Bread Pudding

I have tried few new recipes recently but do not have much time to update here. Before I forget all the recipes again, it is better I do my note here. haha.

Bread pudding making was inspired by Waynie. Photos she showed in FB are too tempting which make me to have a try on this. Pretty easy and just few ingredients needed, this dessert taste well and not too sweet. I felt happy and satisfied when Chris and Calvin fight with each other for this and request for more.

Bread Pudding Recipe

Ingredients:
Bread crust
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1/2 tbsp raisin (adjust accordingly)- soak in water for around 10 minutes
1 tbsp castor sugar
Butter
Icing sugar/ snow powder

Method:
1. Spread butter onto paper cups.
2. Cut bread crust into smaller pieces and place into the paper cups together with raisin.
3. Mix milk, egg and castor sugar in mixing bowl and pour the mixture into the paper cups with bread crust and raisin. Note: the mixture to cover the bread to have better appearance of bread pudding after bake.
4. Bake in the oven for 15 mins with 200C until golden brown. Adjust temperature accordingly due to oven variance.
5. Spread icing sugar/ snow powder as decoration.

Healthy Diet - Day 4 Menu

Janice did send me a photo with scrambled egg as one of dish but too bad, no idea on how scrambled is done. Egg sounds easy yet difficult to me, the ingredients and method of cooking actually determine the type of egg yield! Without wasting the egg as my experimental scarification, I checked on the method to make scrambled egg from YouTube and grabbed the less fatty recipe from google on my trial. Hmm, bingo!! It's  passed!

Besides scrambled egg, i have teriyaki marinated chicken slices, macaroni leftover, cherry tomatoes and toast bread for today's menu!

  
Healthy Diet - Day 4 Menu
A) Mushroom Scrambled Egg
Ingredients
2 eggs
4 mushrooms
1/8 cup low fat milk
small qty of butter, salt, pepper, parsley flakes

1. Boil mushrooms till cooked and set aside.
2. Beat all ingredients (except butter and mushroom) in a bowl till even with no egg white seen.
3. Put butter in pan over medium heat to melt and add in the egg mixture and softly shake the pan.
4. As egg begins to set, pull the egg across the pan with an inverted turned, forming soft curd.
6. Add in mushrooms and continue pulling, lifting and folding egg until thickened and no liquid remain. Remove from heat.

B) Toasted bread
1. Toast in oven with 250 C, 5 mins.

C) Macaroni
D) Teriyaki chicken breast-meat
E) Cherry tomatoes

Healthy Diet - Day 3 Menu

It is day number 3 and I think I have almost used up all my creativity in my healthy meal cooking menu :(. 

I remembered I did buy macaroni which initially i bought  it just for the sake of buying and recommended by Janice. So, why not experiment on macaroni then? With my creativity and few days experience on healthy cooking, I made vegetables macaroni in addition to steam siu pak choy. Ohh, my macaroni turn out lovely but too much macaroni i put so is a bit too much for one person portion. Not to waste, i kept the balance in the fridge and heat up next day :)

Healthy Diet - Day 3 Menu Recipe
A) Vegetables Macaroni
Ingredients:
1/2 to 1 cup macaroni
4 cherry tomatoes (halves)
4 mushrooms
4 baby carrot
2 tbsp olive oil 
5 pieces chicken breast meat (marinated with Kikkom Teriyaki)
salt, pepper, parsley flakes

1. Heat olive in pan and add in chicken breast meat. 

2. Add in all vegetables, salt and pepper.

3. Toss in macaroni, parsley flakes and remove heat.

B) Steamed Siu Pak Choy

1. Boil the vege for 15 mins and drain.

2. Served with soy sauce and fried garlic.

Healthy Diet - Day 2 Menu

After yesterday day 1 cooking on healthy diet, i was so exciting on my cooking on day 2. Haha, as the result of being at excited state, i skipped body combat class..>.<

Today i feel to make grilled vegetables instead of just plain steam. After googling on a few website, i noticed the ingredient are just vege, olive oil, salt and pepper and it sounds pretty easy.. Without disappointment, the grilled vege is amazing and i enjoyed my day 2 menu very much.

