Daring Bakers: French Macarons

HmHmm...sadly, this month's challenge is what I think as a failed mission. My intention was to remake these macaroons, but couldn’t find the time. I have made coconut based macaroons many times, but this is the first time making French macarons and I surely got a 'Ha ha, the joke is on you' slap.

First, even after I left it resting to dry, there was no obvious feet on the macaroons. Room temperature white eggs and I am quite sure I did not mess it up in egg whites beating part. Well..that was that. Then...

I suspect that I didn’t pipe it thick enough, hence the flat disk shape result. Didn’t have hard time in baking it though, came out perfectly fine (to my untrained eyes on macarons), it did not stick to parchment paper.

I made it with three different flavors; cardamom and cinnamon, chocolate and pandan. Pandan one tasted the best I think. Sprinkle a tad too much cardamom to first batch - and it was way infused with it! Though Vik found it to be a perfect match with chai and ice cream!

As for filling, I went on simple route - just made simple chocolate cream (sour cream, confectioner sugar, dash of rum, powdered cocoa; all whipped together until fluffy) and equally simple raspberry and cherry cream (whipped double cream, added with raspberry puree and cherry liquor).


I liked it better with filling. Vik, not so much. He dipped his to tea, coffee and crumbled it to ice cream.

This is one of those recipes that I made a note on, will get back to it one of these days and get those 'feet' on them!!

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

Daring Bakers: Mallows and Milan Cookies

The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

As I looked at the recipe earlier on the month. I was feeling pretty comfortable, especially knowing we are allowed to bake both goodies or to choose one of the two. Have made Milan cookies in the past, so sort of thought I am pretty okay on that front. Never occurred to my mind to make homemade marshmallow; was a little bit reluctant to do so in all honesty. The only time I'll buy marshmallow is when we go camping. Should I really go through the trouble in making homemade version?!! Is it worth it? Sure it does. When else will I be tempted to make my own marshmallow if not now? Though I told myself, will do this challenge a week before deadline. Just in case.

That is until I stared at the calendar on Sunday morning and realized, holymarshmallow!! How could it be end of month already? My simple reasoning, weekend goes by so fast during summer. Especially summer in Toronto, I think. We just don't get enough of warm weather, so when we get them, we won't be wasting it one bit. Salsa fesival, jazz festival, Caribana, oh..all the activities!

So anyway, I decided only to make marshmallow cookies, just to take up the marshmallow challenge.


The marshmallow did not turn out as great as I hoped for and not at all as gorgeous as other Daring Bakers'!! Theirs seem to have a nice stiff peak on it. Mine, it flopped within minutes. Okay, so maybe my fault for not whipping it long enough. I was disappointed. Taste was pretty good, but ugh - the flat top!!! The end result however was quite delicious. Not exactly my type of sweets, but I could totally see the appeal of it. Just like opening Christmas gift! Marshmallow and Chocolate. Maybe something I'll make for holiday season for gifts.


With failed marshmallow episode, I was pumped to whip up second recipe. Pffftttt...Milan cookies, made it dozen times. As I mixed and whipped, it dawned to me that I have never really made it all by myself. It's my mom's cookies - it's her specialties kind of cookies. But yours truly posses a streak of arrogance in her, what my mom can do, I can do better. Yeah!!


I remember how fast my mom could pipe these babies. So, let me take it up a notch by piping them in stripes!! Yeepee! If only I piped it slower, it would have been fine and uniform. I was embarrassed, to say the least. All the crooked zig-zagged cookies!!! Well, this challenge surely keep my feet on the ground. :)

In short, appearance wise for this time around of Daring Bakers Challenge, I am not so proud of myself. In brighter note, Vik voted this Milano cookies as his favorite cookies!!

Extra Notes: Posting few days after the deadline. And this morning, Vik already asked for 2nd batch of Milan Cookies!! So I just baked another half recipe!

Thanks Nicole for this month's challenge!!

Daring Bakers: Bakewell Tart..err..Pudding

While loading photos to this entry, I can't help but wishing these tarts could just magically appear in front of me!! Either from my oven or materializing themselves from photos. Just my perfect kind of sweet thing.

The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England.

And I LOVE IT! As described in the recipe, the frangipane in this tart..mmh.. simply out of this world.

I have decided far in advance that whatever June's challenge will be, I am going to make it for Vik's birthday. Whether sweet or savory, it'd be on the menu. Less one item to worry about, right?


One of the challenges in making DB's challenges has always been the fact that there are only two of us and it's nice not to have leftover of anything sitting in the fridge. Hence, I've always tried to time my whipping up the challenge in such a way that we have some friends to share it with. No difference with this challenge - a dinner party for Vik's birthday. And may I say, nothing left! Except for the two I purposely saved up. The intention was so I'd use it the next day for photo taking purpose - of the filling/inside of these tarts. Well, obviously that did not happen. I completely forgot about it and we had the last two tarts with our morning coffee the next morning. Whoops!



For the jam part, I made simple pineapple jam; grated pineapple, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves. Cook 'em to somewhat thick consistency. I was pleasantly surprised on how easy everything came together. Great texture, right level of sweetness and the perfect size (mini tart that is) of indulgence.

