Pumpkin Donut

This is originally not my recipe, I made amendment to the recipe to fit whatever is in my pantry and here it is with the modification. Original recipe from Mandy in FB group.

Ingredients

• 100g Plain flour 
• 150g Bread flour (original asked for 200g bread flour, without plain flour)
• 20g milk powder
• 4g yeast
• 80g pumpkin (microwaved with a tablespoon of water for 5mins high, then mashed. original recipe called for sweet potato without information on how to prep it)
• 30g raw cane sugar 
• 3g salt 
• 95g of egg + water (1 egg + with water till it is 95g)
• 20g butter (add in after mixture is well mix, the recipe indicate 15mins)
• Oil to fry (I used peanut oil)

Steps:

1. I'm using my Kenwood mixer, with the bread attachment. Place in the wet then dry ingredients, set it to medium low speed and mix for about 3-5mins till all ingredients are well mix together
2. Then add in the butter and mix for another roughly 20-25mins on high speed. I did not wait till it reaches window pane stage coz i was running out of time.
3. Leave it to proof for bout 30mins (it was rather cold last night since winter started, so I proof it over a medium low heat water bath).
4. After 1st prove, deflate air, roll flat and divide into 23 pcs (or up to ur preference), shape into round balls. The dough is rather fluffy and soft to handle. So by the time I'm done with the last, the first is sort of proof again.
5. Pour oil in the pot that you using to fry the donuts and heat it up while working on the donuts.
6. Make a hole in the centre of the ball with your finger, then give it a hoola hoop round in your finger so that the hole in the middle is even, big enough and the entire donut looks even. Make sure the table is well floured.  
7. Proof another 15 mins. (U may prove longer to 30 mins)
8. Be carefully when handling doughnuts. I used my long silicon chopstick that's wonderful for this.
9. Drop in the donut one by one on the oil and fry on low heat till you see golden brown colour. If your oil is hot enough, the donut should float up within 5 seconds you put it in.
10. When done, rest & cool the doughnuts, decorate it the way you like once done.

Keropok Lekor aka as Malay Fish Fingers

This is oil fried version

This is air fried version

This is how it looks like before slicing to fry

What happens when you are in the land that you don't get what you crave for easily or almost not available, you try making it yourself. Keropok lekor is one of my favourite snack from the night market back home. This is actually my second attempt of making this snack. The first was a failure maybe due to the type of fish used. I used basa fillet the first time and it tasted more just like normal fish cake and lack of that spongy feel for the thick type and not crispy for the thin type.

This time, I used barramundi and it works nicely. Maybe it is due to the "kaoness" of the fish. It is the stickiness effect that the fish achieve after being mashed.

Here is the recipe for this yummy snack:

Ingredients:

• 450-470g of fish fillet (I used barramundi, you can use tuna or even ready made fish paste
• 1 1/4 cups of tapioca starch
• 1/4 cup of plain flour
• few pieces of ice cubes
• a pinch of salt
• 10g butter
• 1cup plain flour for dusting
• 1 pot of salted water for boiling
• oil to fry

Steps:

1. Place the 6 ingredients in the food processor. Mix till it is even.
2. Dust the working top with plain flour and scoop the mixture out to shape.
3. Divide the mixture into 6 parts and dust it generously with the plain flour.
4. Shape it into long tube of roughly 12cm with diameter of 2.5cm. Place them aside.
5. Boil the salted water. Once boil, place in a few pieces of the fish tubes and let it boil for bout 4-5mins. It is ready once the tube floats in the water.
6. Remove the fish tubes and let it dry and cool down.
7. Once it is cool and dry, slice it to the thickness of your preference and fry.
8. If you using the air fryer, it takes about 8-10mins at 200c. Time varies with the thickness you cut the cracker.

Flaky Curry Puff

This is not the first time I made curry puff, but this is the first time I attempted the so called karipap pusing style of puff, the pastry is so flakey and crispy.

As usual, I'll attempt both the oil fried version as well as air fried version.

This is the  oil fried version.

This is the air fried version

And since we ran out of potato to make a big batch of filling, we had baked beans cheese filling and tuna cheese filling for a twist.

Since I had posted the basic karipap recipe earlier, I'll just skip the filling recipe here and go straight to the pastry only.

For the filling recipe, refer here.

