Recipe - "Marble cake"

'Marble cake'



Marble cake (Non-mixer)

My husband prefers homemade Marble cake with richness in butter. The following recipe makes a reasonable size Marble cake without using a mixer as I am still waiting for my Kenwood mixer to be delivered.

Ingredients

2 tbsp cocoa powder

6 tbsp hot water

110 gm caster sugar

50 gm brown sugar

250 gm unsalted butter (melted)

6 tbsp vegetables oil

2 eggs (70gm each at room temperature)

1 tsp vanilla essence

200 gm all-purpose floor

1 tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

 

Procedure

Grease your cake tin and line with baking paper. Set it aside.

Preheat oven to 175 C, fan bake.

In a bowl, stir cocoa powder with hot water until it dissolved. Set it aside.

Prepare a mixing bowl. Add in sugar, butter, oil, eggs and vanilla essence. Whisk all the ingredients together until incorporated.

Sift in flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Combine and whisk everything until incorporated.

Scoop one third of the batter into the cocoa mixture and stir together till well-mixed.

Spoon 2 spoonful of vanilla cake batter into the cake tin and follow by 1 spoonful of the chocolate batter. Repeat until all batter has been used up. Insert a skewer and swirl through the batter a few times to create a marble effect.

 

Bake for 40 to 45 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Place the cake on the wire rack and let it cool completely.

Cut, serve and enjoy!

Note : Adapted the above recipe from Foodie and Baker.

 

Recipe - "Chilli Tomato Fermented Soy Bean Paste (Taucu) Prawns

Chilli Tomato Fermented Soy Bean Paste (Taucu) Prawns

Chilli Tomato Fermented Soy Bean Paste (Taucu) Prawns

 

When I was Kuala Lumpur, a good friend of mine introduced me to this dish.

I decided to give it a go by cooking it and my family loves it.

 

Ingredients

500 gm medium size prawns (cleaned, deveined with tails intact)

4 slices of ginger

4 shallots (thinly sliced)

½ tsp chopped garlic

1 large tomato (chopped in pieces)

1½ tbsp fermented soy bean paste (taucu)

1 to 2 finger length red chilli (cut)

 

Sauces

1 tsp light soy sauce

1 tsp sesame oil

¼ tsp sugar

125 ml chicken stock

A pinch of salt

A dash of white pepper

2 tsp corn flour

 

Procedure

Heat wok or non-stick pan. Add oil.

 

Low heat, saute ginger till lightly brown. Add shallots, when shallots turn slightly brown, add garlic. Fry all till fragrant. Add tomato, chilli and ‘taucu’. Fry and mix all together.

Add prawns. Stir fry and let it cook for 2 minutes or until the flesh changes colour. Lastly pour the sauce and let it boil. Turn off  heat.

Dish and serve immediately with rice.

 

Recipe - "Chinese New Year Peanut Cookies"

Peanut Cookies

Peanut cookie is one of the popular items served during Chinese New Year. This time round, I did not buy the ready-made Peanut cookies in Malaysia, instead, I baked them here in Sydney. I prefer making them as I can control the amount of peanut butter, margarine and sugar in the cookies.

The Peanut Cookies as shown in the above picture were baked using the following recipe. A perfect peanut cookie should be able to melt in your mouth as soon you take a bite.

Ingredients

            300 gm roasted peanuts

250 gm all-purpose flour

150 gm caster sugar

2 tbsp unsalted butter (melted)

A pinch of salt

Shallot oil/Vegetable oil

1 egg beaten for glazing

Halves roasted peanuts for topping

Procedure

1. Roast the peanuts. You can either fry it with a hot wok or roast them in the oven. Once the skins start turning dark and the peanuts are crunchy, remove it. Let it cool. Rub the peanuts with your hands to remove the loosened skin. Another way to remove the skin is by placing the peanuts into a large colander. By rubbing the peanuts while shaking the colander would allow the skin to pass through easily retaining the nuts.

