Baked Cassava / Tapioca Cake

A cake with a difference!  I was thrilled to find frozen grated cassava at one of the Asian shops here.  I was craving for this kuih while we were staying in Ampang and me being pregnant.  I remember I kept going to Sungei Wang shopping mall to look for the Malay store that was selling them.  After moving away from Kuala Lumpur, I never came across a store or shop that's selling this.  :-(

I used frozen cassava for this recipe.  It would be definitely better to use fresh grated cassava.  But I consider myself to be lucky as I'm able to get the frozen ones. :-)



Ingredients:

900g frozen grated cassave/tapioca

200g sugar

400ml (one can) thick coconut milk
1 egg, plus 1 egg york
20g butter

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180C.  Line a 18cm square baking pan.

2. In a pot, pour in the coconut milk and warm it with medium-low heat.  Add in the butter and sugar.  Stir until the butter has melted and sugar dissolved.  DO NOT boil it.  Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

3. In a large mixing bowl, whisk the egg and egg york.  Add in the coconut milk mixture and whisk until well combine.  Finally add in the grated cassava and mix well using a wooden spoon.

4. Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan and bake for about an hour or until the top has turned golden brown.

5. Cooled completely before cutting into slices.  It is best to be eaten on the same day.

:-)

Quick Mix Chocolate Cake

I made this chocolate cake for my son Andrew's 11th birthday today.  I call it a quick mix chocolate cake because the steps for making this cake are simple and quick.   It's just a plain chocolate cake with no nuts or fruits added.  This cake turn out soft, moist and delicious.  Kids will love it!


A photo of our birthday brunch:

Ingredients:

1 cup all purpose flour

1 1/2 cup castor sugar

3 large eggs

150g butter

1/4 cup milk

1/2 cup cocoa powder

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder
white chocolate to garnish

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 160C.  Grease a 23cm round springform or a cake pan.  Line with baking paper.

2. In a small pot, place the butter, milk and cocoa powder in and melt the butter in medium low heat.  Using a whisk to stir until the mixture is smooth.  Do not boil it.  Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

3. In a large bowl, using a mixer, beat eggs and sugar together until very light and fluffy.  Sift in flour, baking soda and baking powder and mix until smooth.

4. Add in vanilla extract and the cocoa mixture and beat until well mixed.

5. Pour the batter into the prepared pan.  Bake for 45 - 60 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the centre and comes out dry and clean.

6. When the cake is completely cooled.  Garnish with shaved white chocolate or sprinkle with icing sugar!

Lemon Poppy Seed Loaf

We can now finally shout that the spring is here!  With the long, gloomy winter and the coldest March for the last 70 years, we are more than glad to hear the birds sing, having plenty of sunshine for the last few days, and seeing a tiny purple flower in our garden.  The first colour of spring in our garden!   I couldn't help myself but to capture this beautiful little thingy. :-)

Now back to our baking.  This lemon poppy seed loaf is easy to bake and is lemony zingy.  I like to have my food not too sweet, and as this is a lemon loaf, I would like it to be a little bit sour.  Having said that, kids might not like this cake as it may not be sweet enough for them.  If you would like to bake this cake for the kids, please adjust the amount of sugar and the lemon juice.

Ingredients:

180g AP flour

150g butter, melted

170g Castor sugar

3 large eggs

3 tbsp poppy seeds

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

Juice and rind from 1 large lemon

pinch of salt

Method:

1.  Preheat oven to 180C.  grease some butter and sprinkle with flour in a 20 inches loaf tin.

2.  Beat the eggs, sugar and salt together until pale and creamy.

3.  Add in sifted flour and baking powder, then the poppy seeds and mix well.

4.  Add in the melted butter bit by bit while mixing.  And finally add in the juice and the rind and give it a quick mix.

5.  Pour the batter into the tin and bake for 40 - 45 minutes or until brown and cooked.

6.  You can top with icing sugar mix with lemon juice, sprinkle with some lemon rind.  But for me, the sugar in the cake is more than enough.