Ingredients:

• Water dough
• 360g plain flour
• 150g cake flour/low protein flour
• 1tbsp caster sugar
• 2tsp salt
• 150g butter, cubed
• 200ml water
• Butter dough
• 250g cake flour/low protein flour
• 150g butter

Steps:

1. First, put all the ingredients (except water) for the water dough in the food processor and whizz them up. Slowly add in the water. It will looks a little like bread crumb texture once everything is well mix. Pour them out and knead into a dough. That should take roughly 2mins. Set aside
2. Next, put in the ingredients for the butter dough in the food processor and do a quick whizz to let the butter mix with the flour. It will be very very crumbly texture. Pour them out and knead into a sticky dough. That will take about 10-15mins. Set aside along with the water dough in the fridge for about 10-15mins, covered.
3. Take the dough out and roll the water dough out till large rectangle and sprinkle generously with flour. I rolled mine to roughly the size of 8cm by 16cm.
4. Then roll the butter dough out to roughly half the size of the water dough. Place it on top of the water dough. Fold the water dough over and cover the butter dough.
5. Then roll the dough out again and fold over again. Do this another time before rolling out the dough into a long roll.
6. Cut it into small sizes (I think I cut up to 20pcs).
7. Roll out the small pieces into round flat pieces, fill up with the fillings that you had prepared and cool down and shape as per your preference.

*You may either fry in oil or the air fryer for 15mins at 180c.

* You can also store in freezer in pieces to maintain the shape for 10mins before transferring into the bag for storing.

Cheese Mochi aka pão de queijo

I had baked this 2yrs back with the air fryer and decided to do it this time with the oven instead.

It is a nice yummy snack for both adults and kids, very little ingredients required and easy to make. It has a crunchy outer texture and soft fluffy internal texture.

Ingredients:

• 2 large eggs
• 2/3 cup olive oil
• 1 + 1/3 cup milk
• 340g tapioca starch
• 200g cheese (any shredded cheese either parmesan, cheddar, mozzarella, or a mixture of them)
• original recipe asked for 2tsp salt which i omitted

Steps:

1. Preheat oven at 200c (if fan forced, 180c). 
2. Place all ingredients in the blender and blend till it is well mix.
3. Scoop the mixture into oiled muffin tray (if silicon type, can omit the oiling part). For air fryer, I used muffin cup.
4. Bake at for 20mins (for air fryer, bake at 180c for 9mins).

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.

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.

Air Fried Churros

On Sat, hub wanted to ask us to go San Churros to get his birthday churros but then realised that the voucher is only valid a day before, the day or the day after the "big" day. So, we headed home instead... but I still wanted churros!

At the same time, I had wanted to try it out on my air fryer for a while (no deep frying at home)... so there goes, the attempt to try out since some other people has managed to do it.

Ingredients:

• 225g water

• 113g butter

• ½ tsp vanilla extract

• 2 tablespoons brown sugar (white if you don’t have brown)

• ¼ tsp salt

• 143g plain flour/ all purpose flour

• 3 eggs, at room temperature (I used L size)

Method:

1. In a small saucepan, heat up water, butter and brown sugar till the mixture starts to have a little bubble... stir constantly to avoid burning the bottom part of the mixture. Once it starts to bubble, lower the heat and in the flour.
2. Stir with a spatula or big wooden spoon till the flour is mix evenly with the mixture and starts to cuddle up into a dough. Remove the saucepan from heat immediately and still give it some stirring.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs, salt and vanilla  together.
4. Then little by little mix into the cooked dough. Do not add too fast and mix too slow to avoid the eggs from getting cooked. Continue till the eggs are all mixed well into the dough. Set it aside to cool before putting them into the pipping bag. You may choose to use the star nozzle or just a plain big nozzle depending to how thick you want the churros to be.
5. Preheat the air fryer at 180c for 2-3mins.
6. Pipe the dough directly on the pan (it can be as closed as you like as it won't get any bigger than what you see). Turn the AF to 180c and bake for 8 to 10mins (check them after 8mins coz the bigger size one may take a little longer).
7. If you will like to have it coated, have it coated with cinnamon sugar (combination of 1 part cinnamon to 1.5 part brown sugar). Coat it immediately once you remove it from the AF otherwise it won't stick.

Enjoy!

Curry Puff aka Karipap

Air Fried Version

Oil fried version

Bought some nice yummy curry puff from a fellow Malaysian last week but it was rather salty. So, I thought I'll make some myself so that I can control the flavour better. At the same time, was trying to see the difference of the fried vs the air fried effect on the puff.

I personally thinks that the oil fried one tasted better but hub can't really tell the difference (maybe coz he ate the cooled one while I had the hot one).

