Light Japanese Soufflé Cheesecake

Baking has always been my weakness as it involves accuracy and many steps, not to forget the horrible washing after all the mixing bowls used. Nevertheless, with all the time I have in the day as well as to hone my baking skills, I knew I should do it! Anyway, its a great way to save money when a family member celebrates their birthday as cakes can be really expensive!

Anyway, decided to cook this after eating a really nice chiffon orange cake baked by my aunt-in-law. However, changed it to cheesecake because my children simply loves cheese!!

This is a great recipe as its light and fluffy!

Enjoy!

Ingredients (for 9 x 9 x 2 inch square tray):

160 ml milk
80 g butter, at (tropical) room temperature, cut into small pieces
280 g full-fat cream cheese block, at (tropical) room temperature, cut into small pieces
100 g cake flour, sifted
30 g cornstarch, sifted (if you have corn flour instead, use twice the amount (60g)
1/4 tsp salt
140g egg yolks
 4 tsp lemon juice

 350 g egg whites
 150 g caster sugar


The eggs should amount to about 8-10 eggs depending on size.

Steps:

1) Spray the baking tray with oil/butter, then place baking paper on it.
2) Wrap the sides of tray with aluminium foil
3) Heat milk till warm. Then, place the milk in a mixing bowl, together with the small pieces of butter and cream cheese. Mix it evenly.
4) Add the egg yolks and lemon juice into the mixture of cream cheese.
5) Sieve the mixture twice or more to make it very smooth
6) Place the sifted flour (both cake and corn flour) as well as salt into the cream cheese mixture.
7) Mix it really well and even.
8)Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C
9) Mix the egg whites with a mixer till it creates soft peaks. While mixing, add in the sugar gradually.
10) Fold gently in the egg whites to the yolk mixture in 3 rounds. Get rid of big air bubbles.
11) Pour batter into the tray slowly to avoid creating bubbles
12) Put hot water on a big rectangle tray, then place the square tray in to act as a water bath during baking to keep the cake moist.
13) Place the tray into the oven and bake it at 170 degrees C for about 50-60 mins.
14) Test it with a skewer to see if its ready.
15) Remove cake from oven and cool it on a rack

Enjoy!

Bacon-Nutella Puff Pastry

When my friend, Esther first posted this dish in Facebook, immediately I thought," What a brilliant idea to add nutella to bacon!" (As I know it will surely go well) The saltiness of the pork compliments well with the sweetness of the nutella and who doesn't like nutella??

I know of recipes like bak ku teh (herbal pork rib soup-local dish) with chocolate risotto suggested by a British Michelin star chef.

Anyway, here's the recipe which Esther shared with me! It is easy and make a great snack for bacon and nutella lovers!

Ingredients
- frozen puff pastry. Leave in overnight in fridge to defrost or leave it out at room temp till soft
- nutella
- bacon (fried in small strips)
- 1 egg
- sea salt
- cinnamon powder

Steps
1) Fry the bacon till the way you like it. I like mine crispy

2) Roll out the puff pastry till thin

 

 3) Cut them into rectangles with a sharp knife. Depends on how big you want your pastry to be. I like it bite-sized. So its entirely up to you!

 

4) Lay out the bacon (about 2 pieces each) into the pastry

 

5) Add a dollop of nutella onto the bacon

 

6) Sprinkle sea salt and cinnamon powder on it

 

 

7) Seal it with egg and use the fork to surround it with the pattern lines. Then use your fork to poke holes on it

8) After all done, put in over at 200C for about 10-15 mins or when it turns brown.

Enjoy!

Crispy Crunchy Corn Cutlets

This has been a wonderful snack in my family as sweetness and crunch from the corn makes it nice. Moreover, it is not too difficult to make.

Ingredients
- 4 corns
- 1 chilli finely chopped
- Chinese parsley finely chopped(the whole bunch)
- 7TB corn flour
- 7TB tempura flour
- 3 cloves of garlic
- black pepper corn (crushed)
- salt

Steps
1) Remove the corn kernels from the corn

 

2) Finely chopped the Chinese parsley and chilli. Add to the corn.

