Tiramisu

Kenny kept mention that it had been a while since I made tiramisu, today I adapt the recipe from nigella express..I made half recipe in the morning. And its ready for dessert tonight..Kenny had 2 servings :)

Ingredients
350ml espresso coffee, made with 350ml water and 9 tsp instant espresso powder, cooled (I made 2 tbsp nescafe gold with one cup water)
250ml Bailey cream liqueur ( My Bailey cream liqueur looks weird so I use kalua instead)
400g packets Sponge finger biscuits
2 eggs
75g caster sugar
500g mascarpone cheese
2 1/2 tsp cocoa powder

Methods:
1. Mix the coffee with 175ml of the baileys in a shallow bowl.

2. Dip the biscuits into this liquid; let them soak on each side enough to become damp but not soggy. Line the bottom of a 22cm square glass dish with a layer of biscuits. (I use a smaller square corninware to do half recipe)

3.Separate the eggs, but keep only one of the whites. (I use 1 yolk and 1 white)Whisk the two yolks and the sugar together until thick and a paler yellow,then fold in the remaining 75ml of baileys, and the mascarpone to make a moussy mixture.

4.Whisk the single egg white until thick and frothy; you can do this by hand with such a little amount. Fold the egg white into the yolky mascarpone, and then spread half of this mixture on top of the layer of biscuits.

5. Repeat with another layer of soaked biscuits, and then top with the remaining mascarpone mixture.

6. Cover the dish with clingfilm and leave in the fridge overnight. When you are ready to serve, push the cocoa powder through a small tea strainer to dust the top of the tiramisu.

Small Choux Bun

Have not made cream puff for a long time, tried this recipe from Michel Roux's Pastry book. The book makes the making of pastry looks easy. Did some chocolate cream and only coat the puff without filling, and some custard filling for another batch of puff.

Choux Paste
Ingredients:
125ml milk
125ml water
100g butter, diced
1/2 tsp salt
1tsp caster sugar
150g plain flour
4 eggs

Combined the milk, water, butter, salt and sugar in a saucepan and set over low heat. Bring to the boil and immediately take the pan off the heat. Shower in the flour and mix with a wooden spoon until completely smooth.

Return the pan to a medium heat and stir continously for about 1 min to dry out the paste, then tip it into a bowl.

Add the eggs one at a time, beating with the wooden spoon.

Once the eggs are al incorporated, the paste should be smooth and shiny with a thick ribbon consistency. It is now ready to use.

Choux bun


For small choux buns, put the paste into a piping bag fitted with a 1 cm nozzle. Pipe small mounds in staggered rows onto a baking sheet lined with greasedproof paper for preference, or directly on greased baking sheet. Lightly mark the top with the back of a fork. Bake at 180 deg C for 15-20min until the outside of the buns is dry and crispy but the inside  is still soft. Cool on a wire rack.

Custard Filling


250ml milk
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
3 egg yolk
55g sugar
20g cake flour
5g butter

1. Pour milk and vanilla essence in sauce pot, stir over medium heat till slight boil.
2. Mix egg yolk and sugar in another bowl, use whisk to mix till egg mixture turns pale color.
3. Sift flour into egg mixture, mix till well combined.
4. Add flour mixture into milk of step 1. Mix till well combined. Put on stove and turn on fire(medium fire).
5. The mixture will be watery at first, continue to stir and it will thicken. When the mixture turn smooth, glossy and thick texture, turn off fire.
6. Transfer custard to tray,cling wrap with the plastic touch the custard, chill. Pipe the chill custard into puff when serve.

Sweet corn agar agar

This recipe was an old collection, thought of bringing something to my sister's place for her kid's birthday party, this dessert suddenly float up in mind, made it very last mintues and brought it to sister's place and let it fully set....

Ingredients:

2 pack of agar agar powder

500ml coconut milk

250g sugar

1000ml water

1/4 tsp salt

1 can of cream corn

some pandan leaves

Method:

1. Bring water and pandan leaves to boil, mix sugar and agar agar powder and add into water, bring to boil.

2. Add in cream corn, bring to boil.

3. Add in coconut milk and salt, once the mixture boil turn off fire. Pour mixture into mould and let it cool down before place in fridge and let it set completely.