Malaysian Pan Mee 板麵 Pan Mien

Pan Mee, a type of flat noodles served in soup or dry (kon lou) is originated from Malaysia.  It is a Malaysian Chinese cuisine.

The dough is made of flour, water and salt, sometimes with egg added can be torn or pinch into small flat pieces, rolled with a rolling pin and cut with a knife or cut with a machine into flat stripe noodles. I am making the pinch pan mee for this recipe.

Pan mee is typically served with with fried anchovies, mushroom, minced pork and a green vegetable called sayur manis or sauropus androgynus.

Making the noodles and preparing the garnishes require quite a period of time.  I had to spend about two hours or more.  Especially when I would normally mince the pork myself instead of buying it from the store to reduce fat intake.  But in the end, the result of a hot, yummy bowl of pan mee just like one from a kopitiam worth it all!

Ingredients:  Serves 4

For the noodles:
2 cups AP flour
1 large egg
1/2 to 3/4 cup water
pinch of salt

For the minced pork:
(A)
100g minced pork
1 tsp Shao Hsing wine
1 tsp oyster sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1/2 tsp sugar
pinch of salt
pinch of white pepper
(B)
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 shallots, minced
oil for frying
water if necessary

Soup:
3L of pork broth
3 pieces of dry small fish (as shown on pic),
a big hand's full of ikan bilis (anchovies)
salt to taste
white pepper to taste
some soy sauce (optional)
3 big hand's full of sayur manis leaves
12 fish balls, halved
12 pork meat balls, halved

Garnish:
60g ikan bilis
8 pieces of cloud ear, soaked in water to soften
oil to fry the ikan bilis

Dried fish and anchovies for the soup.

Ingredients

Garnishes

Pinch pan mee

Method:

1.  Prepare the soup.  In a large pot, boil the dried fish and dried anchovies.  Let it cook while we prepare the rest of ingredients.

2.  Make the noodles.  Add in flour and salt in a mixing bowl, make a well in the middle and add in the egg.  Start mixing it using the hand.  Add in water slowly and mixing it constantly with the hand until it form a dough.  Knead the dough for a good few minutes then shape it into a ball and place it in the same mixing bowl cover with a wet kitchen cloth to rest for 20 minutes.

3.  Mix all the A ingredients for minced meat together.  Set aside.

4.  Fry the anchovies.  In a small pot, pour enough oil to deep fry the anchovies for about 1 to 2 minutes or when they turned brown and crispy.  Dish out and set aside.

5.  Add the cloud ear into the soup and let it cook for about 3 minutes.  Dish out and let it cool.  Cut them into thin stripes and set aside.

6.  Prepare the minced pork.  In a pan with high heat, add in oil.  Add the minced garlic and shallot and stir fry until aromatic and light brown.  Add in the minced pork mixture and stir fry for 1 1/2 minutes or until cooked.  Add water if it's too dry.  Dish out and set aside.

7 .  In another large pot, add in enough water to cook the noodles.  Boil the water.  You will notice the noodle dough is softer after the 20 minutes rest.  Give it a little knead and the dough is ready to cook when the water is boiling.  To make pinch pan mee, simply just pinch about 1 1/2 inches of a flat dough (as flat as possible) and just dump it into the boiling water.  Repeating pinching the dough until it's all used up.

8.  While the noodles is cooking, its time to finish up cooking the soup.  Turn the heat to high and add in fish balls, pork meat balls.  When the fish balls expand, add in the sayur manis.  Season the soup with salt, white pepper and soy sauce.  Cover and turn the heat off.

9.  Dish out the desire portion of the pan mee into serving bowls.  Add some soup, fish balls and pork meat balls into each bowl.  Garnish with the minced pork, cloud ear stripes and ikan bilis.  Serve immidiately with your favourite chili sambal or sliced chili padi with soy sauce!

銅鑼燒 Dorayaki - Japanese Red Bean Pancake

The other day my niece tagged me something from Youtube on Facebook.  It was a game that we used to play many years ago.  A Doraemon game!  When I saw the Dorayaki on the screen, I said to myself "I must make this"!  This Japanese red bean pancake was my son's favourite at Dream Food Japanese Restaurant, Centre Point Shopping Mall.

