...until I saw this here : Anie's blog and I strated to drool....

So, on Saturday whilst doing my 'wet' marketing at Pasar Tani Melawati, I decided to find all the ingredients to make this dish for lunch! I got my minced topside (free of fat and very fresh!) and potatoes...hmm somehow there weren't any russet potatoes, err the kind that you make mashed potatoes, so I had to settle with whatever my findings were that day...and the onions...my they were rm6.00 per kg....whooping high price!

Anyway, here's the recipe which i have given many twists and turns from that that I found at Anie's...all to suit whatever that I had in my kitchen......

Ingredients

For Mashed Potatoes

1.5 kg potatoes, peeled and cubed

2 tbsp butter, I omitted

1/2 cup milk, I substituted with 3/4 cup cream...yezza!

salt and ground balck pepper

For Minced Beef Filling

1 tbsp olive oil, I used 1 tasbp olive oil and 1 tbsp cooking oil...way to go ...woot!

1/2 kg minced beef, I used about 3/4 kg minced beef

1 clove garlic, I used 4 cloves

1 onion, I used 2 medium onions

2 tbsp butter, I omitted

2 tbsp all purpose flour

1 cup beef or chicken stock, couldn't find any beef cube stocks from Pasar Tani, so I settled for 1 tsp Maggi Secukup rasa.....eh boleh jadi spokeperson for Maggi, I nih!Add half cup water.

2 tsp Worcestershire Sauce, I used 2 tbsp, hehe!

4 tbsp HP fruity sauce....I added, found this in my fridge, hubby uses this in his sandwiches :p

1 tbsp Lingam's Chilly Sauce, he he!

1 cup grated cheese, I used Bega's extra tasty cheddar...  

I also added red and yellow capsicum diced, 1/2 stalk celery and 2 small sticks carrots

Method

1. Boil potatoes in water, that just covers them, add salt....boil for about 15 minutes. When tender, I stirred the cooked potatoes to dry up all the water, and potatoes were left as a huge lump!

2. Using a fork, I mashed the potatoes, when all done, add whipping/double cream and pepper...set aside.

* While boiling the potatoes, I started preparing the filling....

3.Sautee garlic and onions until brown, add the minced meat and brown them too..this will caramelise and give the 'sweet' taste...

4.Add all the sauces, Maggi secukup Rasa and half cup water.

5.Add a pinch of salt, cheese and add all the vegetables, stir for a couple of turns and turn off fire!

6.To assemble, I simply filled up a large casserole dish with meat filling and spread mashed potatoes to cover. Then spread the rest of the mashed potatoes and using a fork I did a criss-cross all over on top and sprinkled some cheese.

7.Bake for about 40 minutes in a preheated oven at 200C.

After that ENJOY, ENJOY, ENJOY.....too  bad I didn't have any macarons for dessert that day.....

[dear readers, sorry if I had not replied to your comments, I will...soon!!]

Lapis Durian......apakah!!??

Got hubby to get me some durians for a baking project.......but the smell of durians....ahhhh, am totally averse to durians! Since I couldn't tahan anymore and with hubby pestering me...I made this Lapis Durian!

I used the same basic recipe  to make Lapis Cempedak , but subsituted 250g of durian flesh blkended with 1/4 tin of condensed milk....I halved the recipe, as we were rushing to take the kids to visit our neighbours in the zoo...my house is opposite the Zoo Negara you see!

And the result....the taste....voila! Even someone who loathes durian had a liking!! The creamy taste of durian actually blended in with the whole batter and there were none of that "want to throw up" smell of durian at all! Of course hubby loved it beyond words! 

.....and now I regretted not making a full batter! Think everyone would love this!

Black Forest Roll

Think this the easiset and fastest dessert to prepare...all done and ready to be savoured in less than an hour! Yup, it was Black Forest Roll and I got the recipe from Rima's and NingNong's. Here goes.....

Ingredients

5 eggs, I used size A eggs

100g sugar

1 tsp emulisifier

30g flour

25g cocoa powder, I used Van Houten's as usual

1 tbsp corn flour

1 tbsp milk powder

100g melted butter, I used my usual Tatura salted

For filling I used St Dalfour's Black Cherry (which is always available at home, it's hubby's favourite)

Method

1.Beat eggs, sugar and emulisifier at high speed until thickens.

2.In the mean time prepare you baking tin, I used 12x12 inches pan, oiled with butter and baking paper. Set oven at 190C.

3.Sift flour, cocoa powder, corn flour and milk powder. Add to the egg, sugar, emulsifier mix, slowly mix to incorporate.

