Pasta (Fettucini) with Prawns

Pasta (Fettuccini) with Prawns

I love this creamy pasta served with prawns. The prawns were fried separately to keep its shape without getting soggy. However the flavors of the prawns is being infused with the sauce using the heads and shells of the prawns. This recipe may take a little of your time, but remember, good food CAN NOT BE RUSHED. Read on.

Ingredients:

½ Kg. Tiger Prawns
1 onion (diced)
1 garlic (diced)
1 egg
1 can button mushrooms (sliced)
1 small can all purpose cream
1 small can evaporated milk
Cheddar cheese
Parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper
Fresh herbs : sweet basil, parsley, and purple basil (finely chopped)
Fettuccini pasta for 2 persons

Procedure:

Before you start cooking, it is essential that all the ingredients must be prepared and keep them on your side coz everything happens so fast and timing is essential in this recipe.

Wash the prawns, remove the head and shells but keep the end of the tail to retain its shape, slice a slit at the back and remove the vein. Set aside the cleaned prawns. Keep the shells and the heads.

Sauté onion and garlic, add the shells and the heads of the prawns. Stir fry until the juices of the heads had come out. The color must have changed from fresh grayish to red. Add milk. Bring to boil and turn the fire off. Set aside and let it cool while preparing the white sauce. This way, the flavor of the prawns has been infused well with the milk.

Prepare the white sauce:

Pass through a strainer/sift the milk mixture (with the heads and shells of the prawns). Discard the heads and shells, hence, use the milk only.

Assemble a DOUBLE BOILER; put the cream, milk and egg in a small sauce pan. Cook over a simmering water whilst stirring constantly to avoid the egg from scrambling, add the cheeses, stir until thick. Remove from heat and set aside.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta until al dente. While the pasta is cooking, you still have time to cook the other ingredients. In a hot pan, add 2 T. oil. Stir-fry the shelled prawns until done or until color has changed to red orange. Remove from heat. In the same pan, with the flavor of the prawns in it, stir-fry the mushrooms until the sides turn a little bit brown.

Now, that gives you enough time for the pasta to cook. Drain the pasta, in the same pan used to cook the pasta while it is still hot, put the cheese mixture and mushrooms. Add the drained pasta and mix altogether. Lastly, add finely chopped herbs. Toss altogether. Serve with the prawns on top of the pasta and serve immediately.

I suggest serving it with a good white wine.

Double Boiler

What is a double boiler? I feel like I need to post about a double boiler as not everyone knows what it really is and I am using it more often in some of the recipes.

A double boiler consists of two sauce pans. A large sauce pan and a small sauce pan. The large pan is used to boil water and the smaller pan is where you usually put the ingredients which you are going to cook. A recipe usually calls for a double boiler if the ingredients used requires indirect heat for controlled temperature cooking. Cooking that requires not more than the boiling point or 100 degrees C. For example, melting chocolate or butter, making custards and certain sauces, etc. With the indirect heat, this prevents from burning your sauces or chocolates, or scrambling your custards. Theoretically, you cook over simmering water, hence, not directly from the flame.

There are available double boilers in the market that you can choose from, but for me, I just assemble 2 ordinary pans (shown in the picture). The effect is the same, but it won’t cost me much for the same purpose. Choose the pans with long handles, it is easy to use.

Leche Flan

Leche Flan is one of the famous favorite Filipino desserts. It is made up of caramel and cooked custard. I love leche flan but knowing its cholesterol content, I’ve been avoiding it, that’s why it has been ages, I haven’t made it myself, but sometimes, I do indulge myself with guilty pleasures in some shops if I find it. It’s just so sinful, sometimes I can’t resist.

The lemon zest neutralizes the eggy flavor but can be omitted if not available.

For this recipe, i used 6 inch round pan.


5 egg yolks, 2 whole eggs
¾ cup condensed milk
1 ½ cup evaporated milk
1 tsp. vanilla
2 Tbsp. Sugar – for caramel
zest of 1 lemon

Procedure:

Sprinkle 2 Tablespoons of sugar in the pan and cook over low heat on the stove until sugar dissolves and turn brown. Let it cool down and set. It makes a cracking sound as it cools.

In a bowl, Mix egg yolks, evaporated milk and condensed milk. Add lemon zest and mix further.Pour over the cooled pan with the hardened caramel at the bottom. Cover the pan with foil to avoid the steam to get into the pan. Cook in a steamer for about 30-40 minutes or until the custard had set.

