Air Fried Chicken Balls

Instead of making nuggets, I decided to make some nice simple yummy chicken balls for the kids for their dinner and the extras for the big girl to bring to school on the next day.

Ingredients:

• 1 pc of chicken breast (roughly 150-200g) - cut to small fine pieces, but not mince so you still get the chicken slices texture
• 1/4 onion - chopped roughly, to get the crunchy texture too
• 1/2 tsp of garlic powder
• a dash of pepper
• a pinch of sea salt
• 1tsp of corn flour
• 2 slice of bread (blend till powder)
• 1/2 cup of plain flour
• 1egg - beaten

Steps:

1. Marinade the chicken with the onion, garlic powder, pepper, sea salt and corn flour. Leave it aside while you blend the bread, prepare the flour and egg.
2. Scoop a tablespoon and then shape them into balls.
3. Dip the balls into plain flour, egg and finally the bread crumbs. Make sure you follow the right order.
4. Place them in the air fryer. Set at 160c for 6mins.
5. Done, serve with your favourite sauce.

Braised Lamb Shank

I had always been a fan of lamb or mutton but can't really cook them at home coz the big and small bosses don't like it. However, since my small boss no 2 loves any meat, I thought of trying it out. Few days back when we went shopping, lamb shank was on sale.. hmmm... why not try it out with the pressure cooker. Imagining the fall apart and yummy goodness of the veggie.

Ingredients:

• 4pcs of lamb shanks
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 1 onion, cut to 8 chunks
• 3pcs carrots, cut to big chunks
• 2pcs of parsnip, cut to big chunks
• 4pcs of big tomato, cut to smaller chunks
• 1/2 tsp of mixed herbs
• 1/2 tsp of fresh rosemary
• 1/2 tsp of fresh thyme
• 6pcs of fresh button mushrooms
• 1 cup of salt reduced chicken stock
• a big handful of fresh parsley for serving
• some salt and pepper to season the lamb
• 2 tbsp of olive oil

Steps:

1. Heat up the pressure cooker. Pour in the oil and wait for bout 10-15 seconds for it to heat up.
2. Season the lamb shanks with salt and pepper. Then brown the lamb shanks on all side in the pressure cooker. That should take about 5-7mins.
3. Add in all the veggies and herbs and stir the mixture.
4. Then add in the chicken stock and cover the pressure cooker. Set to meat function, KPT for 25mins.
5. Once it is done, let the valve drop and then set it to vent and set to bake for 20mins to help reduce the stock to thicker sauce.
6. Served with fresh parsley.

Cloud Bread

Stumble across this thing called cloud bread, which is actually not bread, not biscuit, but more like softer version of a meringue. It looks simple and I thought it will be a great snack for the kids yet reduce a little carbo amount on their diet.

Ingredients:

• 3 eggs, separate yolks from white
• 1/8 tsp cream of tartar
• 85g cream cheese (can be substituted with thick yogurt or ricotta cheese too)
• 2tbsp honey
• a pinch of salt 

Steps:

1. Preheat the oven to 140c.
2. Prepare some baking tray and line them with greased paper or for me I used the silicon mat (it is easier to take off).
3. Place the egg white and cream of tartar in the mixer. Beat till the egg white reached stiff peak. It should be really thick, fluffy, won't fall off when you turn the bowl upside down.
4. In a separate bowl, beat the cream cheese till smooth. Add in the rest of the ingredients (egg yolk, honey and salt) and beat till it is all well mix and the mixture turn into pale yellow colour.
5. Slowly fold in 1/3 of the egg white to the cream cheese mixture and continue till you finish with all the egg white. Do not over do it and do it slowly to avoid deflating the air in the egg whites.
6. Once done, scoop the mixture on the baking tray to your desired size. Do not place them too near as they will slightly inflate after baking.
7. Bake for 35mins at 140c for till it is dry and crispy on the outside. You will not be able to remove it if it is not ready.

Sweet Potato Balls stuffed with Nian Gao

Hub and the girls are not a fan of the traditional yam and sweet potato sandwich with nian gao, so I have to prepare something different. And I remembered I had made some sweet potato puff balls before and this time, I'll just stuffed it with the sticky cake instead.

This recipe uses tapioca flour instead of glutinous rice flour.

