~ Strawberry Milkshake

Taken from:
Tiffany's! 

Ingredients (serves 2):
200g strawberries
1/2 C milk
4 tsp sweetener (I used lactulose =x)
1/2 C ice

Remarks: 
Blend all together for a refreshing strawberry juice! Yes juice, not milkshake! I could barely taste the milk =( Perhaps a substitution with creamer and less ice to save the drink?

For those who are clueless to what lactulose is, it is a laxative that is really sweet. It is not absorbed by the body and helps to retain water in the bowels, therefore softening the stools. Very good for the slightly-constipated me!

"I'm a good strawberry-shaped fishy, and I'm too adorable to be eaten!"

~ Cheesy Broccoli Oatmeal Soup

Taken from:
Tiffany's! 


Ingredients (serves 2):
240 g broccoli, chopped and steamed
1 tomato, chopped and steamed
1/4 to 1/2 C instant oats
1 C milk
1-2 slices processed cheese

Directions: 
1) Place broccoli, tomato, oats and milk into a pot and bring to boil. Simmer for 5-10 min.
2) Blend till smooth or to desired texture.
3) Pour into bowls and garnish with cheese. Serve hot.


Remarks: 
Ahh I lost the pictures!!!


After the completion of my final year project (FYP), I seem to regain my interest in destroying Mum's kitchen =p  

Here's to good health, and no more FYP!

~ Crimson Oil-Free Mushroom Soup (with Collagen)

Taken from:
Tiffany's! 


Ingredients (serves 1-2):
1 small tomato, cut into chunks
1 carrot, cut into chunks
1/4 red capsicum, cut into chunks
150 g oyster mushrooms
2 tbsp pasta sauce
1 tbsp collagen powder
1 tsp chopped green onions/scallions

Directions: 
1) Place tomato and carrot chunks into a pot and add sufficient water to cover them. Bring to boil and simmer for 10 min, or till carrots are soft.
2) Add in red capsicum and mushroom, to cook for 5 min.
3) Stir in pasta sauce, collagen powder and green onions, and simmer till bubbly. 
4) Season with salt and pepper if desired, and serve.


Remarks: 
Ahh I lost the pictures!!!


Oh dear, this soup gave my olfactory system the jimjams when the pungency of the oyster mushroom clashed head-on with the sharp smell of the red capsicum. Eww what a horrendous malodorous smell! The pasta sauce was truly a saviour, melding the two adversaries together, and the soup turned out pretty awesome! For my palate, that is. =) 

The mushrooms lent an interesting chewiness, the carrots a sweet goodness, the capsicums a stimulatory kick, the tomatoes a tangy zing, the pasta sauce an Italian flavour and the green onions an Asian slant. An excellent medley of ingredients for a healthy crimson soup!

For those who like a faster way of doing things, dump all the veggies into the pot and boil away! The reason for having step 2 is to prevent the red capsicum and mushroom from becoming too mushy to add texture, and also to limit the amount of water (based on volume) added in step 1. 

Regarding the addition of collagen powder, the collagen powder advocates will either 1) nod their heads in approval or 2) gawk in horror, depending on how they see it. Boosting the soup with collagen gets a pat on the back, but stirring vitamin C-fortified gelatin into hot steaming soup turns the table around. Oh well, that's why adding the collagen powder is optional (if you happen to have it).

~ Thick Easy Oil-free Mushroom Soup

Taken from:
Tiffany's! 

Ingredients (serves 2-3):
200 g portobello mushrooms, 1/4 chopped into chunks, rest sliced
50 g oyster mushrooms
6 tbsp + 6 tbsp water (180 ml total)
2 tbsp flour
6 tbsp + 2 tbsp low fat-milk (120 ml total)
1 tsp soy sauce

Directions: 
1) Boil diced mushrooms in 6 tbsp water for 5 - 10 min in a pot. Remove mushrooms and set aside.
2) Add in the rest of the mushrooms and remaining water, boil and simmer till mushrooms are soft, around 15 min.
3) Increase heat, stir in 2 tbsp flour, and mix well to cook. Break up any large lumps with the back of a spoon.
4) Mix in 6 tbsp milk and soy sauce, and cook till bubbly. Simmer for 5 - 10 min and stir constantly to prevent burning of milk.
5) Pour the mixture into a blender and blend to desired consistency.
6) Return the soup into the pot, and rinse out residual soup from the blender with 2 tbsp of milk. Add in diced mushrooms and cook till bubbly.
7) Season with salt and pepper if desired before serving.
OR
1) Boil all mushrooms in 12 tbsp water for 15 min.
2) Mix in 2 tbsp of flour and cook till pasty.
3) Stir in 8 tbsp of milk and 1 tsp soy sauce, and simmer for 5 - 10 min.
4) Blend the soup till desired consistency, and serve with salt and pepper.