4.Pour melted butter (cooled) into the mix and mix well.

5.Pour into cake pan and bake for about 20 minutes.

6.Once removed from the oven and still hot turn over the cake onto a clean baking paper, I used my Silpat. 

7.Spread jam and start rolling the cake....I let it cool a bit before dipping into choc ganache...didn't have time to decorate the cake...when I came home from work the next day, all were gone! 

Nothing pretencious about these, they were delicious swiss rolls, that you won't find from the supermarts..."How come this swiss rolls didn't taste like the ones from the kedais?", asked my daughter! "Sebab Mummy yang buat!!", I said!....so go whip some at home y'alls!.

Bakes and Cakes

I had a rather hectic week last week, but I was happy...a bit tired yes, but contented! Here's what I did last week!

Something bought, something old...

 Something made...mini cakes using the cake mold (3 inches diameter and 3.5inches height) that I got from Pontian yongs ago...

I love this, and so did she....Idrina the doll of my division got engaged last Saturday!

And this is the assemble of the Hantaran (Gift)!

Idrina also ordered 2 dozen macarons in white and baby blue colours, I made Vanilla Bean Macarons with French Maple Pastry Cream fillings...thank you Id!

Nope, it was not my birthday...Devil's Food Chocolate Cake with Choc Ganache, Cream Cheese and Strawberries...a gift for her bestie, thank you Norizan!

2 dozens of Green Tea, Chocolate and Hazelnut Macarons in Choc Ganache, Maple, Salted Caramel and Peanut Butter Buttercream, thank you Fina!

150 pieces of petit Vanilla cuppies in Vanilla Buttercream, thank you Azura!

It will be a rather quiet week this week, so I will attempt a new recipe or two! Happy wet week you alls! Thank you for reading!

Vanilla Bean Macarons with Passion Fruit Buttercream Filling

Making macarons is new to me, and knowing MacTweet is even newer to me! Thank you Tina for introducing Mactweet to me! I have learnt so much from there, and think I have gotten the hang of making macarons, woo hoo!

Well, here's Vanilla Bean Macarons with Passion Fruit Buttercream, my first entry for mac-attack-15-macinspirational ! I loved vanilla bean and I definitely loved passion fruit! In fact I actually planted passion fruit behind my kitchen in our holiday home down south in Pontian, Johor! And, I have attempted making macarons there, and they turned out beautifully! So, the next time when I'm there and when my passion fruits bear fruits, I will make some macarons and share them with my neighbours! 

I used Tartelette's basic recipe and scrape half a Vanilla Bean into my sugar...and added 3 tablspoons of passion fruit pulp into my buttercream. The passion fruits were from Pontian, MIL brought them when she came visiting us last weekend! 

Ingredients (which I halved)

45g egg whites, aged for 3 days in the fridge
15g sugar, which I added some wilton egg yellow colour
55g almond powder
100g icing sugar
beans from half vanilla bean

Method
1.Prepare baking tray with baking paper. Prepare piping bag, I just snipped off the tip of the piping bag to the size of about 1 cm.
2.Whisk egg whites until frothy, like shaving foam, gradually add in sugar that you have mixed with vanilla bean. Whisk until stiff meringue, but not dry.
3.Mix almond icing sugar mixture until well incorporated and do the macaronnage until just, and get a dropping consistency, like  thick cake batter.
4.Pour in piping bag and pipe to the size of 50 cents coin and rap the baking tins a couple of times on you work top to let air loose from the batter.
5.Let the batter rest for about half an hour....err due to very humid weather lately, I had to wait for almost 1 1/2 hours before they form skin!
6.Bake at 150Celcius for about 20 minutes.

Passion Fruit Buttercream Filling (adapted Hisako Igata's recipe)
120g soft butter
4 tbsp caster sugar
4tbsp water
1 egg
3 tbsp passionfruit pulp

Method
1.Whisk egg until pale and foamy.
2.Make sugar syrup by boiling sugar and water.
3.While whisking egg, slowly pour sugar syrup into the egg, keep whisking until it turns foamy and dense.
4.Add soft butter bit by bit, the mix might separate, but bear with me, keep on whisking until you get a creamy mixture.
5.Add the passion fruit flesh.

Here's the passion fruit behind my house in Pontian that had it's first fruit! This breed of passion fruit was from Indonesia!

The taste of the macarons...mmmmm...heavenly subtle hint of vanilla with a punch of tangy sweet sour passion fruit, love it love it love it! 

Banana Bread...with a twist!