Great pick of recipe! Thanks to Jasmine and AnneMarie!!

Daring Bakers Challenge: Apple Strudel

This gotta be a joke! The exact reaction I had over this month's challenge. Suddenly all other challenges I have done in the past sounded so easy. Pftt..what tossing pizza dough compared to stretching and rolling paper thin strudel dough?! I was about to sit this month's challenge out. As I diligently read the forum and gazing dreaming-ly to such beautiful results from fellow DBs - I was so tempted. And on very positive notes, seems like almost everybody was so surprised on how easy the dough come around. Maybe it's not at all too bad then.

The fact that this challenge does not cost much at all helped tremendously - in case I mess it up big time. Every single thing in recipe is pretty much a staple. I simply could not any excuse of having to buy extra fancy stuff to get this strudel going.

In short, oh wow...the result itself was slightly above average, the apples' one was bit too tart - hence I decided to glaze it with Canadian Maple syrup infused with orange peel, cloves and cinnamon. The cabbage one though was pretty good. However, what wow-ed me was the dough!! LOVE IT! It was super easy to work with and the feel of it - ahh...clay vs gum combo I think. I could just play with it for hours!! I was mesmerized by its elasticity and how transparent it could get without having to put too much effort in rolling. Just simply pull and stretch.




At first, I was just going to make apple strudel, with 1/2 recipe of the dough. However, after all that fun stretching, I couldn't resist to use the other half of the dough. Quick rummaging through the fridge, 1/4 head of cabbage. So, yeap..I was too lazy to come up with fancier filling. I also wanted to whip it up quickly while the other half of dough sitting on countertop for over 2 hours already. I sprinkled chopped up green onions when rolling out this savory dough. Quickly chopped up the cabbage, panfried it - with touch of sugar and pepper. Mmmh....not too shabby, if I may say.


The May Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Linda of make life sweeter! and Courtney of Coco Cooks. They chose Apple Strudel from the recipe book Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest and Prague by Rick Rodgers.

Daring Bakers: Abbey's Famous Cheesecake

Such dilemma when I saw this month's challenge. The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge. Cheesecake is one of very few desserts I can truly say that I enjoy. Almost savory dessert, see? The tag of the challenge though 'Be Creative with flavors, toppings, etc.' - oh, I think of myself as quite creative person. That's besides the point. Point is, I am cheesecake type of gal. Rarely go with something flavored or fancy toppings. One, the whole idea of cheesecake is the cheese, no? Second, cheesecake on its own is sinful enough.

However, if I were to make a batch of ole' plain cheesecake - how would I face fellow Daring Bakers? Hence, I decided to make cheesecake tartlets, couple plain ones and few assorted kind.

Figuring out the type of assorted flavor was a challenge on its own. I tried to remember the last time I had a not-plain cheesecake. Mid 2005! Cheesecake factory just came to the town I used to live at. Not a big fan of franchise and food in the Factory is mediocre, in my opinion. However, my parents were visiting and my dad was baffled on something called 'Cake Factory.'

Long story short - I took them there. Dad picked one with chocolate on it. He has never been a fan of cheese, but he'd eat bugs dipped in chocolate - just for the sake of chocolate. Mom decided on Tiramisu one. My dad ended up polishing his entire Chocolate Cheesecake and half of my mom's!


Hence, the Chocolate topping cheesecake and Tiramisu (swirled ones). Like usual, I tend to make sure there will be some other people (family or friends or strangers), other than us, who will help polishing off any dessert I bake. Girlfriend's birthday gathering happened to be on that weekend. Pretty sure that they'd go for chocolate/tiramisu kind, but just to complete the cheesecake scene - I did some simple fruit glaze: passion fruit and mixed berry.

Glad I only made 2 plain ones. If I were to make all plain ones, I'd just stand right in front of the fridge and ate them all!!

Lupis/ Packed Sweet Glutinous Rice with Palm Sugar Syrup

This sweet sticky rice could well be one of my favorite breakfast items growing up. I don't have much of sweet tooth, less so for breakfast food, I rarely eat pancake or sugary cereal for breakfast. Lupis is an exception. It's no fuss no pretend sort of food. Very peasant dish, if I may. Basically it consists of sticky rice, palm sugar syrup and grated coconut.

99.99% of time, it comes in triangular shapes. Sometimes you will see cylinder/ log shaped lupis, but ....that's just not right!! :) It also has to have a tint of green on it, which primarily from the banana leaves wrappers. I guess it won't have any green tint if it's wrapped in foil or plastic. However, my favorite lupis stall actually tint hers with pandan extract. She sells the regular kind too (no pandan extract ones) but boy, the pandan kind is my favorite! I love love the smell of pandan leaves. Somebody should make it into potpourri!

I prefer lupis being packed in banana leaves, not only for the earthy smell of it, but also the beautiful faint green color it lends to this sticky rice. Unfortunately, my last batch of banana leaves went to Pepes Ikan and I haven't been to Asian grocery store since then. So, foil it is then, which actually make the process much easier. I added pandan extract..mmhh..to recreate the ones I used to eat for breakfast. Also, to get the green color on it. I am a firm believer that we feast through our eyes first.