Remarks: 
Ahh I lost the pictures!!!

Attributed to the generous serving of mushrooms, the resultant soup was extremely thick, and some watering down with water/milk might do some good. Avoid over-blending and use chunky mushrooms, as the mushrooms got sort of mushy for my soup. Feel free to experiment with any type of mushroom. I might exclude the soy sauce next time around, which proved to be too overpowering. After slurping the last drop, I found the soup surprising filling - good for an afternoon lunch!

~ Orange Cranberry Chickpea Cake

Adapted from:
Smallest Smallholding

Ingredients:
240 g chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 egg
100 g brown sugar
1/4 tsp baking powder
Zest and juice of 1 orange
50 g of dried cranberry and raisin mix (or any fruit mix), plumped with orange juice

Directions: 
1) Blend chickpeas, egg, sugar, baking powder and 1 tbsp of orange juice in a blender till smooth.
2) Stir in dried fruits and zest.
3) Pour into a greased round tin and bake in a preheated oven at 150 deg for 40 min, or till brown.
4) Spoon orange juice over cake and cool before removing from the tin. Dust with icing sugar if desired.

Remarks:  
Ahh I lost the pictures!!!


Wouldn't call this a cake - it seems very crumbly, maybe another egg might do the trick? It is somewhat like eating mashed potatoes with cranberries. I would probably reduce the sugar as the dried fruits are very sweet already. 

~ Microwave Chocolate Cake

An interesting idea came across my mind while I was brainstorming for an easy recipe to make (ops, I conveniently chucked out the mung bean cake idea that day). Why not make something using one of the fastest way of cooking - the microwave! I remembered seeing some recipes on that, so I googled and lo and behold, countless recipes of microwave cakes popped up on my web browser. Most of what I had seen contained eggs, which I did not desire on that day, so I continued my search for eggless types but to no avail. Not wanting to give up on the idea despite not having any results, I just dug up a previously-tested eggless recipe originating from allrecipes.com, and tried it with some modifications (to increase taste and moisture content) in the microwave!

Ingredients: 
3 tbsp flour
2 tbsp white sugar
1 tbsp cocoa powder
2 tsp oil
3 tbsp milk
1/8 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp vinegar

Just mix everything up in a mug and nuke it. I thought it would take 5 min at hi, but it was already overdone 4.5min and it was slightly charred.. and hard as rock. There was considerable contraction as shown:

Every cloud has a silver lining, so same for this cake too! There was a small little area just above the cake that was soft and fluffy as cake. The rest was really caked, like biscuits in fact.

If the correct timings are established, this would be really a fast way to satisfy one's chocolate cake cravings, though it would be more of a steamed cake rather than baked cake. I would cover the mug with a plastic wrap too, to contain the moisture for a soft cake. Shall give it a try again next time!

~ Unagi Soba

What do the mice do when the cats are out of the house? Raid the kitchen and turn it upside down! There is only one mouse in this house though, and she was bound for the kitchen early in the morning to make breakfast for her brother!

~ DIY Lint Roller

Fed up with removing those stubborn lint on your black clothes with scotch tape? I am! =/ Why not ditch these:

and embrace this:

through making your own lint roller from leftover bottles easily?

What you will need: an empty bottle , a smaller bottle with a diameter that fits into the bigger bottle, scotch tape, and a pile of clothes "angry" with lint (I have plenty).

What you will do: Take scotch tape and wrap the unsticky side over the big bottle, so that the sticky side is facing outwards.

Insert the smaller bottle into the big bottle and roll away! Lubricate the contact points with hand cream or whatever you find suitable if the roller does not roll, and continue to apply new scotch tape over the old one.

Once done, use a scissors to snip off the layers of scotch tape. What convenience! =) Watch my DIY Linter Roller in action:

Bye bye Lint!

Note: I know probably this wouldn't be a suitable post for my blog, but still being a proud creature, especially of my own DIY stuff, I will post it nevertheless =p

~ Instant Noodles Again

Shan't talk too much, I'll just let the pictures do the talking.