Allow to cool before serving. Trace the sides of the pan with a spatula so that the sides wont stick to the pan. Flip over to a serving plate so that the bottom side will be the top with the caramel. Best served when chilled.

Grilled Skinless Chicken Breast

This is quick, easy and simple meal. I can do it with closed eyes! Simple flavors! It’s been a while I’ve been avoiding deep fried foods, healthy options are steaming, grilling, pouching, boiling, pan-frying or stir-frying. Most of the time I go for the grill.

Ingredients:

2 chicken breasts
Salt and pepper
1 Tbsp. cooking oil

Procedure:

1. Preheat the grill.

2. Remove the skin and sinew of the chicken breasts.

3. Make slits with the chicken breasts by making a diagonal pattern.

4. Season the chicken with salt and pepper

5. Sprinkle oil on the chicken

6. In a preheated pan, sear the chicken with the sliced side down for 2 – 4 minutes or until golden brown. Turn the chicken upside down and continue cooking for another 2 minutes. Literally, just brown the chicken with a very hot pan to seal its juices inside.

7. Transfer the chicken to an oven-proof dish and grill for 4 minutes each side.

8. While the chicken is in the oven grill, pan-grill some vegetables like carrots and onions on the same pan used with the chicken. This will absorb the flavor of the chicken at the same time it caramelizes the vegetables and bring out its natural flavors. Pan grill until the vegetables are charred, or when you can see some black chars on the veg.

Serve immediately.

Pasta (Penne and Fusilli) in herbed tomato sauce

Pasta (Penne and fusilli) in herbed tomato sauce

With this dish, I really appreciate our tiny herb garden more and more. It’s such a delight to have herbs freshly picked just before you needed it. I intend to make tomato sauce with sweet basil only but hubby had hand picked all the kinds of herbs that we had, before I can complain, a hand full of herbs greeted me in the kitchen window just adjacent to our tiny terrace garden. Knowing how pleased he was to have a little harvest for the night, hence I have to use all of them, but it really was great combination of flavors. So we had sweet basil, Thai basil, purple basil and parsley. The only herb that didn’t come from our garden is thyme, which I bought from the supermarket. So for the time being, I could say I graduated from using dried herbs to fresh herbs! (silently proud) he he.. The flavors are of huge difference from that of dried. The smell in the kitchen and the dish on the table is definitely alive!

For the pasta, I’ll explain you briefly why it is mixed penne and fusili. I was more than demanding to ask hubby what kind of pasta he likes for the night, so he had a choice of spaghetti, penne, fusilli, boat tie or ribbon and fettuccini. He chose quickly said “penne!” Only to find out that I don’t have enough for the 2 of us. Hence, I have to choose another kind, which I wouldn’t mind having mixed them together with the same sauce. I don’t think it’s forbidden to mix pasta, is it? If it is forbidden by Italians, then sorry for that. I’m just trying to make our dinner.

Anyways, I wont leave you without the recipe, so here it is… its just as easy as ABC.

Ingredients:

Fusili pasta
Penne pasta
1 pc. Onion (diced finely)
2 cloves garlic (diced finely)
4 large ripe tomatoes (sliced in small cubes)
6 Tbsp. tomato paste
Cheese
Fresh herbs :
Parsley
Sweet basil
Thai basil
Purple basil
thyme

Procedure:

Sauté onion and garlic until onions are translucent but not browned, add tomatoes and the sprigs of fresh thyme. Continue sautéing until tomatoes are wilted. Add tomato paste. Add 1 cup of water, season with salt and pepper, bring to boil and lower the flame, leave to simmer for 10 minutes until the liquid had reduced. Remove the sprigs of thyme and discard.

While the tomato sauce is simmering, cook pasta in salted water until al-dente. Drain in a colander and mix with the tomato sauce, add the finely sliced herbs (basils and parsley) and mix all together. Add grated cheese.

Handy tip: Add the herbs on the last minute in order not to loose its flavor. Except for thyme coz the aroma of thyme lingers longer.

Here, I served it with slices of pork.

This recipe is good for 2 servings, you may adjust the amount of sauce and pasta according to your needs.

