Gingerbread House

There is a reason why gingerbread house is not a popular craft in Malaysia. First of all the gingerbread cannot withstand the humidity  and get soggy quickly. Secondly, ants are our common enemy where sugar is present. Nevertheless, it was a success and a wonderful experience for my first project. Thanks to the above recipe from Easetereuropean website, also included the template for print out, the gingerbread recipe was hardy enough to last for more than a week until Christmas party! The kids are delighted! Not to mention my daughter already eaten half the candy 'decor' before the house was completed! 

I modified the recipe as follow:
(source recipe:http://easteuropeanfood.about.com/od/crossculturaldesserts/r/gingerbread.htm)

Pattern Print out

Ingredients:

• 2 cups light corn syrup (I used liquid glucose)
• 1 1/2 cups firmly packed light brown sugar (reduced to 1 cup)
• 1 1/4 cups oil (cooking oil, cheaper!)
• 1kg  all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Preparation:

- Divide the ingredient into 4 parts

- Add 1 part into thermomix and blend for 10second at Speed6, then knead 2min. Do the same for other 3 parts.

- Roll them into 0.5cm thick and cut into shapes. Make sure that the thickness is even, I used 2 coasters to support the 2 ends of my rolling pin.

- Bake at 170C for about 20min or till harden.

Royal Icing Glue:

3 large egg white
500-600g icing sugar
Lemon juice 1/2tsp

- put all into TM bowl and mix for 2min at speed 6.

See above link for detail steps to assembly the house. have fun!

All Fruits Popsicles

Not only the color feast the eyes, they are perfect treat for a hot day, infact everyday is a good day for a chill like this in tropical island here.

These all are REAL FRUITS without coloring or added refined white sugar. All you need is a BPA free popsicle mould and make a trip to the fruit store!

By the color here you can tell I have strawberry, blueberry, red globe grapes, kiwi, mangosteen and mango. I used blended strawberry, mango and mangosteen (separately) as a base and other as cut fruits or whole blueberry to make the designs! Absolutely no sugar needed for mango or mangosteen as they are ripe and sweet, but I do add a few drops of stevia liquid to strawberry.  My favorite? Mangosteen with blueberries and touch of mint leaves, YES! mint leaves is the secret ingredient here, refreshing! Give it a try!

Coconut Flour Brownies

Inspired by Jo from Quirky Cooking to use gluten free flour for baking, this is another alternative to buckwheat and quinoa flour...coconut flour! 

Fresh coconut milk is available in every corners of Malaysian markets, the left over coconut pulp after the milk is squeezed is abundantly available, they usually sell or give to pig farm or farmer or even discarded.  As I passed by my usual grocer whom I buy my coconut milk this morning, I notice a big sag of coconut pulp, the man willingly offer to me for free "take, take! all that you can!"  and wonder what I can do with them! So he gave me a big bag of it. I brought it home and have them lightly toasted with slow heat until they are completely dried (I also tried to put them in oven at low heat, but they turn a lttle brownish) then I grind them up in thermomix to make into FLOUR! Viola! COCONUT FLOUR, for FREE! 
The pulp that I got was not completely 'white' there were some 'skin' attached, this wouldn't make a different when I used it for brownies, you can get the whiter pulp for other type of cake or biscuit.

I pulled together a few brownies recipe and modified to make the following:

150g Olive Oil
100g Coconut Flour
125g Lindt 85% cocoa bar
4 Large Eggs  (i used 3 eggs and rather dry as coconut flour absorb moisture)
200g palm sugar
30g cocoa powder
1tsp vanilla

1/4 tsp salt
40g chopped walnut or hazelnut

1) Melt the chocolate at 50C/1min/s2
2) Add all ingredient and mix at 20sec/s6
3) Pour into lined 9x9in square pan
3) Bake at 180c for 30min

They came out amazingly light, with crusted top, chewy gluey middle and yummy!

Satay Sauce Chicken

Ingredients:
1 kg chicken
1 pkt Satay powder
50g or 1/2c roasted peanuts, skinned.

1tsp dark soya sauce
3tsp palm sugar
1tsp brown sugar
salt pinch


Spice Paste ingredient:
1 lemongrass
3 gloves garlic
5 shallots
2 red chilis
1/2 inch galangal or ginger
2 tsp Coriander Powder


1. Marinate chicken with satay powder and salt. 
2. Chopped roasted peanut, Turbo 1 sec, set aside.
3. Put all spices in bowl, add 20g oil, Blend 20sec/speed10, then V/10min/speed1
4. Add chicken, soya sauce, sugar, 1/2c water, half the peanuts, V/10min/R1
5. When done, stir in remaining peanut and serve.

CURRY CHICKEN KAPITAN

Home Grown Organic Red Chilies

INGREDIENTS:
1kg Chicken (chopped)
10pc lime leaves (kefir leaves) shredded 
2 stalk lemomgrass
10-15g Lime Juice 
1/2 cup coconut milk (optional)

Spice paste Ingredient:
7 red chili
10 dry chili
15 shallots
12 gloves garlic
3 slices Lengkuas
3 Buah Keras
10g Belacan (shrimp paste)

Method:
1. Marinate chicken with salt and some lime juice for 20 min
2. Put all spices in TM bowl, 50 oil, 20g water, blend 20c/speed10
3. Install butterfly V/10min/reverse1
4. Add in chicken, 2tsp sugar, lemongrass (smashed) V/10min/reverse1. Add in coconut milk, lime juice at the last 3min.
5. Serve with shredded kerfir leaves.

Banana Walnut Muffin with Buckwheat flour

A super quick late night snack. Buckwheat is used instead of wheat flour, reduce sweetness on top of using low GI palm sugar. I don't like to store food so I only make half the original recipe. Good opportunity to use up over ripe banana. The muffin is light and so yummy! Since I only make such a small batch so I did not use my Thermomix, I can simply hand whip all the ingredient in a big salad bowl after all muffin do not like to be over beaten, and a six muffin tray fit nicely into my counter top toaster instead of churning up my oven.
The following recipe is converted to Thermomix friendly and you can double up the volume to make full batch of muffin.

Ingredients: (only 6 muffins)

Ripe banana 2
Buckwheat flour (home grind) 120g (1 cup)
Olive oil 30g (3 tbsp)
Palm Nectar Sugar  40g (1/3c)
Small Egg  1
Baking Soda  2/3 tsp
Chopped walnut some

1. Grind buckwheat grain 2min/speed10, set aside.
2. Mash banana with sugar (5s/speed6), scrap down
3. Add oil, egg, flour, baking soda. Speed4/10second (do not over beat)
4. Stir in walnut
5. Bake 12min 200c

Eat, brush teeth, sleep.......

Steamed 'Bun'ny and Porcupines!

Chinese steamed bun or (Man Tou) is the easiest to make, either you can add some fillings or just plain. But making them into these cute babies, that takes a little longer! But my daughter and I just had lots of fun snipped up those porcupine with a scissors. Yes, scissors will just do the tricks!
Unlike bread, Man Tau do not need to rise twice.

Recipe:
Water 120g
Yeast 1tsp
Sugar 20g
Oil 15g
Pau flour (or any bread flour) 250g
Salt 1/2 tsp

1. Place water, yeast, sugar, oil into TM bowl, mix 30s 37C at speed3
2. Add flour, salt. Knead 3min
3. Shape dough into oval for skinny bunny or round for well fed ones, use a sharp scissor to snip from the head onward. Add black sesame seeds for the eyes.  n let rise for 30min in warm place,
4. Steam for 20min Veroma speed1.