The combination of coconut and pandan alone can make my day. Add to that, palm sugar syrup. Mmmhhmmhh!! Growing up, whenever I saw my mom/grandma was about to make something with palm sugar, I'd just stand there with eyes fixating to chopping block and pick on cubes or shavings of this sweet block. It's heavenly.

What:
- 1 cup glutinous rice, rinse well and soak in water for about 45 minutes, drained.
- pinch of salt
- 1 tbsp slaked lime water
- 1 pandan leaf, make into a knot (optional)
- 1 drop of pandan extract (optional)
- 5-6 6" foil square, make into triangular pouch/ cone shape

Syrup:
- 1/2 cup gula Jawa/ palm sugar
- 3/4 cup water
- 1 pandan leaf, make into knot
- 1/2 cup unsweetened grated coconut

How:
- After draining rice, toss in pinch of salt, add slaked lime water to rice. Stir. Add 1 drop of pandan extract. Mix well.
- Take 1 piece of cone foil, fill with 1/3 - 1/2 cup rice. Fold the sides and crimp. Pack it in such way that it resembles equilateral triangle, all equal length three sides.
- Put triangles in pot and cover with hot water. Boil for 2 hours. Check every so often and add hot water if necessary. Drain and let it cool.
- To make syrup, just toss in sugar, water and pandan leaf into saucepan. Stir and let it comes to thick syrup. I like my syrup pretty thick, add more water for thinner syrup.
- Once the triangle bundles cool down, dredge on grated coconut.
- Pour syrup on top of it. Actually, dump the syrup on it!! :) Both posted photos show only some drizzle, simply because I don't think glob of dark syrup would look very appetizing. In real life though, with fork in hand, syrup pouring, folks!

I wanted to say slaked lime water is optional, but at the same time, it is sort of alkali that makes the unique texture of lupis and other similar sweet dishes. I am scratching my head here trying to describe it better. Slaked lime water is sometimes used for fried food/crackers to maintain its crunchiness. In lupis though, it gives identical character of 'crisping' up the stickiness of rice so that it is more solid rather than too chewy and soft. It has certain 'give' when cutting and biting to it, think...al dante in pasta. However, if it comes to it, sudden cravings and all, then I would careless about whether there is slaked lime water or not. :D

That said, I am so submitting this to this month - Waiter, there's something in my..Indonesian, hosted by Wine.Scribbler.

Taro and Shrimp Spring Rolls

To accompany the savory rolls, I quickly whipped up these easy spring rolls. Lately, I have been craving taro and been using it few times for this same recipe, mixing it with different ingredients. Mushrooms and taro, shrimp and taro, or taro with any ground meat. Some water chestnuts to add crunch is yummy too. Super easy to make and the frying part is not too bad with its tiny size - I just use small frying pan and just rotate it to get even browning. Or, of course a huge pan and do it all at once. But then I got to use more oil and I am not particularly fond on having some leftover frying oil. Feel bad to toss it after one time use, as bad as having it sit there in a container. Ick.

What:
- 15 spring rolls wrappers
- 1 taro, peeled and either cut to small cubes or shred.
- 1 cup shrimps, deveined, shelled and chopped coarsely
- 3 dried chinese mushrooms, soaked and choped
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 small onion, minced
- 1/2 tbsp five spice powder
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- 1/2 tbsp sesame oil
- 2-3 spring onions, chopped
- pepper
- dash of sugar

How:
- Heat a little bit oil in pan. Pan fry taro. Once tender, set aside on a platter.
- Toss in onion and garlic to pan. Saute until onion is soft.
- Add mushrooms, five spice powder, soy sauce, green onions, pepper and sugar. Stir and mix thoroughly.
- Add taro back to the pan and toss in shrimps. Cook just until shrimp turn color. Turn heat off and stir in sesame oil.
- Take a wrapper. Put about 1 1/2 tbsp of filling to the edge and roll it like a cigar. Seal with mixture of corn starch and water.
- Fry until golden brown.

For dipping sauce, version of Vietnamese style sauce is perfect, nuoc nam with lime juice, sprinkle with warm water and thinly sliced bird eyes chillies with garlic. Or, just bottled hot sauce. Hoisin sauce whisk together with lime juice and few teaspoon of hot chili sauce is a pretty good pairing also.

Savory Asian Rolls

Having a work-session at our place this weekend. Depressing enough that we needed to work on weekend, on top of that, the weather was not the best - gloomy, humid, semi-raining, semi-sunshine! So everybody decided to bring some snacks to keep going and motivated (to keep eating). I decided to make some rolls - bread rolls and spring rolls!

I have been thinking a lot about baking rolls/bread, especially after religiously checking out Elra's blog! Something about bread baking has always been somewhat intimidating. Which is rather silly due to the fact that I grew up watching a lot of dough kneading and some involved slapping dough to air and counter top - still not quite sure whether it was some anger management session taking place or that type of high level slapping was truly needed?!! Ooh, we don't do any fancy breads, just simple basic savory/sweet filled buns and rolls - I loveee coconut buns!!! And occasionally, some Chinese steamed buns. In short, I should feel okay with the bread ordeal, yeah? But I am just not.