3) Crush the garlic and black peppercorn as fine as possible to add in together with the corn and Chinese parsley

4) After mixing everything together, you might want to put in blender to blitz it a few times only just to crush the corn a little, but yet intentionally leaving some corn kernels behind so as to give a nice crunch to the cutlets.

5) After that, add the corn flour and tempura flour to it. Then mix it together. Leaving this nice paste. Please do not add any water. There will be water from the corn. So don't worry.

 

 

6) Then put oil enough to cover the cutlets fully in a frying pan

 

7) Use the spoon to scoop one TB and gently put in the hot oil

 

 

 

 

8) Make sure all sides end up golden brown. So you might want to turn it as and when the colour is right.

 

 

Do serve this hot as its definitely nicer!

 

 

You might want to eat this with chilli or sambal belachan. Enjoy! 



Banana Crumb Muffins

This is a wonderful snack for your children or to bring for a party as its banana muffins with a twist! It has a good crunch at the top and moist inside.

Hope you will enjoy as much as my friends did.

Ingredients (makings about 10- 12 muffins)
- 3-4 ripe bananas mashed (the more ripe, the better)
- 1 1/2 cups of plain flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 to 3/4 cup of sugar ( I have already reduced it. If you a sweet tooth, then go for 3/4 cup)
- 1 egg, lightly beaten
- 1/3 cup of melted butter (do in a pot low fire)
- 1/3 cup of brown sugar
- 1 TB of plain flour

- 1/8 tsp of cinnamon powder
- 1 TB of butter

Steps
1) Preheat oven to 190 degrees celsius. Lightly grease the muffin cups and lay in the muffin baking tray
2) In a mixing bowl, mix 1 1/2 cups of flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat the bananas, sugar, egg and melted butter.

melted butter just added

3) Stir the banana mixture into the flour mixture just until moistened.
(Important point: Leave the batter to rest for about 1 hour) Spoon batter into the muffin cups laid in the tray. Put about 3/4 of the cup.

4) In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar, 2 TB of flour and cinnamon. Cut the 1 TB of butter and mix it with your hands to resemble coarse sand. Sprinkle the toppings over muffins.

5) Bake in preheated oven for 15-18 mins. Insert a toothpick into the center of the muffin and see if it comes out clean to know its ready.

First batch of muffins

Final batch of muffins

As you can see the difference in the batches. The earliest batch came out quite flat. So from experience, it is very important to leave your batter to rest for about 45 mins to one hour so that the muffin can come out nicely shaped.

Enjoy!

Fried Prawn Begedil (Potato Patties)

This is a party hit when I invited my friends over to my place last week for lunch. Most stalls would cook begedil with beef but the prawn ones which my helper makes is so good that you would not want to eat the beef ones anymore.

Ingredients:

- potato

- vegetable oil for deep frying

- garlic powder

- flat leaf parsley (chopped finely)

- fried shallots (crushed finely)

- salt

- white pepper

- prawns (diced finely)

- egg yolk only

Steps:

1) Peel the potatoes and sliced them up to deep fry them till cook first

2) Mashed the potatoes very finely until soft thoroughly

3) Add the chopped flat leaf parsley, crushed fried shallots, garlic powder, salt and pepper, prawns in to the mashed potatoes

parsley and fried shallots in

The amount of garlic powder to add

Prawns added in

4) Mix well and finally, form them into balls and you can refrigerate it to store till you want to fry it. If not, just straight away rolls into balls and flatten them out with your palm to make a small patty.

5) Deep into egg yolk before deep frying them.

Fry till the colour is right!

Enjoy this wonderful snack!

Buttermilk Fried Chicken

Just last week, I finally got down to my fried chicken experiment which I have been procrastinating in trying- buttermilk fried chicken versus KFC chicken. A while back, my friend posted a KFC chicken recipe in Facebook and challenged me to try.

Result: I preferred the buttermilk taste... as I am quite sure the KFC recipe being shared in Facebook was probably a spam since I doubt they will reveal their real recipe online.

