Zoo Negara

I brought my kids to Zoo Negara yesterday since it was a Public Holiday (Wesak). And this is also my own rule for every my kid must visit Zoo at least once, as to let them get to know how the animals looks like. . So this was my 3rd times but for youngest son Desmond was 1st time to Zoo, he was really excited to get to know all animals in the Zoo, but my daughter felt so boring as she has been to Zoo for 3 times already, hehehe...
This zoo still looks the same when every time I visited, the only thing difference is the animals are getting older, hahaha..

Roasted five-spice chicken and Turmeric rice

At first I think to cook Hainanese fried chicken rice, but a bit hesitate to fry the whole bird of chicken and very oily, end up I roasted the chicken and cooked turmeric rice, something simple and delicious.

This time, the rice is just perfect, fluffy and not too wet.

Roasted five spices chicken and Turmeric rice (from Nasi Lemak Lover)
(printable recipe)

Roasted five-spice chicken

1.5 kg chicken, cut into 6 big pieces

Marinate chicken with below:-
Use a mortar and pestle to pound below to a coarse paste and extract juices:-
2” ginger
10 cloves of garlic

2 tbsp Chinese five-spice powder
1 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tsp white pepper powder
1 tsp salt or to taste
2tbsp honey

1. Marinate chicken pieces with all ingredients for 2 hours
2. Arrange chicken on a baking pan, cover with aluminium foil.
3. Bake at preheated oven at 180c for 30mins.
4. Remove foil and bake at 200c for 20mins or until golden brown.
5. Serve with Turmeric rice.

Turmeric rice

4 cups rice
1/2tsp turmeric powder
1 and ½ tsp of salt
1tsp chicken stock powder
750ml water
2 shallots, sliced
5 slices of ginger
Few pandan leaves (screwpine leaves)

1. Heat 2tbsp oil in a wok, sauté shallots and ginger.
2. Add in rice and all seasonings, quickly mix well and turn off heat.
3. Transfer rice to a rice cooker, add in water and pandan leaves, set to cook.
4. Sprinkle some fried shallots and serve with roasted five spices chicken.

Chili dipping sauce

4 fresh red chillies
1” ginger
4 cloves garlic
2 Kasturi lime, finely grate the rind, and extract the juices
¼ salt
¼ sugar

1. Blend all above ingredients with some water.
2. Serve with roasted five spices chicken and turmeric rice

Happy Cooking !!

Sweet Potato Soup

I like to cook sweet potato soup especially during lunch time, quick and easy, and best to eat with a plate of fried mee hoon (rice vermicelli) .

This is too easy to cook, thus no recipe need to be provided. Just add sweet potatoes pieces in a big pot of water, add few slices of young ginger and pandan leaves (screwpines leaves), cook for about 30mins over medium flame and add sugar to taste.

Happy Cooking !!

Deep fried sweet and sour fish

I don't know much about fish, usually my mom help me to buy fresh fish from my kampung (my hometown is a small fishing village), she help to clean and cut and freeze it for me. The other day when I went back to hometown, my mom told me she managed to buy for me a very fresh and big fish, about 5kg in weight, the fish name in Mandarin is 马友鱼, sorry I don't know the English name, this is the fish image (Latest update-Thanks Pete informed me the English name of this fish, it is called as Threadfin or Kurau in Malay).
Since the fish is too big for my family at one go, I separated into four parts, I use the 1st part (fish body) to cook this yummy sweet and sour fish. Later I will share with you how I cook for the rest of the fish parts.

-Deep fried fish meat, vegetables and sauce. Just eating the deep fried fish meat, also really good, sweet and juicy.

Deep fried sweet and sour fish
(printable recipe)

800 fish meat, cut into cubes
1tbsp light soy sauce
1/2tsp salt
1tsp sesame oil
A dash of white pepper powder

1 green capsicum, cut into wedges
1 yellow capsicum, cut into wedges
1 onion, cut into wedges
1 fresh tomato, cut into wedges
4 cloves of garlic, chopped
4 slices of young ginger

Sauce (combine in a bowl)
5tbsp tomato ketchup
3tbsp vinegar
2tbsp sugar
1tbsp chilli sauce
1tbsp oyster sauce
½ tsp salt or to taste
¼ cup water (or adjust accordingly)

•1/2 tsp corn flour/tapioca flour, mixed with 1 tbsp water for thickening

1. Season fish meat with soy sauce, salt, sesame oil and set aside for 10mins.
2. Coat fish with corn starch/tapioca flour. Deep-fry in hot oil till cooked and crispy. Remove and place on a serving plate.
3. Heat up oil, saute garlic and gingers until fragrant.
4. Add yellow and green capsicums and tomato. Stir-fry briskly. Pour in sauce ingredients and bring to a boil.
5. Add thickening, then add in fried fish and mix well.
6. Dish out and serve hot.