     2. Grind the peanuts in a food processor or blender. Transfer the grinded peanuts into a mixing
         bowl. Mix with all the above ingredients except for the last three items.

3. Add oil little by little. Mould it until it becomes a dough. Make sure the texture is smooth and it does not stick to your fingers.

     4.  Roll it into the size of a small ball. Gently press in one half of a peanut in the centre of each

          ball. Glaze it with the beaten egg.

     5.  Bake in the preheated oven at 180 C for 10 to 12 minutes.

     6.  Let it cool and store it in an airtight container.

                                   

Recipe - "Butter Prawns"

Butter Prawns

Butter Prawns

Butter Prawns is a flavourful prawn dish that is commonly served in Seafood Restaurants and in Chinese Wedding Banquet menus in Malaysia.

The combination of flavours from the curry leaves and creamy buttery milk in the sauce and spiciness from the bird’s eye chillies brings up the very essence of this dish.

The uniqueness of this dish is its luscious golden egg floss that adds to the pure crunch, firm, crisp texture when you bite into the prawn.

Here’s the following Butter Prawns recipe :-

 

Ingredients

King Prawns

500 gm Prawns (trimmed and deveined)

Egg Floss

80 gm salted butter

4 egg yolks (beaten)

½ tsp sugar

 

A

3 cloves garlic (sliced)

4 tbsp evaporated milk

Salt to taste

 

B

20 gm salted butter

4 sprigs curry leaves

3 red bird’s eye chillies (diced)

 

Procedure

Mix some egg whites in the prawns. Set it aside.

Preparing Egg Floss

 

Swirling egg floss

Heat butter in a wok. Pour in egg yolks into wok at a high point (from the height of about 30 cm) slowly but consistently and with the other hand swirl the yolk vigorously. Stir until oil is foamy/bubbles and egg yolk turns golden crisp floss. Sieve excess oil. Set aside golden crisp egg floss. Sprinkle some sugar, toss and mix well.

 

Preparing prawns

Deep fried prawns

 

With the left over oil in the wok, deep fry the prawns until cook. Drain on paper towel. Set it aside. Discard the oil.

Heat the wok. Add 20 gm butter. Fry garlic, chillies, curry leaves and diced chillies. Once the garlic turns golden brown, add milk. Pour the cooked prawns back to wok. Sprinkle salt. Stir constantly for about 1 to 2 minutes on high heat.

Remove prawns onto a serving dish and garnish with egg floss. Serve immediately.

 

 

Recipe - "Stir Fried Clams/Pipis"



Stir fried Pipis (Kam Heong)

Stir Fried Clams of Pipis

If you enjoy eating Clams or Pipis, you may consider this recipe. It only takes less than 5 minutes to cook this dish.

Ingredients

600 gm clams

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1 brown onion (cut into 4)

½ tsp chopped garlic

3 slices of ginger

2 spring onions (cut into 2 inches length size)

1 red chilli (cut julienned)

4 dried chillies (fingers length - seeded)

3 sprig curry leaves

Sauces

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp dark caramel sauce

1 tbsp oyster sauce

½ tsp bean paste (taucu)

½ tsp sugar

Procedure

Place the clams in a bowl fill in with cool tap water. Let the clams sit for 20 minutes to an hour. During this time they will spit out the sand from inside their shells.

Lift each clam individually from the water and scrub it to clean any particles from the outside surface. Once clean, set aside the clams.

In a small bowl, mix all the sauces and set it aside.

Heat a wok or pan over high flame. Pour in vegetable oil. Fry onion and ginger till brown. Add garlic. Fry garlic till golden brown. Add curry leaves.

Pour the mixture of sauces into the wok. Add clams and quickly mix all the ingredients together in very high heat. Cover the wok with a lid and let the clams cook for 2 minutes or until the shells opened. Lastly add cut chilli and spring onions and toss briefly to mix.

