Cuttlefish Nasi Lemak

Nasi Lemak again !! This time I cooked cuttlefish sambal, the cuttlefish was prepared by my mother . She use the dried cuttlefish and soak it overnight, unlike the cuttlefish sell outside which they add some kind of chemical to speed up soak time. And I like to add some water spinach "kangkung" to my nasi lemak...

Durian cream puff (with recipe)

Wanted to bake durian cream puff long time ago, after saw Cooking Crave 's nice strawberry puff. It encourage me to give a try immediately, but waited for her recipe for 1 week, she still too busy and no time to post it, no choice, I use back my old recipe from Nancy Mommy. If you are durian lover, you will love this, the durian cream tasted like durian ice cream.

Recipe to share
100g butter
250ml water
a pinch of salt
150g flour (all purpose)
1/2tsp vanilla essence
1/4tsp baking powder
1tbsp sugar
2-3 eggs (I followed to original recipe which use 4eggs, but the batter became too watery, no choice I added more flour, so you need to adjust the eggs accordingly)
CreamDurian meat 300g( blend )
Whipping cream 植物奶油 200g ( beat till creamy)
* mix both together and chill in the fridge

1. Mix flour, baking powder,salt and sugar, set aside.
2. Heat butter in a pot (medium heat), once butter melted, add in water, mix well.
3. Add in flour mixture (no.1), vanilla, qucikly mix well ( about few seconds), turn off the heat.
4. Continue stirring flour until the dough mix well ( once you see shinning surface).
5. Transfer the dough to a mixer, set aside to let it cool down.
6. Once it cool down (dont need completely cool) , mix in the egg, and beat the dough and eggs till mix well, less than 5mins.(the dough texture must not too soft or too hard, something like biscuit dough which you can easily shape it)
7. Place the dough in a pastry bag fitted with a tip. Pipe quarter-sized puffs about 1 inch apart on a baking pan.
8. Bake at pre-heat oven at 180C (original recipe 200c, too hot) for 25mins or until golden brown.
9. Cut the puff and fill in durian cream (store in fridge when not use), and enjoy it...
Do enjoy Baking !!!

Oyster Sauce Chicken Wings

For those who like to eat chicken wings, this is a very simple and delicious dish that you should try out.









-Deep fried the chicken wings (marinate with oyster sauce, light soy sance, pepper, dark soy sauce for colouring).

Simple steps to share:-

1. Saute ginger, garlic and spring onion.

2. Add in the fried chicken wings and water.

3. Season with oyster sauce, light soy sauce, salt, sugar and Chinese wine.

4. Simmer for about 30mins.

Organic Black Sesame Chiffon Cake

Bought a tin of organic black sesame during Jusco member's sales, and I saw Hsling use the black sesame to bake cup cake the other day, so I steal the idea and bake this black sesame chiffon cake. This organic black sesame powder smell like peanut butter, but after baked, no more peanut butter smell, just smell a bit of sesame aroma....

-Organic Black Sesame powder

-In my point of view, this can consider a perfect chiffon look...

Recipe to share:-
**for chiffon pan 23cm size

(A)95g egg yolks (about 5 eggs-medium size)
25g caster sugar
1/2tsp salt

(B)80g corn oil
50g fresh milk
30g water

(C)100g cake flour
20g black sesame powder (I feel this portion can be increased to 30g to get more sesame aroma)

(D)240g egg whites (about 7 eggs-medium size)
110g caster sugar
15g corn flour

Steps:-
1. Cream ingredient (A) till change pale yellow colour.
2. Add in ingredient (B), corn oil first then add in milk and water, mix well.
3. Fold in ingredient (C) , mix well and set aside.
4. Beat egg whites (D) in a clean large bowl until soft foam. Gradually add in sugar, one tablespoon at a time and finally add in corn flour. Mix well.
5. Spoon about 4tbsp of egg white mixture and use whisk to mix well with egg yolk mixture. Gently fold in the balance egg whites mixture into the egg yolk mixture,until well combined
6. Bake at preheated oven at 160c for 50 minutes. Up side down the pan and wait till completely cool, then only unmould it.

Do enjoy Baking !!!

Shopping and Shopping, Ho Chi Minh

See what I bought during my Ho Chi Minh trip, all are food stuffs, nut, fish sauce, spring roll skin, instant beef noodle, tea leaves and candies..

- Just like to show these photos to those who love to bake, I took it in one of the bakery shop in HCM.

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- Beside foods, I just bought these cinnamon sedge sandals, heard that it keep cool for foot, prevent against the rheumatism, lungistis… The behind one I bought for my sister..I only found one shop selling this nice cinnamon sedge sandals (decorate with nice beads), other shops just sell very normal cinnamon sedge sandals..

At the end, I realized that this sandal was not made in Vietnam but China, hahaha...

Stir-fried Lemongrass Tilapia fish

Never cook river fish before, and this was my 1st time ( sorry ya, it seemed I have so many 1st time dish, hehehe). This Tilapia fish was given by my elder sister who bought this fish from her husband's hometown (Ulu Yam), you can find big and fresh river fish here. Since the lemongrass in my garden has grown so many, so I use lemongrass to cook this Tilapia fish as to get rid of fishy smell..