** I can't get good and clear photo especially when I take picture for the dishes that I cooked for dinner, due to the low light condition in the kitchen during evening time. So no choice, I need to use very high ISO (ISO 800) and use the Canon software to do some adjustment, please accept this poor pictures..

Happy Cooking !!

Layer yogurt sponge cake with blueberries filling

My son Lucas couldn't believe this cake is made by me, I asked him why? he said he never see me decorate cake with this kind of jelly, he thought I bought from outside bakery shop, hehehe...

this time I use store bought piping jelly to decorate this cake.

Layer yogurt sponge cake with blueberries filling
(printable recipe)

4 egg yolks (medium)
10g Castor sugar

4 egg whites (medium)
60g Castor sugar
1tsp corn flour

120g Natural yogurt (or other flavours)
60g Cake flour/Superfine flour
10g Corn flour
40g Corn oil

1) Beat egg yolks and sugar till thick and pale in color, add in yogurt and mix well, set aside.
2) Beat egg white until foamy, gradually add in sugar and continue beat till fluffy. Add in corn flour and beat till soft peaks.
3) Stir a big spoonful of egg whites mixture into the egg yolk batter and gently stir with hand whisk to lighten the batter.
4) Then with a spatula, scoop gradually the remaining egg whites mixture and fold well with egg yolk batter.
5) Sift cake flour and corn flour, and gradually fold into batter.
6) Last add in corn oil and fold gently into batter.
7) Bake in pre-heated oven at 160c for 40mins.

To assemble the layer cake- cut into equal size, spread a layer of blueberries filling. Decorate with store bought piping jelly (I mix plain piping jelly with rose syrup)

-keep in fridge for later consume..

Happy Baking !!

Banana and coconut jam (Kaya) Pizza

Since i still have pandan coconut jam (Kaya), i imitated this banana and Kaya pizza at home which is our family's favourite pizza from Domino's Pizza.

-Forgot to add cheese for the 1st time, but we prefer to have cheese, taste better.

Banana and coconut jam (Kaya) pizza
(printable recipe)
250g high protein flour or bread flour
80ml milk
30ml water
1/2tsp salt
1tbsp sugar
1tsp instant yeast
1tbsp butter

Banana, sliced
Kaya (coconut jam)
Mozzarella cheese, grated

1. Mix yeast with 1tbsp of warm water and leave aside till frothy (about 30mins). Then add milk, sugar and salt and mix well.
2. Sift flour into a mixing bowl, add yeast and milk mixture, slowly add in water and knead till smooth.
3. Add in butter and knead till elastic. Leave to prove till double in bulk (normally about 1 hour).
4. Punch down and leave to prove for another 15mins.
5. Roll out, pull gently into small round sheet (you can adjust thickness and size to your preference).
6. Place onto a greased baking tray, brush Kaya on the pizza base, arrange banana slices and sprinkle the grated cheese on top.
7. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180C for 20 minutes or till golden brown. Remove and serve hot.

Happy Baking !!

Braised soy sauce pork (Tau Yu Bah)

This is a typical grandmother and old fashion of Chinese dish, as Hokkien people like me call this dish as "Lo Bah" or "Tau Yu Bah". When I was a kid, I just like to mix the gravy with rice, and like the hard-boiled eggs but not the pork belly.

This time I use a very old (at least 50years old) and the only one bowl left from my grandmother time to present this authentic Chinese soy sauce pork (Tau Yu Bah) to you..

Braised soy sauce pork (Tau Yu Bah)
(printable recipe)

500g pork belly, whole piece (Hokkien people call this as "Bah")
6 hard-boiled eggs
2 firm tofu
6 fried beancurd pork rolls, refer recipe here, optional
1 cinnamon stick
2 star anise
6 cloves
2 whole garlic, washed and with outer layer skins
1 litre water
3tbsp cooking oil

Seasonings
2 tbsp sugar
4 tbsp light soy sauce (Hokkien people call this as "Tau Yu")
2 tbsp dark soy sauce
1 tsp salt or to taste

1. Heat oil in a wok, add in sugar and stir fry till sugar melted and turned brown.
2. Add in garlic, star anise, cloves and cinnamon, mix well.
3. Add in pork belly, slight fry both sides.
4. Add in water, and follow by the rest of hard-boiled eggs, firm tofu and fried beancurd pork rolls.
5. Add in the seasoning and cook over low flame for 1hour or until gravy become thicker.
6. Serve with rice and dip with chilli sauce.