However, enough whining, so I leafed through family's recipe and realized that there is another reason why I feel reluctant!! High protein vs low protein flour?!! Most of these recipes combine both. And I suddenly remember that in Indonesia - they kinda use the brand name to identify it, isn't it? Or that's just my silly judgment? Cakra as high protein (typically used for bread making) and Segitiga as......low protein? Or is it just all purpose flour? It's for everything kind of flour, yes? Can I just use bread flour then? King Arthur? One day I will figure this out and my oven will be spitting out toasty delicious rolls and buns like no tomorrow! :)

Then I came across another stash of recipes that I kept from random sources and this one sounds good. The picture in magazine looks like what I have in my head, savory filled buns. Big plus it only calls for all purpose flour. Bigger plus, it does not seem too demanding - effort and time.

Savory Asian Rolls
adapted from Korean Spiced Beef and Cabbage Rolls, Cooking Light, January 2008.

Filling:
- 1/2 cup chopped green onions
- 1/4 cup soy sauce
- 1 tbsp sesame oil
- 1 tbsp chinese cooking wine
- 2 tsp sugar
- 1/4 tsp fresh ginger
- 1/4 tsp minced garlic
- 1/8 tsp ground red pepper
- 1/2 lbs ground chicken

Dough:
- 4 cups all purpose flour
- 2 tbsp baking pwder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 1/3 cups water
- 1/4 cup honey
- 2 tbsp canola oil

Eggwash:
- 1 tbsp water
- 1 large egg white, lightly beaten

How:
- Heat a little oil in pan. Toss all filling ingredients together. Cook until chicken is done. Remove from heat and cool completely.
- Combine dry mixture in one bowl: flour, baking powder, and salt, stir with a whisk. Combine 1 1/3 cup water, honey and canola oil, whisk. Add water mixture to flour mixture, stir until a soft dough forms.
- Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead until smooth and elastic about 5 minutes. Cover and let stand for another 5 minutes. (This is where I jumped into making this recipe, 10 minutes in a making just sounds extremely doable, isnt it?!)
- The recipe calls for rolling the dough into a 16 x 12 rectangle, 1/4" thick, on lightly floured surface. Cut dough to 12 squares. But with limited counter space, I just eyeball and portion out 15 dough-balls. Rolling each ball to a 1/4" disk.
- Cover dough with damp cloth. Work with 1 square/disk at the time, spoon about 1/4 cup filling into the center of dough. Moisten edges with water and bring corners to center. Pinch to seal.
- Place rolls, seam side down on baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Mix lightly beaten egg with water. Brush top of dough. The recipe suggests sprinkling sesame seeds on top of dough. But..I don't have any, so plain top it is.
- Bake at 375° for 25 minutes or until rolls are lightly browned.

Well, the outcome is not too bad. Not exactly great either. The dough part is somewhat bland and has crusty/crispy top as opposed to pillow soft like. Not quite what I wished it would turn out to. But maybe if I want these rolls to be the type that I want them to, I should have used the recipe that is meant for it, right?! :) To say the least, for such little time it took to make these mini rolls, I feel quite happy with the result. Plus, there was no leftover, so I really can't complain much.

Now that I am blogging this, it just occurred to me that I did not take any photos of the fillings!!! It was the best part of these small buns. Geez!

Bhajia - Potato, Onion and Cauliflower

So yeah theweathernetwork dot com did say it is going to be raining today. I have learned to pay little attention to weather channel (rarely accurate, dont they?) despite the fact that I do check it everyday. However, I don't need weather network to tell me it's going to rain today, it has been looking all gloomy and dark all morning. Took the umbrella with me for varous meetings. Yet I managed to leave it in the car while going into post office, dropping in few boxes - was quite shock to know 1 kg costs $15 and 5 kg = $22!! Anyway, I thought, heh, 5 minutes, how bad could it be?! It won't be pouring rain all of sudden, will it? It took me longer than 5 minutes. As I inched my way out the door, there were at least a dozen people standing under the awnings in the hope to protect themselves from nasty rain!! So, should I stand there too? Or should I just run?

Car was not too far and I was to pick up Vik from his meeting. So, I dashed!!! Hoping to put all my training to the test. Well, I never train under pouring rain so I skidded a little bit and by the time I got into the car, my jeans was soaked all the way to my knee. All in less than 1 minute time.

