When I am not baking ...

When I am not baking, I will be busy with housework or cooking. Recently, I made pop corns with the new wok, made Sloppy Joe Burgers, made strawberry pudding as well as ice jelly cocktail. I even tried making pizza with pita bread since I am so lazy to make my own base.

Pop corns - It all started with HHB's pop corns, combined with kids' growing interest in watching cartoon movie at home and the new wok. HHB's pop corn post introduced the urge, the kids' interest adds to the need, then it became a MUST with the tool available. (*grin*) It is a very fun thing to do. I followed HHB's ingredient measurement as I lost the recipe given by the promoter. It is very satisfying to see the oil coated corn pop up. However, I messed up when I try to coat the popcorn with caramel. I have to melt the sugar but when the liquid sugar starts turning brownish at certain places while some white crystal are still melting, I started to swirl the wok, hoping to balance the heat and upon seeing all the white crystals disappeared, I quickly emptied all the popcorns inside the wok. I think I overloaded my wok and also the sugar may not be totally melted? I got a problem tossing the popcorns and the sugar hardens easily so I had big lumps of popcorns and some sticking to the base with the sugar. Anyway the kids were still thrilled to have the popcorns with their movie and I think I will try again (have the corns anyway).

Here's sharing the popcorns.

Next up is Sloppy Joe Burger. Oh yes, the recipe came from HHB too. Her instructions are easy to follow and understand. Thank you for sharing, HHB. I am running out of what to cook for the kids only (as head of family is often out to make ends meet) and I saw her lovely post on this burger that is made with japanese curry n spaghetti sauce. Japanese curry and spaghetti are my kids' favourite so I think this should not go wrong. Furthermore, I welcome another way to use beef since I heard beef is good for boosting immunity. I made the burgers using Sunshine's butter rolls which are smaller (less wastage incase they really don't like it). The kids really love the filling and the daddy mentioned that it taste like rendang burger from BK yet minus the sweetness. So that night alone, the kids and the daddy polished up the bag of rolls. I have just received orders from the kids to cook it again next week.

Here is sharing my Sloppy Joe.

Finally the dessert (haha just like in a 3 course meal - but I did not make these the same day) - strawberry pudding. My family loves having dessert and the pudding post from cook.bake.love tempted me and my kids. I even purposely buy gelatin for this. Just as expected, the kids are thrilled. The pudding were very well received. What I did not understand was that .. the pudding kind of become quite watery towards the end (they have finish eating and left the bowls for me to pack up and wash) but soon, I got clarification from Angel (blog owner). Thank you Angel.

Here is how my pudding looked like.

Besides this lovely dessert, I also tried my hands at ice jelly cocktail. My kids will ask for this same dessert everytime we told them we are going to order dessert after a meal outside. Since I have heard that it is not difficult at all, I quickly go to Phoon Huat to get the ice jelly powder and with a can of tropical cocktail, the kids got their ice jelly cocktail. Not difficult to make the jelly because it is after all jelly so made it the usual jelly way. LOL. After setting it in the fridge, I just add cocktail and put in some cocktail syrup. I even put in sugar during the 2nd time I made the jelly and the family prefered jelly with a hint of sweetness.  Now I am trying to tempt you with my homemade ice jelly cocktail ;-)

Pizza with pita bread as base was last night's dinner. I love that the end product look very much like a real pizza, where it is round and have a thick bread look alike base. My boy helped in assembling the pizza and while I showered the kids, I let the cheese melt inside the oven.  After a while, the cheese has melted but did not brown. So I changed the oven mode to grill and I left to coach boy on a math's question. After 4 minutes (my timer beeps) I went to look at them and to my horror, some are "over grilled". The "not so black" parts are given to the hungry kids while those below will have to be cleared by me.

Both dh and the kids felt that this version is better than having normal square sandwich bread as base pizza. If I cook more cooling tea.. the kids will have more choices. 