Healthy Diet - Day 2 Menu Recipe

A) Steamed broccoli
1. Steam broccoli with steamer for ~15 mins.
2. Served with Kewpie sesame soy sauce dressing.

B) Grilled salmon
1. Marinate salmon with Kikkom teriyaki marinate. (I leave it overnight).
2. Grilled in oven ~25-30 mins in oven, 220 C.

C) Grilled vegetables
1. Ingredients:

• 5 baby carrot
• 4 flower broccoli
• 4 mushroom
• 4 cherry tomato (halves)
• 1 potato
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp ground pepper
• Parsley flakes 

2. In a large bowl, toss all the vegetables together with olive oil, salt and pepper.

3. Put the tossed vegetables on oven pan and roast/ grilled for 35-40 mins, 220 C. Remove the vegetables from oven and stir around every 15 mins.

Healthy Diet - Day 1 Menu

1st August was SP Kim wedding. Since mum is teaching the next day, I decided to straight back to Penang from Alor Setar instead of back to SP. 

Woke up at 1pm on Sunday and I started to plan my weekend activities. Brunch..bath.. massage.. pump petrol and dinner.. Now, what to eat for dinner? After many round of thinking, i decided to try on healthy diet meal rather than visiting the restaurant or pack and eat at home. After my massage and checking the diet recipe online and from Janice, I shopped for ingredients at Aeon. Hmm..I feel it is average which cost me around RM70...Broccoli, lady's finger, cherry tomatos, baby carrot, siu pak choy, mushrooms, potatos, chicken, salmon, Kewpie Sesame Soy Souce,  Kikkom teriyaki marinate and macaroni). All the vegetables, chicken and salmon are fresh and i think it should be enough for 5 days supply. Oh yaa.. higly recomended Kewpie Sesame Soy Souce dressing and Kikkom teriyaki marinate.. Both of these in addition to ground pepper serve as my multi purpose dressing for the cooking.

Too many ingredients and i decided to cook siu pak choy, chicken and lady's finger first. All turn out well except fried siu pak choy, too salty and I need to soak it in water before eating. Haha, I think it is better to just steam/ boil next time. Overall still ok and i give myself 60 marks for Day 1 menu (failure on the siu pak choy).

Healthy Diet - Day 1 Menu Recipe

A) Teriyaki chicken breast-meat
1. Marinate chicken with Kikkom teriyaki marinate for ~1 hr.
2. Pan fried and spread ground pepper when almosy ready.

B) Steamed lady's finger
1. Steam cut lady's finger (4) with steamer for ~10 mins.
2. Served with soy sauce and fried garlic.

C) Steamed breast-meat
1. Steam breast-meat with steamer for ~15 mins.
2. Served with Kewpie sesame soy sauce dressing.

No Bake Cheese Cake

It has been awhile i stop baking due to high work load for the past one year. Now while serving notice and is a bit free after work (no date.. haha), i decided to try again on no bake cheese cake which I have tried twice. The previous 2 times were not successful. 1st time no gelatin and it melt easily, 2nd time too much of gelatin and it was too jelly-like. After many research on the web on amount of gelatin to put, finally this recipe works well. It doesn't melt easily (but i think the gelatin amount can still be increased) and will not feel 腻，probably because there is lemon juice added for this recipe. I enjoyed it!

No Bake Cheese Cake Recipe

Yield: 8 inch loose-based baking tin

Ingredients:

• 110 gm digestive biscuits 
• 70 gm butter, melted
• 250 gm cream cheese block
• 50 gm caster sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp lemon juice + lemon zest
• 2 tsp gelatin (3 tsp if need to serve after taken out ~1-2 hr from fridge)
• 2 tbsp water (3 tbsp if need to serve after taken out ~1-2 hr from fridge)
• 200 ml thickened cream
• 250g canned peach slices (garnish)

Method:

1.    Put the digestive biscuits in a sealed plastic bag. Crush to crumbs with a rolling pin. Transfer the crumbs to a bowl. Pour over the melted butter. Combine well. Place them into the tin and press firmly with the bottom of a cup to create an even layer. You might need a spoon or spatula to help when pressing for the 4 corners of the tin.