Ingredients:

Pastry:

• 250g all-purpose flour
• 50g rice flour
• 50g tapioca or corn flour (I used tapioca)
• 50g butter
• 50g vegetable oil (out of supply, uses olive oil)
• 130ml icy cold water + pinch of salt (i didn't use the salt, forgotten)

Filling:

• 600g potato, peeled and diced (I used half potato and half sweet potato)
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 tbsps curry powder (for seafood)
• 1 tsp tumeric
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• Some curry leaves
• 1 cup water (+/-)
• Salt to taste

Methods:

1. Heat up the oil and salute the onion till it is translucent. 
2. Add in the curry leaves and potato and slightly stir it around.
3. Next add in the curry powder, turmeric and salt and stir the potato.
4. Slowly add in the water, bit by bit till you reach the consistency you want, thick and the potato is soften. It should take about 7-9mins. Set it aside to cool.
5. For the dough, mix all the flour together in a big bowl. Stir them around to mix it evenly.
6. Heat up the butter and oil and once warm and butter melted, remove from heat.
7. Pour the oil mixture into the flour and stir them till they mixed up properly. It should be crumbly.
8. Next add in the cold water and knead the mixture till it forms a soft dough. Set aside and cover with a cloth and let it rest for about 15mins.
9. Divide the dough to 24pcs and flatten them out, fill it with the fillings and shape as desire.
10. For frying, heat up the oil and once you can see the oil movement, lower the temperature and fry till it is light brown.
11. If Air Frying, AF at 180c for 14mins. Remember to spray some oil on the puff prior to "frying" it.

Chocolate Fudge (low calories, for diet consumption)

This recipe is from Lose Baby Weight that's kinda yummy, but I find it quite sweet.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 cups of walnut
• 1.25 cups of dried dates
• 1 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tbsp warm water

Steps:

1. Line a small baking pan with greased proof paper.
2. Blend all the ingredients till well mix and the mixture bind.
3. Pour out on the baking pan and press it down.
4. Chill for bout 2-3hrs before cutting it to small pieces.

Roti Boy aka Coffee Bun

Something on my to do list for a long time but just didn't get the chance to do it. Finally, took up the courage to try it out yesterday, yum! Worth the effort. Just need to double up the volume if you want more. The ingredients here just enough for 10pcs.

Ingredients:
For the dough:

• 250g bread flour
• 38g sugar
• 3g salt
• 4g yeast
• 24g egg
• 135g warm milk
• 30g butter
• some oil to rub on the hand to shape the dough and to rub on the utensils to avoid it from sticking

For filling:

• 100g softened butter
• 35g sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla essence

For crusty top:

• 50g softened butter
• 40g icing sugar
• 42g egg
• 1 teaspoon of granulated coffee dissolve with 1 tsp water
• 50g plain flour

Methods:

*Note, I multi task a few steps by using hand mixer and stand mixer at the same time.

1. Put all the ingredients for the dough in the mixing bowl except the butter. I leave this to mix with the stand mixer at low speed. Initially it is quite dry but after a while, it will get a bit elastic and sticky (I use low on my kenwood and this takes about 4-5mins). Finally add in the butter to mix (I use speed 2 on my kenwood) till it is even and the dough is sticky but elastic.
2. While the stand mixer is working, I beat the filling (all ingredients) with the hand mixer till it is all well mix and leave it in the fridge to cool and harden so that it is easier to wrap. If you want it even and easier, after 2mins, take it and divide to 10 portions before putting it back to the fridge.
3. After the dough is done, take it out and divide to 10 portions and leave it to rest while I prepare the crusty topping.
4. For the topping, beat the butter and sugar till well incorporated. Add in the egg and coffee after that. Give it another mix before adding in the flour. Scoop all the mixture into a piping bag and leave it in the fridge.
5. Now, flatten the dough and wrapped the filling inside. Please make sure u seal the dough properly to avoid it from breaking and the butter leaking out. Some of mine leaked.
6. Arrange them on the baking sheet and please make sure you have at least 3-4cm space apart from each bun. Cover them up with cling firm and rest for an hour.
7. Do note that the bun will not rise or get bigger, it will looks small like just before resting (I was worried as why it does not get bigger like any other bread).
8. Preheat the oven at 200C.
9. Pipe the topping on the bun in round swirl, cover as much as you can.
10. Bake for 12mins at 200C.

Healthy Energy Ball

Since I'm still breastfeeding, I'm eating non stop and like crazy (get hungry easily). However, I can't just simple snack on junks as I still want to be on diet to shed those extra weights. So, I was looking up for healthy snack and decided to try make energy balls instead. But the initial batches are super unhealthy with too much calories, fat and sugar (I need to be very careful with sugar intake).

Here it is, the healthier version.

Ingredients:

• 10 pitted dates
• 1 small piece of seaweed, shred it
• 1/4 cup of rolled oats
• 3 tablespoon of virgin coconut oil
• 1/8 cup of dried cranberries
• 1 slice of ginger, cut to really small pieces
• a handful of dried coconut flakes to coat

Steps:

1. Blend all the ingredients together with the blender. Don't need to blend till they are fine, but slightly coarse will do.
2. Chill in the fridge for at least 20mins.
3. Use the hand to scoop small amount to form into small balls and coat it with coconut flakes. Make sure you press it hard to avoid it from breaking apart.
4. Ready to serve. Do store in the fridge if not finish eating it.