Vik quickly pointed out that he was hungry - at 4.30 pm!! Asked me what's for dinner and I told him that I have some chicken marinated overnight for Tandoori Chicken. He was just thrilled. Not because it is my 'special' dish or anything, but he has been disappointed on Tandoori Chicken from our favorite Indian Restaurant. It has always been very good until the past couple months, it becomes a hit and miss dish. Then Vik says 'Can you make some bhajia too? Piping hot bhajia sounds good in this rainy weather'

In normal circumstances, I'd have shove him out off the door. What?!!! I was half soaked, had to deal with a grumpy client not too long ago, and I already have a perfect dinner planned: Tandoori Chicken, Aloo Gobi curry, rice and naan. Have all these steps in my head - put chicken in oven, roast the vegetables, make the sauce, take quick hot shower. Then I am all done. But see, this is not at all..not at all...a normal request from Vik. Flashnews: Vik does not like fried food. He'd never ever order pakoras or bhajias in restaurants. There are some exceptions, but never pakoras, bhajias, samosas, etc. So in conclusion, he must be in serious cravings for it. I just could not say no. Also..I love fried food. :)

Oil issue aside. We both don't like heavily battered fritters - and most restaurants tend to have a thick coat of batter. So I went to work on fritters after popping in chicken to oven as well as cauliflower and potatoes.
I mix and match the ingredients. Just cauliflower. Potatoes, onions and jalapenos. Cauliflower, zucchini and jalapenos. The 'just cauliflower' ones is really for me. I like it that way. But at the end, I only ate about 3..

What:
- chickpea/ gram flour
- water (my ratio of flour: water is something like 1/2 cup flour to 1 1/2 cup water - very thin batter, basically it's just a thin coating for fritters)
- garam masala
- hot chillies powder
- salt and pepper
- cumin powder
- assorted vegetables:
- potatoes, slice thinly
- cauliflower, cut to bite size florets
- onions, slice
- jalapenos, slice
- zucchini, julienne

How:
- Heat oil in pot.
- Mix flour, water, garam masala, salt, pepper, hot chillies powder, cumin. Whisk.
- For cauliflowers, dip it to batter, give it a quick shake (to let excessive batter drips) and drop it carefully to hot oil.
- For the mix: Mix the vegetables in separate bowl. It can be done two ways: Either mix in the batter to vegetables. Spoon a spoonful of it and drop to hot oil. Or, I use slotted spoon, scoop dry vegetable mix, dip to batter, lift and let excess batter drips off through spoon. Then gently drop fritter to hot oil. Fry until golden.

We eat it with trio sauce of coriander chutney, sweet and hot sauce, and sambal ABC.

Cheddar Chives Scones

There is this one TV commercial about iced cappuccino. Two people happen to bump into each other, one of them has a cappuccino on his hand and the other person was just so mesmerized by it. Something along that line happened to me earlier today. As I got out from a building, an older lady almost bumped into me, some 'sorry/pardon/excuse me' being exchanged but all I care at that time was this huge scone in her hand. Hmm!! I am not sure whether the familiar baked goods smell from the bakery nearby or the visual image of the scone that just made me think of scones all the way coming home!!

I knew I'd making a small batch of it as soon as I got home. First I was thinking about sweet kind of scones. A quick look to the pantry - hm..nothing exciting for sweet scones in there. I ended up doing what I usually do, looking at the back of fridge, the drawers, whether any small bits I can use. Few strands of chives. Some cheddar. Very basic cheddar and chives scones then!

I prefer my scones almost biscuit like. Hard crust outside but still has some flakiness inside. From all things I bake, scones rank pretty high up in easy and fast category. It's really quick and effortless. Perfect for quick breakfast. Or, in our case today, afternoon snack. I have always loved herbs flavored scones, it works beautifully with cheeses. Even plain herb scones works wonder with a smear of butter on it.

What:
- 1 cup of flour
- 1/2 tbsp baking powder
- 5 tbsp of unsalted butter, cold, cubed
- 1/2 cup shredded old cheddar
- 1 tsp chives, finely chopped
- 1/3 tsp minced garlic (optional)
- 1/3 cup light cream
- pinch of salt and pepper

How:
- Mix flour, baking powder, salt and pepper in a bowl. Add butter and using pastry blender to make a coarse butter-flour crumbs. Using fingers to rub butter into flour just work as good.
- Add cheese, chives, and garlic to mixture. Toss gently just until combine.
- Pour cream on top and stir slowly to make a loose dough.
- Dump dough onto floured surface and gently knead for a minute just until it does not crumble. Gather into a ball. Pat to 1" thick disc. Cut to wedges or cut to rounds using cookie cutters. I just cut mine to 4 big wedges. Easy work. :D
- Bake in preheated 400°F oven for about 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

Eat it as is, warm from oven. Or with some spread. Or for sandwich. Or with soup! The options are endless. What I like about this type of scones (hard crust outside and still has some flakiness inside) is that it keeps better than the harder version.

Mini Cheese Puff

After some thoughts, I think I should rephrase myself when I say 'I don't bake as much as I cook.' Because I sort of bake quite often. I just don't enjoy baking the way I enjoy cooking. There. That sounds just about right.

That said, I have enough baking molds/cups/tins to open a tiny bakery. When I travel, I usually would bring back about 1/2 a suitcase of baking stuff. Yeah. If any suitcase rattles going through conveyor belt, most likely that's mine. Not in excessive manner though. Not yet, at least. I am pretty realistic person. Kitchen with only very few cabinets, there is only so much I can store. I got them not necessarily because I know how to use all of them, but I LOVE LOVE their quirky design. Okay so, yeah I do sometimes buy them, believing that I will eventually use them one day. But mostly because I know they'll be great for something else too. For example, steam cake mold thing I got, I use it as candle holders on our balcony. So on.