2010/1/23

2010/2/1

~ SweetSpot Patisserie

What a surprise, my parents had decided to make decent use of their money instead of squandering them at the IR! Well, not exactly "money", as they had used the membership points garnered from their gambling sprees to purchase the sweet stuff instead. Whatever. So here we have almost the full CNY collection from the SweetSpot Patisserie (names all unknown):

I was thrilled to see such gourmet treats on the table since my parents rarely "splurge" on such unnecessities, and without-furtherado, I scrambled to get all of these adorable plastic tins to my room for some cam-whoring (<-- did I use this term correctly?) and sampling (<-- I know this is right, for sure).

First on the list, icing-coated dark chocolate almonds. Not as fantastic as the name suggests. The chocolate was not very fresh and there was a rancid sour taste at the chocolate area in closest proximity to the almond.. My first thought was that the chocolate could have been made from Lindt chocolate (with characteristic sourish taste), but after a few of these, I chucked the idea aside. My conclusion? A pity.

Next on the list would be the dark chocolate hazelnut. The chocolate was infused with a faint trace of coffee, and each hazelnut was full. Quite a luxury I would say. However, I did not take to the likings of the taste. The coffee made the chocolate taste slightly burnt, and yes, hazelnut still goes better with plain chocolate on its own. You know, like ferrero rocher or nutella?

The cocoa-dusted dark chocolate macadamia was a pleasant addition to the r'epertoire of chocolates. There was a hint of orange flavour to the chocolate, and each macadamia was humongous. I found it quite odd to not be able to savour the buttery aftertaste that macadamia nuts leave on one's palate, possibly due to the chocolate overwhelming the senses. Still a good experience, dis' the best of the lot.

I don't know it's me or what, I found that the oil that was used to fry this peanut puffs were poor in quality. Or did they use olive oil? The puffs were quite oily, and did not smell very appetising. The filling was relatively generous compared to the size of each puff, and the pastry seemed to be a cross between a puff pastry and chinese curry puff pastry - flaky but not entirely so.

This one caught me by surprise. The exterior pale crust coated with icing resembled dry undercooked butter-based dough, which crumbles easily despite its apparant smooth texture. So much like.. a melting moment. Just that the skin's thicker, and there was peanut filling. Unlike the previous peanut puff which had coarse sugars visible among peanut bits, the peanut filling for this one was thicker and smoother, like peanut butter but more gritty. Once again, I can't help but emphasize to be gentle with it, for a slight squash on this delicate baby would send it crumbling to reveal it's hidden peanut treasures. I wished that the skin would be made less thick and the whole delicacy could be smaller so that I can put it snugly into my mouth without gagging.

The first impression I had when I caught sight of these cookies were that they looked really appetizing, and I would aptly call them: sugar-crusted icebox chocolate butter cookies. It was indeed a chocolate variation of the much-loved sugar butter cookie! A tad bit on the sweet side though, but what's sugar cookies without the sugar? 

There was kueh bangkits too, but I did not manage to get a picture or two before they disappeared. On careful examination, they appeared rather tough, but don't let that fool you. A few moments in the mouth is all a bangkit needs to be partly dissolved.

Along with the goodies, there were cakes slices too. I figured that the top one was a custard strudel, while the bottom would be a cheesecake. It was quite an extravagance to have each slice of cake enclosed in a plastic case and then again with a paper one. The cake holder had a little tab for you to pull the cake out from the plastic case as well, ingenious.

Look at the crusty flaky layers sandwiched with two layers of custard cream, the sugary powdery layer of icing, the charred touch with two heated rods on the icing layer that lends a contrast to the white - a divine aphrodisiac isn't it? 

 
But look what happened when I dug with a fork? The flakiness was all a facade, and there was not much of any other flavours save for the saccharine taste of the white powder. I had immense difficulty getting bitefuls from this. The appearance of the custard strudel was indeed deceiving, and a total disappointment. Perhaps, it might be a better and fairer judgement for such types of cakes when savoured fresh. I do not remember having such problems with few-days-old Ritz apple strudels though.