The orders have started coming in.....yes, alhamdulillah...but that means less or no time for me to bake leisurely for a while....so, let me tell you a story about this Kek Pisang (Banana Bread).....Mak never used to bake except for Kueh Bahulu as we never owned an oven. Making Bahulu those days was done using api atas bawah (top and bottom fire, heat) using charcoal...you know the old traditional way! But, I remember apart from Butter Cake or Orange Cake and Marble Cake, I loved Banana Bread...the kind that you get from Mamak Roti peddlars who came round on his bicycle......of course the Roti Kaya from this Mamak Roti were to die for......tak pernah jumpa dah that kind of Roti Kaya now!

Anyway, I too, following the footstep of Mak, never baked ...well until recently (if you have read that I only started baking when I was carrying my 6th child!).....so, naturally, I have to try baking this......

I have baked this before, but this time I added chopped dark chocolate and throw some raisins on top of the batter.....and the taste....naturally....satisfying.....

Ingredients

175g all purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarbonate soda

1/2 tsp salt

125g butter-melted

120g sugar

2 large eggs

300g bananas-I used 450g pisang emas and reduced the sugar to 100g

80g walnuts-I forgot to add!

100g sultanas- I added

100g dark chocolate-I added

1 tsp vanilla extract

Method

1.Preheat oven at 160C, Prepare baking tins...I used 2 loaf tins.

2.Sift flour, bicarbonate soda, baking powder and salt, set aside.

3.Melt butter, let cool, add in sugar and eggs, whisk lightly. Add in vanilla.

4.Add in flour mixture. Mix bananas, walnut, dark chocolate.

5.Sprinkle raisins on top of the batter and bake for about 40 minutes.

After that, enjoy, enjoy and enjoy!!

A glimpse of shots when I went back to my kampung during Hari Raya Haji.....

Pisang Tanduk from my father's back yard.....

My Tok Wan's (grandfather's) house....used to be my playground!

Hajar, Umar and Muhammad...playing around the compound my grandfather's house...I used to be like them...

The paddy field where I used to play with mud, collected tadpoles (??!!) that is behind Tok Wan's kitchen...hated the leeches, yucks!

Okay, I got to go...have a nice day and thank you for reading!

Bakes and Cakes

Now it's time for me to say thank you to you!

 Blackberry and Hibiscus, Almond and Chocolate Macarons, thank you Aisyah!

Red Velvet Cake...thank you Jihan!

Devil's Food chcocolate Cake...thank you Aida, June!

Special request for Pecan and Green Tea Macarons with Maple French Buttercream, Choc GAnache and Peanut Butter Filling...thank you Lina, thank you Noni!  

Hazelnut, Vanilla, Lady Grey and Red Velvet Macarons with Salted Caramel Buttercream, Maple French Buttercream and Cream Cheese Fillings...thank you Gina!

Pecan Macarons with Maple French Buttercream

You'll see me baking a lot of these...Green Tea and Pecan Macarons! They are my favorites...and hubby loves Pecan ones especially..I first came across the recipe at here :What The Fruitcake .

When I first attempted to bake them, the dauting part was having to toast the pecans and later grind them, and the method calls for the French Meringue method...which I must say I'm not afraid to attempt anymore! Think I have gotten the hang of it....errr a bit! My first attempt was to feast hubby's cousins and my nieces and nephews who were back from New Zealand and been salivating over my macarons seen on FB.

And yes, lately baking macarons have been casualty free, except that I had to wait for 2.5 hours on Friday night (and there goes my sleep!) to let the batter to dry as it was all wet and humid since Thursday due to rain!

Anyway, here goes the recipe....

Ingredients

90g egg whites, aged in the fridge for 48 hours and at room temperature

144g icing sugar

72g granulated sugar

59g almond powder

58g pecan nut powder

Method

1.Prepare the egg whites at least 24 hours before, and I am a strong believer of this thing about aged egg whites....it will give a sturdy and more stable meringue.

2.For this one, you need to prepare the pecan meal by first roasting them, I did mine by chopping the pecans and toasting them on a frying pan, let cool and combine with almond powder and icing sugar and grind in a food processor. You can use a dry mill blender, but make sure you add icing sugar when grinding, that will prevent the nuts to get oily!

3.Whip the egg white until foamy (think shaving foam), then slowly sprinkle sugar (which I added a pinch of cocoa powder to bump the colour). Whip on high until you achieve glossy and stiff meringue, but not dry.

4.Add the dry mixture into the meringue mixture in 3 or 4 additions, when all are incoporated, do the macaronnage by pressing the batter on the wall of your bowl until you achieve a consistency like a flowing ribbon.