Out my sets of pie molds/cups. Oval, round, and something resembling a boat. I wanted to use the mini ones but ya know how it is so often that anything mini requires too much of work and take only a second to eat! So, it has to be something quick and simple.

I thought about this one cheese puff recipe I read not long ago in Cooking Light, using mini muffin cup. Have couple different cheeses in fridge that I need to use. Perfect! Quickly checked out the recipe, only to find out that I don't even have half of the ingredients. But..once I put my mind to it, I will prevail! So, here goes pulling things out from fridge.

What:
- 1/2 cup ricotta cheese
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1 egg yolk
- 1/4 cup old cheddar, finely grated
- 1/4 cup mozarella, finely grated
- 1/4 cup asiago, finely grated
- 4 tbsp parmesan, finely grated
- 2 tbsp flour
- 1 tsp sweet paprika
- 1 tbsp parsley, chopped
- pinch of baking powder
- 1 tsp flour for dusting the tin

How:
- Whip everything with a whisk.
- Grease molds/cups, dust tin with flour.
- Fill cups all the way to the rim. It will rise and deflated.
- Bake in preheated 350 oven until golden brown, about 20 minutes.
- It yields just about 18 minis. Gone in oh..20 minutes. No, we did not eat them all!! :D It was four of us.Considering the time it takes to make this - about 8 minutes (from taking things out from fridge to grating cheese, whisking it), it turns out to be seriously good!! Not too cheesy (though I will not complain if it is), a little crisp outside with soft pillowy melt to your mouth inside.

Croquette/ Kroket

Many variations of croquette across the board. Just in our household alone, we are accustomed with three different ones. According to granny, these croquettes, and many other snack goodies were brought/ introduced to Indonesia during the ruling of the Dutch colonial. Grandmas, of both sides have all these hand written cookbooks (all of which my mom keep and eventually will be mine!!!) , yellowed and brittled, half of them have titles that neither Indonesian nor English. Some funny ingredients that I believe will need extra hunting trip to speciality store. One of these days, I will.

As far as my knowledge, this style of kroket (that I like most) is pretty similar to bitterballen, just different shapes, one is shaped like small balls, the other one is cylinder. It's roux based with minced meat. Deep fried (yummmm!!) and we usually eat these by dunking it to hot sauce. But in reality what savory snack is there that we don't dunk into or slather with hot sauce? Er..almost everything!! :)

What:
- 100 gr flour
- 250 gr combination of chicken and shrimp (we have always used the combination of two, but it's not mandatory, all chicken is fine)
- 2 carrots, very finely shredded
- 75 gr unsalted butter
- 200 ml milk
- 1 egg (separate the yolk and white)
- 6 shallots, slice super thinly
- 2 green onions, finely chopped
- pinch of nutmeg
- salt and pepper

How:
- Heat butter in wok, toss in shallots and fry until soft. Note: It is 'lots' of butter (Paula Deen would just love it), but with it being roux based, well..butter it is.
- Toss in ground chicken and shrimps, stir and slightly 'mashed' with wooden spoon to prevent lumping. Toss in carrots, green onions, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Stir and mix thoroughly.
- Pour in milk and let it comes to boil. Then, scoop in flour gradually. Turn the heat to low. Cook for few minutes. Turn off the heat and let cool.
- Once batter/ dough is cool to touch, mix in the 1 egg yolk. Stir thoroughly.
- Form dough to oblong shape. First, dip to eggwhite and then roll to breadcrumbs. Then deepfry them until golden brown.
Note: this snack can be made few days ahead, keep in fridge and just reheat in conventional oven/ toaster oven.

Risoles/ Risole

Instead of frying these risoles, I bake them. Personally, I like it best all fried and crispy. However, being the last item I made for the weekend Independence Day dinner and after frying batches of croquette and corn fritters, I have enough of it. Enough of the hot oil and the lingering fume of it. And also, I'd feel a little bit bad to eat all these fried foods.

I was not very certain about baking them. This is my very first time baking risoles! Doesn't sound very 'right', does it - baked risoles??! But anyway, I did. It's crispy, but man..the fried version is still better!!

Measurement of the filling/stuffing is pretty much up to the person who makes it. :) Just eye-ball everything. It also can be made vegetarian.

What:
Filling:
- 1 1/2 cups long beans, chopped
- 2 cups carrots, small cubed
- 1 1/2 cup cooked shredded chicken (optional)
- 4 shallots, minced
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- pinch of nutmeg
- 1/2 block of chicken bouillon mix with 1/4 cup warm water
- 1 tsp of cornstarch, mixed with water
- salt and pepper

Crepe:
- 250 gram of all purpose flour
- 2 eggs
- 600 ml milk (I just use 2% milk, but my mom mix up water with powdered milk (Nestle), and if I may say, it gives a hint of sweet flavor, but I don't have a box of Nestle just sit around in my pantry)
- 60 ml melted butter
- pinch of salt

How:
- Make filling by frying up shallots and garlic. Then, just toss in chicken, green beans, carrots and nutmeg. Stir. Pour in chicken bouillon mixture. Salt and pepper. Cook until carrots are tender.
- Pour in corn starch mixture. Filling should be slightly sticky/damp.
- Make and assemble risoles just like the Pandan Crepe entry.
- Dip risoles to egg whites, roll on breadcrumbs. Bake in 400F preheated oven, until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Turn the rolls once halfway cooking. Or, better yet, fry them!