Simple recipe to share

1 Tilapia fish (cut out fish meat, marinate with chopped lemongrass, tumeric powder, salt, light soy sauce, sugar)

5-6 stalks of lemongrass, crushed

spring onion, cut into long strips

fresh red chili, shredded

ginger (little), chopped finely

garlic (more), cut slices

Seasoning- salt, fish sauce, lime juices

Steps:-

1. Deep fry the marinated Tilapia fish meat and set aside.

2. Heat oil in a wok, saute garlic slices till golden brown and set aside.

3. Use the remaining oil, saute ginger, add in lemongrass, spring onion and red chili.

4. Add in the fried fish and fried garlic slices, tasted with salt and fish sauce, add few drops of lime juices, quickly mix well and dish out.

5. Serve hot

Do enjoy cooking !!!

Hoang Yen restaurant, Ho Chi Minh

My husband local counterpart was recommended us to this good restaurant in Ho Chi Minh, dishes served there are delicious and yummy..

- We like to eat this vegetable, can't find it here, and it has a nice name- Thousand miles...little tini flower vege..

-Thousand miles vege sauted with beef and garlic

- Salted chicken and spring onion, the spring onion is super sweet...

-pickled vege

-Vietnamese Fried spring rolls

- very nice vege plating

- this fried prawn spring roll is super delicious..

- I forgot to take note this restaurant address, but this restaurant is easily found as it just located at the same row of Renaissance Hotel..

- Too bad, we can't order many dishes as only two of us...

Teochew-Style Spiced Duck Rice

This was my 1st time to braise a duck, and I did not cook the Hokkian way which my mum use to cook, instead I tried Teochew-style, I prefer the Teochew style than the Hokkian style. So I just cooked this duck and prepared some mixed local salads, this was a simple dinner in a lazy Sunday.

- I think I have bought a wrong type of duck (they called as white duck), it can not stand for long hour cooking, broken down when I cut it....

My daughter and hubby said this was a best duck rice they have ever had..so you can imagine how nice this duck rice, hehehe..
Simple recipe to share:-
1 duck, about 2kg
Spices:-
-1 stick cinnamon
-5 stick of "gan cao"
-3 pcs of dried tangerine peel
-5 pcs of star anise
-4 pcs of cloves
-some peppercorns
5-6 slices of galangal (nan jiang or lengkuas) ** This must have, remember...
Five spice powder
Enough water to cover whole duck
Seasoning:-
Chinese wine
Light soy sauce
Dark soy sauce (for colour)
salt
White sugar
Rock sugar
Steps:-
1. Boil water in a wok and add few slices of galangal, lower the duck into the hot water to wash it briefly, remove duck to a colander to drain. Rub five spice powder on whole body of duck and set aside.
2. Heat oil in a wok, add white sugar and rock sugar to melt them until it caramelises. Add in galangal slices, bring enough water in the wok.
3. Place all the spices in a cotton pouch, and put this cotton pouch in the wok, once the water boiled, add in the duck. Add in seasoning and simmer for about 2 hours, turning the duck every 30mins.
4. Turn off the fire and leave the duck to immerse in the sauce for another hour.
5. To serve, cut the duck into pieces and garnish with Chinese parsley and local salad (marinate carrot, white carrot and cucumer with salt, sugar and vinegar). Serve with white rice and garlic chili sauce (bottled garlic chili sauce, chopped garlic, fish sauce, vinegar and sugar)

Do enjoy Cooking !!!

Chocolate Chips Chiffon Cake

After few attempted of making chiffon cake, I think I have master it already. I was so happy when I brought a Chocolate Marble chiffon cake back hometown, all my family members like it so much. They said nowadays is hard to find a good Chiffon cake (moist, not too sweet, soft and no chemical substances) from outside wet markets. Since my kids love chocolate flavour of cake, so this time I baked this Chocolate Chiffon cake, and added some chocolate chips as well.

-The chocolate chips were sank to the bottom..but it look nice in this way...

Recipe to share:-

**for chiffon pan 23cm size

(A)
95g egg yolks (about 5 eggs-medium size)
25g caster sugar
1/2tsp salt

(B)
130g corn oil (increase the corn oil, reduce water, to get more moist texture)
40g water

(C)
100g cake flour
25g Chocolate powder, 50g Chocolate chips

(D)
240g egg whites (about 7 eggs-medium size)
110g caster sugar
15g corn flour

Steps:-
1. Cream ingredient (A) till change pale yellow colour.
2. Add in ingredient (B), corn oil first then add in water, mix well.
3. Fold in ingredient (C) except chocolate chips till no lumps, set aside.
4. Beat egg whites (D) in a clean large bowl until soft foam. Gradually add in sugar, one tablespoon at a time and finally add in corn flour. Mix well.
5. Spoon about 4tbsp of egg white mixture and use whisk to mix well with egg yolk mixture. Then only add in the chocolate chips. Gently fold in the balance egg whites mixture into the egg yolk mixture,until well combined
6. Bake at preheated oven at 160c for 50 minutes. Up side down the pan and wait till completely cool, then only unmould it.

Do enjoy Baking !!!

Walk and see, Ho Chi Minh

These were few shots I took during my walked in the Ho Chi Minh city....

-Wood crafts

-Drawings

-hand stitch

- Malaysia Dato Michelle Yeoh road safety advertisement

- Post cards

- The only Malaysian restaurant in HCM-the name of the restaurant is Halal Saigon..

- Opera House