Dish and serve immediately.

 

Frankfurter Roll

Chicken Frankfurter Roll

Frankfurter Roll

Chicken Frankfurter roll is my daughter’s favourite. She normally eats it for breakfast, bring one to school for her morning tea and another for her afternoon tea when she comes back from school.

There are two reasons why you should bake your own frankfurter rolls :-

1.            You get to choose good quality frankfurters

2.      The frankfurters are well cooked when the rolls are baked

Ingredients

Adapted from Don Yong – Bread Winners book

Sponge

280 gm  Strong flour (bread flour)

3     gm  Instant dry yeast

170 gm  Water

 

Dough

 

120 gm   Strong flour (bread flour)

15   gm   Milk powder

6     gm   Bread improver

8     gm   Instant yeast

80   gm   Sugar

6     gm   Salt

50   gm   Egg

20   gm   Water

60   gm   Butter (softened)

 

Filling

14        Frankfurters

 

Procedure

Firstly, par boil the frankfurters for 1 minute and set it aside to cool.

Prepare the sponge by mixing all the ingredients and knead until the sponge is firm, dry and cool to touch. Ferment the sponge for 4 to 5 hours in a fairly large airtight greased container at about 27 degrees Celsius.

When the sponge is fermented, prepare the dough. Place the remaining dry ingredients into a mixing bowl. Add egg and water, mix and combine well. Cut sponge into a few pieces and add to the mixture, knead it. Lastly add butter and mix together. Mix and knead for about 10 minutes until the dough is fully developed.

Round up the dough and rest on a flour dusted table for 10 minutes. Divide the dough into 55 gm pieces and round up again.

Leave the dough pieces to rest for 5 to 10 minutes and then roll out each dough piece between your hands until it’s about 2 ½ times the length of the frankfurter or about 35 cm. Take a dough strip and wrap it around a frankfurter by forming 5 to 6 coils of dough over it.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Place the shaped rolls on the paper. Cover the rolls with clean cloth.

Prove rolls for 1 hour in a warm place until the dough doubles in size.

Brush egg over the surface of the rolls, sprinkle some sesame seeds on top if desired and bake in a preheated oven at 200 degrees Celsius for 12 to 15 minutes until the rolls turn golden brown.

 

 

Recipe - "Doughnut"

Doughnut

Doughnut

 

My daughter loves doughnut and I decided to make doughnut for breakfast and her tea break in school.

Ingredients

Adapted from Don Yong – Bread Winners book.

 

Sponge

350 gm  Strong flour (bread flour)

4 gm      Instant dry yeast

210 gm  water

 

Dough

50 gm    Strong flour (bread flour)

100 gm  Plain flour (all purpose flour)

30 gm    Milk powder

10 gm    Baking powder

8 gm      Bread improver

8 gm      Instant yeast

75 gm    Sugar

5 gm      Salt

30 gm    Egg

40 gm    Water

60 gm    Unsalted Butter (softened)

 

Procedure

Prepare the sponge by mixing all the ingredients and knead until the sponge is firm, dry and cool to touch. Ferment the sponge for 4 to 5 hours in a fairly large airtight greased container at about 27 degrees Celsius.

When the sponge is fermented, prepare the dough. Place the remaining dry ingredients into a mixing bowl. Add egg and water, mix and combine well. Cut sponge into a few pieces and add to the mixture, knead it. Lastly add butter and mix together. Mix and knead for about 10 minutes until the dough is fully developed.

Round up the dough and rest on a flour dusted table for 15 minutes. The dough must not stick to the table.

Cut the dough into 50 gm pieces. Round up the dough. Lightly flatten into your palm. Place your thumb in the middle to make a hole.

Prove dough for 45 minutes in a warm place until the dough doubles in size. Fry in hot oil (180 degrees Celsius) for 45 seconds on each side until golden brown.

Drain on kitchen paper towel and coat with sugar.