Ingredients:

• 230g sweet potato, steamed (I microwaved with water) and mashed
• 150gram tapioca flour
• 50g rice flour
• 15g corn flour
• 25g sugar
• a pinch of salt
• 2tbsp oil
• 1/4 cup of water
• oil to spray
• nian gao cut to small cube, roughly 1.5cm size, recipe for nian gao is here

Steps:

1. Mix all the ingredients except the sticky cake and knead till it forms a soft dough.
2. Once it is ready, scoop roughly a big tablespoon of it out and flatten it. Put a cube of the sticky cake and wrap it up, shape into a ball.
3. Place the balls in the air fryer and set at 160c for 5mins.
4. Then spray some oil on the balls and shake it around so that it is well coated and AF for another 5mins. Do not stuff too many balls into the basket to avoid them from sticking together.
5. Once ready, take it out to cool but do not stack them up yet as this will deflate the ball.

Nian Gao / Sticky Cake

This CNY, I had prepared something different from the previous year. No pineapple tart this year as I was too lazy to cut, blend and cook the pineapple for long time on the stove top. Not CNY cookies too, other than some Airfried crab stick and seaweed popiah crisps.

This is the special that I had made this year with my kitchen toy, the pressure cooker. Instead of the traditional way of steaming it for 3-4hrs, it now takes only 1hr in the pressure cooker.

Nian gal or the sticky cake is one of the nice stuff sold widely in the market during CNY. However, due to commercialisation, there are lots of "hanky panky" type in the market that I rather hesitate so decided to make it myself. Another reason it is expensive.

I had made two batch and think the second batch one tasted better and looks prettier too (btw the pic is from the first batch which is too pale and too soft). Here is the recipe:

Ingredients:

• 300g glutinous rice flour 
• 200ml water
• 400g golden syrup (ready made from CSR)
• 2tbsp oil
• banana leaf (blanched in hot water to soften it)

Steps:

1. Line the container that you will like to use to steam the nian gao with the banana leaf. I had used the container from the tiffin carrier. Make sure you have sufficient layer to avoid the liquid from spilling out and sticking on the container after steaming. Spray the banana leaf with a layer of oil to make it easier to remove when you need to serve the nian gao.
2. Mix the water with the flour till it is well mix. The mixture will be quite hard as I had reduced the amount of water requested by the recipe. 
3. Now add in the golden syrup into the hard dough mixture and get a little amaze at how it all liquified. The entire mixture will now be a thick liquid. Add in the oil and mix till it is all evenly mix.
4. To avoid any lump, make sure you sieve the mixture.
5. Pour the the mixture into the carrier that you had provided and place it into the pressure cooker.  I'm using the Philips pressure cooker and a stainless steel inner pot. I'm able to fit in two layers of the tiffin carrier into it. If you are not using the stainless steel inner pot, make sure you put a layer of cloth to avoid it from scratching. 
6. Make sure the water level in the inner pot is at least half the level of the tiffin carrier's single layer. Set the pressure cooker to steam and KPT 59mins.
7. Once done, let the valve drop, remove the container out of the pressure cooker. If there is any water that I had drip on the nian gao, make sure u wipe off the water and let it cool. Once cool, let it set in the fridge for at least 2-3days before you remove it from the container.

Pumpkin Kaya / Jam

Something that's healthier yet taste yummy. This pumpkin jam goes well with bread and it is suitable for vegetarian that does not take egg.

Ingredients:

• 400 grams of pumpkin
• 2 Pandan Leaves
• 50 grams of brown sugar
• 100 ml thick coconut milk
• 100ml thick cream

Steps:

1. Instead of the normal steaming of the pumpkin, I roasted them on the air fryer to give it that extra nice flavour. So cut the pumpkin to small cubes and air fried them for bout 15-20mins on 160C. However if you don't have one you can just steam it till it is soft for the same amount of time.
2. Blend the pumpkin with the cream and coconut milk. I used the hand blender. But if you have one, mash it and sieve thru it so that there is no clump in the mixture.
3. Pour the mixture on top on non stick wok/pan/pot. Then add in the rest of the ingredients.
4. Cooked on low fire (I'm lazy, I want it fast, so I started with slightly higher fire and once it gets heated and before it bubbles, lower down the temperature) till the mixture thickens and when you run a spoon over it, it draws a line on the mixture.
5. Let the mixture cool down before transferring it to a clean, dry and sterilised container.