Yogurt Muffin

While the little one was napping, I decided to make something healthy, yummy and pretty for her kindy snack tomorrow. So, colourful chips yogurt muffin. And the rest, with the blackberry jam that the relocation bought for us when we first arrived.

Ingredients

• 2 cups Self Raising Flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/2 cup of yogurt

Methods:

1. Preheat oven at 180C.
2. Lightly mix the sugar, milk, yogurt, egg and olive oil till well mixed.
3. Add in the flour and lightly fold it. Just a quick one will do, no need to be extremely well mix coz that will overmix the mixture and it will be too hard.
4. Pour in the muffin cups. Make 22 small size cups. Each cup should be 3/4 filled.
5. Scooped in 1 teaspoon of jam for each muffins. Those without, sprinkle with the colorful chips.
6. Baked for 15mins at 190C.

Yaki Onigiri

Got the recipe from http://momofukufor2.com/2010/01/yaki-onigiri-recipe/

Ingredients
cooked Japanese rice (i dont have stock of this, I used bario rice)
water
soy sauce
oil

Directions
1. Shaped hot rice into desired onigiri shapes.
2. Grill in a lightly oiled medium-low pan until all sides form a crispy crust.
3. Brush all sides with soy sauce and re-fry all sides.

Lor Mai Kai

• Quarter chicken cut to bite sizes (700g)


• 1 tablespoon of oyster sauce - marinate


• 1 teaspoon of five spice powder - marinate


• 1 teaspoon of pepper - marinate


• 2 tablespoon of rice wine - marinate


• 1 tablespoon of soy sauce - marinate


• 1 teaspoon of teriyaki sauce - marinate


• 2 tablespoon of corn flour - marinate


• 3 cups of glutinous rice - soaked for about 4hrs


• 1 cup of water


• 5 tablespoon of garlic


• 2 teaspoon of shallot


• 1 tablespoon of oil


• 4 chinese dried mushrooms (soaked and sliced)


• 50g sliced pork


• 1 pinch of salt - pork marinate


• 1 pinch of pepper - pork marinate


• 1 teaspoon of hoisin sauce - pork marinate


• 1/2 teaspoon of soy sauce - pork marinate


• 9pcs of dried musssels


• 2 tablespoon of dried shrimps


• 1/2 tablespoon of oil


• 9pcs of aluminium bowl


• 3 cups of water for steaming

1. Marinate chicken with the marinate ingredients for 4hrs.


2. Marinate pork sliced with pork marinate ingredients for 4hrs


3. Saute shallot for 1mins and add in garlic. Fry till almost golden, add in glutinous rice.


4. Fry the mixture for 2 mins, add in water and steam till water fully absorbed. Set aside.


5. Use the 1/2 tbsp oil to fry the dried shrimps. After 1min, add in dried mussels. Fry for 2mins and set aside.


6. Lay chickens, mushrooms, pork, dried mussels and dried shrimps on the aluminium bowl.


7. Cover it with the glutinous rice.


8. Steam over boiling water for 20mins.


9. When serving, cup the aluminium bowl over a plate and the lor mai kai will come off. Served with chilli sauce.

http://www.grouprecipes.com/23245/lor-mai-kai-glutinous-rice-chicken.html

Banana Cupcake

This recipe can make 12 cupcakes only. If you count, four is missing coz its already in our tummy.... hehehe

• 1 cup flour


• 2tsp baking powder


• 1/4 salt


• 1/4 baking soda


• 125g butter (soften)


• 2 tbsp of sugar


• 1 egg (big) or 2 if small


• 1 pc of big banana or 3 pieces of small one

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degree.


2. Beat the egg, salt, baking soda, baking powder, sugar and butter to even.


3. Add in flour and mix till all flour is dissolved.


4. Put in half the mixture to all the cups.


5. Mashed the banana and put in a teaspoon on all the cups.


6. Top up with the other half of the mixture.


7. Bake it and check after 10 mins

Banana Cupcake @ Group Recipes

Lotus Root Chip

• 1piece of lotus root (size depending on the amount you want to make)



• Some butter

1. Peel of the skin from the lotus root.



2. Sliced it thinly (as thin as you can).



3. Placed it on a greesed foil (do not over lap on each other).



4. Grilled in in the over for about 5-10mins (checked the color often as there is no fix time).



5. Dish it out when it turns light brown. Ready to serve.

http://www.grouprecipes.com/1935/lotus-root-chips.html