Happy Cooking !!

Desmond turns 6 today !!

Today Desmond turns 6, he was celebrating with his classmates in the Kindergarten. He likes Spiderman, so I decorated Spiderman on his Birthday cake with my poor cake decoration skill. I baked a basic cocoa sponge cake and decorated with fresh cream.

Desmond hand over goodies bag to his friend..

Pray before enjoy his Birthday cake

group photo with the girls

group photo with the boys

Happy Birthday my son, mommy hope you stay healthy and happy!!

Lemon Poppy Seeds butter cake_specially for my mom

I'm so happy my Lemon butter cake recipe well received by many bloggers. Here are few bloggers have tried this recipe. Thanks for trying out this recipe.

Please visit their lovely blog as they also share a lot of good recipes:-
1. Ching
2. Sulianmummy
3. Jane's corner
4. Ohbin
5.ahmok33
6.Reesekitchen
7. Tee kitchen

Today I made this cake again, as I'm going to balik kampung (go back hometown) tomorrow to celebrate Mother's day with my mom, my mom prefer butter cake. Why i celebrate Mother's day after 1 week later, this is because my sisters have to celebrate Mother's day for their mother-in-law on the actual day. They have no choice, in Chinese family, husband's family comes first...I have no MIL, and I prefer we celebrate this day with our mom together.

In order to get better flavour, I baked today and keep this cake till tomorrow..

This time, I added blue poppy seeds, this is also my 1st time use poppy seeds, just like to present something new for my mom .

Lemon glaze, without this, this cake will not taste nice..

I also made some changes to the this recipe too.

Lemon Poppy Seeds Butter Cake
*use a 8” springfoam cake tin
(printable recipe)

Ingredients
250g butter
200g sugar
2 lemon, finely grate the rind
4 large eggs
280g cake flour
2tsp of double action baking powder
4tbsp milk
20g blue poppy seeds

Lemon glaze
8tbsp sugar
2 lemon, extract juice
2 lemon, finely grate the rind

1. Sift cake flour and baking powder in a bowl.
2. Beat butter with the sugar until pale and fluffy.
3. Add in egg one at a time, then add in lemon rind, mixing well.
4. Fold in the flour and milk, combine well. Last add in poppy seeds, stir well.
5. Pour the mixture into cake tin.
6. Bake in pre-heated oven at 180C for 50mins.
7. While baking the cake, start to prepare the lemon glaze.
8. Mix sugar and lemon juice and cook over low heat till sugar dissolved, add in lemon rind, set aside.
9. When cake done, remove cake from the oven and prick all over with a skewer.
10. Pour over the lemon glaze over the hot cake.
11. Ideally to leave cake to set overnight, to get better flavour.


Hopefully my mom will like this new way of butter cake...

Happy Baking and Happy Weekend ahead...

Homemade Pandan Kaya

I never think to get my hands on making Kaya (coconut jam) because it is so easily to get it from supermarket here. Anyway, I tried to make Pandan Kaya for the 1st time, and it turns out so well, I like the jade green colour from the fresh pandan leaves (screwpine leaves), no artificial colour added, smooth paste and full of coconut aroma.

my home grown pandan (screwpine leaves), very tiny in size..

started to cook over the double boiler.

about 15mins

about 45mins, colour getting darker


Done, with nice jade green colour


Recipe adapted from Kitchen Corner. I agreed with her, I like this recipe too because it don't need to be stirred all the time with double boiling cooking method. Thanks Grace for kind sharing.

Homemade Pandan Kaya
(printable recipe)

Ingredients

3 large eggs (lightly beaten)
250g caster sugar
350ml coconut milk
8pcs pandan leaves (screwpine leaves)

Steps:-
Mixture A - Blend pandan leaves and coconut milk in a blender. Strain to discard pulp.
Mixture B - Add sugar into beaten eggs, use a hand whisk to stir mixture until sugar dissolves (Do not beat but lightly stir !!)

1. Add mixture A into mixture B became kaya mixture. Stir and mix well.
2. Sift the kaya mixture into another mixing bowl (stainless steel preferred).
3. Place mixing bowl over another pot of boiled water on low heat, stir kaya mixture occasionally.(Do not stop too long, 1-2mins intervals)
4. It took at least 1hour to cook till desired thickness. Cool completely before store in a clear jar and keep in the fridge.

My note:
Since my home grown organic pandan leaves size is very small, I increased the pandan leaves to 14pcs. At the beginning, the colour of kaya mixture is very pale in green, but the colour will turn darker and darker, you will get very nice jade green colour at the end. The volume of kaya will be reduced at least 1/3 from the initial kaya mixture.

Simply Delicious !!