Yuan Xiao (元宵)

The 15th day of the first chinese lunar month(Sunday) was the last day of the Chinese New Year celebration, tang yuan (glutinous rice ball) is the dessert that some or many chinese family will eat on this day. Bought a pack of japanese mochi flour sometime ago, tried making the tang yuan with it, the flour is abit more sticky compare to the local glutinous flour, maybe because the nature of japanese rice is more sticky, the tang yuan turn out more chewy as compare to nomal type.

    Japanese Mochi Flour

We like to add sweet potato to the sweet soup, I sweeten it with orange sugar.

Valerie's Apple Crumble Pie

Attended Ms Valerie's Apple Crumble Pie class last week, thanks to my friend S for recommending this class, lucky that I manage to sign up at the last minute. Although Valerie gave each student a big tasting portion, Randal asked for more after tasting it, so I made 1 batch for Sunday's breakfast. The part on making the crumble is rather tricky, so ask Trenyce to help me did it. The crumble is very crispy, even after a few hours, the crispiness still stays, we love this recipe.
...camera ran out of battery, so didn't get to take the interior of the pie...

Mango puree with Sago and Pomelo Dessert (杨枝甘露）

Finally tried this dessert as I want to use up the big pomelo at home. I added not so much syrup, cos we ate the dessert with vanilla ice-cream.

Ingredients:

2 mangoes - diced

2 mangoes - puree

1/2 cup of sago

about 3 slice of pomelo - remove skin and break up the flesh into smaller pieces

2 cups of vanilla ice cream

syrup:

1/2 cup brown sugar

150ml water

Vanilla ice cream

Method:

1. Syrup: bring the water to boil, add in sugar and boil till sugar completely melted. Set aside to cool.

2. Bring a about 300ml or more water to boil, pour in sago pearl and boil for 10min. Drain away the water. Wash the sago under running water to remove the starch on the sago. Set aside.

3. Blend the mango with ice cream till puree.

4. Mix mango puree, pomelo, sago and syrup together. Chill in fridge. Serve with diced mango and ice-cream.

Rainbow Tangyuan

Sunday was dong zhi (冬至）, the kids had requested to make multi color tang yuan and Trenyce requested to add nutella into her tang yuan. Trenyce help me to form half of the tang yuan balls, I didn't teach her how to do and to my surprise her tang yuan was quite well done. I did 2 type of simple soup base, one was using canned peanut, the other was clear soup with brown sugar for the kids.

Ingredients (tang yuan):

400g glutinous rice flour

330ml warm water (approx.)

edible coloring (optional)

Method:

1) Place glutinous rice flour into a big mixing bowl, add water a little at a time till it form a dough, knead the dough for about 15min. Cover with dough with cling wrap or cloth for 15min.

2) Split the dough into portion and add a little color into each portion and knead the dough till the color is evenly distributed.

3) Roll the dough into a long rod, take a small portion and form into balls by rolling it between two palms.

4) Boil a pot of water, add sugar to taste, add in tang yuan into the boiling water. When the tang yuan floats, its done. Serve warm.

Rainbow Agar Agar

I made this agar agar for my mum's birthday, she didn't want a cake. This agar agar was quite popular among the family during the gathering.

Mango with Sago Dessert

I thought that eating the mango like any cut fruits were abit boring so came out with this simple way of eating the indian mango, for the pass 2 weekends Kenny and I (the kids don't like mangoes) have been enjoying the sweet mangoes like this...






Ingredient:
2 mangoes – Peel and diced
1/4 - 1/3 cup sago

100ml water } Syrup water
3 tbsp sugar }

Method:
1) Boil syrup water and set aside to cool.

2) Bring a pot of water to boil, water should be enough to cover more than 1 inch of the sago when sago is added in. Add sago pearl to boiling water and boil till it become transparent. Drain and rinse over cold water. Set aside.

3) Put some sago in a bowl, add about 3 tbsp sugar syrup to sago, can add abit more per individual taste. Place dice mango on top of sago, best serve with some ice cubes.

Pulut Hitam

Was busy making mooncake last Saturday afternoon, have no time to make other snacks for tea so I use pressure cooker to cook some pulut hitam. Its was done on rough estimation, bought 1 pack of black glutinous rice from market, soak it for a few hours, rinse and cook it in pressure cooker with a handful of glutinous rice and a few pandan leaves plus more water than usual in order to avoid the water being soak up while cooking. When the needle of the cooker pop up, cook a further 20min, after the pressure was release, I remove excess water then pour the rice in another pot and reheat it and add rock sugar to taste. Serve it with coconut milk.