Sweet & Spicy Chicken Wings

Sweet & Spicy Chicken wings (served with potato wedges)

I didn’t measure the ingredients, so its just a matter of preference how spicy or how sweet you like to have. The marinade shouldn’t be too runny, so avoid using so much soy sauce as it would just be wasted and the flavors are loosened as well. So, to keep the flavors intact, just keep nicely moist leaving you just enough marinate to baste on the wings when grilling.

Ingredients:

Chicken wings
Paprika
White pepper
Chili powder
Honey
Soy sauce
Salt

Procedure:
Wash and dry the chicken wings and pat-dry with kitchen paper. Season chicken wings with salt and pepper and massage the meat so that flavors will be absorbed. Add paprika, honey, pepper, chili powder and soy sauce. Marinate for at least 30 minutes so that flavors would develop nicely. Preheat oven grill at high temperature.

Grill for 15 minutes each side, brush the remaining marinade onto each side before turning, until chicken wings turn dark brown and well done, but still moist inside. Overcooking makes the chicken dry.

Meanwhile, while the chicken wings are on the grill, prepare potatoes. Cook potatoes in boiling salted water for 10 minutes or until just done, but not over-cooked. Cut the potatoes in wedges. In a hot oiled pan, pan fry the potatoes, sprinkle with salt, pepper, garlic powder and a little dash of paprika. Continue pan frying until the sides of the potatoes turn golden brown. Drain in kitchen paper.

Remove chicken wings from the grill and serve with potato wedges.

Mutton Sio Mai

Mutton Sio Mai

We are a big fan of dim sum restaurants and once in a while at home we crave for it. The key to a tasty dim sum dumplings is to cook with a bamboo steamer. I have tried doing it in my metal steamer, there’s nothing like it with a bamboo steamer! It’s the flavor and the aroma that has stucked into it that gives a special touch. In my quest to find a bamboo steamer, I’ve been to china town, but wasn’t successful. I’ve seen huge gigantic bamboo steamer which is not what I’m looking to buy! Not until now, a colleague of hubby was kind enough to buy it for us, and we are very pleased to have a medium sized bamboo steamer in four layers. We just got it last night and we wanted to try it right away! Just in time, I have frozen dumpling wrapper which have been sitting in the freezer for quite some time now, But the available minced meat I have is mutton and mutton only! I haven’t had mutton sio mai in my life, but that didn’t leave me any much choice but to try making mutton sio mai. My imagination had worked fantastically with the flavors, hence I put spices that I haven’t used with chicken or pork dumplings. I added chili onion, mushrooms which worked out just well!

Ingredients:
¼ Kg minced mutton
1 can button mushrooms (diced finely)
1 large white onion (diced finely)
1 red chili (diced finely)
1 green chili (diced finely)
6 Tbsp. Soy sauce
1 Tbsp. sesame oil
2 Tbsp. corn starch

Soy Sauce:
¼ C. Soy sauce
2 Calamanci (small lime)
½ tsp. Sesame Oil

Procedure:

Prepare all the ingredients and place everything in a mixing bowl. Mix vigorously with your hand, you may wish to use plastic gloves, as I did, until all the flavors have been blended together. Let it stand for about 10 minutes that the flavors will develop nicely.

Place 1 teaspoon of meat mixture at the center of each dumpling wrapper, pat with water around the meat using your finger. Gather the edges of the wrapper up forming pleated raffles. Tap on the table to flatten the bottom of the siomai and squeeze a little just before the edge of the wrapper, leaving a little meat exposed. Do this until all the meat mixtures have been wrapped, then you are ready to steam.

To use the bamboo steamer, place about an inch deep of water in a large woke, taking care that the water should not get out of the rims of the steamer. This is important to keep the steam inside the bamboo steamer. Bring the water to boil and reduce the heat when it is bubbling already. Brush with the base of the bamboo steamer to avoid the dumplings sticking onto it. Place the dumplings in each base keeping a little distance in between each dumpling.



Stack the bamboo steamer over the simmering water and cover the last layer.



Cook for 15 minutes. Serve with soy sauce.

This siomai is just perfect to our taste, and I shall do it again! It’s even better than what I have tasted in the food court of KLCC which was a little bit commercialized, I should say.

Hubby was so impatient infusing flavor and aroma with the new bamboo steamer, he steamed by adding onion, garlic to the water instead of just plain water, I find it a brilliant idea. Hence, now we have a bamboo steamer that smells like it is used since a long time.