This pancake is Doraemon's (a robot cat) favourite food.  Dora in Japanese means "gong" and perhaps that's how the name Dorayaki originated as the shape is smilar to a gong.

There's a legend saying that there was a samurai named Benkei hiding in a farmer's home and he forgot to bring along his dora "gong" when he left.  The farmer then used the gong to cook the pancake, thus came the name Dorayaki.

Here are the ingredients:

1 cup (160g) AP flour

3 large eggs

120g castor sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tbsp honey

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tbsp milk

300g red bean paste, or more

makes 8 yummilicious Dorayaki

Method:

1. In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar, vanilla extract, milk and honey until well combine.

2. Sift in flour, baking powder and baking soda and mix well.  Cover and rest for about 20 minutes. 

3. Heat a medium non-stick pan on medium heat. You can wipe the pan with paper towel that is dipped in oil, but I made mine without brushing or wiping oil on the pan.

4. Using a ladle, drop the batter carefully to create a round pancake.  When the surface started to bubble, flip the pancake over and cook the other side.

5. Cover the cooked pancakes with towel to prevent them from drying.  Sandwich two pancakes with the red bean paste.

年宵節吃＂年宵＂（湯圓）Glutinous Rice Balls

Today is the fifteenth day (and the last day) of Chinese New Year celebrations.  This day is called 'Nian Xiao' or Chap Goh Meh in Malaysia.  It's also called Lantern Festival where in China and Japan, thousands of Lanterns are lighted and it's a colourful night!

Chinese New Year is extremely quiet in Germany.  Having no China Town here (the whole of Germany), there is just no CNY atmosphere at all.

But still, we celebrated CNY at our own home.  Having our family dinner during the 除夕 (CNY eve), cooking Chinese food, giving the kids 紅包 (red package), making Yee Sang and wearing something red, etc.   I wanted to make an "open house", meaning inviting friends over for food, food, food and food for this CNY, but I had a flu and was sick for a week.  So I had to skip that this year and hopefully I will have one next year.

During Nian Xiao, the traditional food to eat is 湯圓, which is also 年宵, glutinous rice balls.  Eating Tang Yuan on this day means 團團圓圓, that the family will always be able to get together during these type of special occasions.  My daughter had helped me a few times now with making tang yuan. And she's pretty good at it. :-)

The tang yuan recipe that I want to share today is red bean paste tang yuan in coconut milk syrup with sago and the aroma of pandan leave and ginger.

Ingredients:
for tang yuan
200g glutinous rice flour, with 100g in each bowl
170ml water, with 85ml in each glass
100g red bean paste
Food colourings

for the syrup
1 can coconut cream 400ml
600ml water
1 pandan leave, tied
Two slices ginger
5 tbsp sugar
Pinch of salt
1/2 cup sago, soaked in water

makes 32 balls

Method:
1.  If you don't want to use food colours, then you don't need to separate the flour and water.
2.  Add the colour you desire into the water and mix well. I used purple and yellow. Mix the yellow colour water with 100g of flour well until they are a smooth dough and do not stick on your hands.  Repeat the same with the purple colour water and the remaining 100g flour.
3.  Divide each colour dough into 24 equal pieces and roll them into a ball shape.  Using your fingers, flatten the ball and place some red bean paste in the middle.

4.  Fold the edge to seal the dough. Using both palms, roll the dough into a ball shape gently.  The red bean paste should be completely wrapped by the dough.  Do not put too much fillings though as the ball may burst while boiling.

5.  In a pot boil the 600ml water with pandan leave and ginger for about 5 minutes.  Pour in the drained sago.  When the sago is almost cooked through, add in sugar and salt.  Then add in the coconut cream.

6.  In another pot, add in enough water to boil the balls.  Drop the balls into the hot boiling water.  They are done when they float to the top.  Transfer them to the coconut syrup and serve the tang yuan with coconut syrup hot or warm.