Mini Donuts

I always wanted to try making these mini donuts but there's always other things to do in mind that I kept postpone it. Last sunday morning I realise that I didn't prepare anything for breakfast so this mini donut recipe suddenly pop up in my mind. Thanks Peony for sharing the recipe , it was so easy to do, just stir and pour it into the mini donut tray and bake.

Japanese Pastry Cream Puff

Learn this cream puff from cc sometime ago, I tell myself that I have to make this cream puffs one of these days because I want all to try the cream, did 1 batch over the weekend to bring over to in-law's place. Glad that all likes it after tasting it.

Barley, Gingko nut and Beancurd Dessert

There are a few types of dried beancurd sheets in the market, bought a pack of thin dried beancurd with the intention of making this dessert long ago but didn't have chance to cook, finally bring it to my mum's place and cook it...



Ingredients
½ cup pearl barley
1 ½ litres water
½ cup ginko nuts
1 cup(est) thin beancurd (fu chook) - break into small pieces
½ cup brown rock sugar

Method:
1. Rinse barley in several changes of water until runs clear. Place in a pot with water and boil for 30min.

2.Meanwhile, carefully crack the gingko nut shells and remove nuts. Place in a small pan, cover with water and bring to the boil. Remove pan from heat, drain water and run cold water over nuts-this makes it easier to peel off the papery skins covering the nuts. There is also a germ within the gingko nuts which needs to be removed as its is bitter. You can do this by either splitting the nut into half and removing it, or by gently pushing pushing it out using a toothpick.

3.Place the prepared ginkgo nuts into the pot of boiling barley. Simmer until tender.

4.When barley and gingko nuts are tender, add the beancurd skin into the soup and cook for another 10-15min. Sweeten to taste. Serve either warm or cold.

--If using canned gingko nuts, add to the soup when the barley has softened.

Apple Strudel

Tried doing something different last weekend, the filo pastry in the freezer is expiring so took the opportunity to practice making this recipe as its quite easy also can have a feel how the filo pastry is like. I read from another blog that to prevent the filo pastry from drying, its better to cover it with a towel on another tray while applying the butter on each sheet of filo pastry. Kenny and Randal likes it very much, next round will try the renaldo version. Recipe from Kevin Chai's A Touch of Classic Baking Book.

Ingredients:
10pcs filo pastry (thawed)
80g butter (melted)

Filling
8 green apples (peeled, seeded, cubed)
180g caster sugar
½ tsp salt
2 tbsp cornstarch
1 ¼ tsp cinnamon powder
60g raisins
60g butter (melted)

Method
1. To make filling, combine all ingredients. Put onto baking tray lined with aluminium foil. Bake in oven at 220°C for 15 min. Leave to cool.

2. Brush some melted butter on 1 sheet of filo pastry. Continue layering with another sheet of filo pastry until finished.

3. Spoon baked apples along 1 long side of filo rectangle of edge. From apple side, roll up like swiss roll.

4. Place on baking tray, seam side down. Bake in preheated oven at 190°C for 30min.

Mango Jelly

Whenever there's a function or gathering, I always like to make this konnyaku jelly simply because its very easy to do. It was my nephew's 1 yo birthday and I don't have time to do other things other than this dessert. Make use of the opportunity to use up last pack of the jelly powder from Anna Culinary. My friend S recommend her jelly powder cos its of better quality, and true enough it would 'produce' water after placing it in the fridge overnite.


Ingredients:

900ml mango juice
160g sugar
1 packet of konnyaku powder (for redman brand is 10g/pkt)
1 can of syrup longan (optional) - can use other type of fruit per individual preference

Method:
1. Mix the konnyaku powder with the sugar in a bowl.
2. Pour the juice in the pot, then pour in 1. and turn on the stove fire and stir continously to prevent the powder from cuddle. Stir over medium fire then the mixture boils.
3. Turn off fire. Place the 1 logan in each mould, pour in the jelly mixture. Let it cool down at room temperature then place in fridge to let it set and chill.

Durian Glutinous Rice

My intial plan for the durian pulp was interupted as the ingredient for the intended dessert was spoilt, so I have to do something to used up the durian pulp before it spoilt or stinks the whole fridge. Got this recipe from one of those small books that's available in major book stores.



Ingredients:
300g glutinous rice
150ml thick coconut milk
200g durian pulp

Seasoning:
40g sugar
50ml pandan juice

Method:

1. Rinse and soak glutinous rice in water for 2 hour. Rinse, drain and steam for 20-25min.

2. Combine steam glutinous rice with coconut milk and seasoning. Cook till fairly dry in pot then
add the durian pulp and cook till the mixture becomes a sticky ball. Remove and let it cool.
Spoon mixture into a small cup.