I have posted Chicken Siomai long time back, say 2 years ago, when we were in Angola. I did it quite differently as I have to settle what I can find there, and I even used bread crumbs coz I cant find cornstarch in the supermarket, and I remember there is no available sio mai wrapper there, so I used the spring roll wrapper instead and cut them into small pieces. Those were the days when I was living in (T.I.A.) which means “This Is Africa”. I tell you, it was not easy!

Creamy Tuna Carbonara

I love carbonara. It doesn’t look very glamorous on the table yet, it really has mild flavors that just melt in my mouth.

Ingredients:
3 Tbsp. cooking oil
1 can tuna chunks in oil
1 can button mushrooms (sliced thinly)
1 pc. Large white onion (minced)
2 cloves garlic (minced)
2 eggs
1 small can all purpose cream
¼ cup milk
½ cup grated parmesan cheese
1//4 cup cheddar cheese
Salt and pepper
Spaghetti

Procedure:

Prepare the sauce first before preparing the pasta. The heat of the pasta is essential to cook the eggs further. I’m very keen on egg safety these days as it is not good for preggy, hence, modified the standard procedure in making carbonara for safety reasons.

In a hot pan, add oil and sauté onions until wilted, but not brown, add garlic and continue sautéing in low-medium fire. Add Mushrooms and stir fry for about 1 minute until sides of the mushrooms turn brown. Add tuna and stir fry for another minute and season with salt and pepper. Turn off heat and set aside.

Mean while cook the spaghetti until al-dente while making the white sauce.

To make the white sauce:
In a DOUBLE BOILER,put all purpose cream,milk and eggs in a smaller pan. Cook over simmering water, whilst stirring constantly. Do not stop stirring while doing this because the eggs might scramble. The aim is cook the eggs without scrambling, so go on stirring until it becomes thick. Add the cheeses and stir. Add in the sautéed tuna and mushrooms, add the hot spaghetti and toss everything together.

Enjoy!

Omelet filled with tomatoes

Simple and easy for a weekend breakfast.

Ingredients:
2 pcs. Eggs
Salt and pepper

Filling:
2 large tomatoes
1 white onion
Cheese
Salt and pepper

Procedure:

Make the filling first by sautéing onions and tomatoes wilted. Season with salt and pepper. Grate cheese and set aside.

Preheat a shallow frying pan, beat eggs and season with salt and pepper. Oil the preheated pan and wipe with kitchen paper. Add half of the beaten eggs and swirl the pan around to spread the egg evenly. Add the sautéed tomatoes and onions in half side of the egg. Sprinkle cheese and fold the remaining half of the egg. Repeat procedure for the 2nd omelet.

The recipe yields 2 omelets. Serve with toasted bread.

Handy tips:
The pan should be hot enough before adding frying the egg; but not overly heated so that egg will not get burned.

The filling should be a little bit dry and wilted, not chunky, otherwise the eggs will easily break when folded.

Beat the eggs slightly, not fluffy. Fluffy eggs would turn out bubbly and will collapse after and beat eggs on the last minute before adding into the hot pan.

Pan-fried fish with oatmeal

An easy nutritious meal indeed! Been trying to incorporate some fibers in our diet and this just popped out in my mind. I’ve tried making this before but I used batter to coat the fish with oatmeal. This time, its just plain oatmeal and very little flour.

For the mashed potatoes, I used to make it creamy and yummy by adding a knob of butter while it’s still hot and a little hot milk to make it soft and fluffy, but this time, I made it simpler, just to cut some fat. It was still great and I’m pretty satisfied with it.

Ingredients:

2 slices of Fish

4 Tbsp. Oats

Salt & Pepper

Oil to pan fry

Procedure:

Wash slices of fish and pat dry with a kitchen towel. Season the fish with salt and pepper and coat with whole grain oats. In a heated pad, add about 2 Tablespoons of oil, pan-fry for about 2-3 minutes each side over medium heat until golden brown. Do not over cook, otherwise the fish will be dry inside.

Mash Potatoes:

Peel Potatoes and slice into quarts, boil in salted water until done. Mash with a potato masher or fork. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serve in a bed of mashed potatoes.

Hummus - A Spread that makes a difference!

My first entry to GYO (Grow Your Own), a monthly food blogging event that celebrates that we grow ourselves and the dishes we make using our homegrown products. For more information about GYO, click

Here

.