Chinese Almond Cookies

I'm back!!  After a long break.  I wanted to spend more time with the kids during the summer holidays.  And when the holidays were over, we bought a house in Langenhagen, Germany.  So I had spent a lot of time packing and unpacking.  Though this time we just moved from an apartment to a house which is 1 km away, this was our 6th move for the last 11 years!  Now that the kids' rooms are nicely done.  99% of the boxes were unpacked, I finally have time for blogging. :-)

This Chinese almond cookies had been in my draft for quite a while.  It's the right time to post this as Chinese New Year (CNY) is only a month away.

I remember these cookies were sold in the shops in a plastic container with a red cap.  This cookie and pineapple tart are my favourite.

The first photo shown is the traditional shape of the cookies.  But you can make them into different shapes as well.



Ingredients:

250g all purpose flour

90g icing sugar

50g ground almond

165ml vegetable oil

1 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp almond essence

some almond for topping

1 egg yolk mix with 1/2 egg white for egg wash

Method:

1.  Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder and icing sugar onto the worktop.  Add in ground almond.  Make a well at the center and add salt, oil and almond essence.  Mix well to form a dough. 

2.  Knead into small balls.  Place baking paper on a baking pan.  Place balls on the pan.  Egg wash and then press an almond on each ball.  

3.  Bake in the oven at 150 degree C for about 20 minutes or until golden brown.

Note:  To make into different shape, refrigerate the dough for at least 2 hours.  Roll the dough between two sheets of baking paper into 1 cm thickness.  Cut with cookies cutter and bake in the oven.



Sambal Belacan Shrimps with Onion, Egg, Cucumber and Peanut

This is one of my husband's favourite shrimp dish.  For him shrimps or prawns are either steam or fry with chili.  Whenever we ordered prawn/shrimp, then for sure he would say "chili prawn."




For this recipe, the shrimps are cooked with sambal belacan paste, with some lime juice and sugar added.  Served with hard boiled egg, sliced cucumber and peanuts, just like nasi lemak.

Ingredients:

300g medium/large size shrimps, shelled and deveined

2 onions, sliced

3 tbsp sambal belacan paste (for recipe, click here)

1 tsp fresh lime juice

1/2 tbsp sugar

Salt to taste

2 tbsp cooking oil

2 hard boiled eggs, halved

Cucumber, sliced

toasted, unsalted peanuts

Serves 2

                                                               Sambal belacan paste

Method:

1. Heat cooking oil in a pan over medium heat.  Add in the onions and have a quick stir.  Add the sambal paste, lime juice and sugar and stir until fragrance.

2. Pour in the shrimps immediately and  cook for 1 to 2 minutes depending on the size of the shrimps.  Take care not to overcook the shrimps.  Season with salt.

3.  Serve immediately with plain rice, hard boiled eggs, cucumber and peanuts!  Or simply serve on a serving dish with plain rice and other Asian dish.

German Cheesecake with Mandarin Orange and Blueberry

I've made the basic German cheesecake many times now and always received good compliments from it.  For this cheesecake, I'm using the same recipe with mandarin orange segments added at the bottom of the filling and then garnish with blueberries on top of it.

Serving it with or without cream, this cake looks and tastes great!

For the recipe of the basic German cheesecake please click here.

Ingredients:

Crust:

85g butter, soften

1 1/3 cup flour

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg

1 tsp baking powder

Filling:

500g low fat quark

1 cup sugar

2 egg yolk

1 egg

3 tbsp melted butter

1 package vanilla sugar (about 2 tsp)

1 cup milk

1 package vanilla pudding mix (37g)

2 tbsp fresh lemon juice (about half of a lemon)

1 small can of mandarin orange segment, drained

300g blueberries to garnish

some icing sugar

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 175C
2. Grease a 22 x 22cm baking tin with butter or oil.  Line with baking paper for easy removal, longer on both sides as shown on photo.