-Pandan juice, blend 4 pieces of pandan leaf with water, strain the mixture.

Steam Bake Chocolate Pudding

Learn this dessert at Phoon Huat a few weeks ago. This is the second time I tried cos the first time I failed as I didn't know that the batter is not suppose to fill the whole mould, my friend S help to find out that the batter only fill half the mould. This pudding is taste best when serve warm with ice cream.

3x 8 ½ inch savarin mould

Ingredients:
175 gm unsalted butter
A) 90gm caster sugar
8 egg yolks
150g dark chocolate couverture – melted

8 egg whites
B) 90gm sugar

175gm ground hazelnut
50gm bread crumbs

Method:
1. Cream the butter with sugar A until creamy.

2. Add in egg yolks and melted chocolate, mix till well combined.

3. Whip up egg white and sugar B until soft peak, add into step2.

4. Lastly mix in ground hazelnut and bread crumb.

5. Pour into savarin mould and steam bake at 200°C until set.

Note:
-Fill the batter till half the mould.

Stuff Glutinous Ball (糯米糍）

Wanted to take a break from cake baking, so made this snack. The dough was quite springy quite difficult to shape to add filling, looks quite ugly and not so round...LOL. The kids enjoy it so much that they don't mind to eat those with broken dough skin, and it was sweep off the plate in no time while I was wrapping the filling. Recipe from March issue's Oriental Cuisine.




250 g glutinous rice flour
30g sugar
20g shortening
300ml water

Filling: (mix)
300g peanuts (toasted and grounded),
150g sugar

Method:
Mix glutinous rice flour with sugar, water and shortening, mix into batter. Pour the glutinous batter into a container. Steam the glutinous batter in high heat for 20min, once cooked, let it cool down.

Pour the steam glutinous dough into a tray with additional glutinous rice flour.

Cut the dough with knife into about 30g each.

Flatten the dough into round shape.

Wrap in peanut filling.

Form into balls. Coat with glutinous rice flour again. Serve.

--The recommend 300g peanut is too much, I didn't finish the 180g of gounded peanuts for my dish.

Apple Streusel Slices

Wanted to use up the green apples in the fridge, so use it to make apple streusel slices on Saturday nite, Kenny likes it very much he ate 4 pieces of pastry that nite, recipe from Alex Goh's cookie book...

Sweet Pastry
50g icing sugar
100g butter
1tbsp milk
170g flour

Filling
8 green apples cut into cubes
100g sugar
100g water

Topping
150g butter
100g icing sugar
150g flour
zest of 1 lemon, finely grated

Method:
Pastry
Mix the butter and icing sugar till well blended, Then add in milk and mix till well combined. Add in the sieved flour and mix well.

Filling
Cook all the ingredients till apples becomes soft. Let it cool and discard the water.

Topping
Cut the cold butter into small pieces. Mix with the remaining ingredients till it has crmbly texture.

1. Press the sweet pastry into base of a greased 25cm shallow square pan prick some holes with a fork.
2. Bake it at 180°C for 15minutes, then spread some apricot jam onto it while hot.
3. Place the apple filling into it. Then sprinkle the topping over the filling.
4. Place it at the lower rack of the oven. Bake at 180°C for 25-30min or till golden brown.
5. Let it cool for 10min and then remove it from the pan.
6. When cool, cut into slices.

Tau Suan

I've only try this dessert once, and it wasn't done correctly because I throw in the bean and boil with the water which in the end was broken and dissolve in the soup. This time, after reading from some books finally understand the trick behind this simple dessert, should soak and steam the bean instead of boiling it.

Ingredient:
300g mung beans
3 pandan leaves
2.2 litres water
300g sugar
50g sweet potato flour
1 cup water
¼ tsp salt
4-6 dough fritters(yau char kuai) - cut into small pieces

Method:
1. Rinse mung beans then soak in water for 2-3 hours. Drain. Steam together with pandan leaves over high heat till mung beans are softened.

2. Boil water, sugar and steam pandan leaves in pot. Stir till sugar dissolves.

3. Dissolve sweet potato flour in 1 cup water. Lower heat. Stir in sweet potato flour solution and salt till syrup is thickened. Add steam mung beans and stir well.

4. Transfer tau suan into serving bowls. Serve with dough fritters.