Hummus is a popular dip or spread in middle eastern countries. Its primary ingredient is chick peas mixed with garlic and lemon juice. There are many variations with spices as well.



The hummus takes the center stage of this recipe - The spread that makes the difference! Since we are not in Middle Eastern country, we can’t easily find a good hummus unless you make it at home

Since Hubby and I have lived in the middle east for quite some time, it is not unusual for us to crave for some Arabic foods that have influenced our palates like Shawarma – a popular street food made of flatbread filled with meat either chicken, beef or lamb and of course with hummus as spread. In other countries it is popularly known as wraps, but the spread is not hummus, made of mayonnaise with other variations but it’s the same idea, it is a wrap basically, but its a makes a complete meal coz it has the basic food groops, ie, carb, vegetables, meats, and its worth mentioning, the chickpeas is full pack of protein, iron and vitamin C.

Ingredients:
1 can chickpeas (cooked)
2 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. paprika
1 tsp. cinnamon powder
Juice of 2 lemons
2 cloves garlic (grate)
½ Cup Olive Oil
Fresh Parsley and basil (chopped)

Procedure:

Grate garlic and set aside. Drain chickpeas and put in a food processor or blender, add lemon juice, grated garlic, cumin, paprika and cinnamon powder. Blitz for few seconds and stir. Blitz again for few minutes, while the machine is running, add the oil gradually until very fine and smooth. Garnish with chopped fresh parsley and basil.

For this recipe which has garlic, it is essential to have fresh herbs to go with it to fight the garlic breath – a distinctive odor after having some sauces with garlic. One of the cures of garlic breath is having something green, means with chlorophyll. This works wonders! Usually in Middle Eastern countries, they serve this with lots and lots of rockets, the purpose of which is to avoid garlic breath. Parsley also works well with garlic. Having that in mind, that’s why I added some parsley to the hummus.





As my option is not very limited, I just asked hubby to get me some parsley and pass it across the kitchen window, I got a handful of parsley and sweet basil, which was a great idea. So, having some greens at hand is very useful.

Straight from my tiny garden are fresh parsley and basil which we have grown them ourselves. We have a tiny garden in our terrace which original a space for ornamental plants but we squeezed them to one side to give a space for some herbs. We planted some seeds when we came back from vacation. So now, we have parsley, sweet basil, Thai basil, and Kangkong. Now I’m enjoying my little harvest for garnishes.





While the hummus is ready, prepare the meats to go with it.

Ingredients:
Beef
Sausage
White onion
Tomatoes
Cucumber

Slice onions and tomatoes thinly. Set aside

Slice the beef thinly and set aside

Grill the sausage.

While the sausage on the grill, in hot pan with a teaspoon of oil, sear beef by adding one slice by slice so that the beef will not curl up when cooked. Stir-fry until the sides of the beef is done. You can tell when its done when the sides of the beef slices turn dark brown. Remove from pan. Add the sliced onions to the same pan. Do not be tempted to add oil. Just brown the onion by moving it around, taking the flavor of the beef at the same time. Remove from pan. Take out the sausage on the grill and slice thinly.

Assemble the dish on a big tray and serve with flat bread on the side. Serve while the meats are still warm.

Hot Chocolate

I stumbled upon this post from Ronell of

My French Kitchen

which I simply just couldn’t resist. While reading her post, I have to stop and mentally, I’m scanning my pantry if I have chocolate chips and the moment I remember that I have some, I suddenly had this “I-have-to-make-it-right-now” feeling. So indeed I made! Might be quite different from the

Original Recipe

but I’m very satisfied. Yummmm, it was such an indulgence! I really enjoyed it. Thanks to Ronell.

Ingredients:
1 cup milk
1 Tablespoon heap of cooking chocolate chips
1 Cinnamon stick



Heat Milk in a pan, add chocolate chips whilst stirring constantly until totally melted, simmer for 1 or 2 minutes. Remove from stove whisk vigorously using wire whisk or frother until foamy. Serve in a cup and a cinnamon stick. Instead of stirring it with a teaspoon, use the cinnamon stick to stir the hot chocolate to infuse the flavor of cinnamon.



Upon browsing some blogging activities, decided to have the picture of this post as my entry for Click, a monthly themed food photography event. For this month's theme it's "Liquid Comfort" for more details, click

HERE

.