3. For crust, mix the butter and sugar until smooth.  Mix in 1 egg and follow by baking powder and flour.  Knead together until it form a dough.
4. place the dough on the tin in batches.  Then using fingers, press them evenly covering the bottom and the sides of the tin.

5. Lay some mandarin orange segment on the crust.

6. For filling, mix together quark, melted butter, sugar, vanilla sugar and the pudding mix in a large bowl until smooth.
7. Blend in egg yolk, egg, milk and lemon juice and mix well.
8. Pour the filling into the pan.  After knowing the level of the filling in the form, trim the dough at the sides evenly.  It is OK if the filling is a little bit over the dough.  For more photos and details please refer to the basic German cheesecake recipe here.

9. Bake in the middle rack for about an hour or until the filling no longer move when shake gently.
10. After baking for about 40 minutes, the filling will rise.  Don't worry, this is normal and it will fall when cooling down.
11. And finally leave the cake in the oven for 10 minutes after turning the oven off.

12. When the cake is completely cooled, garnish the top with blueberries and icing sugar.  Keep the cake in the refrigerator until serve.

Simple Sambal Belacan Paste



Sambal, as we call it in Malaysia and Indonesia.  It is a must for some authentic Malay and Indonesian cooking.  There are many varieties of sambal in Indonesia and the one that is most popular in Malaysia, I would have to say is sambal belacan.  Belacan is a shrimp paste, made of dried shrimps, anchovies and salt.  Something that is definitely pungent for some people.  But with belacan, the result of one dish would both taste and smell heavenly!

This sambal belacan paste can be a base for many dishes.  Stir fry sambal belacan asparagus/kangkong/eggplant, sambal belacan prawns, sambal belacan grill fish(serve with lime, yumyum), oven baked sambal belacan chicken and more!  With some lime, it is also a wonderful condiment, for noodles, rice, etc...

Please have your door open, windows open while making this sambal belacan paste as the smell can fill the whole house.  I'm wondering if our 3 neighbours on the same floor in this apartment moved away has to do with this belacan!!! 

Ingredients:

120g red chili, cut, seeds removed (I prefer smooth paste)

100g belacan

20 bird's eye chili/Thai chili

4 cloves garlic

120g red onions, cut

juice from half a lemon

3 tbsp cooking oil

1 1/2 tbsp sugar

1 tsp salt

makes about 2 cups of sambal belacan paste

Method:

1.  Traditionally this should be made using a stone mortar.  But I'm saving my time and energy and just blend them.  So chili, bird's eye chili, onions, garlic, belacan, lemon juice all dump into the blender and blend until smooth.

2.  In a small stainless pot, heat cooking oil over medium heat.  Pour the blended paste into the pot and cook for 15 minutes or so or when the colour turn dark red and oil started to float.  Add sugar and salt, give it a quick stir and turn off the heat.

Sambal belacan kangkong

                                                                                    oven baked sambal belacan chicken

 



Potato and Broccoli Soup

This potato and broccoli soup recipe was given by a dear friend I met in Bucharest, Romania.  This is a hearty soup with potatoes, broccoli, onion and garlic.  I like to add some ginger in this soup during the winter.  The ginger would help keep one warm.

Ingredients:

200g potatoes, sliced

100g broccoli, chopped

1 medium brown onion, sliced

400ml vegetables stock or water

2 gloves garlic, sliced

2 tbsp olive oil

Salt and pepper

some cream

some chives

Serves 2

Method:

1.  In a medium pot, heat the oil over medium heat.  Stir fry the onion, potatoes, garlic and broccoli together for 2 - 3 minutes until soft.

2.  Add in the vegetables stock/water and bring it to a boil, turn the heat to low and simmer for 10 - 12 minutes with the lid cover.

3.  Remove from heat and blend with a hand held blender or a food processor.  Blend until smooth.  Bring it back to the pot(if you are using a food processor) and season with salt and pepper to taste.  The soup is done when heat through.  (You can add some water if the soup is too thick)

4.  Scoop the soup into two serving bowls.  Add some cream and sprinkle some chives on top.  Serve hot with some crispy baguettes.