Changes to my hobby blog

Dear friends,

I have made some changes in the settings of my blog. I have added the option of moderating comments and also word verification. I am sorry to cause inconvenience to you when leaving comments but I have to do it to safe guard myself and you too.

Recently I have received comments in two of my beading post. The comments look very real, with relevance to my post contents too, but when I clicked on the page of that user, I was brought to a website not so suitable for children. My hubby told me that these are ways people advertise their website, or help create awareness or could be virus being loaded into the PC when the link being clicked on. I am fine with people advertising cos it is a way I get to know the world beyond my home, but virus? no way. Since everyone can click on the links, I would prefer to put a stop to those "bots" that could be putting in comments.

My hubby also mentioned that, the person could be a genuine reader but her/his PC is infected with virus that changes links after she posted. So on the safe side - I hope you all can understand and will understand.

Cheers and have a good weekend ahead.

Trying to follow HHB's baking trail - Mixed Berries Muffins

I said I will join HHB in her baking trail.. and it has been a long long while then I started ... her Mixed Berries Muffins. She explained that the usual muffin method uses less fat, so this creaming method uses more fat .. oh dear ... but it is a new thing to me, mixing berries .. so I wanna try.

Even though it is such a simple thing, I took a long long time to get it done. I can only blame it on the fact that I do not bake often. So I have to do alot of washing, before and after .. and putting them into the muffin cups proves a bit of a job . The batter I ended up having is rather thick even though my batter curdles alot in between (because I have pour in two eggs by mistake). My kids love the muffins especially my boy because blueberry is his favourite.

I did not get a high muffin because I have forgotten how high should I fill my muffin cup, I am worry about them overflowing so I just fill 3/4 full and in process of baking, the batter became half full only and rise to 3/4 full not nicely to the top. Next time if I am to bake again, I will fill the cup higher.

Here is sharing the nice blue and red tinted muffins.

Please refer to the recipe from Happy Home baking's blog. Perhaps you would like to join her in her baking trail too?

Yellow Yellow Ugly Fellow

It is now 2.30am, Saturday morning, in the week of school holiday. I have just finish blog hopping and finally willing to write about my latest bake that I did last week.

I have been itching to bake for a long long time. My last bake is in December! However, I am really lazy and  I am still adjusting to new routine (My girl went to P1 this year) .. blah blah blah... ok so I want easy, fast .. so I went to my shelves and took the "Easy Stir n Bake Cakes" book. I remember I have the cheese (since Nov! and yet not expired and not mouldy *phew*) so I settled for "Pineapple Cheesecake". I revisited my first try, knowing how my kids had liked it, I went ahead with full confidence.

However, I had problem melting my cheese into smooth and creamy state, but luckily that did not affect the cake at all. I cannot explain why the cheese has tiny lumps thou. Beside this difference, I also must note that I did not have enough cream cheese but since slice cheese can make into lovely cheesecake, I am sure there is no harm making up the difference with a slice of sliced cheese. I did worry about the saltiness of sliced cheese, but what can I do then? :-) I also deliberately reduce the sugar (since the pineapple should be sweet coming from a can) and oil. I reduce both by 20g.

Although there wasn't much hiccups during preparation, the cake rose unevenly in the oven, so unlike the first try.

 


Was quite upset by it since it is suppose to be fail proof. However, the end result is so well received by my kids, as expected.
The cake is gone in day 2 and the boy make a big fuss as he only has two pieces in that 2 days.

I took a few photos (cos I also love photography) even though it is a simple cake so now I had problem choosing one to be place here. (Note : Please do not expect good pictures, cos loving to take doesn't means I can do it well now.)

Shall spare myself the agony of looking at those pictures (now at 3.09am) by putting only just one.

A piece that looks like coming from a perfect loaf.


















As this cake has pineapple, I would like to give my support to a challenge started by SSB and now hosted by Jess.

For the challenge and convenience, I am posting the details of recipe here.