The cheesecake was much better. The creamcheese portion was really whobby (dropped on my table) and had a slight hint of lemon. There was a thin caramelized layer topped with gold shavings, a dollop of whipped cream, a piece of dark chocolate thin and some sticky coated cookie crumbs, all of which were cloyingly sweet. I was more satisfied with the lower half underneath - there were layers consisting of chocolate sponge, lemon curd, almond or hazelnut mixture (couldn't make out which) and then another chocolate sponge. The lemon curd imparted a tangy flavour and the nuts added contrast to the whobby mess. I ended up eating the creamcheese layer separately from the bottom layers, and I'm sure anyone would know why.

For an establishment that caters to the distinguished foreign guests and the rich, SweetSpot's run-of-the-mill webpage seems inadequate in my opinion. Furthermore, there is still room for improvement in terms of the quality of their (supposedly) forte - desserts. Exquisite packaging may attract a customer, but it is ultimately the food quality that keeps customers coming back for more, for that's what hits the customers' Sweet Spots. 

~ Wanton

I have a problem. You see, I have been really busy with schoolwork nowadays.. And the products that were bought online are streaming in like salmon swimming up the river for mating season. With my to-do list growing longer and longer, how can I take time off to bake/cook? One good short-cut way is to assist Mum!

This time around, she had prepared the meat filling so what I had to do was to wrap them up and put them to boil before featuring them here. It might seem easy, but it really wasn’t. I was pretty puzzled over the fact that the wanton wrappers were rectangular, not squares, and this made wrapping challenging when I tried to shape them into triangles with a generous spoonful of filling each. Mum later educated me that the wanton wrappers were meant to be made into rectangles instead of triangles. Ops, so much for the aesthetic purpose =x

This is the outcome after boiling them in a broth containing caixin, soybeans and ikan bilis:

I’m always impressed with multitude of stuff that Mum uses in her wanton fillings. There will be black fungus, prawn, pork, carrot shreds.. And so on. Each time the wantons would be consistently delectable.

Another brilliant way to have short-cuts? Make simple recipes! I’m thinking of baking mung bean cakes. The texture is that of crumbly ones, but only when you put one into your mouth. I have heard of Vietnamese ones, but they seem to vary slightly from the Chinese ones. Regardless, mung bean cakes are still yummy, and I can’t wait to get my hands-on experience!

~ New Product Review Blog

Just a quick advertisement for my new blog on the products that I have bought =) Aw, how I wish I can have my blog posts pay me $$ instead of paying $$ to put up posts.

~ Instant Noodles with Mushrooms, Xiao Bai Cai and Egg

This is all too familiar - Mum didn't wish to cook, I wasn't hungry but I had to eat, instant noodles whetted my appetite, convenience ruled. =) By the way, the broth was green.

~ Instant Noodles with Mushrooms

This was my first dinner of 2011 (yes I know, this is paa-pathetic..), and I hope it wouldn't be my frequent dinner though the instantaneity of making this entices a lazy person so much. And I shall not use this post as an avenue to rant about my life. Well.. at least not for today, not the first day of 2011 =p

As depicted clearly above, there were button mushrooms, corn, icebery lettuce, and egg simmered in (chicken) broth for my noodles. I like to top my noodles with a soft-boiled yolk that adorns the dish with its bright happy colour and simply begs to be savoured. The sensation of warm and creamy liquid yolk bursting out of its slightly cooked golden film over one's sensory (taste) organ sends one to heaven =) I would always have my yolk first, "to save the best for the last" is not applicable when it comes to my soft-boiled gems. And just a reminder, it's the liver that makes most the cholesterol in one's blood, not due too much to the consumption of egg yolks.

Having mushrooms and lettuce proved to be a wise move in an attempt to "bulk-up" the dish. They gave texture and taste variations to the palate, and do not have much calories. I had jubilantly poured in a whole large can of mushrooms into my noodles after noticing that that can of mushrooms had less calories than an average apple. Now, how much cooler can that get? 

Recently, I have had some trouble in the toilet too, so this dish  was somewhat a salvage therapy for me with all fibre that it contained. Fortunately, I didn't pass too much gas. Somehow, when I take higher fibre intake, my body seems to adapt to it and wouldn't make me embarrass myself in public with bouts of flammable and unappealing gas as much as it did before. Good.

Aw I just had to rant - I don't care if today's the first day of 2011, it's in my blood to complain! You see, I couldn't come up with interesting, eye-catching, mind-blogging names for the variations of instant noodles that I cooked! Anything that sounds convincing and true to the picture will be it alright! Looking forward to instant inspirations in naming my future noodles!