For spicy hot food eaters, slip in one or two thai bird eyes chillies at both end of rolls once fried. The way I like to eat it: take out the chili, take a bite of risoles, then a bite of chili. Or, my brothers would just start from one end that has chili/chillies on it. The heat should (it will) linger long enough til the last bite.

Lemper Ayam (Glutinous Rice with Chicken Floss)

Traditionally, lemper comes in banana leaves as wrappers, then grilled on open fire. The charred banana leaves lend this smoky flavor the the 'patties'. But nowadays, lots of places just wrap a sliver of banana leaves around it, less hassle. That said, I just semi wrap it with banana leaves band. Ugh..I feel silly for having to say this, but these leaves are just for show - decoration! Not intended for consumption. Things like this, escapes my mind and often, put our friends to the risk of 'chewing leafy' stuff. Good thing Vik has always been very good in reminding such things to our friends/guests, sometimes he also insists on signing consent form. ;)

The 'right' way of making the rice part is to steam it, then mixing it with boiling coconut milk, and steam it again until it's cooked. I find it a tad time consuming and plus the only steamer I have is just too small for this purpose. So, I just have been 'cooking' it like any rice cooking - no complaints so far.

What:
Rice part:
- 1/2 kg glutinous/ sticky rice, soak for about 1 hour.
- 350 cc coconut milk
- 1 stalk lemon grass, wacked
- pinch of salt
- pinch of sugar

Filling:
- 2 cooked chicken breast, shredded very finely (thus, the name 'floss')
- 1 tbsp ground coriander
- 2 tsp ground cumin
- 1 piece of galangal
- 3 shallots, chopped finely
- pinch of salt
- pinch of sugar (to taste)
- 1 stalk lemon grass, whacked
- 1 bay leaf
- 150 cc coconut milk
- banana leaves for wrapping (optional)

How:
- Cook soaked rice with low heat (do not need any extra water at this point), for about 20 minutes. It should be half cooked by then.
- Pour coconut milk into rice mixture. Turn up the heat a little bit and let it come to boil. Turn the heat back to medium low. Stir ocassionaly until rice soak up all the liquid.
- Cover and cook until it's done - about another 20 minutes.
- Grind coriander, cumin, galangal, shallots, sugar and salt to paste. Fry in little oil.
- Toss in chicken, bay leaf, lemon grass, coconut milk to pan. Stir and cook filling until it's only slightly damp.

There are many ways in shaping this dish. The 'best-professional' looking ones, and I believe the most used method in Indonesian kitchen is to use rectangular shape cookie cutter kind of mold. It was specially made for this, but basically a rectangular cookie cutter. Press 2 tbsp of rice to base of mold, pack it up, fill with 2 tsp of filling. Top with another 2 tbsp of rice. I only did this version..total of ...ONE time! I lost my cool by the third one. Too tedious.

Another way is to use big baking sheet/ pan, same idea, but just making bigger slab at once. Then cut it up to smaller rectangular. I use very slender baking pan/mold - 3x9x2. It's designed for stacked layered cake. But I found it perfect for this purpose too. Then, cut to 1.5x2 rectangular (after trimming the side). Dip knife to water between slicing/cutting to prevent stickiness. Oh, and also, when shaping/molding/patting rice mixture to pan, it helps to dip fingertips lightly to oil first, to prevent messy stickiness.

Some fancy places roll it up - sushi roll style. Come to think of it, probably the easiest method of all, huh? But it's just one of those things I insist to 'preserve', lemper should be rectangular. :)

Quick notes about photos: in up coming entries, there will be some that will have multiple unneccasary shots. Testing out some tips for taking better food photos. Love looking at good photographs - enjoy strolling to galleries that house photography stuff. A good audience, that I am. Completely helpless with camera and doubt that I will be anything great with it in near future - just like gardening. That said, I do want to take better food pictures. So, after some whining and all, a dear friend sent me three mock-up of 'mini studio.' Thank you, Magnus!! He tried to give me some pointers in words but my mind just draw a blank (45 degrees to where?!) Which is very oxymoron, considering that I make my living by imagining things. So, he sent me sketches/images!!!

Still not very comfortable yet, but I absolutely start to see how it can be.....extra frustrating!!! :) Nawh, getting there, getting there. Any easy tips are always welcome.

Corn Fritters/ Perkedel Jagung

Oh, how do I even describe these fritters? I could eat the entire plate of it!! I had to alter the recipe a little from the original family recipe. In original recipe, there is no adding flour as thickening/binding agent. Just grated corn and spices. The taste and flavor of the corn just heavenly and very light in texture. To be able to do that, the recipe calls for older corn - hmm..does it even make sense? It's fresh corn, but not like being picked two days ago fresh. With drier kernels of aged/ older corn, the grated pulp binds better with other ingredients.