5.Pour the batter into a piping bag, errr I never use a nozzle, instead I snipped off the tip to the size of 1 cm diameter nozzle.

6. Once piped, rap the baking tray on your work top a couple of times to let the air from the meringue to lose and allow the batter to dry.....the batches that I baked yesterday took 20 minutes to dry....the sun was out and it was quite dry!

7. I baked at a preheated oven at 170Celcius, but turned down to 140Celcius when I popped the batter in!

8.Bake for about 20 minutes when the batter is a bit jiggly when touched it should be done.

9.Once cooled fill with Maple Buttercream....and I made French Buttercream.....divinely delicious!

Maple French Buttercream

Ingredients

2 egg yolks

40g caster sugar, I used 2 tbsp

50ml water

120g butter, softened like mayonaisse

maple syrup

Method

1.Whip the yolks with sugar until pale.

2.Heat water until boiling point, remove from fire, mix with yolks until well incoporated. Put back in saucepan and on medium fire heat until it thickens, like runny custard.

3.Whisk until the mixture is cool and add softened butter bit by bit, it would look like a velvety mousse.

4.Add maple syrup to your liking...I added 5 tbsp of maple syrup.

And the taste of these macarons....mmmmm voila!

Umar Turns 8

It was Umar's birthday on Saturday, but the boys had a full day of extra-curricular activities, so we celebrated his birthday yesterday. Furthermore, Yusof was returning home from Yemen yesterday and my mak ayah and hubby's cousins came to see Yusof.....

I thought Umar or rather the kids would have had enough of my cakes, so, I ordered this cuppies from Buttercream Genious! The kids loved them, and I especilly loved the deco...I can never achive the same deco!

Happy Birthday Umar, another avid reader after Khadijah!

Umar and his cousin and Ibraheem...

A glimpse of Yusof at the arrival hall....he is more matured and changed (a bit)...but alhamdulillah!

I did a lot of baking this weekend, and will post some recipes soon, bye!

Butter Cookies

Ok, ok one last recipe that I owe a reader before i become totally submerged with my work and my baking....got an email from my CFO early this morning...and the wave is definitely coming.....

I have had tasted this kind of Butter Cookies before, but failed to achieve the result I wanted (the one that melts in your mouth) from all the Butter Cookies recipes that I have tried until I tried this from nasilemaklover. And, I think this recipe is apt as Chinese New Year is around the corner...or for all of us to make and keep (ah well not for long!) in our kitchens! Or for those of you who would like to make gifts for your Chinese friends and families!

The secret to this recipe and the buttery taste is of course the good quality butter that one uses....and I used SCS salted. Think you can chill the batter once mixed in the fridge to firm it and roll and press using cookie cutters....I just pop them in a piping bag and pipe on baking paper and drizzle some hundreds and thousands before baking....once baked, my children one container each with them munching them while playing around the house...see, how good they are!

Anyway, here goes the recipe......

Ingredients

200g butter, use good quality ones please! And I used SCS salted and it was yummeh!

50g icing sugar

150 all purpose flour

50g corn flour

Choc chip or hundreds and thousands if you wish

Method

1.Heat oven at 140C.

2.Beat butter and icing sugar until pale and light.

3.Add in all purpose flour that had been sifted with corn flour, in four additions....I folded the flour using my hands, lightly knead to incorporate the ingredients together until my hands are clean.

4. Using a piping bag and a nozzle, I piped the batter on baking paper and bake for about 20 minutes and the cookies had turned light golden colour.

5.Cool and store them away in cookie jars...or you can eat them right away!

The piped batter!

Have a brilliant week ahead, I'll probably post again next Monday, Tra!

Chocolate Mousse

Hmmm, I've been updating my blog almost regularly lately...you might wonder if I had been so free, lately...not...the waves (read: in the office and at home!) are coming...but I know I owe you some recipes...

Well, what do you do when you have almost abundance of yolks left after the whites were taken and made into macarons....I have been feeding my Ginger Torch plants in my kitchen and my Daun Kesum and Mint leaves...but I just could't rid of them yolks anymore.....so, I decided to make Choc Mousse two nights ago and will be attempting Creme Brulee, soon!

So, here goes....

Ingredients

40g egg yolks, from about two eggs

30g caster sugar, about 2 tbsp

30ml water

170g dark chocolate

300g heavy cream, I used whipping cream

Method

1.Whip heavy cream until soft peaks, set aside.

2.Using double boiling method, melt the dark chocolate and set aside.