Anyway, here's the buttermilk recipe

Ingredients
- buttermilk (enough to cover your chicken in a bag)
- salt (2 TB)
- freshly ground black pepper (1/2 tsp)
- dried rosemary herbs (1 tsp)
- 1/2 onion finely grated
- 2 cloves of garlic finely grated
- paprika (1/2 tsp)

Soak the above ingredients overnight in a bag together with your chicken

Steps
1) After soaking your chicken overnight with the above ingredients, you prepare a plate of all purpose flour/ plain flour, together with garlic powder  and onion powder (1 TB each) and paprika (1 tsp)

2) Remove the chicken from the buttermilk, pat dry it with paper towels, remove any herbs from the chicken and cover them with the seasoned flour.

3) Finally, just deep fry them with vegetable oil

Enjoy!

Stuffed Bean Curd Puffs- 2 ways

Now that I am a stay at home mum, I have been thinking of what to have for lunch with my helper at home. So yesterday, she said she had cravings for something she used to eat- Stuffed bean curd puffs. So I told her to make me some for me to try and it was refreshingly nice, simple and healthy!

Give it a try! Makes a great party snack!

Ingredients:

- cabbage (sliced thinly)

- bean sprouts

- carrots (sliced thinly)

- garlic (minced)

- flat leaf parsley (chopped finely)

- bean curd puffs

Steps:

1) Add some oil to the frying pan/wok. Throw in your garlic.

2) Add the sliced carrots before your garlic turns brown

3) Add your sliced cabbage and stir fry it

4) Then add bean sprouts

5) Season it with salt and soya sauce to your liking.

6) Finally, throw in the chopped flat leaf parsley and give it a few tosses before you off the fire.

7) The vegetables should be cooked but yet crunchy. (Pressure Point: Don't overcook it if not it becomes soggy and soft. Look at your bean sprouts for a good gauge. It should still be crunchy without having the raw taste)

8) Then remove the vegetables from your wok into a strainer and a bowl to collect the sauce. You can reuse the sauce for your other cooking since all the vegetable stock flavour is in there. Don't waste it!

9) Then, cut the tofu puffs by doing a slit on just one side of the square. Then you blanch the tofu puff with hot water for just 1-2 mins.

10) Finally, you stuff in the veggies!

This is the healthy version which I prefer!! As you feel so happy and guiltless eating this!

For the deep fried version, you basically pound the garlic, salt and black peppercorns (for some spice if you like)

Then add plain flour to a mixing bowl, together with one egg and some water enough to just dissolve the flour and throw in the pounded garlic,salt and pepper.

Then submerge it with your puffs and deep fry them!

Here's the outcome!

Enjoy!

Guilt-free Crispy Ikan Bilis (anchovies)

My children simply loves anything crunchy and crispy- from crispy fish skin, chicken skin to fried ikan bilis. I have recently read a recipe online in noobcook blog and there was this crispy baked ikan bilis recipe which I had to try because I do not like to cook dishes with lots of oil. My helper usually fries the ikan bilis with lots of oil which I feel so sinful eating and seeing the oil go to waste like that.

So this recipe is simple, guilt-free and ends up with the same crunchy, crispy result. So why not?

Ingredients
- dried anchovies (the ones that are cut in halves already with the bones)

Steps
1) Wash the anchovies for two rounds to remove most of the salt content
2) Pat dry them and lay them out on the baking tray
3) Air dry it for about an hour
4) Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius
5) Place the baking try with ikan bilis inside for 10 mins

6) Take out the tray and use a spatula to just toss it around so that the ikan bilis get evenly browned on all sides
7) Turn up the oven to 200 degrees Celsius for just 5 more mins and it should be done! How brown you want it is simply up to you..

After that, I let it cool down for 10 mins before placing it into a zip lock bag which I eventually placed it in the airtight container.

Great compliment for your lunch or dinner!You can also pound this up into powder to make a soup base stock for your porridge or noodles as well. Very nutritious!

Enjoy!

Croque Madame Muffins

Enjoy this simple, tasty breakfast or snack for the family!!

However, if you really love eggs that have runny yolk at the end of the day, use less time then what she said in the video as I followed accordingly and my yolk was still dried up after that.

Nevertheless, its still a very enjoyable food to prepare!