2.    In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese, sugar, lemon juice + zest and vanilla extract with an electric mixer until smooth.

3.  Soak gelatin in water and dissolve by heat and add in mixture in item #2.

4.  Use another mixing bowl, beat the thickened cream until fluffy and smooth. Stir into the cream cheese mixture and combine well.

5. Spoon the mixture onto the biscuit base. Use a spatula to level the surface. You might like to smooth the top of the cheesecake with the back of a spoon damped with water.

6. Chill in fridge until completely set.

7.  Garnish accordingly with peach/ biscuit crush.

Notes：

• You can use either unsalted or regular butter.
• To get a very smooth surface of your cheesecake, try to use a damped spoon for the final touch, as the cream cheese mixture tends to stick to the spatula.

Durian ice cream

It is durian season again, my favorite fruit season through out the year!!! Besides enjoying the mouth watering "ang her" etc, this time i decided to try out durian ice cream.

Of course, i did not use branded durian for the first try but local durians with average quality. After 2 times trial, i feel it is better to use average or above average quality durians so that the aroma of the ice cream is stronger and better. Why use cheap or low quality durians which yield ice cream with not strong durian's aroma right? Haha.
Googled durian ice cream recipe online and I decided to grab the one from Year of the durian as reference.

I did some modification on the recipe and the ice cream turn out well and yummy. The sweet food lover of the house, dad said it has the standard as those selling outside. Haha. and this trial did satisfied me :)


Durian Ice Cream Recipe
Yield: 1L tupperware

Ingredients:400g durian flesh
30g of sugar (Do not add sugar if the durian is sweet)

130g of plain yogurt

200g of whipping cream.

Method:

1. Puree/blend durian flesh and sugar until it becomes a smooth paste. 
2. Transfer the durian meat into a cleaned, large bowl and mix in the yogurt. 

3. Whip the cream in a stand mixer until stiff and carefully fold into the durian/yogurt mixture.
4. Churn the mixture in completely freezed (24hrs freezing in the fridge) freezing bowl until it becomes thick and partially frozen.
5.  Freeze the ice cream until firm before serving.

Mushroom Aglio Olio

Today is the 6th day of CNY so I did not feel to stay at home after work alone without doing anything special. Very lucky I am able to go off from work at 6pm so I decided to cook Aglio Olio for myself. Searching the recipe from Google on my way to GIANT and I found the easy one from Sandra's Easy Cooking and My Kitchen Snippets.

My spaghetti turned out not bad but a bit too spicy as the result of putting too much of chili flakes.

It was a nice try but I think it will be better if i put more garlic and add some shrimps too to add the sweetness of this dish. Will try it again for sure as I still have lots of ingredients in the house, Thursday maybe.

Mushroom Aglio Olio Spaghetti Recipe:

Serving: 1

Ingredients:

120 of dry pasta (around 1/5 pack of 500g packing)

2 tsp salt for water + 1/4tsp for pasta (adjust according to taste)

1 1/2 tbsp olive oil

3-4 cloves garlic, minced

1/4 tsp red pepper flakes (adjust according to taste) 

1 tbsp parsley flakes (adjust according to taste)

1/8 ground black pepper (adjust according to taste)

3 button mushroom ( big fresh white button mushroom)

1/2 tbsp butter

1 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese

Method:

1. Bring a large pot of water to boil and add salt, drop the pasta in and wait to be cooked (6-7 mins). Set aside 2 tbsp of pasta water and drain the pasta. Immedietly place the drained pasta into a container and mix well with butter.

2. Heat the olive oil over medium heat in a frying pan. Add the garlic and fry until it begins to turn golden. Stir frequently to avoid from burn.

3. Add in mushroom and salt. Cooked until the mushroom begin to brown and the liquid from mushroom evaporates.

4. With low heat, add in the pasta and toss it into the mushroom mixture. Then add in chili, parsley flakes and ground pepper and mix together. Drizzle in the pasta water and mix well.

5. Turn off the heat and transfer to plate. Garnish with grated Parmesan cheese and served warm.