3. Whip the yolks until pale and frothy.

4.Make sugar syrup by boiling water and sugar until boiling point and at a temperature of 150Celcius.

5.Slowly pour the sugar syrup into the whipped yolks, and keep whipping until the mixture cools down.

6.Incorporate the melted chocolate into the sugar syrup and yolk mixture.

7.Lastly, add the whipped heavy cream in three additions, until all the mixture is well incorporated.

8. Pour into containers and leave to set in the fridge over night.

This recipe was obtained from Su of Delectables !

Hubby's favourite Bunga Kangkung collection...

....and I brought two tubs when I had lunch with Sham, my quirky full of wisdom friend, over at razak's floracafe at Ampwalk yesterday. Sham did the renovation works for Razak's cafe! The delightful choc mousse were shared between me, Sham, Vida (whom I considered all time Ms Peens) and Zuri (one of Razak's designers)...ahhh...it was one of those days that I thought the universe belongs to me and it was total bliss....

Apple Cinnamon Buttermilk Cake

It was one Sunday afternoon in December...I can't remember the exact date...we have had lunch...Gulai Jenahak and the kids had happily gone upstairs to do their things.....and while I was cleaning the kitchen, I got a call from our longtime friend Bad (Bad and my task then, when we visited our friends in Nottingham was to do groceries! Bad's best friend and hubby were housemates...) that he and his family were dropping by, not for lunch, but they had not eaten!

So, as requested I made Sambal Sardine (always hv Mr Yeo's sardine in stock) for Bad and decided to give this recipe a shot....it was very humid that day..and I was reminiscing my days in Walpole Road and plucking Sze Mee's (Sze Mee a Malaysian was my landlady) Bramley apples from her garden in summer....

This recipe has buttermilk in it, and that had really attracted me to bake this cake.......the original recipe calls for Raspberry (which I think would be a "killer" but for the price of raspberries here in Malaysia, as I loved raspberries) at pinchmysalt and Gourmet .

Ingredients

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 salt....I have La Pincee, la la la....

4 tbsp unsalted butter, I used 60g salted Tatura

2/3 sugar, I should have used brown sugar

1 large egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup buttermilk

1 cup peeled and chopped baking apple, I used Granny Smith

brown sugar and cinnamon to sprinkle, I only sprinkled brwon sugar and should have sprinkled cinnamon powder as well

Method

1.Set oven at 160C, prepare an 8 inch cake tin.

2.Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamona and salt, set aside.

3.Beat butter and sugar until light and pale. Add egg and vanilla.

4.Add the flour mixture and alternate with buttermilk in two additions.

5.Scatter chopped apples, sprinkle brown sugar and cinnamon powder.

6.Bake for about 35 minutes.

Think it is best served with Pastry Cream or ice-cream, but, we couldn't wait for all that...the cake finished in almost a blink...everyone loved it and I will definitely bake this again! It is simple and using all the ingredients available from my kitchen (well, except for buttermilk, which I now have always made my own!) and delicious....try this ya!

Red Velvet Cake

I began to love this cake when I first tried them at Delicious...I have tried two recipes before this, but they were not to my liking! This cake has the red red colour that I wanted and moist, the tangy and yet subtle hint of cocoa taste and I loved the creamy cheese that went with it!

The only thing that puts me off were the amount of colouring...2 oz babe...and thank god I didn't splatter any on my apron or my kitchen....there were a few spots on my kitchen top! Haha!

Hubby never liked this before, but this one...he kept getting from the fridge over and over on Saturday and Sunday! Think I'll have rasberry ripple with the cream cheese next time...that will give the extra voila!!

Red Velvet Cake

2 1/2 cups cake flour

2 tbsp cocoa powder

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

2 large eggs

1 1/2 cups oil

1 cup buttermilk

1 tbsp vinegar - I used distilled malt vinegar

2 oz red food colouring - my oh my....I used up all the gel red colouring that I had ..now I've got to restock!

Method

1.Preheat oven at 160C. Prepare 2 cake tins of 8 inches.

2.Prepare the dry ingredients. Sift cake flour, cocoa powder, salt and bicarbonate soda, set aside.

3.Prepare the wet ingredients, oil, buttermilk, vinegar and food colouring. Mix the oil and buttermilk and eggs until incorporated.

4.Mix dry ingredients with sugar, whisk well. Then, add in the wet ingredient and mix well.

5.Add the food colouring until well incorporated.

6.Divide the batter between the cake tins and bake for about 35 minutes.

7.When cool, spread the cream cheese.

.....and then...enjoy, enjoy, enjoy.......