Ingredients

180g cream cheese
120g caster sugar
90ml corn oil
3 eggs
130g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
170g canned pineapple (diced)

Method

1) Grease and line a 10cm x 20cm (4 x 8 inches) loaf pan. Preheat oven to 170dC.
2) Stir cream cheese and sugar over simmering water until soft and smooth. Remove from heat. Stir in oil and eggs until well combined.
3) Combine flour, baking powder and soda. Fold into cheese mixture together with pineapple dices until well blended.
4) Spoon mixture into prepared pan. Bake in oven for 40 - 45 minutes or until cooked. Stand for 10 minutes and turning on to wire rack to cool.



Recipe from Kevin Chai - Easy Stir 'n Bake Cakes


I am submitting this entry to this month's Aspiring Baker#5 : Fruity March (March 2011).

Hobbies, hobbies and more hobbies? - bento

Ok, this post is not about my bakes too, but about a simple bento that I assembled for my kids on Valentines' Day. It may not be a hobby as in an activity that I do during my leisure time, but I definitely love doing this.

I put together bento for them since they started school (ie from age 4 nursery). No, I am not telling you how experience I am, because I do not do beautifully decorated ones, but simple one that my kids are happy with. They are usually bread cut into shapes or roll up since they have very limited break time during the kindy days. Now that they went to Primary School with a half hour recess and longer school hours, I need to upsize the bento, ie more assembly work but of the similar ingredients since my kids are rather fussy eaters. LOL.

This Valentines' Day, I put together the below for them.

I cut frozen cocktail sausages diagonally the night before and left them to thaw in the fridge. Early next morning, I halved them, arranged them into heart shape on small pieces of bread "lined" with cheese (bite size bread is easier for them to eat). Then I popped them into the toaster oven for around 5 minutes. I am using the melted cheese to "secure" the heart shape sausages. Flowers and strawberries cannot be wrong for Valentines' so I added the flower shaped store bought biscuits and two strawberries in a food pick to fill up the box. They do not take the usual "space fillers" raw vegs like lettuce so there is no way I include it. They are happy and so am I. Would be nice and more appropriate if I have bought the below food picks earlier.

Initially I thought of using this post to support my cyber friend in a challenge she started, but after seeing a few entries, 我打退堂鼓。The rest of the entries are so much nicer. Next time perhaps SSB.

Now .. how about my baking and beading ....

A very Happy Lunar New Year to all of you

Again, I am not able to bake any CNY goodies before the CNY ... I did set aside last friday for baking peanut cookies, but PH has no stock for the peanut powder ... so these few days I am rushing my last minute spring cleaning thou I started in end Dec. I will be away for the CNY, back to hubby's hometown. 

Here, with the picture I took of my mashimaro (which I dig out during spring cleaning, hello rabbit) and the esso tigers in the background (bye tigers) , I wish all my friends and all visitors to my blog, a very Happy Lunar New Year.

I hope my wish of baking some CNY goodies will come true after I come bak from hometown.

Ta Ta.

祝大家  新年快樂，萬事如意，身體健康，心想事成。

A baking technique

This is not a post about my bake, but rather on how I can make cookie in a shorter time.

I came across this article in Dec 2010 Real Simple magazine that says I can prepare the dough in advance, and freeze them. Then I can have cookies whenever I want it. I just have to type it out here for record.

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Freezing dough

Want a recipe for avoiding holiday-baking overload? Mix up and freeze dough ahead of time, then bake it when you need it. What works best : drop cookies, like chocolate chip, oatmeal, and gingersnap. Here's what to do.
 
Scoop balls of dough onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and freeze until just firm, 15 to 20 minutes. (A small, spring-loaded scoop will give you nice, equally sided rounds, but a measuring spoon will work, too.)

Transfer the frozen balls to a freezer-safe container, cover and freeze for up to 3 months. Ready to bake? Place the frozen balls on baking sheets (no need to thaw) and bake according to the instructions, adding 1 to 2 minutes to the total time.

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There! Now I hope I have time to make some cookie dough. I am still thinking if I have time to try CNY cookies - peanut cookies ... pineapple tarts, the open face type ...