Stif-fried Flat Noodles

Here’s a hit for the night! Stir-fried flat noodles. I used to make pancit or the normal egg noodles and used to put soy sauce, but this time, I like it differently as I’m avoiding the smell of soy sauce, strange as it may sound but blame it on baby on my belly.

I used flat noodles which I happen to grab from the super market even if I don’t have any plan of doing something with it… I guess I was curious with different types of noodles I saw from the Chinese noodles in the shelves of various shapes, and it stayed in my pantry untouched for quite some time. (picture below)



Anyways, I had a handful of the following ingredients that went along with it:

Sweet peas
Red pepper/capsicum (sliced thinly)
Green pepper/capsicum(sliced thinly)
Button mushrooms (sliced thinly)
Garlic (sliced thinly)
Onion (sliced thinly)
1 chicken breast (sliced thinly in strips)
Cabbage (sliced thinly)
Pechay (sliced thinly)
Oil for stir-fry
1 cube chicken stock (dissolved in ¼ cup hot water)


The trick with stir-frying is to keep everything ready at your side coz everything happens so quickly. It’s a different way of doing it the way I used to before, like everything will go in the woke and estimate the amount of liquid to be absorbed by the noodles which I usually end up either with the noodles sticking at the bottom (lack of liquid) or the noodles are over cooked and soggy coz I put too much liquid. Well, now, I learned how to do it perfectly.

You will need 2 pans at the same time, 1 deep pan to boil water and a woke for stir-frying. First, bring to boil about a liter of water in the deep pan, while heating the woke.

Sauté onion until soft, add the garlic and mushrooms. Stir-fry until the sides of the mushrooms had turned brown, add chicken and continue stir-frying. Keep it is important to keep the ingredients moving. On the other hand, while the water is boiling, you are ready to blanch the vegetables. Use a slotted ladle to do this. Blanch the sweet peas into the boiling water in a few seconds and add to the woke, blanch cabbage and add to the woke, blanch the white part of the pechay, add to the woke, blanch the green part of pechay add to the woke, add the pepper/capsicum to the woke, whilst stirring constantly after each addition, add chicken stock and continue stir-frying. Add the noodles to the boiling water and boil for a minute; do not over cook the noodles. Drain and add to the stir-fried vegetables. Continue cooking for 2 minutes more and you’re done.

Handy tip:
In stir-frying, add ingredients with the harder in texture first and the leafy ones last so that everything will be cooked at the same time. Hard vegetables like sweet peas needs a little more time to cook than cabbage.

Brazo de Mercedez

It’s been a long time I haven’t made this, say 2 years or so… it is one of my favorites but I haven’t posted anything about it. I’ve seen other recipes on this but I will still stick to my style coz I’m adjusting the sugar content. Some are so sweet while I just like it sweet enough and it will just melt in my mouth without feeling guilty of sugar overload. It’s a little bit tricky to do this the first time, I would say, it takes some practice. Or if you have been making chiffon cakes or working with meringues before, then it should be easy as ABC. But no worries, I’ll try to explain how to make it the best I could.

Handy tips for working with meringue:

1. The eggs must washed, wiped dry and at room temperature. I separate the yolk through the shells by breaking them in two and pass from the half shell to the other. I’m comfortable this way while some are using their other hand to separate the yolk and let the egg white just fall to the bowl, but I find it a little messy. Whatever you are comfortable with, do it the way you like it.

2. The mixing bowl should be absolutely dry and dust free.

3. Adding sugar. Add the sugar at the right stage of the egg white. It should be added while it is at soft peak; to test this, stop the beater/whisk and lift it up. If the whites has soft peak and bends at the tip of the peak, then it’s the right stage. Add sugar gradually while beating continuously until egg white is at “stiff” stage. Test this by stopping the beater and lift it up, if the peak is stiff and doesn’t bend at the end of the peak, you have to stop beating.

4. Meringue should be cooked at low temperature. In my oven, 180 degrees C. 15-20 minutes, the meringue is nice and slightly brown.

Ingredients:

6 pcs. Eggs
8 Tbsp. Condensed milk
1 Tbsp. Cornstarch (dissolved in 3 Tbsp. water)
½ Cup Sugar
½ tsp. cream of tartar
2 tsp. vanilla essence
1 Tbsp. butter

Procedure:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.