With summer young fresh corn, once grated, it gets so watery that I have to add rice flour to thicken it up to right texture. It is still delicious, just tad short of flavor and texture (denser, due to the flour.)

What:
- 4 corns, grate
- 4 shallots, cut paperthin
- 2 green onions, cut paperthin or chopped finely
- 1 medium size potato, boiled and mashed
- salt and pepper
- 1/4 cup of rice flour
- 1 eggs, lightly beaten
- 4 bird eyes chillies, chopped finely (optional)

How:
- Mix all ingredients together (except for egg). Add egg only as much as needed, to help the binding. This weekend, I only add about 2 tbsp of egg mixture, because the batter was pretty liquidy as is. Other time, I added the entire egg. It's just something you got to eye-ball.
- Heat oil in pan. Carefully drop spoonful of batter to hot oil. Fry until golden brown.

Spinach Pinwheel

Beside the thick dumplings skin in the fridge, there is also a thawing box of puff pastry that I was planning to use for making quick breakfast 'danish' the next day. Just slap some preserves on it or chopped ham and eggs filling. Yum! But well, we ended up using it as another addition to our siomai and green onions crepe duo.

What:
- 1 sheet of store bought puff pastry (10x10)
- 1/2 box of frozen spinach, thawed and squeeze all the water out
- pinch of nutmeg
- 1/2 cup sharp cheddar, grated
- 3-4 basil, cut into confetti
- 1/4 cup of parmesan
- red pepper flakes
- 1/4 cup of sour cream (optional)
- 1 egg beaten
- sweet paprika

How:
- Mix spinach, nutmeg, cheddar, parmesan, basil, red pepper flakes, sour cream and 1/2 portion of beaten egg, stir well.
- Lay pastry on parchment paper, spread filling on top of pastry. Roll. Wrap rolled pastry with parchment paper. Slide it back to freezer for about 10 minutes.
- Take pastry out, cut into 1" thick pinwheel. Place on baking sheet (wheel side up), brush with eggwash and sprinkle with sweet paprika.
- Bake in 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes or golden brown.

Chicken Curry Puff

What:
- puff pastry
- the 1 cup leftover chicken from previous post
- 1 small potatoes, boil and cubed
- 1/2 cup green peas
- pinch of ajwain *
- 1/4 tsp of cumin
- 1/2 tsp coriander
- 1/2 tsp paprika
- 1/2 tsp hot red chili powder
- 1 jalapenos chilies, minced
- 1/4 cup onions, diced
- 1 tbs yogurt (optional)
- few sprigs of cilantro, chopped.
- salt and pepper
- 1 egg, beaten

How:
- Heat oil in pan, toss in onion, jalapenos, and ajwain.
- When onion is translucent, add chicken and the rest of ingredients to it (except beaten egg).
- Stir, make sure everything is mixed well. With back of wooden spoon, semi-mash the potatoes. Don't mash it so much/hard that it becomes all mushy. Just do it enough to resembles drier chunky mashed potatoes. Seasoned.
- Let it cool for a while.
- Roll out puff pastry. Work quickly so that the butter content in pastry stay cold. We managed to cut out 8 rounds and 1 very odd shape oval triangle. That's how much pastry I have in freezer, so we had to make do. There was enough filling leftover to make maybe another 4.
- Put filling in the center of round cut out. Seal the edge by gently pressing. Scrimp with forks.
- Brush with egg wash. Bake in preheated 350F oven until golden brown, about 20 minutes.

*ajwain is mostly used in Indian and Middle Eastern dishes. It happens to be in my pantry because some of Vik's favorite Guju dishes call for it. Even with that fact, it is one of those spices that I don't get to use much. So I try to use it whenever I feel it'll work well with the dish.

It almost tastes like caraway, so feel free to use caraway as substitute.

Pan Fried Pork and Chives Dumplings

What:
- 20 dumplings wrapper
- 2 cups ground pork
- bunch of chives, chopped
- 2 tablespoon chopped water chestnuts
- 1/4 cup finely chopped napa cabbage
- 1/2 inch grated ginger
- 1 clove grated garlic
- 2 teaspoon sesame oil
- soy sauce
- pepper

How:
- Mix everything together (except the wrapper) until well combined. Heat pan and spoon a small bits of the mixture to the pan - just to taste, whether it needs extra spices.
- Once it tastes right, start assembling the dumplings. Place spoonful of filling onto the center of wrapper, dab water/egg white around the edges of wrapper, fold and crimp. Usually there is some instruction at the back of wrapper package.
- Heat pan with 2 tablespoon of oil. Once hot, place the dumplings in the pan. I use quite big of pan and can fit 20 dumplings at once. If using smaller pan, do not overcrowd pan to prevent any sticking between dumplings.
- Don't move around the dumplings. Once the bottom part of dumplings are crispy and golden brown, pour 1/4 cup of water to hot pan, cover. The steam will finish up the cooking process. It will take only couple minutes.
- Serve with sesame oil mixed with soy sauce and hot sauce.