Cinnamon Rolls with Chocolate Chips

Hmmm.... Cinnamon rolls, who doesn't like them?

These soft bun/rolls with the sweetness from brown sugar and with rich ground cinnamon flavour smell and taste just as good!

I made these rolls two years ago and thought that it took too much time and too much work.  But I like soft buns, my kids like soft buns, and where we came from, most of us eats soft buns.  My kids and I don't really fancy the German's Brötchen - small buns that are soft inside but hard and crispy outside.  So I had decided to give this recipe another go.  Thinking that if this went well, I will make more bread and bun in the future.

Surprisingly, it was not too much work at all.  The original recipe call for keeping the dough in the fridge for 4 hours but instead I just leave it in room temperature to rise for 1 1/2 hours.  And I only kneaded it once.  I've made a little twist by adding some chocolate chips too, so let's start making some!


Ingredients:
160g all purpose flour
30g cold butter
15g butter, melted
60ml milk, room temperature
1 tbsp warm water (40 degree C)
1 tbsp + 2 tbsp white sugar
1 tbsp dark brown sugar
3/4 tsp active dry yeast
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
Some chocolate chips (optional)

Method:
1.  In a little bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water, cover and set aside.

2.  In a medium bowl, combine flour, 1 tablespoon sugar and salt.  Using finger tips rub the cold butter with flour mixture until crumbly.  Add in milk, yeast mixture, egg yolk and stir well.  On a lightly floured surface, knead for about 1 minute.   Put the dough back in the bowl, cover with plastic wrap, keep in a warm place to let it rise for at least 1 1/2 hours.  Then gently punch the dough once to release the air.

3.  On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough into 25 x 15cm rectangle.  Brush the edges with butter (to seal the edges).
Mix the 2 tablespoons white sugar, dark brown sugar and ground cinnamon together and sprinkle over dough.  Top with chocolate chips.

4.  Roll up the dough like a Swiss roll cake.  Cut into eight pieces.  Place them in a greased 19cm square baking dish(a round dish also works fine).  Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1 1/2 hours.

5.  Bake at 180 degree C for 10 to 15 minutes or until golden brown.

Note:  My kids and I enjoy eating them without any glaze.  Also I find it healthier without it.  :-)

Vegetarian Curry Puff with Puff Pastry

I'm sure anyone who had been living in Malaysia or Singapore for a while knows this popular snack!  This is probably the fastest and easiest way to make curry puff.  Instead of making the pastry from scratch, just use ready made puff pastry.  Simple and easy with curry potatoes fillings.

I would normally make two dozens of them, put six of them in a plastic bag, and freeze them.  Whenever I feel like having some, I just pop them in the oven, and I have hot yummy home-made curry puff in just 10 or 15 minutes.

Ingredients:

350g potatoes, peeled, cut into 1cm cube 

1 small onion, finely chopped

100ml water

1/2 tbsp curry powder

1/4 tsp chili powder

1 tsp salt\

1/2 tsp sugar

1 tbsp cooking oil

275g ready made puff pastry, thawed (25 x 42cm)

Method:

1.  Preheat the oven to 200 degree C.  Line a baking tray with grease paper.

2.  In a pan over medium heat, add in 1 tablespoon of oil.  Stir fry the onion for about 1 minute or until fragrant.  Add in the potatoes and stir fry for about 1 minute.

3.  Mix the curry powder, chili powder, sugar, salt with water.  Add the mixture in the pan and cook the potatoes in low heat for another 10 or 15 minutes.  It's done when the potatoes are cooked through.

4.  Set the potatoes aside to cool.  Meanwhile cut the puff pastry to 12 rectangles.  Put 1/2 tablespoon to 1 tablespoon of potatoes in the centre of the rectangle.  Fold the pastry into half.  Press the sides of the pastry with a fork (as seen on the photo below). 

4.  Bake the curry puff for 10 - 15 minutes.  You can egg wash the top of the pastry with half of an egg mix with 2 tablespoons of milk.