2. Prepare the baking try by lining it with a baking sheet. Brush baking sheet with butter and set aside.

3. Separate the eggs. Whites to the mixing bowl and Yolks in a small skillet.

4. Add cream of tartar to the egg white.

5. Beat the egg white until soft peak using an electric mixer/ beater.

6. Add sugar gradually spoon by spoon while beating continuously. Increase the speed of the beater and continue beating until egg white becomes stiff. Stop beating by this stage.

7. Spread the meringue evenly on the prepared baking tray by using a spatula.

8. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the sides are slightly brown. The bottom usually turns brown first than to top, so you can tell when it is done if you lift the baking sheet a little bit and see if the bottom had browned.

9. While the meringue is in the oven, make the filling. Assemble a double boiler.

You will need a small and a bigger skillet. Boil water in the bigger skillet. Put egg yolks in the smaller skillet and add condensed milk, vanilla essence and cornstarch mixture (cornstarch dissolved in water), mix and place the smaller skillet on the boiling water. Reduce the heat to medium. Mix vigorously with a whisk until thick but not runny. Thick enough to hold its form. Do not stop mixing until the right consistency is achieved, otherwise; you will end up with scrambled egg. Remove from heat and let it cool down to room temperature.

10. If the meringue is done, trace the sides with a spatula and lift the baking sheet off the baking tray and carefully transfer it to a flat surface to work on. Spread the yolk filling evenly on the meringue leaving at least 2 inches at the end. Now with the shorter side towards you, start rolling the baking sheet while carefully peeling it off from the meringue. It should not stick if it is not overcooked because you have greased it with butter. Continue rolling (just like the way it is done with Swiss rolls) until the end. Now you have a log shape. Trim the edges. Serve in slices. It is best served when chilled. (Picture below)

Lettuce Salad with strips of ham

Here’s a simple salad for a light and healthy dinner.

Ingredients:

Iceberg lettuce
Green coral lettuce
Onion
Cucumber
Tomatoes
Strips of ham (cooked)
Shavings of parmesan cheese

Dressing:
1 tsp. capers
1 tsp. mustard
1 clove garlic
4 Tbsp. lemon juice
12 Tbsp. olive oil
2 tsp. Balsamic vinegar
Salt and pepper


Procedure:

Slice thinly the cucumber, tomatoes, cucumber and onion. Cut the lettuce leaves into manageable bite size; slice the ham into strips and set aside.

In a salad bowl, put lemon juice, olive oil, mustard, balsamic vinegar and season with salt and pepper. Grate a clove of garlic and add to the mixture. Mix the mixture vigorously with a whisk or fork to emulsify and incorporate all the flavors together until thick. Add capers and mix further. Toss in the sliced vegetables and mix well. Lastly add some shavings of parmesan cheese. Serve with bread.

Apple Struddle

Strangely, hubby got a sweet tooth on the first day of the year 2008 and wished for something sweet for breakfast with his coffee… Had a quick look at the pantry and fridge then in the freezer; spotted my remaining puff pastry.. and well, I can do something sweet in say 25 – 30 minutes.

Ingredients:

2 sheets puff pastries

5 pcs. apples

4 Tbsp. Honey

1 Tbsp. Butter

1 tsp. cinnamon powder

½ Cup ground toasted peanuts

1 pc. Egg (slightly beaten)

Procedure:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees C. Thaw pastry in the fridge.

Peel and slice apples thinly. Excluding the core at the center. (Picture below)

Heat butter in a pan, add sliced apples, drizzle honey, sprinkle cinnamon powder, cook further until the apples are caramelized. They will be nicely wilted and brown.

(Picture below)

Turn off heat, transfer the apples in a plate and place in the freezer for 5 minutes to cool down.

A handy tip: The filling should be at least at room temperature or cooler when introduced to the puff pastry, as pastry would tear easily when you put something hot and difficult to handle.

Meanwhile, bash some toasted peanuts until they are roughly fine.

Lay flat the puff pastry and sprinkle the nuts on half of the pastry, leaving the half to roll. Sprinkle the nuts on lower half of the pastry. Add the prepared apple slices and roll the pastry tucking the filling inside and forming like a log. Seal the edges with an egg wash (slightly beaten egg). Brush the top of the pastry with an egg wash, make slits on the top, Bake for 10-15 minutes until golden brown. (Picture Below) Serve in slices.